page_title: Charles Townley
section_title: Townley Collection
hierarchical_section_title: Charles Townley / Townley Collection
caption_attribution_description: English: Youth with his dog, mastering a horse with a metal bridle (now lost). Marble relief, Roman artwork inspired by Greek classical models, ca. 125 AD. From the Villa Adriana, near Tivoli. Roman gallery, British Museum (London). Français&#160;: Jeune homme accompagné par son chien, tentant de maîtriser son cheval à l'aide d'un mors en métal (aujourd'hui disparu). Bas-relief en marbre, œuvre romaine inspirée par des modèles classiques grecs, vers 125 ap. J.-C. Provenance: villa Adriana, près de Tivoli. Roman gallery, British Museum (London).
context_page_description: Charles Townley FRS was a wealthy English country gentleman, antiquary and collector. He travelled on three Grand Tours to Italy, buying antique sculpture, vases, coins, manuscripts and Old Master drawings and paintings. Many of the most important pieces from his collection, especially the Townley Marbles are now in the British Museum's Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities. The marbles were overshadowed at the time, and still today, by the Elgin Marbles.
context_section_description: The antiquities collected by Townley, which now constitute the Townley Collection at the British Museum, consists of some 300 items and includes one of the great collections of Graeco-Roman sculptures and other artefacts. Prominent amongst this collection are:
  Astragalizontes ("Boys Playing at Knucklebones") attributed to the Greek sculptor Polykleitos
  Bust of Clytie
  Bust of Hadrian
  Cista Mystica
  Discobolus
  Nymph with a shell
  Pair of dogs
  Pair of statues of Pan, signed by Marcus Cossutius Cerdo
  Tombstone of the shoemaker Xanthippos
  Townley Sphinx
  Townley Vase
  Townley Venus
  When Townley died in 1805 his family sold the collection of marbles, larger bronzes and terracottas to the British Museum for £20,000 – a sum probably a fraction of its original purchase price. The trustees of the museum obtained a parliamentary grant specifically for the purpose. The smaller antiquities, including coins, engraved gems, and pottery, followed in 1814.
  Townley fully intended to leave this collection to the British Museum, as indicated in his will. However, shortly before his death he decided to leave it to the care of his brother Edward and his uncle John Townley on the condition that the sculptures should be exhibited in a purpose-built gallery. The gallery was duly constructed, but as the collection of the Museum's Greek and Roman antiquities grew, it became clear that the old Montague House, the original home of the Museum, was too small for its purpose. The old Jacobean mansion and its Palladian-style Townley Gallery were pulled down in 1823 and gradually replaced with grand rooms arranged over two floors around a central courtyard, today's quadrangular building.
caption: A relief from Townley's collection, from Hadrian's Villa near Tivoli, ca. 125 AD.
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