3-037-166 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Portrait Head of Plautilla, A.D. 200-205. Additional Info: Depicted in this portrait is the Empress Plautilla (ca. A.D. 185-212), wife of Caracalla (A.D. 188-217) and daughter of the praetorian prefect Fulvius Plautianus. Few sculptures survive of the empress, who was exiled by her husband in A.D. 205 and then murdered on his orders in A.D. 212. She is shown as a young girl. Her hair is parted in the center, and a series of vertically oriented braids cover the sides and top of her head. These braids come down low on the nape of the neck, where they are folded back up to just below the occiput. Loose waves of hair are brushed over the frontal braids and form a wide band over the forehead.