A 18k gold ring set with a 17th/18th century agate cameo. Portrait of Pompey the Great (Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus)

The cameo depicts the portrait of the great Roman general Pompey; statesman and party leader, who was named Magnus, the Great, at the age of 25, upon his return from Africa in 82 BC. The physiognomy presents the image of a mature man, marked by military campaigns and political life. Although no portrait made during his lifetime has survived, numerous honorary statues were erected in his memory, and the subsequent monetary production bearing his effigy allows us to compare the existing statues of this great man, as evidenced by the marble portraits in the Glyptotek in Copenhagen (inv.733) or that of the Louvre Museum, Paris (Ma 6196) from the 2nd century CE, and to relate them to the monetary issues from Sicily produced between 42 and 36 BC.