A small group of three dioscuri (Castor and Pollux, the twin sons of Jupiter by Leda) has been found in Britain at Colchester (150), Wroxeter (408) and Canterbury (641). They all depict a naked youth wearing a pileus, or conical cap, standing with his arms bent at the elbows and hands raised to his chest. The figurine from Canterbury carries what might be a torch in his right hand. The figures from Colchester and Canterbury are remarkably similar and may even have been produced from the same mould, while the Wroxeter figure has a slightly wider stance. Two similar figures from the Continent have also been identified. One from Tongeren, Belgium (de Boe 1981, fig. 13), resembles the Wroxeter piece, while a figure from Vaison, France (Rolland 1965, 69 no. 102), is in the same stance as those from Colchester and Canterbury.
Henig and Webster (2002, 105) suggest that these figures are copies of a late Classical bronze and were perhaps popular with soldiers in the Imperial Army in the 1st centuries BC or AD. The presence of two of the British figures at sites with early military associations might support this idea.
© Internet Archaeology/Author(s)
University of York legal statements | Terms and Conditions
| File last updated: Tue Mar 20 2012