A Greek peasant digging in a walled niche near the ancient city ruins on the island of Milos struck a buried marble figure, armless and broken at the waist. French naval officers on the island quickly recognized its value and arranged its purchase, and the statue was shipped to Paris, where it became one of the Louvre's most celebrated treasures.
Yorgos Kentrotas was clearing stones from a field near the ruins of ancient Melos when his spade struck something solid. Digging further, he uncovered a two-piece marble statue of a woman, nude to the waist, her arms already missing, tucked into what appeared to be an ancient niche built specifically to house it. A French naval ensign stationed nearby, Olivier Voutier, happened to be exploring the same ruins and quickly grasped what had been found.
Word reached the French consul, who negotiated its purchase and shipment to France, where it was presented to King Louis XVIII, who in turn gave it to the Louvre. The statue arrived at a moment of French cultural anxiety: Napoleon's forces had recently lost the Venus de' Medici back to Italy, and French officials were eager to claim a rival masterpiece of ancient sculpture.
No one has ever found the missing arms, and generations of scholars have argued over what they once held, a mirror, an apple, a shield. Its very incompleteness became part of its mystique. Today the statue, believed to depict Aphrodite and carved sometime between 130 and 100 BC, remains one of the most visited and most photographed works of art in the world, an armless goddess whose fragmentary state feels, paradoxically, essential to her fame.
Key people: Yorgos Kentrotas, Olivier Voutier, Louis XVIII