Translucent deep amber brown, colorless, and colorless with a bluish tinge. Oval disk in two layers of varying thickness with flat back, ground edge, and gently sloping upper surface; slight undercutting around edge to head; fused to disk, a carved head in high relief. Head of beardless man in three-quarter view to right, wearing a laurel wreath; hair in flowing locks over forehead and to front of proper right ear, eyebrows with parting between bridge of nose, large almond-shaped eyes with small, round pupils, pointed nose, small mouth with pursed lips, and prominent chin. Head intact; disk with broken off chip at bottom right; pinprick bubbles in head; larger bubbles in disk; very little weathering but some dulling on disk.
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Title:Glass cameo: head of Augustus
Period:Early Imperial, Tiberian
Date:early 1st century CE
Culture:Roman
Medium:Glass
Dimensions:Height: 1 1/8in. (2.9cm)
Classifications:Gems, Glass
Credit Line:The Cesnola Collection, Purchased by subscription, 1874–76
Object Number:74.51.4297
From Cyprus
Myres, John L. 1914. Handbook of the Cesnola Collection of Antiquities from Cyprus. p. 425, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1920. Catalogue of Engraved Gems of the Classical Style. no. 330, p. 162, pl. 74, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1948. Roman Portraits, 2nd edn. no. 26, p. ii, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1949. "Glyptic Portraits of the late Republic and early Empire in the Metropolitan Museum." Hommages à Joseph Bidez et à Franz Cumont. p. 299, pl. XXII, 11, Brussels: Latomus, revue d'études latines.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1956. Catalogue of Engraved Gems of the Classical Style: Greek, Etruscan, and Roman. no. 650, pp. 130–31, pl. 73, Rome: L'Erma di Bretschneider.
Megow, Wolf-Rüdiger. 1987. Kameen von Augustus bis Alexander Severus, Antike Münzen und geschnittene Steine, XI, Deutsches Archaologisches Institut, ed. no. A 25, p. 169, pl. 13.15, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter & Co.
Boschung, Dietrich. 1993. Die Bildnisse des Augustus. no. 213, p. 195, Berlin: Gebr. Mann.
Milleker, Elizabeth J. 2000. The Year One: Art of the Ancient World East and West no. 45, pp. 58–9, 206, New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 2006[1956]. Catalogue of Engraved Gems of the Classical Style: Greek, Etruscan, and Roman, 2nd edn. no. 650, pp. 130–31, pl. 73, color pl. 21, Rome: L'Erma di Bretschneider.
Lightfoot, Christopher S. 2017. The Cesnola Collection of Cypriot Art : Ancient Glass. no. 483, pp. 44, 69, 315–16, Online Publication, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than 30,000 works ranging in date from the Neolithic period to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312.
