10. Profile Head of a Soldier in Relief (KM 2425)

inv. no. 2425
Purchased by F. W. Kelsey, in October 1900, at the Baths of Diocletian
max. h. 0.28 m; max. w. 0.24 m; max. d. 0.16 m
Pentelic marble
Broken on all sides and back. Scattered traces of gray pozzolana. Head chipped on forehead, nose, chin, and ear. Back of helmet mostly missing.

The soldier's head, in low relief, is shown in right profile wearing a helmet with cheek guards, brow-plate, and crest. The youthful, idealized face is smoothly rendered with little surface articulation. The end of the upper lip bears traces of a moustache, and just below this lip the lower edges of the teeth are visible. Drill channels mark the line between the lips and the rim of the ear. The inner ear is deeply carved. Traces of drilling also survive at the base of the crest and left corner of the fragment. The cheek guard bears a decorative scroll in low relief, the brow-plate a weapons frieze, and the cap a laurel wreath.

G. Koeppel calculates a height of 0.195 m for the head without the helmet and reconstructs the original height of the figure as about 1.45 m. He proposes that the soldier was originally part of an imperial adventus panel celebrating the return of Vespasian to Rome. To the same panel Koeppel assigns the Kelsey Museum's head of Vespasian, loricate torso fragment along with the adjoining Hartwig soldier's head, and the Hartwig Genius Populi Romani.

Bibliography

Catalogue entry by Elaine Gazda

Catalogue 9

Catalogue 11