Helios is shown as a charioteer, swinging his whip over his head with his r. hand. The whip has a short handle and a long corded or braided strap which comes down to the charioteer’s l. ear, then falls on his shoulder. He stands with his back partly against a pillar topped by acanthus leaves, and partly free of it. Almost all of the back of the skull and a little more than half of the back can be seen. The two arms and the whip are also free of the background, resulting in characteristic open work. The body is fat and massive, and the neck is broad and short. The head is squarish, with a small pouting or smiling mouth. The button lips have a small central drilled hole. His forehead is crowned by a series of broad, triangular rays. The body was probably intended to be athletic. To the l. of the figure are cuttings: a horizontal one is at head height; the other, after a dotted drill row, is perhaps the upper rim of a chariot. The back pillar, which is somewhat rounded, spreads at the top to end in three preserved acanthus leaves. It looks as if originally there could not have been more than five.

The tooling is largely with a small stop drill and light chisel. The surface is smoothed. Fingers are indicated by incision.

The strict r. and l. profile views make Helios look like a Byzantine emperor of the 5th or 6th C. He belongs to a well-known group of open-work alabaster sculpture.

Marble, alabaster-like, and yellowish.

Broken at waist of figure and on l. side; part of r. arm broken, and l. arm below the elbow. There are traces of black pigment (water soluble) on locks, nose, and whip.