This plaster bust, unusual in an English collection at that time, was originally thought by Soane to be after a bust of Napoleon by the Venetian sculptor Antonio Canova. However, it is in fact most likely to be based upon, or a cast of, a similar bust by Antoine-Denis Chaudet now in the Louvre in Paris. It is not known how the bust came into Soane’s possession but it is shown in an engraved view of the colonnade published in Soane’s last description of his house in 1835, and drawn around 1834.