Portrait of a Roman Man

In imperial Rome, in addition to portraits of emperors and members of their families, numerous portraits of private individuals were produced. There were so many statues that, according to the ancients, they made up "a whole separate Roman people". Roman artists always paid attention to the character of the sitter. This marvellous portrait of an unknown Roman is in just this style. Beyond the outwardly ordinary features we can see the very individual nature of the man who played an important role in late Republican Rome and the early Empire. We know of several replicas of this man's portrait, of which the Hermitage example is recognized to be the best. For many years it was thought to be a portrait of Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo, a military commander famous for victories in Parthia and Armenia. But closer study led to a rejection of this theory and the unknown man, with his intelligent, ironic face, is more likely to be a scholar than a soldier and his prototype has been sought amongst the politicians and literary figures. None of the names suggested so far, such as the poet Horace, or Gaius Maecenas (friend of Augustus), have been sufficiently convincingly supported, and the question remains open.