Portrait of a Woman with Plautilla-Type Hair, on Modern Bust

Roman art

The head, of unknown provenance and placed on a modern bust, depicts a young woman with an oval face and delicate features, characterised by large eyes with carved iris and pelta-shaped pupils, framed by wide eyebrow arches. The mouth is small, the chin rounded. Her hair, with central parting and concentric undulations over the ears, is gathered on the nape of the neck in a small flattened bun, that recalls one of the variants adopted by Plautilla, wife of the emperor Caracalla. This detail allows us to date this private portrait to the first decade of the third century CE.

Object details

Commentary

Described as a bust of Sabina, wife of Hadrian by Antonio Nibby – who in his Guida alla Galleria records it in Room II in one of the seven high niches – this statue was moved to its current location before 1893. The head, of unknown provenance, is set on a modern bust and depicts a young woman with an oval face and delicate features, characterised by large eyes slightly hollowed out compared to shape of the forehead, with carved irises and pelta-shaped pupils set under wide eyebrow arches. The mouth is small, the chin rounded. The hair, with a central parting, presents decreasing concentric undulations defined with light graffiti which cover the ears and are gathered at the nape of the neck in a small flattened bun. At the hairline, on the forehead and neck, small curled locks escape the gathered bands, creating a highly natural effect. The sophisticated hairstyle is reminiscent of one of the variants adopted in coin portraiture and full-length portraiture by Plautilla, the wife of the emperor Caracalla from 202 to 205, the year of his exile to the Lipari Islands, who tragically died in 211 CE. This particular matronly portrait of the highest quality, finds striking comparisons with the hair style of the portrait identified as Plautilla by J. Meischner and unanimously considered by later critics to be one of the few indisputable images of her and a very rare case of a portrait to survive the damnatio memoriae (Wiggers-Wegner 1971, p. 118 ff; p. 128, table 29, c-d; Fittschen 1978, p. 146; Coraggio 2009, pp. 113–114, no. 88; Riccomini 2014, pp. 132–133). According to the classification proposed by Saletti, it should correspond to the third coin type, minted between 202 and 205, when Plautilla was already Augusta: the hairstyle adopted at the time featured twisted locks descending obliquely on the nape of the neck, gathered in a wide and flat weave of plaits (Scheitelzopf) (Saletti 1967, pp. 32–33). As in the Vatican head, in the present statue a few fine locks escape the hairstyle on the nape and forehead.

Although the Borghese portrait does not depict Augusta, it presents an excellent execution and can be dated to the first decade of the third century CE.

Jessica Clementi