Roman head of the Hermes Propylaios

The origin of this early Imperial piece, a Roman replica of a Greek original from the 4th century BC, goes back to the Hermes Propylaios, so called because of its location in the propylaea of the Acropolis in Athens, which was the work of Phidias' pupil Alcamenes, and which is characterised by a long beard with vertically wavy locks, three rows of curls on the forehead and a half-open mouth. Numerous variants of this Hermes appeared in Greek times. This piece belongs to the Warocqué type, named after the Hermes in the collection of the Belgian industrialist Raoul Warocqué, now in the Royal Museums in Brussels.