The Museum of Classical Archaeology is a museum in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

, England, housed in the

Faculty of Classics Faculty or faculties may refer to: Academia * Faculty (academic staff), professors, researchers, and teachers of a given university or college (North American usage) * Faculty (division), a large department of a university by field of study (us ...

of the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

. Since 1982, it has been located in a purpose-built gallery on the first floor of the Faculty of Classics on the

Sidgwick Site The Sidgwick Site is one of the largest sites within the University of Cambridge, England. Overview and history The Sidgwick Site is located on the western side of Cambridge city centre, near the Backs. The site is north of Sidgwick Avenue an ...

of the university. The museum is one of the few surviving collections of

plaster cast A plaster cast is a copy made in plaster of another 3-dimensional form. The original from which the cast is taken may be a sculpture, building, a face, a pregnant belly, a fossil or other remains such as fresh or fossilised footprints – ...

s of ancient

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

and

Roman sculpture The study of Roman sculpture is complicated by its relation to Sculpture of Ancient Greece, Greek sculpture. Many examples of even the most famous Greek sculptures, such as the ''Apollo Belvedere'' and ''Barberini Faun'', are known only from Roman ...

in the world. The collection consists of several hundred casts, including casts of some of the most famous surviving ancient Greek and Roman sculptures. Noteworthy casts include those of the ''

Laocoön and His Sons The statue of ''Laocoön and His Sons'', also called the Laocoön Group (), has been one of the most famous ancient sculptures since it was excavated in Rome in 1506 and put on public display in the Vatican Museums, where it remains today. The st ...

'', the

Farnese Hercules The ''Farnese Hercules'' () is an ancient statue of Hercules made in the early third century AD and signed by Glykon, who is otherwise unknown; he was an Athenian but he may have worked in Rome. Like many other Ancient Roman sculptures it is a ...

, the

Barberini Faun The life-size ancient but much restored marble statue known as the ''Barberini Faun'', ''Fauno Barberini'' or ''Drunken Satyr'' is now in the Glyptothek in Munich, Germany. A faun is the Roman equivalent of a Greek satyr. In Greek mythology, s ...

and ''

Charioteer of Delphi The ''Charioteer of Delphi'', also known as ''Heniokhos'' (, the rein-holder), is a statue surviving from Ancient Greece and an example of ancient bronze sculpture. The life-size (1.8m) Janson, H.W. (1995) ''History of Art''. 5th edn. Revised a ...

''. The

Peplos Kore The Peplos Kore is an ancient sculpture from the Acropolis of Athens. It is considered one of the best-known examples of Archaic Greek art. Kore is a type of archaic Greek statue that portrays a young woman with a stiff posture looking straight ...

is perhaps the best known exhibit in the museum. It is a plaster cast of an ancient Greek statue of a young woman painted brightly as the original would have been, which was set up on the

Acropolis of Athens The Acropolis of Athens (; ) is an ancient citadel located on a rocky outcrop above the city of Athens, Greece, and contains the remains of several Ancient Greek architecture, ancient buildings of great architectural and historical significance, ...

, around 530 BCE. In 1975, the museum attempted to replicate the sculpture's original appearance by painting a cast of the figure. The replica is displayed next to a second, unpainted cast as a challenge to the erroneous equation of ancient Greek sculpture with pure white marble. The museum also holds a large collection of

sherds This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains. A B C D E F ...

and epigraphic squeezes. The museum is open to the public Tuesday to Friday (10.00am to 5.00pm) and on Saturdays in university term time (2.00pm to 5.00pm). The museum is one of eight which make up the

University of Cambridge Museums University of Cambridge Museums is a consortium of the eight museums of the University of Cambridge. The consortium works in partnership with the Cambridge University Botanic Garden and other Cambridge University collections. It was awarded Maj ...

consortium. Its former home on Little St Mary's Lane was designed by

Basil Champneys Basil Champneys (17 September 1842 – 5 April 1935) was an English architect and author whose most notable buildings include Manchester's John Rylands Library, Somerville College Library (Oxford), Newnham College, Cambridge, Lady Margaret Ha ...

in 1883. In the 1970s it became evident that it was no longer adequate to house the collection, and it now houses the library of

Peterhouse Peterhouse is the oldest Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge in England, founded in 1284 by Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely. Peterhouse has around 300 undergraduate and 175 graduate stud ...

References

External links

Museum of Classical Archaeology website
{{Authority control Classical Archaeology Institutions in the School of Arts and Humanities, University of Cambridge Museum of Classical Archaeology Sculpture galleries in the United Kingdom Art museums and galleries in Cambridgeshire Collections of classical sculpture Archaeological museums in England History museums in Cambridgeshire Museums in Cambridge Museums of ancient Rome in the United Kingdom Museums of ancient Greece in the United Kingdom Plaster cast collections