Island Life Magazine Ltd February/March 2014 | Page 41

ADVERTISING FEATURE

Rare trophy at Brading
A

rare silver cup, bought by the
British Museum for £1.8million,
will be on display at a special
exhibition at Brading Roman Villa from
February 14 to May 5.
The Warren Cup, with relief decoration
of homoerotic scenes, takes its name from
its first owner in modern times, art-lover
and collector Edward Perry Warren
(1860-1928). After Warren's death the
cup remained in private hands, largely
because of the nature of the subject
matter.

Such cups
were intended
to provoke
conversation
at private
entertainments
Only with changing attitudes in the
1980s was the cup exhibited to the public,
and in 1999 the British Museum was able
to give this important piece a permanent
home in the public domain; making it
then the most expensive single item it
had ever acquired.
The British Museum believes the

cup was made in the first century
AD, possibly by Greek craftsmen
for a Roman client. It was probably
excavated in the early 20th century
in Palestine, having been hidden and
never recovered rather than buried in a
grave or lost.
Such cups were intended to provoke
conversation at private entertainments,
and