CAST GALLERY

GALLERY 14, LEVEL G

The Cast Gallery is one of the country’s oldest, largest and best-preserved collections of casts taken from monuments and sculptures of the ancient world. The Museum's cast collection began in 1884 and now numbers over 900.

Greece and Rome were profuse statue-using cultures and the gallery represents the density of sculptured monuments to be found in a variety of ancient contexts: the sanctuary, the public square, the cemetery and the country villa.

The casts are exact 1:1 replicas and give a powerful idea of the scale and physicality of ancient statues and reliefs.

Highlights in the gallery include the Laocoon cast group and the grand imperial reliefs from the Arch of Trajan at Beneventum, along with the Nike of Paeonius, the Delphi Charioteer and sculptures from the temple of Zeus at Olympia.

There is also a unique display of casts of Roman and Late Antique portraits from Aphrodisias in southwest Turkey.

Many of the well-known images such as the Uffizi Boar in Florence, the Thorn Puller (Spinario) and small bronze copies of these statues are on display in the Britain and Italy Gallery and Italian Renaissance Gallery.

Cast gallery displays

Inside the gallery, you'll be surrounded by life-size casts and reliefs taken from monuments and statues from the ancient world.

Laocoon group

This masterful cast is made from the marble original of the so-called Laocoön group, which was found in Rome in 1506 and placed on public display in the Vatican, where it remains. The sculpture shows Laocoön, a Trojan priest of Apollo, and his sons struggle with two flesh-eating snakes, sent as a divine punishment.

c. 50 BCE – 20 BCE

CG.B.130

Cast of a section of the relief of Trajan's column

From the Column of Trajan erected in the Forum of Trajan in Rome. In situ on the column in its original position in Trajan’s forum in Rome. The relief shows the deeds of Trajan and the Roman legions during the Dacian Wars of 101-2 and 105-6.

Early 20th century (creation)
113 CE (original)

CG.A.150.b

Prima Porta Augustus coloured cast (detail)

Painted cast of the Emperor Augustus which was acquired in 2009 from the Musei Vaticani. Reconstructed polychrome version produced under the scientific direction of P. Liverani.

2001 – 2009

CG.H.102

Cast of a satyr and a Hermaphrodite

A satyr sits on a rock, seizing a Hermaphrodite from behind. The compositional group was a famous Hellenistic work replicated in some 20 full-scale versions in Roman villas and theatres.

2013 (creation)
1 CE – 200 CE (original)

CG.H.107

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CAST GALLERY DEPARTMENT

The Ashmolean Cast Gallery is one of the oldest, largest and best-preserved collections of casts of Greek and Roman sculpture in the UK, containing some 900 plaster casts of statues, reliefs and architectural sculptures.

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