Glass portrait head of a woman

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Semi-opaque streaky blue. Hollow block pressed into an open mold with irregular tooling marks on inside and ground flat edges around top of head. Shaped by mold and then details added by carving: long flowing headdress in two folds above hair, falling onto shoulder; hair parted at the center and arranged in flowing locks to either side; arched brows; well-defined eyes with eyelids and upward-looking pupils; straight nose with flaring nostrils; small mouth with pursed lips; small chin; part of dress visible on proper right collar. Broken across bottom and up proper left side; pinprick and some larger bubbles; pitting of surface bubbles and patches of creamy brown weathering. This portrait, in glass imitating rare and valuable lapis lazuli, was made by pressing the glass into an open mold. It probably represents the goddess Juno (Greek Hera), the consort of Jupiter Capitolinus, and must have been set up in either a public temple or a rich private sanctuary.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art