aa5874

How in the world can any one prove that there is no trained expert that think Tacitus Annals is a forgery??

Did Ehrman talk to every trained expert??

Ehrman's statement is just propaganda or mis-leading.

Ehrman is NOT Credible.

Vorkosigan

Did you not read Carrier's remarks above?

GakuseiDon

Yes, and I find them over-the-top, especially for what amounts to little more than a nitpick. I gave Ehrman's response above. To paraphrase Carrier, his over-the-top response here is indicative of his over-the-top responses to the rest of Ehrman's book. This website here examines Carrier's claims in his review of DJE? over 10 webpages, and shows the terrible misreading done by Carrier: http://christianstudies.wordpress.co...rical-jesus-1/

Anyway: below is Ehrman's original comment in his book. It is from his chapter on the non-biblical sources for a historical Jesus, where he covers Pliny the Younger, Seutonius and Tacitus, laying out the evidence for a historical Jesus. He is not addressing the mythicist case here. After discussing the Tacitus reference, he writes:

Some mythicists argue that this reference in Tacitus was not actually written by him—they claim the same thing for Pliny and Suetonius, where the references are less important— but were inserted into his writings (interpolated) by Christians who copied them, producing the manuscripts of Tacitus we have today. (We have no originals, only later copies.) I don’t know of any trained classicists or scholars of ancient Rome who thinks this, and it seems highly unlikely.

Note that he writes "SOME mythicists" there. A few paragraphs later, Ehrman writes:

At the same time, the information is not particularly helpful in establishing that there really lived a man named Jesus. How would Tacitus know what he knew? ... It should be clear that in any event that Tacitus is basing his comment on hearsay rather than, say, detailed historical research.

Carrier then takes the first statement above and analyses it thusly:

Ehrman says “I don’t know of any trained classicists or scholars of ancient Rome who think” the passage about Christians in Tacitus is a forgery (p. 55). Now, I agree with Ehrman that it’s “highly unlikely” this passage wasn’t what Tacitus wrote; but the fact that he doesn’t know of the many classical scholars who have questioned it suggests he didn’t check.

Which is a reasonable nitpick by Carrier IF Carrier thought Ehrman was saying that he doesn't know that there were EVER any classical scholars who questioned the Tacitus reference, and that Ehrman should have known that there were. But the problem is that this isn't what Ehrman claimed, as Ehrman points out below.

Carrier then goes on to conclude from this:

This is important, because part of Ehrman’s argument is that mythicists are defying all established scholarship in suggesting this is an interpolation, so the fact that there is a lot of established scholarship supporting them undermines Ehrman’s argument and makes him look irresponsible.

Ehrman doesn't argue that mythicists "are defying all established scholarship" in suggesting this is an interpolation. Carrier is reading this into Ehrman's comment. And he does that quite a few times -- basically agreeing with Ehrman on the point being raised, then finding a (usually reasonable) nitpick, but then turns the nitpick into something ridiculous.

Ehrman's response:

... I need to stress that my comment had to do with what scholars today are saying about the Tacitus quotation. What I say in the book is that I don’t know of any scholars who think that it is an interpolation, and I don’t.

As Carrier notes, "the overall consensus of scholarship, myself included, sides with Ehrman on the conclusion is true". Ehrman doesn't know any classically trained scholars currently holding that the Tacitus reference was a forgery. Should he have checked? Perhaps; that is a nitpick worth bringing up if Ehrman should know of such scholars.

Carrier's response:

Ehrman says now, “my point is that I was not trying to make a statement about the history of Tacitus scholarship; I was stating what scholars today think.” This I would credit as a fair statement (assuming, again, that he checked), but it’s not what he says in the book... In fact, if all Ehrman meant were that no current Tacitus expert doubts the passage, then his book’s argument doesn’t hold up. He would have to change that argument to make this new premise work.

Now, I can't make any sense of that last point. (Fuller quote in my earlier post.)

Carrier continues:

It must also be noted that Ehrman still doesn’t admit that he tars the competence of mythicists when he tells his readers (and regardless of what he meant, what his readers will take him to mean is the issue: because it is that that I have to constantly correct and therefore makes the book bad) that no competent expert would ever agree with them and that they are the only ones coming up with these ideas. But if serious qualified experts had the same notions, that seriously alters the entire impression of the matter. It’s not a crazy idea coming out of left field anymore. It’s just wrong. And the difference is huge. This should be particularly clear to someone who acts like such criticisms are personal attacks and unfair. Ehrman made his opponents look crazier and less competent than they are.

Carrier repeats the same thing numerous times, as Jonathan Burke covers on his website. Carrier finds a (usually reasonable) nitpick -- though agreeing with the wider point -- and then makes it into something big.

Let's revisit Ehrman's point again:

Some mythicists argue that this reference in Tacitus was not actually written by him... but were inserted into his writings (interpolated) by Christians who copied them, producing the manuscripts of Tacitus we have today. (We have no originals, only later copies.)

Is this statement true? Yes. Ehrman continues:

I don’t know of any trained classicists or scholars of ancient Rome who thinks this, and it seems highly unlikely.

Is this statement true? Apparently. Ehrman reiterates later that he in fact doesn't know any such scholars. Carrier suggests that Ehrman should have known; and that is a reasonable nitpick if there were such scholars today that Ehrman should be aware of. But to read into this that Ehrman is doing what Carrier claims above is simply over-the-top.

I'll revisit Ehrman's comment on the Priapus statue in his "Unbelievable" interview next.

aa5874

What Ehrman claims cannot be proven to be true so has no real value. Ehrman has ADMITTED ignorance of what trained experts think about the matter.

Toto

But in fact Ehrman's argument is that mythicists are defying all established scholarship, is it not? I don't think that Carrier is reading that into what Ehrman and his followers claim.

In the first place, Ehrman identifies the theory that Tacitus was interpolated as only held by some (presumably unprofessional) mythicists, when these mythicists are reading established scholarship.

Then Ehrman had to backtrack and say that he meant scholarship today, and that he did not know anyone personally who made those arguments.

The best you can say is that Ehrman is sloppy and says what he does not mean.

This may be a nitpick if you are feeling charitable towards Ehrman, but it does not reflect well on his credentials as a historian. Remember, this is an issue that is raised here whenever we argue over the value of consensus. Ehrman has training in theology, not historical methods.

If you are going to make broad statements about the state of scholarship, should you not be acquainted with the full range of scholarship? If Ehrman meant that no one he had a drink with at the last SBL section differs on this issue, he should state that.

This is the issue: Ehrman is dismissive of mythicist arguments - too far outside of real scholarship to take seriously. James McGrath does the same thing at an even lower, more vicious level.

As you quote Carrier:

It is true but misleading. There are non-mythicist scholars who have argued that the passage is an interpolation.

"Over-the-top" is not a meaningful phrase. Has Carrier said anything that is not true? Have you not followed the course of this debate - the name calling, the disparagement by historicists who want to maintain that mythicism is too loony to analyze seriously?

If Ehrman is so uninformed on the state of scholarship on the issue, should he pass himself off as an expert?

Tom Verenna

Toto,

Excellent points overall. A couple of things.

1. Ehrman's whole point in writing the book is to establish that mythicists are out of touch with scholarship, overstate the evidence, or illogical claims.
2. Real scholars are much more cautious and have a broader understanding of the scholarship, which ultimate leads them to accept historicity.
3. Because of these two main points, mythicists should not be taken seriously (generally speaking).

The point that Carrier makes (and yes, he can be quite over-the-top on occasion, but none the less correct in this instance) is that Ehrman is blind to the thorn in his own eye. He's just as guilty as the mythicists in every one of these issues (to the point where he actually fails to correctly cite Pliny!) and, if the shoe were on the other foot, he'd have no trouble pointing out these flaws (and maybe even write a book about it and make a boat load of money--I'm not bitter or anything ).

Carrier should have used more tact and been more forgiving in some areas--certainly he should have read Ehrman a bit more sympathetically. In that I agree with GDon. However, and we must make this point clear, Carrier's fear is a valid one: most laypeople reading Ehrman's book will not have recognized the problematic claims or factual errors in the book. Most people would take him at face value. Some, like James McGrath (who I actually like and find to be quite a bright scholar--probably won't win me friends on this board), would go so far as to even vehemently defend Ehrman as if infallible. So Carrier's reaction to Ehrman's 'be all end all (of mythicism)' book for laypeople is not completely inexcusable. If someone wrote a book arguing for the historicity of Romulus, I'd probably react just the same way (well, okay, maybe not the *same* way).

Addendum: Some Classicists have argued for the historical Romulus, it seems. :constern02:

Just my two drachmae.

GakuseiDon

Can you QUOTE Ehrman on his argument that mythicists are defying all established scholarship please? He has nice things to say about Price, Carrier and Wells (mainly).

Can you QUOTE Ehrman when he identifies the theory that Tacitus was interpolated as only held my some (presumably unprofessional) mythicists, please?

Can you QUOTE Ehrman actually backtracking please?

Can you QUOTE Ehrman saying what he does not mean, please?

Why does it not reflect well on his credentials as a historian. How many "trained classicists or scholars of ancient Rome who thinks" the Tacitus forgery should a historian know about?

But Ehrman is talking about scholarship today. How many scholars have those views today, and not writing 50 years ago? How many does Ehrman know? How many does Carrier know? How many do you know?

Tell me which scholars writing recently think the Tacitus reference is a forgery, and which ones Ehrman should know about, and why.

stephan huller

Me too. I don't agree with what he says all the time but he has demonstrated himself to be able to think independent of the rest of the herd.

GakuseiDon

Hi Tom. I'm not worried here about the tact, nor would I say that he needed to read Ehrman more "sympathetically". I think he should have been more critical; that is, evaluated the statement on its own merits. But he didn't: he reads a whole lot of things into what Ehrman says and doesn't say, which I think is horrible. Having been the brunt of such attacks myself over the years from mythicists, I was shocked to see Carrier do the same thing.

Carrier has raised some reasonable nitpicks, which as far as I can see don't affect the points he is raising. (Most times, Carrier agrees with those points.) But it is what he does with those nitpicks is what is shocking.

By all means, we should point out the problematic claims or factual errors in the book. That is not in doubt. It is the mind-reading that should be avoided.

GakuseiDon

The full story of Priapus-gate, whether you want it or not! Starting from Ehrman's interview on "Unbelievable".

The interview occurred on 03-Apr-2012, several weeks before Carrier posted his review of Ehrman's book. Here is the relevant transcript:

Interviewer: "You get things like Peter's name 'the rock' really means 'cock', and then the author draws a picture of it."

Ehrman: "Yeah, draws a picture of Peter with a nose that is in fact an extended penis -- an erect penis -- the author indicates that this is a statue that is kept in the basement of the Vatican Museum. [laughs] It’s just made up! There is no such [thing?] – it’s just completely made up!"

It is clear that:
1. Ehrman believes that Acharya S is drawing a picture of a statue of Peter with a penis nose
2. Ehrman suggests that Acharya S (or someone else) simply made the statue she apparently represents as a symbol of Peter up.

Carrier makes the reasonable point in his first review blog on 19-Apr-2012 that, though the statue has nothing to do with Peter, such a statue does exist:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/1026/

The Priapus Bronze: In response to D.M. Murdock’s claim that there is a statue of a penis-nosed cockerel (which she says is a “symbol of St. Peter”) in the Vatican museum, Ehrman says that “there is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up” (p. 24). Ehrman evidently did no research on this and did not check this claim at all... It does not have the name “Peter” on it (Murdock never claimed it did; that it represents him is only an interpretation), but it apparently exists (or did exist) exactly as she describes.

He then goes on to suggest that Ehrman should have investigated further before "arrogantly declaring" the statue didn't exist:

At the very least I would expect Ehrman to have called the Vatican museum about this, and to have checked the literature on it, before arrogantly declaring no such object existed and implying Murdock made this up. I do not assume Murdock’s interpretation of the object is correct (there is no clear evidence it has anything to do with Christianity, much less Peter). But its existence appears to be beyond dispute. She did not make that up.

Fair enough. But Ehrman's point is that there is no statue of Peter the penis-nosed rooster, as he responds here on 22-Apr-2012 (my bold):

A case in point of my “carelessness and arrogance” is the first instance of an “Error of Fact” that he cites, which I assume he gives as his first example because he thinks it’s a real killer. It has to do with a statue in the Vatican library that is of a rooster (a cock) with an erect penis for a nose (really!) which Acharya S, in her book The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold, indicates is “hidden in the Vatican Treasury” (that damn Vatican: always hiding things that disprove Christianity!) which is a “symbol of Saint Peter” (p. 295).

In her discussion, Acharya S indicates that Jesus’ disciple Peter was not only the “rock” on which Jesus would build his church, but also the “cock.” Get it? They rhyme! Moreover, the word cock is slang for penis (hard as a “rock,” one might think); and what is another slang word for penis? Peter! There you have it. And so when there is a statue of a cock with a rock-hard peter for a nose, this symbolizes Peter, the disciple of Jesus. No wonder the popes have kept this thing in hiding.

My comment on this entire discussion was simple and direct: “There is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up.”

Carrier attacks my comments with a rather vicious set of comments: “Ehrman evidently did no research on this and did not check this claim at all…. Indicative of the carelessness and arrogance Ehrman exhibits in his book.” But alas, I am unrepentant and will say it again: “There is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican.”

What Carrier wants us to know is that in fact this statue does exist and that it is in the Vatican. It does not take much research to dig out this juicy bit of museum lore. Acharya S herself gives the references in her footnotes. And yes, they are both right. The statue does appear to exist. But it has nothing to do with Peter, as any sophomore in college with one semester of Greek under his belt and a course or two in religious studies could tell you.

On the base of the statue are the words SOTER KOSMOU – Greek for “Savior of the World.” No Christian ever thought that Peter was the Savior of the World. Peter was not portrayed in the early church in ithyphallic form. Let alone has an overly-excited rooster. This statue was considered to be of Peter because of crass and irrelevant modern idle wanderings that have nothing to do with real research (cock/rock; Peter and the cock crows; peter = penis = cock; and so on). It in fact is simply a rather unusual Priapus. There are lots of Priapi that have come down to us from the ancient world, and they tend to arouse the giggles of the middle school students with their first exposure to a classical collection in a museum. Off hand I don’t recall any others quite like this, but they may indeed exist. None of them has anything to do with Jesus’ disciple Simon Peter.

And so my offhand statement about this particular one was that the Vatican does not have a statue of Peter as rooster with a hard cock for his nose. Carrier’s response was that the statue does exist. Let me put the question to him bluntly: Does he think that the Vatican has “a penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock” in its collection? I think we can say with some assurance that the answer is no. As I said, unlike a lot of other mythicists Carrier is both trained and smart. But sometimes he doesn’t read very well.

He makes this kind of mistake routinely in his vicious assault on me and my book. The problem appears to be that he sees something that strikes him as a problem, and he isolates it, dissects it, runs with it, gets obsessed with it, and …. forgets how it was actually said in the first place. Careful reading can solve a lot of problems of misunderstanding.

In the comments section, someone raises that Ehrman should have phrased things differently. Ehrman responds on 24-Apr-2012:

Maybe you’re right: maybe I should have phrased it differently. Everything looks different in hindsight!

Carrier's response to Ehrman's response here on 27-Apr-2012 (my bolding below):

In his second reply he addressed one single point in my review. And here I believe there is reason to suspect he is lying about the Priapus statue. In my review of his book I called him out for saying (certainly very clearly implying) that Murdock “made up” the statue at the Vatican that she presents a drawing of and says is a symbol of Peter. He clearly did not call the Vatican about it or research the claim at all. Because if he had, he would have said what any responsible scholar would have said, which is that yes, the statue she depicts is real and the drawing she provides is reasonably accurate, but her argument that it symbolizes Peter is not credible. It’s just a pagan statue of the god Priapus.

Now in his reply on this point, in “Acharya S, Richard Carrier, and a Cocky Peter (Or: “A Cock and Bull Story”),” he claims I misread him, that he never denied the statue existed nor implied that Murdock made it up. Now let’s look at what he actually wrote in the book. You be the judge:

[Acharya says] “‘Peter’ is not only ‘the rock’ but also ‘the cock’, or penis, as the word is used as slang to this day.” Here Acharya shows (her own?) hand drawing of a man with a rooster head but with a large erect penis instead of a nose, with this description: “bronze sculpture hidden in the Vatican treasure of the Cock, symbol of St. Peter” (295). There is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up.

That’s the sum total of what he says about this. It is quite evident to me that when he wrote this, he doubted the drawing came from any source, and believed (and here implies to the reader) that she just made it up. There is no such statue. That is what he is saying. But you can judge that for yourself. Certainly, the one thing this paragraph doesn’t say is that the statue she references does exist, is (or at one time was) at the Vatican, and looks essentially just as her drawing depicts it. It also does not say that she is merely wrong to interpret this statue as being of Peter. To the contrary, all it says is that there is no such statue, she made this up. Which is false. And betrays his failure to even check.

But he now claims he did check. Sort of–he says he saw her citations and assumed there were priapic statues; he did not actually say he checked her sources, or contacted the Vatican. Some commentators on his site have also tried claiming the statue was never at the Vatican, but their misinformation and mishandling of the sources is thoroughly exposed in an extensive comment by an observer at Murdock’s site. The object may have been moved (as I implied was possible in my original review), but Ehrman said it didn’t exist anywhere, so its location is moot. And I should add, this is precisely the kind of source analysis that Ehrman should already have worked through and be able to discuss informedly, yet in comments there he said the original commentator’s findings were “very interesting” and “very hard to get around” (and he likewise mistakenly affirms they are correct in his subsequent post), indicating he didn’t in fact do any of this research and isn’t familiar with the source materials on the statue.

Of course he now claims that he never said the statue didn’t exist. He only said a statue of Peter didn’t exist. That’s right. He parses his words hyper-literally to argue that he said the exact opposite of what he said. You see, when he said the statue didn’t exist, that it was made up, he meant a statue of Peter, and since the statue that Murdock references and presents a drawing of isn’t a statue “of Peter,” the statue doesn’t exist. Get it? This is an amusing case of faux metaphysical deepness being used as an excuse to read a sentence as saying a statue simultaneously does and doesn’t exist, depending on what one calls it. Even if that is really what he was doing when he wrote the book, this is just a variant of a masked-man fallacy (“The statue exists. She says it is a statue of Peter. No statues of Peter exist. Therefore the statue doesn’t exist.”).

It’s bad enough that, even if this is true and he really meant to say the opposite of what he appears to say, he obviously wrote it so badly he not only sucks as a writer but can’t even tell that he sucks as a writer (indeed only after repeated goading in comments did he confess that “maybe I should have phrased it differently”). But trying to use the “I suck as a writer” defense against the much worse crime of careless scholarship requires him to claim the masked man fallacy isn’t a fallacy but a perfectly reasonable way to argue. Which only convicts him (yet again) of not understanding how logic works.

Before I get to the punchline, I really must emphasize this point: even granting his excuse, the fact that the wording is completely misleading and will misinform the public still confirms my point in citing this example, that we can’t trust his book. If he so badly miswrote here that he meant the opposite of what he said, then how many other sentences in this book are as badly written and mean the opposite of what they say? Indeed, that he had to be repeatedly goaded before even admitting that this sentence does that, means he is not even capable of detecting when a sentence he has written says the opposite of what he meant. That entails we should trust his book even less. Because whatever filter is supposed to prevent him making these kind of mistakes is clearly not working in his brain...

... Ehrman is basically saying “I was never wrong. I’m just such a phenomenally lousy writer that things I wrote appear to say what they don’t, and everyone who reads this book will often be misled in result.” Others have noted the problem entailed by his repeatedly careless and irresponsible wording of things, which can completely mislead lay readers of his book. Ophelia Benson (Butterflies & Wheels), for example, found many problems with the way Ehrman’s choice of words misleads, as well as his questionable logic (see: What Ehrman Actually Says, The Unseen, A Small Town Guy).

But I fear it may be worse than that. Because I don’t actually believe him when he says he didn’t mean to say the statue didn’t exist. I suspect that is a post-hoc rationalization that he cooked up in an attempt to save face, after his careless and irresponsible scholarship on this matter was exposed. I suspect this not only because his excuse is implausible on its face (read his original paragraph again, and ask yourself how likely it is that someone who wanted to say “the statue she depicts does exist, but it’s not a statue of Peter” would say instead what he did), and not only because he still doesn’t claim to have researched her sources or contacted the Vatican (in other words, to do what he should have done), but also because, as several people have since pointed out to me, he said in a podcast (before my review and before Murdock herself exposed him on this) that the statue did not in any sense exist.

Carrier then discusses the interview on "Unbelievable":

On Homebrewed Christianity, April 3 (2012), “Bart Ehrman on Jesus’ Existence, Apocalypticism & Holy Week,” timestamp 20:30-21:10: at this point in that podcast, Ehrman says Acharya talks about Peter the cock and shows a drawing of a statue with a penis for a nose and claims this is in the Vatican museum, at which Ehrman declares, with laughter, “It’s just made up! There is no such s[tatue]… It’s just completely made up” (emphasis mine). In context it is certainly clear he is saying there is no such statue of any kind, that her drawing is not of any actual object. (Note that I put the word “statue” in partial brackets because he speaks so quickly he didn’t complete the word but started saying what is obviously the word “statue”; he doesn’t pause to correct himself, though, he just quickly segues to the next phrase in animated conversation.)

Now, I must leave it to you to decide what’s going on here. From both his own wording in the book and this podcast, it certainly seems that Ehrman had no idea the statue actually existed, until Murdock and I hammered him on it. Notably, I had emailed him about this weeks before my review, asking what his response to Murdock was, because I was concerned it didn’t look good. I had not yet read his book, so I didn’t know the whole thing would be a travesty of these kinds of errors. Ehrman never answered me (even though he has in the past). Only after my review did he come out with the explanation that he meant to say the statue existed but wasn’t connected to Peter. And on that point I suspect he is lying.

I can give more leeway to a podcast interview, where we often forget to say things or say things incorrectly, and we don’t get to re-read and revise to improve accuracy and clarity (though this excuse doesn’t hold for a book). But here this does not look like an accidental omission or a slip of the tongue. He really does apear to think (at the time of that podcast) that the statue was completely made up, and that certainly appears to be what he says. Did he really also “mean to say” in that podcast that the statue wasn’t “completely” made up, that in fact it existed, but that Murdock was only wrong about what it symbolized? In other words, did he once again say, as if by accident, exactly the opposite of what he meant? You tell me.

In the Comments section, Carrier writes on what Ehrman could have written:

[Ehrman could have written:] “The statue she refers to is not a statue of Peter, but a statue of the pagan god Priapus, one of many like it. That it ever represented Peter is simply a product of her imagination, with no basis in evidence.”

And for those who have got this far, here is Ehrman's original comment in "Did Jesus Exist?" that started this storm:

'Peter' is not only 'the rock' but also 'the cock,' or penis, as the word is used as slang to this day." Here Acharya shows (her own?) hand drawing of a man with a rooster head but with a large erect penis instead of a nose, with this description: "Bronze sculpture hidden in the Vatican treasure of the Cock, symbol of St. Peter" (295). [There is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up.]

************************************************** *******

BTW, I recommend reading Jonathon Burke's web articles on this. From here:

Impressed with what he referred to as ‘numerous scholarly references’ provided by Murdock, Carrier ironically decided to trust Murdock’s claims, and the claims of one of her supporters, without checking them. He certainly did not contact the Vatican himself. In fact he did not even check her references at all. An examination of them shows that Murdock failed to provide ‘numerous scholarly references’, contrary to Carrier’s claim...

Carrier was wrong to say Murdock cited ‘numerous scholarly sources’, an error he made because he failed to check the facts. Murdock’s work itself was anything but scholarly, and Carrier (with academic qualifications Murdock lacks), should at the very least have checked Murdock’s sources before describing them so enthusiastically. If he had checked them, he would have realized how wildly inaccurate her claims were, and how poor her research was. This failure of Carrier’s was unfortunate in the context of him criticizing Ehrman for neglecting to check sources and verify claims...

If Carrier had taken the time to check Murdock’s claims against her own sources, he would have discovered that they contradict her. Murdock claimed that the statue is a ‘Bronze sculpture hidden in the Vatican treasury of the Cock, symbol of St. Peter’. But in a book which Murdock does not quote, Knight (the only original source cited for the claim that the statue was ever in the Vatican), states explicitly that the sculpture was displayed publicly in the Vatican palace, not ‘hidden in the Vatican treasury’.

More on his webpage.