296 THE WILTSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY MAGAZINE 
The Minerva Plaque from Charlton Down 
by Paul Robinson 
The late Roman bronze plaque depicting the 
goddess Minerva (accession no.354 — fig. 1, left), 
found in the 19th century at Charlton is arguably 
the best known object of Roman date in the 
Society’s collection, and has recently been 
described as ‘surely one of the most interesting and 
attractive figural bronzes from Britain’ (Henig 
2001, 110f). This note is inspired by the recent 
donation to the museum by Mrs_ Elizabeth 
Williamson of an early lead cast of the plaque 
(accession no.2003.6 — fig. 1, right) which she had 
originally purchased from an antiques shop in 
Chippenham. It provides the opportunity of 
confirming the findspot of the original plaque 
about which there has been confusion in the past as 
well as considering how and when it entered the 
museum collection. 
The first known reference to the plaque is a 
brief account of the exhibition by the Revd Edward 
Wilton of a cast of it on 6 June 1851 at a meeting of 
Fig. 1 The bronze original (left), and the lead replica (right) 
