The most famous statue at Fenway Court is probably the Peplophoros, a representation of a youthful goddess such as Persephone, made at the time of Julius Caesar or Augustus after an original of about 455 BC. The smooth finish of the surfaces and the translucent qualities of the Greek island marble make this a very attractive modernization of a bronze from the so-called Severe Style that led to the golden age of Phidias and the Parthenon in Athens. The goddess, or perhaps a noble mortal, wears a high-girt Doric chiton with an ample overfold. The chiton is represented as sewn at the right side, where a long wavy seam with horizontal stitches has been carefully copied in marble from the bronze original. Mrs. Gardner’s treasure of Greek female dignity was discovered in March 1901, on the site of the famous Gardens of Sallust, in the property of the Sisters of San Giuseppe on the Pincian Hill. Mrs. Gardner never saw the statue in Boston. It was a showpiece of the American Academy in Rome from 1901 until 1936, when the Italian government authorized its export.

Source: Cornelius C. Vermeule (1978), "A Goddess (Peplophoros)," in Eye of the Beholder, edited by Alan Chong et al. (Boston: ISGM and Beacon Press, 2003): 7.

Purchased in 1901 from the Sisters of San Giuseppe, through Richard Norton.