Just outside Argos there was a major sanctuary of Hera, commonly called the Argive Heraion, and the sculptor Polykleitos made the huge cult statue for the Temple of Hera there in about 420 BCE. Like the cult statues in the Temple of Zeus at Olympia and the Parthenon it was made of gold and ivory and has long since disappeared. This head is said to be copied or derived from that colossal cult statue.
Most depictions of Hera show her, as here, with a pure but severe expression, and a tiara or diadem on her head
Naples National Museum 144
Purchased in 1884 from the casting establishment of Naples Museum
Lippold: Griechische Plastik, 173 (n.9)
Walston: Catalogue of Casts in the Museum of Classical Archaeology (1889), 65, no.293
Ruesch: Guide to the National Museum, Naples, 49-, fig.19
Found in Naples. Formerly in the Farnese collection, Rome
