Property from a German Private Collection
A ROMAN MARBLE RELIEF PORTRAIT HEAD OF A MAN, ANTONINE, PROBABLY EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN, CIRCA A.D. 140-150
Lot Closed
July 9, 01:46 PM GMT
Estimate
25,000 - 35,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
Property from a German Private Collection
A ROMAN MARBLE RELIEF PORTRAIT HEAD OF A MAN, ANTONINE, PROBABLY EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN, CIRCA A.D. 140-150
with short beard, moustache, and unruly hair falling in comma-shaped spot-drilled locks over the forehead, a vertically drilled channel along the left side of the head outlining the transition with the missing relief background; no restorations.
Height 26 cm.
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Fritz Fremersdorf (1894-1983), Director of the Römisch-Germanische Museum, Cologne, acquired prior to 1956
by descent to the present owner
The present head is misidentified as a portrait of Marcus Aurelius on page 3 of Fritz Fremersdorf’s 1956 will and testament.
Similar drill holes can be seen on the hair of portraits of the young Marcus Aurelius, such as a head in Hamburg (S. Faust, “Zu einem Bildnis des Marc Aurel im Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg,” in H. Schwarzer – H.-H. Nieswandt, ed., "Man kann es sich nicht prächtig genug vorstellen". Festschrift für Dieter Salzmann zum 65. Geburtstag, 2016, pp. 247–254 pl. 27). The absence of drilled pupils and incised irises on the present head would suggest a production date in the fourth decade of the 2nd Century A.D
On Fritz Fremersdorf’s career see https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Fremersdorf.