Dr Sally Foster: 19th-century replicas and the generation of visions of early medieval peoples

Abstract:

There is a growing awareness that replicas contributed significantly to academic and popular perceptions of early medieval material culture during the long nineteenth century. Linked by the vision, energy and actions of one man — George Buist — in 1839 the St Andrews Literary and Philosophical Society and the Fifeshire Literary, Scientific and Philosophical Society produced multiple plastercasts of the St Andrews Sarcophagus and pewter replicas of the Norries’s Law hoard, respectively one of the most accomplished surviving Pictish sculptures and the largest surviving body of Pictish metalwork.  By 1853, visitors could see fac similes of the St Andrews Sarcophagus in Dublin, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Cupar. This unexpectedly precocious, scientifically motivated programme of replication of archaeological material culture also provides an important window into contemporary attitudes to St Andrews’ medieval legacy, and to early medieval material culture in general. In all senses, it is the starting point for introducing how the biographies of replicas also add to our appreciation of Victorian and Edwardian medievalism.