Portrait of Marcus Aurelius

As a young man, Marcus Aurelius was adopted as the emperor Antoninus Pius’s chosen successor. This portrait depicts Marcus as a youthful prince, with the first traces of a beard and a head of rich curls. The imposing nude torso gives him a heroic appearance, enhanced by the military cloak draped around his shoulders and the sword and scepter he holds. Emperor from A.D. 160-181, Marcus spent much of his reign confronting invasions on the northern and eastern frontiers of the Empire. He also wrote a collection of philosophical reflections known as the Meditations.

This statue was found at a villa near Rome in 1771 by the Scottish antiquarian and art dealer Gavin Hamilton. Hamilton sold it to the first Marquess of Lansdowne, who assembled a large collection of Greek and Roman sculpture at his house in London. The statue was restored from several fragments in the late 1700s. According to Hamilton’s correspondence, the head was found near the body; scholars disagree over whether or not the head belonged to this statue in antiquity.