Mouse (1–200 CE): Art, History and Details

Mouse (1–200 CE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The Romans were the first people in antiquity to make large numbers of genre sculptures for no purpose other than household decoration. This mouse may have been just such a knick-knack or it may have ornamented a metal food container laying claim to its contents so that other mice would stay away.

Object facts

• Title: Mouse
• Date: 1–200 CE
• Culture: Italy, Rome
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: bronze
• Dimensions: Overall: 1.4 x 1.6 cm (9/16 x 5/8 in.)
• Collection: GR - Roman
• Department: Greek and Roman Art
• Accession number: 1985.177

A detail from the museum

Small mouse figurines were often affixed to oil lamps to ward off living mice that might eat the wicks or lamp oil

Collection credit

Gift of Keith P. Smith

Further reading listed by the museum

• Kiernan, Philip. "The Bronze Mice of Apollo Smintheus." American Journal of Archaeology 118 (2014): 601-626.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.