For the farther satisfaction of the curious: how an alabaster carving from Caerleon reached the Ashmolean Museum

An alabaster carving found under strange circumstances in seventeenth-century Caerleon and presented to the Ashmolean Museum has now been identified as a depiction of St Michael from a medieval tomb chest. This article places the carving in context and speculates as to its origins. Finally it comments on the strange route by which this quite unexceptional carving has been given pride of place in a prestigious museum.