This statue of a warrior is signed by the sculptor, Agasias of Ephesus. First recorded in 1611, just after it had been found, it was in the Borghese villa by 1613, where it was regarded as the most admired work of antiquity in the collection. Indeed, so many casts were taken that Prince Borghese sought to prohibit any more copies being made. One can see the remnant of a shield held high on the left arm and, in the right hand, that of a sword. The warrior, although known as the Borghese Gladiator, would seem to be a foot soldier combating a mounted opponent.
In Three Persons Viewing the Gladiator by Candlelight (1765) by Joseph Wright, connoisseurs regard a model of the Borghese Gladiator, a drawing of the statue behind them. Several years later, Sir Joshua Reynolds, first president of the Royal Academy of Arts, expounded to its students on the moral and intellectual benefit of such contemplation.
"It is not in the Hercules, nor in the gladiator, nor in the Apollo; but in that form which is taken from them all, and which partakes equally of the activity of the gladiator, of the delicacy of the Apollo, and of the muscular strength of the Hercules. For perfect beauty in any species must combine all the characters which are beautiful in that species. It cannot consist in any one to the exclusion of the rest: no one, therefore, must be predominant, that no one may be deficient."
Third Discourse on Art (December 14, 1770)
"All the arts receive their perfection from an ideal beauty, superior to what is to be found in individual nature" This ideal was not to be found in any one of these classical statues, and certainly not in their mere imitation, but in the abstracted "central form" of each. Students, therefore, should make copies of a variety of classical statues. Contemplation of the ideal is arduous work, just as it was for the artists who sought to create that ideal themselves. "But if industry carried them thus far, may not you also hope for the same reward from the same labour?"
Reference: Seven Discourses on Art (1771) by Sir Joshua Reynolds.
