Female Torso
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.Qasr al-Mshatta
The unfinished palace at Mshatta near Amman, Jordan is the largest of the Umayyad palaces. Resembling a fortress with its twenty-five semicircular towers and monumental entrance gate, it had a grand audience hall on the same axis as the entrance. The gatehouse complex near the entrance included a mosque. The exterior walls flanking the entrance gate were covered with elaborately carved decoration in the Byzantine tradition. The building may have been ordered by the Umayyad caliph al-Walid II (r. 743–44) to welcome those returning from the pilgrimage (hajj) to Mecca and then left unfinished at his death.
This torso is the remains of a large female figure, perhaps a dancer. Wearing revealing drapery and holding what may be a piece of fruit before her navel, she resembles the maenads—members of Dionysos’ retinue in the classical and Byzantine periods. She is one of a group of nearly lifesize male and female figures that decorated the audience hall of the qasr (palace).
The unfinished palace at Mshatta near Amman, Jordan is the largest of the Umayyad palaces. Resembling a fortress with its twenty-five semicircular towers and monumental entrance gate, it had a grand audience hall on the same axis as the entrance. The gatehouse complex near the entrance included a mosque. The exterior walls flanking the entrance gate were covered with elaborately carved decoration in the Byzantine tradition. The building may have been ordered by the Umayyad caliph al-Walid II (r. 743–44) to welcome those returning from the pilgrimage (hajj) to Mecca and then left unfinished at his death.
This torso is the remains of a large female figure, perhaps a dancer. Wearing revealing drapery and holding what may be a piece of fruit before her navel, she resembles the maenads—members of Dionysos’ retinue in the classical and Byzantine periods. She is one of a group of nearly lifesize male and female figures that decorated the audience hall of the qasr (palace).
Artwork Details
- Title: Female Torso
- Date: mid-8th century
- Geography: Made in Jordan, Qasr al-Mshatta
- Medium: Limestone, carved
- Dimensions: 29 1/2 x 20 1/2 in. (75 x 52 cm)
- Classification: Sculpture
- Credit Line: Jordan Archaeological Museum, Amman (J. 16583)
- Curatorial Department: Medieval Art and The Cloisters