European Year of Cultural Heritage

The Laocoön and His Sons sculpture; the inscription 'ANNO EUROPEO DEL Patrimonio Culturale' (European Year of Cultural Heritage), the state name 'Città del VATICANO', the year '2018', the name of designer Daniela Longo, the initials of engraver Claudia Mormoni, and the mint mark 'R'.

The Laocoön Group is one of the most striking testimonies of ancient sculpture: the marble figures of the Trojan priest Laocoön and his two sons, entwined by sea serpents, were probably created in the 1st century BC and are regarded as a masterpiece of Hellenistic Rhodian sculpture. Since its rediscovery on the Esquiline Hill in 1506, the sculpture has been housed in the Vatican Museums — part of a collection ranking among the most significant and extensive in the world. The museums themselves are an institution that has grown continuously since the 16th century and today draws millions of visitors a year to Vatican City.

The European Year of Cultural Heritage 2018, proclaimed by the European Commission, was guided by the idea of raising awareness of Europe's shared cultural heritage — from ancient sites and works of art to living traditions. The Holy See took part in this European initiative, underlining its role as one of the world's foremost custodians of cultural heritage: the Vatican collections, archives and monuments — from St Peter's Basilica to the Sistine Chapel — represent millennia of Western cultural history. The choice of the Laocoön Group as the motif captures this claim precisely: not a Christian symbol, but a universal heritage of antiquity that has found its place within the Vatican.