A marble head of the Emperor Augustus has been found at a large and well-appointed Roman villa just discovered outside the capital .

The head, practically a bas-relief, shows the emperor in profile in his middle years .

It will shortly be taken to the newly refurbished Roman Antiquities Museum at Palazzo Massimo near Termini Station to be shown to the public .

Also travelling from the dig site - north of Rome, not far from Hadrian's great villa - will be some 100 gold and silver coins .

The head was found at the bottom of a well at the villa, a large (2,500 square-metre) property built between the second century BC and the first century AD .

"We don't know who the villa belonged to," said dig leader Stefano Musco .

"This is an area dotted with villas, because of its proximity to the administrative and cultural hub that was Hadrian's court" .

The villa also boasts "particularly fine" mosaic floors with characteristic geometrical designs, Musco said .

Other finds were thermal baths, a warehouse and two entrance halls or atria. Augustus (63 BC-14 AD), the adopted son of Jiulus Caesar, was Rome's first emperor