Plato was a Greek philosopher and writer, from a prominent Athenian family background, who lived from 429 to 347 BCE. After the death of his tutor Socrates he travelled extensively, and on his return to Athens founded the Academy, a school of philosophy which lasted for nine hundred years, and where he himself taught for forty. Plato’s best known works are the Dialogues, one of which is his Republic.

This portrait head, mounted on a square pillar called a herm, is a cast of a Roman copy. A handful of lifesize portraits like this exist, all quite similar, so it is probable that all are copied from a lost Greek prototype