Bronze Head of Hypnos from Civitella d'Arna Bronze Head of Hypnos from Civitella d'Arna The Bronze Head of Hypnos is a Roman copy of an ancient Greek statue found at Civitella d'Arna near Perugia in central Italy. Widely copied since its discovery in the early nineteenth century, it has been part of the British Museum's collection since 1868. Only the head of the bronze statue is extant. The face shows wings emerging from his right temple and elaborately woven locks of hair held in by a head band. As the god of sleep, the intact statue would have shown the deity walking forwards, clutching a drinking horn
Greek mythology libretti for many of Handel's and Mozart's operas. By the end of the 18th century, Romanticism initiated a surge of enthusiasm for all things Greek, including Greek mythology. In Britain, new translations of Greek tragedies and Homer inspired contemporary poets (such as Alfred Lord Tennyson, Keats, Byron and Shelley) and painters (such as Lord Leighton and Lawrence Alma-Tadema). Christoph Gluck, Richard Strauss, Jacques Offenbach and many others set Greek mythological themes to music. American authors of the 19th century, such as Thomas Bulfinch and Nathaniel Hawthorne, held that the study of the classical myths was essential to the understanding of