Marble portrait head

Found in 1971 in Goldsmith Street, this miniature portrait head in white Italian marble dates to the mid to late first century AD. It shows a man in late middle age. In publishing this piece Dr Roger Ling, an authority in the study of Roman sculpture, noted that the carving is in the veristic style in which the face was shown in dry, often unflattering, realism, whilst the use of the drill, used here for the hair, dates the piece after c. AD 60. Since it is unusually small, it may have come from a memorial in a private house or a tomb.

Publication: Ling, R. 1991: Sculptural finds, in N. Holbrook & P. Bidwell (eds.), Roman finds from Exeter, EAR4, p230-1.

Acknowledgments: RAM Museum