Nowhere else in Munich the ancient world is nearer than on the Königsplatz with the Propylaeum, the national collection of antiques and the Glyptothek, a building with a collection of antique Greece and Roman stone sculptures and cut stones of the Bavarian State. Behind the temple front of the oldest museum of Munich one of the leading collections of sculptures from the Greek and Roman time are hidden like the Statue of the barberinic faun the gable figure from the Aphaia-Temple of Ägina that is 2500 years old or portraits of historical characters.

The Glyptothek is the owner of sculptures, mosaics and reliefs from the archaic time (about 650 b. C.) to the late roman time (about 550 a. C.).

The collection is due to King Ludwig I. who acquired antic sculptures systematically already in the year 1804 being crown prince. His agent for art Johann Martin von Wagner bought the barberinic faun 1813 in Rom and the precious gable figure of the Aphaia-Temple of Ägina – the so called Äginaten – in Greece.

Leo von Klenze purchased the portrait of the goddess Eirene and Diomedes which was found in Rom by auction in Paris whereas Ilioneus which derived from the collection of Emperor Rudolf II from Prague was purchased by Ludwig himself in Vienna 1814.

Later further acquisitions succeeded like the Apoll of Tenea 1853 and the so called Münchner Kouros 1909. The also famous discus thrower from Esquilin which was purchased 1938 had to be passed back ten years later to Itlay because of the American occupying power.