East Riding Museums

This item is in the Burton Constable Hall collections and is included on this database by kind permission of the Burton Constable Foundation. Cheere’s life-size statue of Livia Augusta, ‘finished in the best manner,’ cost ten guineas in 1765. Described as ‘the most powerful woman in the early Roman empire’, Livia was the wife of Augustus, the first Roman Emperor and the mother of Tiberius by her first husband, Tiberius Claudius Nero. An intelligent and persuasive woman, she exerted great influence over her husband and her son who eventually succeeded as Emperor. The statue of Livia Augusta at Stourhead may have provided Cheere with a source for this work. Located in the Staircase Hall.