Great Forgers of the Past

Abstract

The paper, an introduction to the text titled A Cuneiform Forgery. A Miniature Obelisk with Assyrian
Inscription in the Collection of the National Museum in Warsaw synthetically outlines the
history of forging antique art since Roman times until the 20th century, with a particular focus
on the 1500s–1700s. The author presents various types of adaptations and paraphrases of antique
works (imitation, emulation, repetition, reproduction, similarity, copy, reconstruction,
pastiche, stylization, adaptation, plagiarism, forgery). He points to the significance of copies,
falsifications and pastiches as well as conservators’ reworkings for the emerging modern literature
on art history and archaeology (Winckelmann and others) and the co-responsibility of
both these disciplines for shaping the aesthetic canon and scholarly knowledge on antiquity.