Best Museum Piece

The Tusculum portrait is a marble sculpture widely considered one of the most authentic surviving likenesses of the Roman general and dictator Julius Caesar. Dated to approximately 50 to 44 BCE, the bust was discovered in Tusculum and is currently housed in the Museum of Antiquities in Turin. The sc...

The Bust of Constantine I is a collection of surviving marble fragments from a colossal acrolithic statue of the Roman Emperor Constantine, currently housed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. The fragments include an oversized head, hands, feet, and arm segments that originally belonged to a seated...

A marble portrait bust of Emperor Caracalla (Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus, reigned 198–217 CE) is held in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples. The bust exemplifies the distinctive Caracalla portrait type recognized in Roman art for its intense, furrowed expression and the characteristi...

The Bust of Ramesses II in the British Museum is an ancient Egyptian granite portrait fragment of the 19th Dynasty pharaoh (r. c. 1279–1213 BCE), acquired from the Ramesseum at Thebes in the 19th century.

The Bust of Lucius Junius Brutus is an ancient bronze portrait housed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. Traditionally identified as the legendary founder of the Roman Republic, the sculpture dates back to the 3rd or 4th century BCE. It is celebrated as one of the oldest surviving Roman bronze portr...

The Capitoline Brutus is a bronze portrait bust displayed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. It is traditionally, though not definitively, identified as a depiction of Lucius Junius Brutus, the legendary founder of the Roman Republic. Dating to around the 3rd or 2nd century BCE, the artwork stands a...

The Bust of Augustus in the Capitoline Museums is a Roman marble portrait of the first Roman emperor, Augustus. He ruled from 27 BCE until his death in 14 CE, establishing the Roman Empire. This bust is part of the extensive imperial portrait collection held in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. Sculpt...

This marble portrait bust depicts the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, who reigned from 161 to 180 CE and is best known as the author of the Stoic philosophical treatise Meditations. It is housed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome and dates to the Antonine period. The bust is one of several surviving a...

This marble bust of the Athenian statesman Pericles is a Roman copy created in the 2nd century AD, based on a mid-5th century BC Greek bronze original. The original sculpture is widely attributed to the renowned sculptor Kresilas, a contemporary of Pericles. The portrait is highly distinguished by i...

The Bust of Socrates in the Vatican Museums is a Roman marble copy derived from a bronze Greek original created during the 4th century BCE. It depicts the classical Athenian philosopher Socrates, capturing his distinct features, including a broad nose, protruding eyes, and a thick beard. This sculpt...

The Bust of Akhenaten is an ancient Egyptian sandstone sculpture dating to the 18th Dynasty, currently housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. It depicts Pharaoh Akhenaten, who ruled from approximately 1353 to 1336 BCE and is known for abandoning traditional Egyptian polytheism in...

The Bust of Plato housed in the Vatican Museums is a Roman marble copy created after a Greek bronze original sculpted by Silanion. The portrait depicts the Athenian philosopher Plato, who founded the Academy in Athens and authored foundational texts like the Dialogues. It presents him as a thoughtfu...

The surviving busts of Aristotle are Roman marble copies of a lost Greek bronze original, generally attributed to the sculptor Lysippos. They depict the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, who studied under Plato in Athens and later served as a tutor to Alexander the Great. These portraits typicall...

The Bust of Homer in the British Museum is a Roman marble copy of a lost Hellenistic original, depicting the legendary ancient Greek epic poet. Homer is credited with composing the Iliad and the Odyssey, and this portrait type characteristically portrays him as a blind, elderly man with a furrowed b...

This marble portrait bust of Emperor Vespasian (r. 69–79 CE), founder of the Flavian dynasty, is held at the National Archaeological Museum of Naples. Roman portraits of Vespasian emphasized his rugged, aged features and receding hairline, deliberately departing from the idealized Julio-Claudian sty...

Marble bust of Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 BCE) in the Capitoline Museums, Rome, reproducing one of the most widely copied portrait types of the late Roman Republic. Cicero was Rome's preeminent orator, lawyer, and statesman, whose speeches and writings became foundational texts of Latin prose. Th...

Marble bust of Emperor Hadrian (r. 117–138 CE) in the British Museum's collection. Hadrian was the first Roman emperor to be depicted with a full beard in official portraiture, a feature that became standard for imperial images for the following century. More surviving portraits exist of Hadrian tha...

This marble bust was discovered in the Rhône River near Arles, France, in 2007 alongside other ancient sculptures and is now held at the Musée départemental Arles Antique. Some scholars identify it as a contemporary portrait of Julius Caesar, dated to approximately 46 BCE near the end of his life, b...

The Bust of Trajan is an ancient Roman marble portrait of Emperor Trajan, housed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. Trajan ruled the Roman Empire from 98 to 117 CE, a period during which the empire reached its greatest territorial extent through military campaigns in Dacia and Mesopotamia. The sculp...

This marble portrait bust, identified as Cleopatra VII, is part of the classical antiquities collection at the Altes Museum in Berlin. Dating to the mid-1st century BCE, it depicts the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt wearing a royal diadem and a distinctive melon-coiffure hairsty...

The Bust of Demosthenes in the Vatican Museums is a Roman marble copy of a Greek bronze portrait created by the sculptor Polyeuktos around 280 BCE, over four decades after the Athenian orator's death in 322 BCE. The bronze original stood in the Athenian Agora and was commissioned by the Polis to hon...

The Bust of Thutmose III at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is a fragmentary ancient Egyptian portrait sculpture carved from quartzite. It depicts the pharaoh Thutmose III of the 18th Dynasty, who ruled from approximately 1479 to 1425 BCE and is renowned for his extensive military campaigns that expa...

Housed in the British Museum, the Bust of Amenhotep III is a sculpted portrait of the pharaoh who presided over ancient Egypt during a period of unprecedented imperial wealth and power in the 18th Dynasty. Ruling from approximately 1388 to 1351 BCE, Amenhotep III was a prolific builder, and this art...

The Bust of Livia Drusilla is an ancient Roman marble portrait currently held in the Louvre Museum in Paris. It depicts Livia Drusilla (58 BCE–29 CE), the influential wife of Emperor Augustus, who was the first Roman empress and mother of Emperor Tiberius. Rendered in the classical style, the sculpt...

The Bust of Nero is a Roman marble portrait sculpture housed in the Capitoline Museums in Rome. It depicts Emperor Nero, who ruled the Roman Empire from 54 to 68 CE as the final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. The sculpture is an important surviving likeness of the emperor, characterized by i...

This marble bust is a Roman-era copy of a Greek original depicting the ancient Athenian tragedian Sophocles, who lived from approximately 497 to 406 BCE. The portrait is classified as the "Lateran type" because its proportions are based on a full-length statue formerly housed in the Lateran collecti...

This Roman marble portrait bust, held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, depicts the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus, who lived from 341 to 270 BCE. Epicurus founded the philosophical school of Epicureanism, which taught that the pursuit of a simple, tranquil life free from pain...

The Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen houses this marble portrait bust of Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, known as Pompey the Great, who lived from 106 to 48 BCE. Pompey was a prominent Roman general and statesman who formed part of the First Triumvirate alongside Julius Caesar and Marcus Licinius Crassu...

This marble portrait bust in the Capitoline Museums in Rome depicts Emperor Antoninus Pius, who ruled the Roman Empire from 138 to 161 CE. Antoninus Pius is traditionally counted among the Five Good Emperors and is noted for the relative peace and stability of his reign. The bust follows standard Ro...