Augustus, Livia, Tiberius: new data on the marbles of the "group from Fayum"

This article focuses on the three marble portraits of Augustus, Livia and Tiberius, nowadays displayed at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek. The busts are commonly labeled as the "Group from Fayum" because of their supposed provenance. However, some data make us doubt that they were originally made to form this group. First of all, since they come from the antiquities market, it is not possible to be sure that the three pieces were found in the same spot. Moreover, from technical and stylistic points of view, the busts present several differences and only those of Livia and Tiberius share some affinities. To this evidence it is now possible to add the results of the marble analysis, published for the first time here, which show that the busts of Livia and Tiberius are made of the same type of marble, the precious lychnites, that is to say Parian marble from the underground quarries of Stephani, while the portrait of Augustus is also made of Parian marble, but from the by far larger and open pit quarries of Lakkoi. Therefore, thanks to the archaeometric identification, it is possible to definitively state that only the busts of Livia and Tiberius were originally made together, while the portrait of Augustus was added to this group in a later phase, in antiquity or in modern times.