Cleveland Museum of Art

Head of a Young Woman

Date

25–1 BCE

Medium

marble

Culture

Italy, Roman (archaizing)

Department

Greek and Roman Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This head of a young woman is designed after Greek art in the Archaic period (c. 600–480 BCE). She references a type of Greek statue called a kore in her heavily patterned hair, almond-shaped eyes, neutral expression, and large disk earrings, best preserved on the right ear. Her stephane or diadem crown is from the later Hellenistic period; however, with the addition of the decorative vegetal scroll it is characteristic of Roman art. All these elements together are not found in original Greek archaic artworks. This ancient combination of deliberately historic styles is called archaizing or archaistic by modern scholars. When Rome conquered Greece in 146 BCE, Romans developed a taste for historic Greek art.

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