A Marble Portrait Bust of a Man, Roman Imperial, Julio-Claudian , circa early 1st Century A.D.

inspired by the veristic portrait style of the late Roman Republic, turned to his right, with powerful neck, deep furrows flanking the nose, broad and very prominent cheekbones, wide deeply set eyes, and large ears, his finely carved hair falling in overlapping wavy locks down to the nape fo the neck and brushed forward in much fuller and luxuriant curls around the temples and forehead, the crown of the head carved separately in antiquity.

Stefano Bardini, Florence, late 19th Century
Johann II, Prince of Liechtenstein (1849-1929), Garden Palace, Vienna, acquired from Bardini in 1891
Sotheby's, London, May 17th, 1983, no. 194
English private collection

Gabriella Capecchi, The Historical Photographic Archive of Stefano Bardini: Greek, Etruscan and Roman Art, Florence, 1993, p. 39, no. 75a, illus. p. 119

As shown in the photograph (see p. ... in this catalogue), which was taken prior to 1892 in one of Stefano Bardini's villas or townhouses, this bust stood on a turned socle high up atop a tall marble pilaster of triangular section itself set on a quadrangular base; at the time the bust still preserved several of its plaster restorations, such as the top of the head, nose, and proper right shoulder. On the sole basis of the photograph scholars had suggested that the portrait head was "a copy of the Corbulo Gabii type... on possibly ancient bust of dubious pertinence" (Capecchi, op. cit., p. 39). It is now clear that the portrait is not a replica of the Corbulo type (compare Louvre, Catalogue des portraits romains, vol. 1, nos. 7-8) and that the head and bust are carved from a single block of marble.