Books, Miscellaneous

The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus – Receding Hairline of Caesar

I was reading this book and stumbled upon this part that was amusing to read:

What is supportable is that Caesar proudly wore every feature of his aging face as a badge of an accomplished and well-lived life. A portrait (ca. 44 B.C.) from Tusculum, now in Turin, harmoniously presents every facial crinkle and fold (Fig. 16). Caesar wears the concentric circles of wrinkles around his neck like a shimmering silver torque and his baldness like a princely crown. That is not to say that Caesar was above vanity. Caesar’s enemies poked fun at his baldness and used it against him, causing him to find ways to conceal it (Suet., Caesar 45). When the Senate and People of Rome voted him the privilege of wearing a laurel wreath, Caesar immediately embraced it, positioning it low on his forehead to mask his receding hairline. Masterful coin portraits, struck in 44 B.C. by Marcus Mettius, depict Caesar with this very laurel crown, cleverly conceived as if it grew naturally from his own locks (Fig. 17).