Magna Graecia, South Italic Colonies, Apulia, Canosan, Hellenistic Period, ca. mid-4th to early 2nd century BCE. An adorable pottery figure of a seated male child, perhaps wingless Eros – Roman Cupid – the Greek god of love, displaying a round body still pudgy with baby fat and a cherubic visage. Crowned by a diadem atop a luscious, coiled coiffure, he wears only a pair of bracelets and a crossbody strap, likely attached to his quiver. The youthful god leans on his left arm while raising his right, as though attempting to grasp the blue drapery that falls behind him. Eros was the mischievous yet endearing god of love, as well as the minion, constant companion, and, according to some classical writers, son of the goddess Aphrodite. Though he is typically depicted with wings, wingless portrayals of the god did exist in the Hellenistic world, such an example can be found in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, accession number 74.51.1745. A charming example with gorgeously preserved pigments!

Figures like this one played an interesting role in Canosan funerary practices as they were placed into Canosan tombs as replacements for large red-figure krater amphorae; first, however, mourners had to carry these figures in funerary processions and keep them present while carrying out rituals at and inside the tomb. Virtually all of the statues known from Canosan tombs depict women. However, scholars believe that they represented goddesses or mourners rather than the gender of the deceased individual; young women played a major role as mourners in this society. The Canosans, like other members of Classical society, believed that the spirits of the dead remained at the tomb and watched over the living. Canosan tombs were frequently re-opened to entomb deceased members of the same familial lineage, and this suggests that these statues were perhaps reused to maintain the spiritual connection between the living and the dead.