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For clarification this is an object I own. It is part of the Traves Parkinson Collection - R W Traves Parkinson. This votive of the Etruscan God Laran was made in about 400BC. It was the Lar Familiaris or household God and would have been the centrepiece of the household shrine of an Etruscan family. The Lar Familiaris in the family shrine represented the spirits of the ancestors of the family. This particular bronze was found in a field near York and may have come to Britain in the rucksack of a Roman Legionary. The ninth legion raised by Julius Caesar in 58 BC was also based in York for more than 50 years. The ninth marched out of York in 117 AD to drive the Picts back into Scotland. The legend is that they marched north deep into the Grampian Mountains in full array but never returned, being lost to history in the mists of Scotland. Perhaps a member of the ill fated legion hid his treasured family heirloom before marching north, in order to keep it safe? Perhaps he was haunted by premonitions of the legions fate and hoped that either he or one of his comrades would return to reclaim the sacred image; but alas no one returned