Sleeping Hermaphroditus [SEP] collection
Hermaphroditus" was immediately claimed by Cardinal Scipione Borghese and became part of the Borghese Collection. The "Borghese Hermaphroditus" was later sold to the occupying French and was moved to The Louvre, where it is on display.
The "Sleeping Hermaphroditus" has been described as a good early Imperial Roman copy of a bronze original by the later of the two Hellenistic sculptors named Polycles (working "ca" 155 BC); the original bronze was mentioned in Pliny's "Natural History".
Original Borghese copy.
one point Laurence hears two men compare him to the "lovely hermaphrodite" in the sculpture collection of the Villa Borghese, the Sleeping Hermaphroditus.
Laurence (also called Laurent) lives most of his life as a man and then spends a period living as a woman. Both men and women fall in love with him and he responds to both. He explains how he has chosen to favor men or women: "When I wished to trifle, I preferred the latter. When I wished to reason gravely, I chose