By FRANCES D'EMILIO
ROME (AP) - She suckled Rome's legendary twin founders and fed Benito Mussolini's ambitious dreams of renewed imperial glories.
For centuries, the she-wolf has been one of Rome's most powerful symbols. But now some experts are contending that the bronze statue in a city museum atop Capitoline Hill might not be so old after all.
New theories suggest that the statue dates from the Middle Ages, and not from Etruscan times, as has long been held.
"It's decisively medieval," said Anna Maria Carruba, a researcher who studied the statue when she worked on its restoration a decade ago. "As I went ahead with my research, I was ever more sure," Carruba said in a telephone interview on Wednesday.
( rest of article )
ROME (AP) - She suckled Rome's legendary twin founders and fed Benito Mussolini's ambitious dreams of renewed imperial glories.
For centuries, the she-wolf has been one of Rome's most powerful symbols. But now some experts are contending that the bronze statue in a city museum atop Capitoline Hill might not be so old after all.
New theories suggest that the statue dates from the Middle Ages, and not from Etruscan times, as has long been held.
"It's decisively medieval," said Anna Maria Carruba, a researcher who studied the statue when she worked on its restoration a decade ago. "As I went ahead with my research, I was ever more sure," Carruba said in a telephone interview on Wednesday.
( rest of article )