We're in the Capitoline Museums in Rome looking at the equestrian sculpture of the emperor Marcus Aurelius.

We're not exactly sure of the date, but it's sometime around 176 CE or 180 CE.

It's in a new space, because it was suffering some conservation problems,

and so it had to be removed from the campidoglio where Michelangelo had put it.

And, actually, that's an important point because we don't know where it originally was in Rome.

What's really important is that this is the only equestrian sculpture of its size to survive from antiquity.

And we know that there had been dozens of them in Rome.

They were created to celebrate the triumphal return of an emperor.

There's so much authority as a result of him on horseback, clearly ruling.

His left arm is lightly holding the reigns, or what would have been lightly holding the reigns of the horse.

The right hand protrudes out, addressing the citizens of Rome.

There's a sense of confidence in his posture, and of course in the scale, it is enormous.

This survived because it was thought to have represented Constantine,

the emperor who made Christianity legal in the Roman Empire,

and so this wasn't melted down for it's bronze, the way that almost all other Equestrian sculptures were.

This could have ended up as a cannon.

Right, so we're lucky it survived and it had enormous influence in the Renaissance,

for artists beginning with Donatello, and Leonardo da Vinci.

And of course, also, the ability to cast something this size in bronze had also been lost.

And it just shows how accomplished the ancient Romans were,

both in their handling of the material, but also in the representation,

the real understanding of the body and its musculature.

And of the anatomy of the horse, striding forward, it's so animated and lifelike.

The folds of the neck, as his head pushes downwards.

And the folds of the drapery that Marcus Aurelius is wearing.

How it comes down and drapes over his leg and the back of the horse.

There's also something really wonderfully momentary and also at the same time very timeless here.

The horse is striding, his arm is raised but there's also a wonderful sense of balance.

The horse is in motion, he's pulling to the right.

He had, in his left hand, the reigns so there's a tension in that

he sort of seems to be pulling back and the horse pulls its head back a little bit.

At the same time, the right side of his body seems to be moving forward, and leaning to the right,

there's a kind of animation throughout.

There's also this unity between this incredibly powerful animal and Marcus Aurelius,

and he's in full control of the horse.

And even, kind of, moving forward while pulling the horse back slightly, holding it back.

And you're right, his left hand is holding the reigns, but it's a light touch, even though he's in command

of this incredibly powerful animal.

Is it me, or does he seem a little too big for the horse?

Do you know if this was cast in one piece?

It would have been cast in individual pieces, and then it would have been assembled

and then the bronze would have been worked so as to erase the seams.

And so this commemorating of a great man and his great deeds was an important idea in the Renaissance

with the flowering of Humanism, this recognition of the achievement of an individual,

the representation of that individual in a portrait.

These are things that had been lost in the Middle Ages.

This interest in representation, both of his authority, of his position in society, but also

the ability to render the body and the interest in rendering, all those things come together in the Renaissance,

again, having originally come together, of course, in the Classical world.