Apollo Belvedere
Roman copy after Leochares (~330 BC)
2nd century AD
Sculpture – Museum
Adult €25
15min
Vatican Museums (Cortile Ottagono)
Viale Vaticano, Vatican City 00120
The statue that defined the Western ideal of male beauty for three centuries — Apollo in the moment after releasing an arrow, cloak billowing. Winckelmann called it 'the greatest work of art in existence.' Napoleon stole it for Paris in 1798 (returned 1816). In the same courtyard as the Laocoön — the Vatican's twin poles of ancient sculpture.