Coptic, 4th-5th century A.D.

Sandstone, carved in relief with remains of paintwork. Depicting a standing goddess of victory in lush foliage and architectural elements. Mounted on a later green marble base.

W 94, H 60 cm. With base 116 cm.

Various losses and chips. In part weathered.

Provenance:
- Private property Paul Mallon (1884-1975), Paris.
- By inheritance to his stepson Milton Girod-Mallon, New York/Paris, December 21, 1980.
- Private collection Switzerland, acquired from the above.
- Swiss antique dealer.

Paul Mallon was a renowned Parisian antiques dealer specializing in Asian, antique (especially Egyptian), and Byzantine artifacts. In the 1910s/20s, his gallery was located at 114 Champs-Elysées, and from about 1934, his wife Marguerite Mallon ran the gallery, which moved to Rue Raynouard. In the late 1930s and 1940s, the Mallons were regular guests at the Gladstone Hotel in New York and sold artworks to a number of American museums, including the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the Brooklyn Museum.

Publication: E. Simon et al, Dei e Uomini, Roma 1997, 83 Gli atleti di Zeus, Lo sport nell'antichità, Museo d'arte Mendrisio, 2009, 195 & 209, op.131.

Cf. Donald B. Spanel, Two Groups of "Coptic" Sculpture and Relief in the Brooklyn Museum of Art, in Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, vol. 38, 2001, pp. 89-113.