Roman Head

this fantastic sculptured marble head is closely related to a marble funerrary portrait statue of a noble roman poet which has been sold at Sotheby's in 2018. The workmanship ist elaborate and it can assumed that a high ranking sculptor of his time has worked on the head. Our fine marble head resembles the features of the head of the funerary statue in a way that one can assume, that it is the head of a smaller copy of this masterpiece. We look into the eyes of a highly educated person of rank.

The identity of the poet of the funerary statue is hithero unknown since no attribute or inscription can help to identiy the person. However, our marble head shows traces of read or purple in the hair and might point to a red-haired poet.

To me, accoring to the dates of the funerary statue as well as our head, it seems likely that a famous red-haired poet is the person shown. There are famous red-haired poets at this time and one of the most adored persons is Lucius Varius Rufus (74-14 B.C.). he has been a close frined of Vergil and has witten important works of poetry. It is said, that even Vergil was using some sentences of the work of Rufus for his works.

Price: 6.000,00 €