Townley Vase

The Townley Vase[1] is a large Roman marble vase of the 2nd century, discovered in 1773 by the Scottish antiquarian and dealer in antiquities Gavin Hamilton in excavating a Roman villa[2] at Monte Cagnola (Montecanino) considered to have been a villa of Antoninus Pius,[3] between Genzano and Civita Lavinia, near the ancient Lanuvium, in Lazio, southeast of Rome.

It is carved with a deep frieze in bas-relief, occupying most of the body, illustrating a Bacchanalian procession.

Townley's collection, long on display in his London house in Park Street, was bought for the British Museum after his death in 1805.

In the 19th century it was often imagined that Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn (1819) was inspired by the Townley Vase, though modern critics suggest instead that the inspiration was more generic, and may have also owed something to scenes portrayed on William Hamilton's collection of Greek vases which entered the BM collection at around the same time.

Between the World Wars, table lamps modelled after the Townley Vase identified "cultured" households.