Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Rostock, 1934. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2007. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file (viewed on October 30, 2007) Page v list of figures missing from manuscript. Includes bibliographical references.

The dissertation re-examines a fragmentary and understudied group of nearly 150 portrait statues representing Hellenistic kings. The surviving portrait statuary comprises a small fraction of those originally produced for kings in marble, bronze, gilded bronze, and other materials during the Hellenistic period. The corpus of extant statuary presents many interpretive challenges, from fragmentary conditions to often uncertain provenance, and from unrecognizable physiognomies of rulers to unstandardized royal iconographies. Most previous scholarship was concerned with identifying kings in their portraits, unfortunately without much success. As a result, the portraits have received relatively little attention over the past few decades, despite robust and relevant scholarly advances related to Greek portraiture and Hellenistic kingship. While most studies have focused on identifying faces and interpreting portraits in thecontext of specific reigns, the present study collates the art historical, archaeological, and textual evidence for royal portraits’ forms, iconographies, and original placements to gain a fuller understanding of the corpus. Analysis of surviving royal statue bases, literary accounts, honorific decrees detailing royal portrait commissions, and royal portraits in other media (e.g., coins, seals, bronze figurines, mosaics, etc.) reveals that royal portrait statues were often more diverse, conspicuous, theatrical, and divinizing than portrait statues representing non-royal individuals. The study demonstrates the resonances between these portrait features and the marvelous bodily adornments, choreographed movements, and calculated performances of kings' real bodies in royal rituals and spectacles, ultimately revealing that like the staged appearances of kings, Hellenistic royal portrait statues were conceived as conspicuous material syntheses of royal actors and royal roles.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2005. / Available online via OhioLINK's ETD Center; full text release delayed at author's request until 2010 May 31.