Athena Giustiniani

[1] It depicts Athena standing, wearing a thin chiton covered by a heavier himation draped over her left shoulder.

[3] The statue is first attested in the 17th century in the collection of the Italian banker and art collector Vincenzo Giustiniani, from whom it received its modern nickname.

[7] A later family tradition among the Giustiniani held that the statue's head had been found separately during the construction of the Collegio Romano and sold to them by the Jesuits at an exorbitant price.

In 1817 he sold it to Pope Pius VII, who in 1822 installed it in the newly constructed Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican Museums, where it remains today.

[11] Its popularity and influence in the 18th century can be traced through a variety of small-scale copies and allusions in other arts: In the 19th and early 20th centuries, when plaster casts of classical sculpture were produced in large quantities for museums, schools, and private collections in the United States, copies of the "Minerva Giustiniani" appear regularly in the catalogues of several commercial cast manufacturers.