Property from the Collection of Axel Vervoordt
A Fragmentary Roman Marble Head of the Great Herculaneum Woman, circa 1st Century A.D.
Lot Closed
July 5, 12:30 PM GMT
Estimate
6,000 - 9,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
Property from the Collection of Axel Vervoordt
A Fragmentary Roman Marble Head of the Great Herculaneum Woman
circa 1st Century A.D.
her eyes with lightly incised irises, her wavy hair arranged in a melon coiffure and covered by a veil in back, a curl escaping before the right ear, the back carved flat in antiquity; no restorations.
Height 19.5 cm.
American private collection, acquired on the Los Angeles art market in the 1960s (Bonhams, April 13th, 2011, no. 94, illus.)
acquired by the present owner in 2011
acquired by the present owner in 2011
The present head is a Roman Imperial copy of the head of a long lost Greek original, a late 4th Century B.C draped statue of a woman. The statuary type, known as the "Great Herculaneum Woman", is named after a complete copy found in Herculaneum (now in Dresden: K. Knoll and C. Vorster, eds., Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden. Katalog der antiken Bildwerke, vol. 3, 2013, pp. 170ff., no. 33; https://arachne.dainst.org/entity/1065512), and was widely used during the Roman Imperial period for the bodies of female portraits. Another head of this type was sold at Sotheby’s, New York, December 8th, 1995, no. 70 (from the Norbert Schimmel collection). Both the Schimmel head and the present head are carved flat in the back.