PROPERTY FROM THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, BOSTON, SOLD FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE COLLECTION

A ROMAN MARBLE PORTRAIT HEAD OF A MAN

ANTONINE PERIOD, CIRCA MID 2ND CENTURY A.D.

Details

A ROMAN MARBLE PORTRAIT HEAD OF A MAN
ANTONINE PERIOD, CIRCA MID 2ND CENTURY A.D.
Lifesized, depicting a man of middle age, with a full beard of short curling locks and a downturned mustache, his hair a mass of thick wavy tresses
8¾ in. (22.2 cm.) high

Provenance

Paul E. Manheim, New York, gifted to the MFA, Boston, 1968.

Literature

C.C. Vermeule, MFA Annual Report, 1968, p. 33.
C.C. Vermeule, The Classical Journal 65, 1969, pp. 68-69, fig. 18.
M.B. Comstock and C.C. Vermeule, Sculpture in Stone: the Greek, Roman, and Etruscan Collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Boston, 1976, no. 360.

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Lot Essay

Vermeule suggests that this portrait represents an individual also known from other examples, one in the Worcester Art Museum, one at Schloss Adolphseck in Germany, and one in Florence (see p. 229 in Comstock and Vermeule, op. cit.). Based on the attributes of the other portraits, Vermeule postulates that this was a man of military rank.

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