Dewlish leopard

This striking mid-4th-century mosaic from Dewlish Roman villa in Dorset – a 2m by 2.4m panel depicting a leopard attacking an antelope – has been purchased by the Dorset County Museum, saving it from being exported overseas. Discovered during excavations at Dewlish in 1974, the leopard mosaic is considered one of the most realistic depictions of an animal by a Romano-British artist to survive in any artistic medium. It was sold at auction back in 2018, then resold to an international buyer in 2019, but lobbying by the County Museum saw the DCMS put a temporary export bar on the panel, in the hope that the necessary funds to buy it back could be raised. We reported on this campaign in CA