Marble portrait of a young girl

Marble portrait of a young girl

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The often-changing hairstyles of ladies at the imperial court are well documented, making possible the approximate dating of many portraits of unknown but fashionable women. This girl’s coiffure with a rounded halo of curls and tight braids tied at the nape of the neck is very similar to that of Domitia Longina, wife of the emperor Domitian, as she appears on coin portraits that are dated to the early eighties A.D.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Marble portrait of a young girlMarble portrait of a young girlMarble portrait of a young girlMarble portrait of a young girlMarble portrait of a young girl

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.