Sleeping Hermaphroditus / Ermafrodito dormiente

This is an imperial age marble Roman copy from an original Hellenistic statue dated II century B.C. The statue has been located in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence since 1669. This artwork represents the life size statue of a sleeping Hermaphroditus, son of Hermes and Aphrodite. According to the Latin poet Publius Ovidius Naso, Hermaphroditus was a handsome guy who was transformed into an androgynous form after a supernatural union with the water nymph Salmacis. The nymph Salmacis fell in love with him but was not returned, so she prayed the gods to physically join him along with her traits inside his body. Hermaphroditus lived the rest of his life both as a man and as a woman, feeling the two sexes at the same time.