A Roman marble head of Aphrodite, Circa 1st-2nd Century A.D.

Depicted with a serene expression on her face, her head tilted and turned to the right, the waving hair centrally-parted and dressed with a diadem around her head, the elaborate curls drawn back into a loose chignon, some escaping at the base of the neck, the frontal tresses swept into a topknot, the wide-set eyes beneath a softly curving browline, the full lips slightly parted, 10½in (26.8cm) high, mounted, cleaned, the tip of the nose restored. Estimate: £10,000 - 15,000

Provenance: UK private collection. Acquired by the father of the present owner in Paris in the 1960s.

Literature: This head is of the Venus de Medici type, named after a Hellenistic marble statue of the goddess dated to the 1st Century B.C., now in the Uffizi Museum, Florence. This type is thought to date originally to the early part of the 3rd Century B.C. Cf. M. Bieber, The Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age, (New York, 1955), p.20, fig. 28.

Bonhams. Antiquities, 29 Apr 2009. New Bond Street www.bonhams.com (Copyright © 2002-2009 Bonhams 1793 Ltd., Images and Text All Rights Reserved)