Head of Alexander the Great (c. 300–200 BCE): Art, History and Details

Head of Alexander the Great (c. 300–200 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Slightly smaller than life-size, this head of Alexander the Great features a slight turn, tilt, and upward gaze said to have characterized the young conqueror's posture in life. After his death, Alexander was worshiped as a god; posthumous portraits like this one, likely carved in Ptolemaic Egypt, portray him with long hair and youthful, idealized features.

Object facts

• Title: Head of Alexander the Great
• Date: c. 300–200 BCE
• Culture: Greece, Alexandria, Hellenistic
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: marble
• Dimensions: Overall: 26.5 x 14.5 x 13.8 cm (10 7/16 x 5 11/16 x 5 7/16 in.)
• Collection: GR - Greek
• Department: Greek and Roman Art
• Accession number: 1927.209

A detail from the museum

Portraits of Alexander the Great share his characteristic anastole hairstyle, parted off-center and swept back from the forehead.

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. Ralph King

Further reading listed by the museum

• Bieber, Margarete. 1961. The Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age. Rev. ed. New York: Columbia University Press.
• R. H. “A Portrait of Alexander.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 15, no. 1 (January 1928): 6–7.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.