In the Augustan age, art commissioned by non-dominant groups (e.g. women; formerly enslaved citizens; provincial inhabitants) suggests that these subaltern groups gained newfound importance and agency. That is to say, the crumbling of the Republican system, which favored the senatorial elite class, paved the way for non-elite groups who had long been denied power and agency in public venues. Female patrons, formerly enslaved persons, and even provincial persons can and should be seen as active participants in the cultural revolution that characterizes the Augustan period. **To make your case, choose one of these subaltern groups, and two pieces of evidence made for or by its members.
Your essay must articulate an opinion. It will therefore have a strong thesis that you state earlyon, and defend throughout the essay using material evidence. Remember also that this is anopinion piece, and I want your opinion – you are allowed to use the first person if this paper.Synthesis of primary evidence [art, architecture]: You will need to write about at least two piecesof archaeological evidence in your paper. You must describe each in full, and interpret themwith relevance to your thesis (use them to support the interpretation/opinion that you are tryingto prove in the paper).Interpretation: You are free to either complement or critique the interpretations raised byprevious scholars [the textbook, myself, your TAs, classmates, etc.]. But whatever yourconclusions are, you should come to them via the evidence. Use primary evidence and possiblysecondary scholarship to support your claims. Empresses and Women* in the Augustan AgeFragment of the
Severan marble
plan showing the
Porticus Liviae
ca. 203 – 211 CE
Week 5 Announcements
• Paper 1
– Grades posted today
– Averages, general feedback on Wednesday / in section
• Exam 1
– Grading is under way!
• Field Trips
– GRI Poussin & the Dance – confirming RSVPs tomorrow (Tuesday)
2nd Writing Assignment: Tips & Tricks
• Introduction
• On Canvas
– Specs; prompts
– Optional: add’l bibliography
• Will go over more on formatting and
citation in a separate video
– Paper must make an argument. In
other words, your paper sets out to
prove / demonstrate something
• Body Paragraphs
• Opinion piece
– Respond (positively or negatively) to
one of the prompts
– At least two material examples:
DESCRIBE and INTERPRET
• Week 4 and 5 material
• Conclusion
• Submission
– Monday, May
2nd
by midnight
– SYNTHESIS, not summary
2nd Writing Assignment: Tips & Tricks
• Building space and grace into
these assignments
– Complete 2 of 3
– No averaging, just the two highest
• Small-step writing
– Pilot project
– Plan and write a little everyday
• Look out for an email
• Introduction
– Paper must make an argument. In
other words, your paper sets out to
prove / demonstrate something
• Body Paragraphs
– At least two material examples:
DESCRIBE and INTERPRET
• Conclusion
– SYNTHESIS, not summary
Empresses and Women* in the Augustan Age
• Women in Roman society
– Rights, roles, responsibilities
• Imperial Women
– Augustus’ leading ladies
• Women in the Augustan Age
– Provincial case study of Eumachia in
Pompeii
Relief detail from the Ara Pacis, Rome, 13-9 BCE (marble)
Women* in Roman Society: Rights and Roles
Women cannot:
• Hold an office, take part in war
• Vote
• Operate without a guardian
– Patria potestas: father; husband;
appointed guardian
– *Naming conventions*
At left: panel from the Ara Pacis, exterior south wall
Women* in Roman Society: Rights and Roles
But free women can (as citizens):
• Own property
• Inherit
– From their kin or others
• Initiate lawsuits
• Initiate divorce
– Divorce is very frequent, especially
among the upper class
At left: panel from the Ara Pacis, exterior south wall
The
Sarcophagus of
the Spouses
Etruscan, from
Cerveteri,
ca. 520 BCE
terra-cotta
Women* in Roman Society: Rights and Roles
Elite Occupations
• Matrona (matron; wife)
• Priestesses
– E.g. Vestal virgins; wife of the high
priest of Jupiter; etc.
Sub-elite
• Shop owners
– Involved in commerce, manufacture
• Sex workers
Enslaved women
Statue of
Eumachia, priestess
of Venus, from
Pompeii
Women* in Roman Society: Rights and Roles
Citizen mothers, wives, sisters
• Virtues: pietas; pudicitia
• Cannot vote or hold office
– but this does not mean they are
confined to the domestic sphere!
– Alternative ways to “participate” in
politics
• Auctoritas
Funerary Relief of the Vibii [more on this Wednesday]
Female Exempla in the Roman Republic
• Cloelia
– Early Republican POW who
“inspires honor”
– Voted an equestrian statue
• “Maiden sitting on top of a horse”
(Livy)
• Cornelia
– Voted a posthumous public statue
• Seated statue of Cornelia, daughter of
Africanus, [mother] of the Gracchi
Statues as a distinctly civic honor…
Modern parallel? The equestrian statue of Anita
Garibaldi on the Janiculum hill in Rome
Female Exempla in the Roman Republic
• Cloelia
– Early Republican POW who
“inspires honor”
– Voted an equestrian statue
• “Maiden sitting on top of a horse”
(Livy)
• Cornelia
– Voted a posthumous public statue
• Seated statue of Cornelia, daughter of
Africanus, [mother] of the Gracchi
Statues as a distinctly civic honor…
Empresses and Women* in the Augustan Age
New Opportunities?
Looking at Imperial Women
Empresses and Women in the Augustan Age
• Public presence of women
increases
– In Rome
• and beyond
• Part of the Augustan cultural
transformation
– Changes in politics and gov’t, art and
literature
– Social movements are part of this
cultural revolution too
• Augustus as a symptom of this cultural
revolution…
Powerful Women in the Augustan Age
• Livia
– Augustus’ 3rd wife, mother of
Tiberius
• Octavia
– Augustus’ sister; former wife of
Mark Antony; mother of Marcellus
• Julia
– Augustus’ only child; mother of
Gaius and Lucius
At right: Octavia
Below: Livia
Part I: Portrait
Iconographies
35 BCE:
Augustus sets up
statues of Octavia
and Livia in Rome
N.B.
These are NOT
the statues of 35
BCE, they do not
survive; but these
are actual
portraits of these
women
Nodus:
Bun at the center of
the forehead / top of
the head, a popular
style in the late
Republic
Title: Portrait of Octavia
Location: Rome, now in the Terme Museum
Artist: unknown (state workshop)
Medium: marble
Date: early 30s BCE
Size: life-size
Part I: Portrait
Iconographies
35 BCE:
Augustus sets up
statues of Octavia
and Livia in Rome
N.B.
These are NOT
the statues of 35
BCE, they do not
survive; but these
are actual
portraits of these
women
Nodus:
Bun at the center of
the forehead / top of
the head, a popular
style in the late
Republic
Precedent? Coin of Mark
Antony and Octavia in 39 BCE,
minted in Ephesus
Title: Portrait of Octavia
Following on tradition of
Hellenistic
leaders
Location:
Rome, now
in the Terme Museum
Artist: unknown (state workshop)
Medium: marble
Date: early 30s BCE
Size: life-size
35 BCE:
Augustus sets up
statues of Octavia
and Livia in Rome
Public Honors:
Exempla or
dynastic
messaging?
Nodus:
Bun at the center of
the forehead / top of
the head, a popular
style in the late
Republic
Title: Portrait of Livia
Location: from the Fayum region, Egypt
Artist: n/a
Medium: basalt (hard dark stone)
Date: ca. 31 BCE
Size: just under ife-size
35 BCE:
Augustus sets up
statues of Octavia
and Livia in Rome
**
This later example
is from an
imperial cult site
in Egypt –
Explicit dynastic
messaging
Nodus:
Bun at the center of
the forehead / top of
the head, a popular
style in the late
Republic
Title: Portrait of Livia
Location: from the Fayum region, Egypt
Artist: statue workshop in Egypt
Medium: marble
Date: after 4 BCE
Size: life-size
Ara pacis as a window
onto Augustan policies
Moral legislation – Leges Juliae
• 18 BCE: requirement to marry
– Penalties for remaining unmarried
• 17 BCE: law criminalizing adultery
• 9 CE: law promoting procreation
– Tax breaks for parents
• Women are allowed to exist without a
guardian after 3-5 children
N.B.: In the Ara Pacis, the Imperial Family and children
appear in state art for the first time
Part II: Architectural Projects
Porticus Liviae
• 15 – 7 BCE: Porticus
built on the Esquiline
Hill
– In Livia’s honor with
money and land given to
Augustus
• Ara Concordia
– Livia as patron
Porticus Liviae
• 15 – 7 BCE: Porticus
built on the Esquiline
Hill
– In Livia’s honor with
money and land given to
Augustus
• Ara Concordia
– Livia as patron
Forma Urbis (Marble Plan of Rome from 203-11 CE
Porticus Octaviae
Architectural activity in this area
• 179 BCE Temple of Juno Regina
– Consul M. Aemilius Lepidus
• 146 BCE: Porticus Metellus and
Temple of Jupiter Stator
– C. Caecilius Metellus
• 27 – 23 BCE: Porticus of Octavia
– Porticus of Metellus is replaced
with the Porticus Octaviae
Title: Porticus of Octavia
Location: Campus Martius, Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: n/a
Date: 27 – 23 BCE
Size: 50m by 140m length (one and a half football fields in length)
Porticus Octaviae
Forma Urbis again
Opera octaviae (known from Pliny the Elder)
• Temples to Jupiter Stator and Juno
Regina
• Libraries, schools
– Dedicated in honor of Marcellus by
Octavia herself
• Curia Octaviae
• Art works
– Greek masterpieces (Lysippus’ bronze
Alexander group) and Roman icons
(e.g that seated Cornelia!)
Porticus Octaviae
The Architectural Patron…
• Augustus in Octavia’s name
– Livy, Suetonius, Cassius Dio
• Octavia herself
– Festus, Pliny?
– * the libraries
Porticus Octaviae
Imperial Women as Architectural Patrons
• In Rome, the tradition begins in
the Augustan age
– Buildings built by, or in honor of,
imperial women (Octavia, Livia)
• Significant public honors for
women in this period
– There is little of this in earlier
periods, and nothing on this scale
• Provinces are a different case, but
Rome is Rome
Empresses and Women in the Augustan Age
• Public presence of women increases
– In Rome
– And beyond
• More concrete social power in these
provincial territories?
• Women in the 1st c. BCE
– Not involved in civil war; not targeted
in proscriptions
• Growing power and clout is in some ways
independent of Augustus
For Wednesday & Thursday
• Reading: Lauren Hackworth
Peterson, “Monument and
Memory: The Tomb of the Baker in
Rome”
• Wednesday’s lecture: material
evidence for the freedperson class
• Thursday’s section: discussion of
this article and the Tomb of the
Baker in depth
The tomb of
the Baker in
Rome,
outside the
Porta
Maggiore,
circa 30
BCE,
concrete &
travertine
Writing Assignments
Writing Assignment #1
• Class average: 91% (A-)
– This is great! Kudos
– Writing assignment: 15% of your grade
• Only two count, for 30% total
• Areas of improvement
– Argumentation
• Making a point
• Structuring your paper with this in mind
– Analysis
• Defending your point with material culture
Writing Assignment #2
• Argumentation
– This is an OPINION piece
– You can use the first person voice
• Analysis
– Requires two pieces of evidence
– Material is created with an intended
message, but different audiences view
material with different bkgds and
experiences….this is where interpretation
comes in
• Small step writing program
– Subscribe to the discussion forum
• Working now on a roadmap (outline) that
we’ll begin filling in with prose
On Sources and Citation
I have created a infographic about this (and will record myself talking over it this afternoon),
what follows here is a summary
• Sources
– You can write this piece with the material
that has been assigned
• Lectures; assigned readings
• Outside sources / additional bib
– OPTIONAL
– Use the recommended sources
• “Optional Bib” on canvas
– Outside inclusions – must be scholarly
• Check with myself or your TA
• Move away from Wiki; Khan Academy
• Citation – what to cite
– Shared knowledge (lecture; textbook)
doesn’t need to be cited
– Opinions / arguments DO
• I think; scholars say; etc.
• Citation – format
– Let’s agree on Chicago style
• Notes (foot or end) and bibliography
• All should have a bib, because your opinion
must acknowledge / build on basic facts
(presented in textbook and lecture)
Funerary Art of Freedpersons in the Augustan Age
Funerary relief of the Gessii, 30 – 20 BCE, Rome (marble)
Funerary Art of Freedpersons in the Augustan Age
• Enslavement in the Roman world
– Manumission & the freed citizen
class
• Funerary Evidence
– Review of what we’ve seen
– Relief portraits of Freedpersons
– Tomb of the Baker
Slavery in the Roman world
• An accepted and normalized part
of life
• Slavery – social death
– Enslavement is a social status
– Anyone can be(come) enslaved
• Majority: POWs
Enslavement & manumissio
• Slavery is a social status, but not
necessarily a permanent one
• manumissio
– a release coming from the authority of
the owner
• HOW?
– Freed in wills
• Demonstrations of wealth
– Some “buy” their freedom
• arrangement with their owner; savings
from employment
Funerary relief of the Gessi, 1st c. BCE, Rome (marble)
Enslavement & manumissio
•
Libertus/a
– A freedperson
– Takes a three-part Roman name (you
take name of your former owner)
• Example: Marcus Tullius Tiro (often the
first two names (agnomen and nomen
are “Roman”)
• Citizen Rights
– Voting
– Marriage
• Produces Roman citizens
– 3rd gen. can run for high political office
Funerary relief of the Vibii, 1st c. BCE, Rome (limestone)
Freedpersons in Rome’s Patron/Client System
• Hierarchical Relationship
– with mutual obligations
• Patron (patronus)
– sponsor and benefactor of his clients
– provided physical & financial protection
• Client (cliens)
– offered services to his patron
– supported him politically
– Freedmen become clients upon
manumissio
Funerary relief of the Gessii, 1st c. BCE, Rome (marble)
Freedpersons become
more visible in the Late
Republic & Augustan
era in art/archaeology but also
literary texts
• Conquest and POWs
•
3rd c. BCE on
• Re-distribution of
wealth & power
•
especially 1st c. BCE on
Characteristics of freedperson funerary monuments
• Truncated bust portraits
– Portraits styled for the status quo
• Emphasis on Citizenship
– Tria nomina with “L” for libertus/a
– Gendered attributes
• Women: Draped head (pious matron);
rings; [freedborn] children
• Men: Citizen toga
• Family groups
– Looking forward to the next generation
Title: Funerary Relief of the Gessii
Location/ Museum: Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble (from Carerra)
Date: late Republican, 30-20 BCE
Size: 65cm x 204cm x 34 cm
Pay attention to a single “L” that is not followed by an “F”
GESSIA P L FAUSTA P GESSIUS P F ROM P GESSIUS P L PRIMUS
Gessia P(ublii) L(iberta) Fausta – P(ublius) Gessius (Publii) F(ilius) (Tribu) Rom(ilia) – P(ublius) Gessius P(ublii
Gessii) L(ibertus) Primus
Title: Funerary Relief of the Gessii
Location/ Museum: Rome
Gessia Fausta, freedwoman
of Publius,
of the
Romilian tribe – Publius
Artist: n/aof P. Gessius – Publius Gessius, son
Medium:
marble (from
Carerra)
Gessius
Freedman ofSize:
P. Gessius
Date: late Republican,
30-20Primus,
BCE
65cm x 204cm x 34 cm
Above: Portrait of Gessia Fausta
At right: Portrait of Livia (Augustus’ wife), from the Fayum
EX TESTATUM P GESSI P L PRIMI
From the testament of Publius Gessius Primus, freedman of Publius Gessius
Location/ Museum: Rome
ARBIT[RATU] GESSIA[E] FAUSTA[E]
Title: Funerary Relief of the Gessii
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble (from Carerra)
Under the direction of Gessia
Fausta
Date: late Republican, 30-20 BCE
Size: 65cm x 204cm x 34 cm
P · AIEDIUS ·
P · L·
AMPHIO
AIEDIA · P · L
FAUSTA ·
MELIOR
Publius Aeidius
Amphio,
freedman of
Publius
Aidia Fausta
Melior,
freedwoman of
Publius
Title: Funerary Relief of P. Aiedius Amphio and Aiedia
Location/ Museum: Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble
Date: second half of the 1st c. BCE
Size: 64 cm wide x 99 cm tall
Dextrarum
iunctio:
“joining of
the right
hands”;
sign of
marriage
Title: Funerary Relief of P. Aiedius Amphio and Aiedia
Location/ Museum: Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble
Date: second half of the 1st c. BCE
Size: 64 cm wide x 99 cm tall
Title: Funerary Relief of the Vibii
Location/ Museum: Rome, Vatican Museums
Artist: n/a
Medium: limestone
Date: second half of the 1st century BCE
Size: n/a
L VIBIUS L F TRO.
VECILIA Ↄ L HILAR[A]
L VIBIUS FELICIO FELIX
VIBIA L L PRIMA
Lucius Vibius, son of Lucius,
of the Tromentina tribe.
Pay attention to a retrograde
(backwards) “C” – indicates a
person freed by a woman
Vecilia Hilara, freedwoman
(of a woman).
Lucius Vibius Felicio Felix
Vibia Prima, freedwoman
of Lucius (probably his
daughter)
Funerary Art of Freedpersons in the Augustan Age
Part II:
The Tomb of the Baker
EST HOC
MONIMENTUM
MARCEI VERGILEI
EURYSACIS PISTORIS
REDEMPTORIS APPARET
This is the monument
of Marcus Vergilius
Eurysaces, baker,
contractor.
Apparet:
Public Servant
or
Voila / it’s obvious!
Title: Tomb of Eurysaces the Baker
Location/ Museum: Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble, tufa, concrete core
Date: late Republic (second half of 1st century BCE)
Size: 33 feet tall
“EST HOC MONIMENTUM MARCEI VERGILEI EURYSACIS PISTORIS REDEMPTORIS APPARET”
Sandra Joshel on occupational inscriptions (1992): Work is fundamental to the existence of
an enslaved person, but it is also, paradoxically, the means to achieving something more
Relief images suggest pride in all aspects of his work
“EST HOC MONIMENTUM MARCEI VERGILEI EURYSACIS PISTORIS REDEMPTORIS APPARET”
The Debate:
Does this monument
commemorate a free
man or a freed man?
Why does this
question matter?
Answer: If a freed man
can build something
like this, the game has
changed. New avenues
for social promotion
are open to new
classes / new kinds of
people
Prepare for Section Tomorrow!
• Lauren Hackworth Peterson’s
Monument and Memory: Tomb of
the Baker in Rome
– What is she trying to argue?
• Moving away from the freed or not
debate
– What evidence does she use to prove
her point?
• “Close reading” a monument and a
piece of scholarship
Beyond Rome: Life in the Augustan-era Provinces
(and some thoughts on social mobility broadly)
Monument
of the Julii
(30-20 BCE)
and
(triumphal?)
arch of 1-25
CE, Glanum
EST.HOC.MONIMENTVM
MARCEI.VERGILEI.
EVRYSACIS.PISTORIS.
REDEMPTORIS.APPARET
This is the monument
of Marcus Vergilius
Eurysaces, baker,
contractor. Isn’t it
obvious?
!
Title: Tomb of Eurysaces the Baker
Location/ Museum: Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: marble, tufa, concrete core
Date: late Republic (second half of 1st century BCE)
Size: n/a
New Groups of
people doing
quintessentially
ROMAN things
Example #2:
The Eumachia Building in
Pompeii
(#7 on this plan)
aisle
nave
Title: The Eumachia building
Location/ Museum: Pompeii
Artist: n/a
Medium: brick, concrete, marble
Date: Augustan (early 1st c. CE)
Size:
Eumachia,
daughter of Lucius, a public priestess, in her
own name, and in the name of her son,
Marcus Numistrius Fronto, made the
chalcidicum, the crypta and the porticus
with her own money and dedicated the
same to Concordia Augusta and to Pietas.
Who is Eumachia?
”To Eumachia, daughter of Lucius, public
priestess of Pompeian Venus, from the fullers”
A woman with public influence and [unofficial]
power
Beyond Rome: Provinces in the Augustan Period
• Augustus and the provinces
– How provincial administration
works
• Western Empire Case Study
– Roman Gaul
• Eastern Empire Case Study
– Client Kings & Herod the Great
The Theater at Caesarea Maritima
Provinces under
senatorial
leadership
(no troops;
pacified)
Provinces under
imperial
leadership
(troops; frontier
regions and/or
very wealthy)
Client kingdoms
Governors,
Army
Inhabitants
(roman + locals)
Beyond Rome: The West
Gaul in the Late Republic / Early Empire
Pre-Roman Gaul
• Southern Gaul
– Connected to Mediterranean networks
since the 7th c. BCE
– Hellenistic and Phoenician colonies
• Ex. Massalia (Greek colony / port)
• Northern Gaul
– La Tène culture, ca. 450 – 50 BCE
– Gallic / Celtic groups
• Lived in oppida [hill-top forts]
• Metal work
• Trade with Mediterranean groups
Impact of the Roman Conquest of Gaul
• Mediterranean culture leaves the
Mediterranean
• Roman troops
– Economic explosion
• Supplies depend on trade, commerce
– Civic infrastructure: roads, bridges,
aqueducts
• New towns crop up in the plains, vs. hilltops
– Veterans are settled
On Romanization….
Case Study in Gaul: Architecture in Glanum
• Celtic / Gallic foundation
– Probably 6th – 5th c. BCE
• Roman veterans
– Settled in Glanum and
throughout southern France
after 49 BCE
• Celtic / Roman identities
– Can material culture give us
insight into acculturation,
assimilation, resistance,
resilience…?
Dedicated by Sextus,
Lucius, and Marcus
Julius, sons of Gaius,
to their father
tholos
Gens Julia
+ Persons given
citizenship by Caesar
or Augustus
probably local people
who fought in the
Roman army
quadrifons
socle
Title: Monument of the Julii, Glanum
Location: Glanum (Gallia Narbonennsis)
Architect: unknown, but trained in Rome?
Medium: limestone from local quarries
Date: ca. 30 – 20 BCE
Size: 18m tall
Title: Monument of the Julii, Glanum
Location/ Museum: Glanum (Gallia Narbonennsis)
Artist: “Glanum master” (local artist)
Medium: limestone from local quarries
Date: ca. 30 – 20 BCE
Size: 18m tall
Title: Monument of the Julii, Glanum
Location/ Museum: Glanum (Gallia Narbonennsis)
Artist: unknown (but probably not trained in Rome)
Medium: limestone from local quarries
Date: ca. 30 – 20 BCE
Size: n/a
Roman culture entwined with local customs
• Sculptural carvings
– Greco-Roman iconographies, Celtic
artisans
• Tower tomb
– Eclecticism of architectural motifs
(tholos, quadrifons, etc.) departs
somewhat from the Mediterranean
mode
• Dedicatees: the Julii
– Local men who benefited from
participation in the Roman machine
How does
conquest work?
+ rarely achieved
in one campaign
+ sustained
efforts and
violent raids
“Becoming
Roman” is a long
process that
rewards some
and breaks others
Title: Glanum arch (possibly triumphal but in city walls)
Location/ Museum: Glanum (Gallia Narbonennsis)
Artist: unknown but local*
Medium: limestone from local quarries
Date: ca. 10 – 25 CE
Size: n/a
Beyond Rome: The East
Client Kingdoms, Herod, and Judaea
Client Kingdoms
• Roman point of view
– Manage local populations
• Collect taxes; access to resources
– Keep barbarian groups at bay
• Benefit from local trade relations
• Local point of view
– Maintain a degree of autonomy
– Receive the protection of the
Roman army
Client Kingdoms
• Herod
– Expands the kingdom of Judaea
under Augustus
– As a client to Rome, he provides
Rome with a gateway to the East
• Augustus’ rise to power
– is “very much tied to Herod’s
career” at key points
• Makes for an interesting case study
L. Michael White in the Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus
Octavian and Judaea + Herod
• Herod’s rise
– Flees to Rome in 40 BCE when Parthians
attack Judaea
• Rome helps him secure the monarchy
– Team Anthony in the 30s, but luckily joins
team Octavian after hearing about
Anthony’s defeat
– Herod helps Octavian resettle / pacify the
East
– Octavian reaffirms Herod’s kingship and
gives him some of Cleopatra’s lands
Coin of Herod (ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ ΗΡΩΔΟΥ)
Herod’s reign, 37 – 4 BCE
• Builder in the style of Eastern
dynasts
– Palaces
• E.g. Herodium
– Cities and urban amenities
• Harbor at Caesarea
– Religious structures
• Temple at Jerusalem; Temples to
Augustus and Roma
Constructing the harbor s
To be continued in class on Monday the 2nd!
•
Hollow-wall Box method
– Box with hollow walls is floated out to sea, filled with mortar and,
once it sinks, concrete
– Variation (method 3) – Barges half-filled towed into position
Augustan Art and Architecture (Part I)
Augustus’
Mausoleum,
concrete core
Week 4 Announcements
• EXAM #1
– Friday, April 22nd during the class period
– You will need a bluebook and a writing utensil
• EXAM LOCATION
– Sections A, B, C, D, E: Dodd 147 (our regular classroom)
– Sections F, G, H, I, J, K: Moore 100
• EXTRA CREDIT
– Specs / worksheet links posted
– GRI (along 405) RSVP is live; Getty Villa RSVP will be send via email tmmrw
Art & Architecture in the Augustan Age
• Portraiture and Iconographies
– Augustus Primaporta
• Building projects
– The Forum of Augustus
– The Mausoleum of Augustus
• Who is Augustus? What does the
material record suggest?
– Restorer of the Republic?
– Cautiously autocratic?
• Are these mutually exclusive?
Remains of the Mausoleum of Augustus
Ca. 27 BCE
Ca. 10 BCE
Ca. 2 CE
Capite velato:
head covered,
iconography of
piety or
priesthood
The
Augustus
Primaporta,
ca. 20 CE
(copy of a
bronze
original, 10
BCE?) Rome
(marble)
Title: Doryphoros (Spear Bearer). Roman copy after an original of ca. 450-440
BCE by Polykleitos.
Artist: n/a
Date: ca. 450-440 BCE.
Source/ Museum: Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples
Medium: marble
Size: height 6’6″ (2 m)
Augustus as
Pontifex
Maximus (?),
ca. 12 BCE,
Rome
(marble)
The
Augustus
Primaporta,
ca. 20 CE
(copy of a
bronze
original from
ca. 10 BCE)
Rome
(marble)
Title: Doryphoros (Spear Bearer). Roman copy after an original of ca. 450-440
BCE by Polykleitos.
Artist: n/a
Date: ca. 450-440 BCE.
Source/ Museum: Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples
Medium: marble
Size: height 6’6″ (2 m)
On Polychrome Sculpture
• The Romans preferred colored,
embellished statuary
– Gold gilding
– The Natural patina of bronze
– Organic paints
• Pliny the Elder; Vitruvius
• White marble
– Prized for its translucency and uniformity
• A blank canvas
• White marble sculpture – a myth
– Reception of classical antiquity – week 10
Title: Augustus Primaporta statue
Location: found at Livia’s villa outside Rome
Artist: unknown
Medium: marble
Date: ca. 20 CE copy of a bronze original
Size: n/a
Iconography
Dress and Aspect
• Military apparel
– Raised arm; cuirass;
paludamentum
• Shoeless
•
Clue as to the date of this particular piece
Marble Supports
• A Cupid riding a dolphin
The Augustan look
• Stylistic similarities with Greek
sculpture (proportions but also
the emphasis on idealized
youth)
Cuirass:
Bronze
breastplate
Paludamentum:
Military cloak,
worn by officers
Iconography
At Top
• Sky gods: Caelus, Aurora, &
Luna
Center
• A Parthian (right) gives the
Roman standards back to the
military Roman figure at left
– Other non-Roman barbarians
Bottom
• Images of Diana and Apollo and
earthly prosperity (Tellus and
twin babies)
Terminus post quem of the original 19 BCE
Art in the Augustan Age
• Art (broadly) is encoded with
complex messages
• The frequency of quotation
(across media in the Augustan
period) suggests
– power of visual media
– visually literate, astute viewers
– an increasingly autocratic society?
The tradition of Imperial Forum buildingLocation/
begins
under
Museum:
n/a Julius Caesar.
n/a forum is completed in 2 BCE
Artist: n/a completes Caesar’s Forum (29 BCE); Medium:
*Augustus
his own
Title: Plan of the Imperial Fora
Date: n/a
Size: n/a
Temple
Mars Ultor
Forum of Augustus
with the
Temple of Mars Ultor
• Vowed in 42 BCE
• Project “begins”
• Construction begins in
the late 20s BCE
• After land is
purchased
• Dedicated in 2 BCE
• When Augustus is
pater patriae
Exedrae
Title: Forum of Augustus
Location: Rome, imperial for a complex
Artist: unknown
Medium: architectural complex
Date: dedicated in 2 BCE
Size: n/a
Altar base from
modern-day
Algiers, with
images of the 3
gods venerated
in the Temple of
Mars Ultor
L to R: Venus,
Mars, and the
deified Julius
Caesar
Title: The Algiers Relief
Location/ Museum: found in Algiers, now in the Algiers Archaeological Museum
Artist: unknown
Medium: marble
Date: early Claudian (?)
Size: n/a
Iconographic
comparanda
Marble relief
fragment of a
sacrifice, from
the so-called
Ara Pietatis
Augustae,
dated to the
Claudian era
(40s CE)
References to the Republic: Summi viri
Galleries of statues of the Republic’s heroes
Aeneas, carrying his father Anchises and holding the hand
of his son, Ascanius, as they escape from Troy [pietas]
Romulus with a trophy (the spolia opima) [virtus]
References to Classical Athens: Caryatids
Compare to the
Erechtheion, Athens
References to Alexander: Shields of Jupiter Ammon
In certain narratives of his life,
Alexander the Great’s father was Jupiter
Far left: coin of Alexander with the horns of Jupiter Ammon from
the mid-3rd c. BCE
The Porticos of the Forum of Augustus:
a Colossal Augustus (?)
The Forum of Augustus
• New mythology for a new age
– Aeneas and Romulus
– Venus and Mars, and Julius Caesar
• Political space
– Augustus as patron is referenced
symbolically throughout the
complex
– Forum becomes location for
sending out troops, receiving
ambassadors, etc.
• New spaces for a new “Republic”
Art & Architecture in the Augustan Age
• Who is Augustus?
– Restorer of the Republic?
– Cautiously autocratic?
• What does the material record
suggest?
Remains of the Mausoleum of Augustus
Augustan Art and Architecture (Part II)
Reconstruction of the Ara Pacis, 13-9 BCE, in the Campus Martius in Rome (marble altar enclosure)
Art & Architecture in the Augustan Age
• Who is Augustus?
– Restorer of the Republic?
– Cautiously autocratic?
• What does the material record
suggest?
Remains of the Mausoleum of Augustus
Dedicated in 2 BCE,
which almost 30 years of
Augustus as princeps
He is granted the title of
Pater Patriae in 2 BCE
Title: Forum of Augustus
Location: Rome, imperial for a complex
Artist: unknown
Medium: architectural complex
Date: dedicated in 2 BCE
Size: n/a
Is Augustus a revolutionary figure / builder?
• Dutiful son, Roman
– Finishing Caesar’s projects
• Forum of Caesar in 29 BCE
– Restoring temples (28 BCE)
• 82 temples were renovated and renewed
under his leadership
• EARLY building projects suggest an
ambitious leader in a familiar mode
– Temple of Apollo Palatine (28 BCE)
– Mausoleum of Augustus (28 BCE)
Mausoleum of Augustus, 28 BCE, Campus Martius
Concrete and marble facings (now gone)
Orange:
Forum of
Caesar
Purple:
Structures
renovated
by Caesar
1.4:
Senate
House
Old curia, restored
by Julius Caesar
Building in and near
the Forum Romanum
under Caesar and
Augustus disrupts dayto-day activity, and
works to engender a
different kind of
“Republic”
3.4 and 3.9:
Basilicas
1.16 Temple
of Vesta
Plan after Davis 2017
Is Augustus a revolutionary figure / builder?
• Dutiful son, Roman
– Finishing Caesar’s projects
• Forum of Caesar in 29 BCE
– Restoring temples (28 BCE)
• 82 temples were renovated and renewed
under his leadership
• EARLY building projects suggest an
ambitious leader in a familiar mode
– Temple of Apollo Palatine (28 BCE)
– Mausoleum of Augustus (28 BCE)
Mausoleum of Augustus, 28 BCE, Campus Martius
Concrete and marble facings (now gone)
Zones of
Augustan building
Campus Martius
• “Field of Mars”, formally
outside the city
Roman Forum
• Civic center of the city
Palatine Hill
• Temple of Apollo & private
residence
Title: The Mausoleum of Augustus
Location/ Museum: Campus Martius, Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: Marble facing and a concrete core
Date: 28 BCE
Size: 295 feet diameter, 132 feet tall
Title: The Mausoleum of Augustus
Location/ Museum: Campus Martius, Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: Marble facing and a concrete core
Date: 28 BCE
Size: 295 feet diameter, 132 feet tall
Strabo, Geography V.3.8
…a great mound near the river
on a lofty foundation of white
marble, thickly covered with
ever-green trees to the very
summit. Now on top is
a bronze image of
Augustus Caesar;
beneath the mound
are the tombs of
himself and his
kinsmen and
intimates
Title: Possible reconstruction – The Mausoleum of Augustus
Location/ Museum: Campus Martius, Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: Marble facing and a concrete core
Date: 28 BCE
Size: 295 feet diameter, 132 feet tall
Inspiration?
Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, 4th c. BCE in Caria (Turkey)
One of the 7 wonders of the ancient world
Inspiration?
Etruscan tumuli at Cerveteri
Mounds in this image: 8th – 5th c. BCE
CAECILIAE
Q·CRETICI·F
METELLAE·CRASSI
To Caecilia Metella,
daughter of Quintus
Creticus, wife of
Crassus
Title: Amiterum Reliefs
Location/ Museum: L’’Aquila
Artist: unknown
Medium: local limestone
Date: Augustan era
Size: n/a
The Mausoleum
of Augustus
• Dynastic ambitions?
• Monumentum
• Situates Augustus in a
historical continuum
that reifies and
legitimizes his rise to
power
• Its construction at an
early date in his reign
is significant
The Ara Pacis (a senatorial monument for Augustus)
• Voted by SPQR, 13-9 BCE
– Senatus populusque Romanus
– Commemorates Augusts’ return
from successful campaigns in Gaul
and Germany around 13 BCE
• Agrippa pacifying the East 16 – 13 BCE
– “through just war, the blessings of
peace”
• Augustus keeps the peace by pacifying
/ securing the borders
register:
an artistic
convention –
the division of
a field into
parallel rows
(horizontal
bands), or
occasionally
columns
Title: The Ara Pacis (Augustan Altar of Peace)
Location/ Museum: Campus Martius, Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: Marble
Date: 13 – 9 BCE
Size: outer wall 34’5” by 38’ by 23’
Complex Iconography
of relief sculptures
Lower register of reliefs:
Vegetation – images of abundance
The Ara
pacis: Plan of the structure and relief decoration
The Ara pacis: exterior enclosure wall
East and West Sides
Myth as allegory –
elevates reality
(A Greek modus operandi)
East Side: Roma & Tellus
The sun rises on a new Empire
The Ara
West Side: Mars & Aeneas
The sun sets on legendary city founders,
connecting Augustus to that legacy
pacis: Plan of the structure and relief decoration
Below: Venus / Tellus / Fertility Figure
Above: Roma
Title: Relief of Tellus (mother Earth) or Venus
Location/ Museum: relief on the Ara Pacis, Campus Martius in Rome
Artist: n/a
Medium: Marble
Date: 13 – 9 BCE
Size: n/a
The Augustan style (classicizing)
At right: Roman-era (1st c. CE) copy of the Doryphorus
statue, a 5th c. Greek original
At left: Mars and Romulus & Remus
Below: Aeneas or Numa Pompilius
East Side: Mythology
The sun rises on a new Empire
South Side:
Historical Relief
North Side:
Historical Relief
Senators & the imperial family
show support for Augustus
(Emphasis – Civic support for
Augustan program)
Priests and the Imperial
Family show their support for
Augustus (Emphasis: Religious
support for Augustan
program)
West Side: Mythology
The sun sets on legendary city founders,
connecting Augustus to that legacy
The Ara pacis: Plan of the structure and relief decoration
South side:
High priests, Augustus
and the
imperial family
East Side: Mythology
The sun rises on a new Empire
South Side:
Historical Relief
Priests and the Imperial
Family show their support for
Augustus
North Side:
Historical Relief
Senators & the imperial
FAMILY show support for
Augustus
(Emphasis – Civic support for
Augustan program; plus
dynastic ambitions?)
(Emphasis: Religious support
for Augustan program; plus
dynastic ambitions?)
West Side: Mythology
The sun sets on legendary city founders,
connecting Augustus to that legacy
The Ara pacis: Plan of the structure and relief decoration
The Ara pacis
• Celebrates Augustan
peace, piety,
prosperity
• Celebrates the
permanency of such
statements [marble]
• Links Augustus’
Rome to a glorious
past and a fertile
future
• Procession of
senators and priests
suggests political and
divine support for
Augustus’ leadership
Looking ahead to week 5
• Augustan era
– Non-dominant groups: women,
enslaved and freed people, and
non-Roman persons
• Outside Readings
– Scholarly articles for Monday
(women) and Wednesday (enslaved
and freedpeople in funerary art)
Timing: The first exam will be held during the normal
class period, from 12 – 12:50 on Friday, April 22nd
Exam I
Logistics
Location:
Sections A, B, C, D, E: Meet in DODD 147 (usual classroom)
Sections F, G, H, I, J, K: Meet in MOORE 100
** Exam I covers material presented in weeks 1-4:
Content from lecture, section, and readings
Part I: Slide IDS
You will see an image, and you will be asked to provide the
NAME, DATE, and LOCATION of the object / site in the
image
Format
Dates: If a numerical date is listed, that is the correct answer
Location: If a location within Rome is listed, that is the correct
answer
You will make two comments about the SIGNIFICANCE of
the piece in response to a question posted alongside the
image
Bullet points are okay here, but they must be full thoughts
There will be THREE Slide IDs on this exam (28 points total)
You will have 3 minutes for each slide
Part II & III: Visual Analysis and Critical Thinking (72
points)
Part II: Short answer questions around a theme or a set of
images
N.B. If the question asks you to talk about object X, you will
have to rely on what you remember about it.
Write in full sentences – I will provide guidelines on length.
Format
Part III: Longer form questions that ask you to 1) respond to
a question and 2) supply images / objects / structures as
evidence for your response
You MUST use things we have seen in class or in the reading.
You will NOT be writing any essays here, but you may be asked
to assemble the material for an essay (e.g., choose 3 objects
that would be part of an essay on X subject, and justify those
choices).
Write in full sentences – I will provide guidelines on length.
Lecture 7: Apr 18, 2022
● Augustan Art and Architecture (pt I)
● Portraiture and Iconographies
○ Augustus Primaporta
● Building Projects
○ The Forum of Augustus
○ The Mausoleum of Augustus
● Who is Augustus? What does the material record suggest?
○ Restorer of the Republic
○ Cautiously autocratic(absolute power)
■ Are these mutually exclusive?
● Augustus portraits don’t change from 27 BCE -> 10 BCE -> 2 BCE
○ Timeless stability
● The Augustus Primaporta ca. 20 CE (with general clothes)
○ Style of other generals in the republic
○ Marble, would have originally been bronze
○ This statue type was disseminated throughout the empire
○ Military breastplate
● Augustus as Pontifex Maximus 12 BCE (with cloak; pious Roman)
○ Dutiful
○ Presents himself with head covered with respect towards Roman saint,
gods
○ Main job is to carry out duties that better the state
● On Polychrome Sculpture
○ The Romans preferred colored, embellished statuary
■ Gold gilding
■ The natural patina of bronze
■ Organic paints
● Pliny the Elder, Vitruvius
○ White marble
■ Prized for its translucency and uniformity
● A blank canvas
○ White marble sculpture – a myth
■ Reception of classical antiquity – week 10
● Dress and aspect
○ Military apparel
●
●
●
●
●
●
■ Raised arm; cuirass(a piece of armor consisting of breastplate and
backplate fastened together, paludamentum – cloak of the general)
■ One hand raised, angle suggests he’s speaking an order to troops
■ He is shoeless?? The fact that he is shoeless is a clue to the date of
the piece. It is like being naked, either you are super high up or you
are very low. This was probably made after he was died and
deified(second mortal to do that after Caesar)
The marble support, little Cupid figure (baby) on top of a dolphin with nose down
Dolphin and cupid
○ Cupid(Eros) is the son of Venus
○ Venus is ancestral goddess
○ Julius Caesar calls Venus his great great ancestress. Augustus is adopted
by Caesar at his death and the tiny reference to Eros is the visual clue to
think of Venus
Dolphin
○ Sea creature
○ Subtle reference to Augustus victory at Battle of Actium (a naval battle)
○ References ancestry and also greatest military accomplishment
The Augustan look
○ Stylistic similarities with Greek sculpture (proportions but also the
emphasis on idealized youth)
Breastplate
○ At top: sky gods: Caelus, Aurora and Luna
○ Center: A Parthian gives the Roman standards back to the military Roman
figure at left
■ Other nonRoman Barbarians
○ Bottom: images of Diana and Apollo and earthly prosperity (Tellus and
twin babies)
Art in the Augustun age
○ Art broadly is encoded with complex messages
○ The frequency of quotation across media in the Augustan period suggests
■ Power of visual media
■ Visually literate, astute viewers
■ An increasingly autocratic society
● Julius Caesar first to build forum
● Forum for Augustus
○ Augustus completes Caesar’s Forum; his own forum is completed in 2
BCE
● Forum of Augustus with the Temple of Mars Ultor
○ Vowed in 42 BCE
■ Project begins
● Construction begins in the late 20s BCE
○ After land is purchased
● Dedicated in 2 BCE
○ When Augustus is pater patriae
● Frequency of visual media and quotations
○ Copies of images of cult statues
○ Altar base from modern day Algiers with images of the 3 gods venerated
in the temple of Mars Ultor
○ Center is Mars (older figure, Roman soldier)
○ Venus and Mars are presented as a couple (mother and father of Roman
people)
○ Rightmost is deified Caesar
● References to the Republic: Summi Viri
● Aeneas, carrying his father Anchises and holding the hand of his son, Ascanius,
as they escape from Troy
● Other picture: Romulus with a trophy
○ Best thing you can do as a general is get the armor of the enemy’s leader.
Romulus did it first
● References to Classical Athens: Cartyatids
● References to Alexander: Shields of Jupiter Ammom
The Forum of Augustus
● New mythology for a new age
○ Aeneas and Romulus
○ Venus and Mars and Julius Caesar
● Political space
○ Augustus as patron is referenced symbolically throughout the complex
○ Forum becomes location for sending out troops, receiving ambassadors
■ New spaces for a New Republic
Discussion:
What insight does this provide regarding Roman approaches to colonization?
– Romans dominated culture in their colonies; these colonies were getting
patronage from Roman gods; kind of a military camp; it was an ideal city plan
Lecture 8: Apr 20, 2022
● Augustus – restorer of the Republic
● Aeneas – trojan war hero
○ Founder of the Roman people
● Romulus – founded Rome
● Both present in the form of Augustus
Is Augustus a revolutionary figure/builder?
● Dutiful son, Roman
○ Finishing Caesar’s projects
■ Forum of Caesar in 29 BCE
● Restoring temples 28BCE
○ 82 temples were renovated and renewed under his leadership
● Early building projects suggest an ambitious leader in a familiar mode
○ Temple of Apollo Palatine 28 bce
○ Mausoleum of Augustus 28 bce
● Zones of Augustan
○ Campus Martius
■ Field of Mars
○ Roman forum
■ Civic center of the city
○ Palatine Hill
■ Temple of Apollo and private residence
● Augustus Mausoleum
○ Inspiration: Etruscan tumuli at Cerveteri
● The Mausoleum of Augustus
○ Monumentum
○ Situates Augustus in a historical continuum that reifies and legitimizes his
rise to power
■ Its construction at an early date in his reign is significant
● The Ara Pacis ( a senatorial monument for Augustus )
○ Voted by SPQR, 13-9 BCE
■ Senatus populusque Romanus
○ Commemorates Augusts’ return from successful campaigns in Gaul and
Germany around 13 BCE
■ Agrippa pacifying the East 16-13BCE
● Through just war, the blessings of peace
○ Augustus keeps the peace by pacifying/securing the borders
● The Augustan style (classicizing) – solid figures, smooth lines, reserved and
peaceful
Week 5: Apr 25, 2022
● 2nd writing assignment
● On canvas: specs; prompts
● Optional: additional bibliography
○ Will go over more on formatting and citation in a separate video
● Opinion piece
○ Respond (positively or negatively) to one of the prompts
■ Week 4 and 5 material
● Submission
○ Monday, May 2nd by midnight
● Introduction: paper must make an argument. In other words, your paper sets out
to prove/demonstrate something
● Body paragraphs
○ At least two material examples: describe and interpret
● Conclusion: synthesis, not summary
● Building space and grace into these assignments
○ Complete 2 of 3
○ No averaging, just the two highest
● small -step writing
○ Pilot project
○ Plan and write a little everyday
■ Look out for an email
Empresses and Women in the Augustan Age
● Women in Roman society
○ Rights, roles, responsibilities
● Imperial Women
○ Augustus’ leading ladies
● Women in the Augustan Age
○ Provincial case study of Eumachia Pompeii
● Women in Roman Society: Rights and Roles
●
●
●
●
○ Women cannot: hold an office, take part in war
○ Vote
○ Operate without a guardian
■ Patria potestas: father; husband; appointed guardian
○ Naming conventions
But free woman can:
○ Own property
○ Inherit
■ From their kin or others
○ Initiate lawsuits
○ Initiate divorce
■ Divorce is very frequent, especially among the upper class
○ Elite occupations
■ Matrona (matron; wife)
■ Priestesses
● E.g. Vestal virgins; wife of the high priest of Jupiter
○ Sub-elite
■ Shop owners
● Involved in commerce, manufacture
■ Sex workers
Citizen mothers, wives, sisters
○ Virtues: pietas, pudicitia
Cannot vote or hold office
○ But this does not mean they are confined to the domestic sphere
Alternative ways to participate in politics
○ Auctoritas
Female Exempla in the Roman Republic
● Cloelia
○ Early Republican POW who inspires honor
○ Escapes to Rome and comes back to Senate to report what happened
● Voted an equestrian statue
○ Maiden sitting on top of a horse
● Cornelia
○ Voted a posthumous public statue
■ Seated statue of Cornelia, daughter of Africanus, mother of the
Gracchi
New opportunities? Looking at imperial women
● Public presence of women increases
○ In Rome and beyond
● Part of the Augustan cultural transformation
○ Changes in politics and government, art and literature
○ Social movements are part of this cultural revolution too
■ Augustus as a symptom of this cultural revolution
● Livia
○ Augustus 3rd wife, mother of Tiberius
● Octavia
○ Augustus sister, former wife of Mark Antony, mother of Marcellus
● Julia
○ Augustus only child; mother of Galius and Lucius
● 35 BCE: Augustus sets up statues of Octavia and Livia in Rome
● Nodus: bun at the center of the forehead/top of the head, a popular style in the
late Republic
Public honors: exempla or dynastic messaging
Moral legislation – Leges Juliae
– 18 BCE: requirement to marry
Penalties for remaining unmarried
– 17 BCE: law criminalizing adultery
– 9 BCE: law promoting procreation
● Tax breaks for parents
● Women are allowed to exist without a guardian after 3-5 children
Porticus Liviae
● 15-7 BCE: Porticus built on the Esquiline Hill
○ In Livia’s honor with money and land given to Augustus
● Ara Concordia
○ Livia as patron
179 BCE: Temple of Juno Regina
– Conul M. Aeimilius Lepidus
146 BCE: Porticus Metellus and Temple of Jupiter Stator
– Caecilius Metellus
27-23 BCE: Porticus of Octavia
– Porticus of Metellus is replaced with the Porticus Octaviae
The Architectural Patron
● Augustus in Octavia’s name
○ Livy, Suetonius, Cassius Dio
● Octavia herself
○ Festus, Pliny
In Rome, the tradition begins in the Augustan age
● Buildings built by or in honor of imperial woman like Octavia and Livia
● Significant public honors for women in this period
○ There is little of this in earlier periods and nothing on this scale
Week 5: Apr 25, 2022
● Writing 2
● Argumentation
○ This is an opinion piece
○ You can use the first person voice
● Analysis
○ Requires two pieces
○ Material is created with an intended message, but different audiences
view material with different bkgds and experiences…this is where
interpretation comes in
● Small step writing program
○ Subscribe to the discussion forum
■ Working now on a roadmap that we’ll begin filling in with prose
● Sources
○ I have created an infographic about this and will record myself talking over
it this afternoon
○ You can write this piece with the material that has been assigned(lectures,
assigned readings)
● Outside sources/additional bib
○ Use the recommended sources
■ Optional bib on canvas
○ Outside inclusions – must be scholarly
■ Check with myself or your TA
■ Move away from Wiki and Khan Academy
● Citation – what to cite
○ Shared knowledge (lecture, textbook); doesn’t need to be cited
○ Opinions/arguments DO
■ I think; scholars say
● Citation – format
○ Let’s agree on Chicago style
■ Notes (foot or end) and bibliography
■ All should have a bib, because your opinion must
acknowledge/build on basic facts (presented in textbook and
lecture)
Funerary Art of Freedpersons in the Augustan Age
● Enslavement in the Roman world
○ Manumission and the freed citizen class
● Funerary Evidence
○ Review of what we’ve seen
○ Relief portraits of freedpersons
○ Tomb of the Baker
Slavery in the Roman world
● An accepted and normalized part of life
● Slavery – social death
○ Enslavement is a social status
○ Anyone can become enslaved
■ Majority: POWS
Enslavement and Manifesto
● Slavery is a social status, but not necesarily a permanent one
● Manumissio
○ A release coming from the authority of the owner
● HOW?
○ Freed in wills
○ Demonstrations of wealth
○ Some “buy” their freedom
■ Arrangement with their owner; savings from employment
● libertus/a
○ A freedperson
○ Takes a three-part Roman name (you take name of your former owner)
■ Example: Marcus Tullius Tiro (often the first two names (agnomen
and nomen are “Roman”)
● Citizen Rights
○ Voting
○ Marriage
■ Produces Roman citizens
○ 3rd gen can run for high political office
● Hierarchical Relationship
○ With mutual obligations
● Patron (patronus)
○ Sponsor and benefactor of his clients
○ Provided physical and financial protection
● Client (cliens)
○ Offered services to his patron
○ Supported him politically
○ Freedmen become clients upon manumissio
Liberti in the Late Republic/Early Empire
● Free Persons become more visible in the Late Republic and Augustan era in
art/archaeology but also literary texts
● Conquest and POWS
○ 3rd c BCE on
● Redistribution of wealth and power
○ Especially 1st c BCE on
Characteristics of freedperson funerary monuments
● Truncated bust portraits
○ Portraits styled for status quo
● Emphasis on Citizenship
○ Tria nomina with “L” for libertus/a
○ Gendered attributes
■ Women: draped hear (pious matron); rings; freedborn
children
■ Men: citizen toga
● Family groups
○ Looking forward to the next generation
GESSA P L FAUSTA
P GESSIUS P FROM
P GESSIUS P L PRIMUS
Dextrarum iunctio: “joining of the right hands”; sign of marriage
Lucious Vibius, son of Lucious, of the Tromentina tribe
Vecilia Hilara, freedwoman (of a woman)
Licius Vibius Felicio Felix
Vibia Prime, freedwoman of Lucius
EST HOC MONIMENTUM MARCEI VERGILEI EURYSACIS PISTORIS REDEMPTORIS
APPARET
This is the monument of Marcus Vergilius Eurysaces, baker, contractor
Sandra Joshel on occupational inscriptions (1992): Work is fundamental to the
existence of an enslaved person, but it is also, paradoxically, the means to achieving
something more
The Debate: Does this monument commemorate a free man or a freed man?
If a freed man can build something like this, the game has changed. New avenues for
social promotion are open to new classes and new kinds of people.
Week 5: Apr 29, 2022
Life in the Augustan-era Provinces
Second prompt: whether nondominant groups see or have a greater public
presence or more power/agency?
Tomb of the Baker
● Marcus Vergilius Eurysaces, baker, contractor
● Made of expensive material
New groups of people doing quintessentially ROMAN things
Example 2: the Eumachia Building in Pompeii
Eumachia, daughter of Lucius, a public priestess, in her own name, and in the
name of her son, Marcus Numistrius Fronto, made the chalcidum, the crypta and
the porticus with her own money and dedicated the same to Concordia Augusta
and to Pietas
● A woman with public influence and unofficial power
Augustus and the provinces
– How provincial administration works
Western Empire Case Study
– Roman Gaul
Eastern Empire Case Study
– Client kings and Herod the Great
Provinces under senatorial leadership (no troops; pacified)
Provinces under imperial leadership (troops; frontier regions and/or very wealthy)
Client kingdoms
Governors, Army Inhabitants (roman + locals)
Beyond Rome: The West
Pre-Roman Gaul
● Southern Gaul
○ Connected to the Mediterranean networks since the 7th c BCE
○ Hellenstic and Phoenician colonies
■ Ex: Massalia (Greek colony/port)
● Northern Gaul
○ La Tene culture, ca 450-50 BCE
○ Gallic/Celtic groups
■ Lived in oppida (hill-top forts)
■ Metal work
Impact of the Roman Conquest of Gaul
● Mediterranean culture leaves the Mediterranean
● Roman troops
○ Economic explosion
○ Civic infrastructure: roads, bridges, aqueducts
○ Veterans are settled
On Romanization…
Caesar conquers and everyone becomes Roman; pay Roman taxes
That story is far too simplistic. When a foreign culture comes in, the indigenous
culture does not disappear. Scholars explore how acculturation, assimilation and
fusion cultures develop. Who is responsible for that and what is the material
culture like?
Architecture in Glanum in Gaul
● Celtic/Gallic foundation
○ Probably 6th – 5th BCE
● Roman veterans
○ Settled in Glanum and throughout southern France after 49 BCE
● Celtic/Roman identities
○ Can material culture give us insight into acculturation, assimilation,
resistance, resilience?
Monument of the Julii
● Built out of stone
● Dedicated by Sextus, Lucius and Marcus Julius, sons of Gaius, to their
father
● Persons given citizenship by Caesar or Augustus
● Probably local people who fought in the local army
● Limestone
Roman culture entwined with local customs
● Sculptural carvings
● Tower tomb
● Dedicatees: the Julii
○ Local men who benefitted from participation in the Roman machine
How does conquest work?
– Rarely achieved in one campaign
– Sustained efforts and violent raids
“Becoming Roman” is a long process that rewards some and breaks others
Glanum Arch (possibly triumphal but in city walls)
– Two figures (a nude male with cloak and a female who are captive)
– Trophy that suggests Roman victory
Client kingdoms
● Roman point of view
○ Manage local populations
■ Collect taxes; access to resources
○ Keep barbarian groups at bay
■ Benefit from local trade relations
● Local point of view
○ Maintain a degree of autonomy
○ Receive the protection of the Roman army
● Herod
○ Expands the kingdom of Judaea under Augustus
○ As a client to Rome, he provides Rome with a gateway to the East
● Augustus rise to power
○ Is very much tied to Herod’s career at key points
■ Makes for an interesting case study
Octavian and Judaea + Herod
● Herod’s rise
○ Flees to Rome in 40 BCE when Parthians attack Judaea
■ Rome helps him secure the monarchy
○ Team Anthony in the 30s, but luckily joins team Octavian after
hearing about Anthony’s defeat
○ Herod helps Octavian resettle/pacify the East
○ Octabian reaffirms Herod’s kingship and gives him some of
Cleopatra’s lands
● Builder in the style of Eastern dynasts
○ Palaces
■ Eg. Herodium
○ Cities and urban amenities
■ Harbor at Caesarea
○ Religious structures
■ Temple at Jerusalem; Temples to Augustus and Roma
● Construction projects
○ Open Sea harbor made using pozzolana shipped from Italy
○ The first open sea harbor on the Levantine coast
● Constructing the harbor
○ Excavations at caesarea since the 1960s
■ 2005 on, samples taken on concrete cores sunk into the sea
floor
○ Three different types of construction at the harbor
Gender
Gender
Eve D’Ambra and Francesca Tronchin
The Oxford Handbook of Roman Sculpture
Edited by Elise A. Friedland, Melanie Grunow Sobocinski, and Elaine K. Gazda
Print Publication Date: Mar 2015 Subject: Classical Studies, Classical Art and Architecture
Online Publication Date: Mar 2015 DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199921829.013.0030
Abstract and Keywords
Among the many roles of Roman sculpture—whether private portraits, imperial propagan
da, shop signs, or mythological Idealplastik—was the reinforcement of social stratifica
tions, especially the hierarchy created by the gender binary so ingrained in classical cul
tures. While social class, foreign status, and transgressive sexual identities sometimes
complicated matters, the iconography of “male” and “female” was mostly straightforward
—even if the relationships between gender and power were sometimes knotty in the Ro
man world. This chapter explores those iconographies and the social roles on which they
were based, as well as a few cases in which such standard imagery was contravened. It
also addresses methods scholars have employed to bring issues of gender, sexuality, and
status to the forefront of Roman art history. The chapter pays special attention to feminist
scholarship on images of women and the means by which these asserted individual identi
ty, cultural ideals of femininity, and sexual difference.
Keywords: gender, female, women, nudity, Kampen, portrait, body
Introduction
IN the late 1960s, scholars questioned the canon of works that constituted the field of Ro
man sculpture. In particular, they sought out art and artifacts that documented the lives
of Roman citizens unattested in the ancient historical sources (Bianchi Bandinelli 1967).
In the study of classical art and archaeology, the question of gender arrived at the same
moment as the new social history that aimed to redefine history from below. Workers’
struggles, rather than court intrigues, took center stage. Classicists asked where the
silent women of Rome were and found tales of stoic mothers and courageous daughters in
the ancient written sources (Pomeroy 1975). Livy’s account of the founding of Rome and
Plutarch’s exemplary lives, however, focus on elites, and the occasional mention of wom
enfolk concerns the privileged, political classes. In the wake of the social upheavals of the
late sixties, art historians and archaeologists turned their attention to the monuments
commissioned by the lower echelons of Roman society. Some scholars sought to include
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Gender
ignored works of art in the corpus; others aimed to demonstrate the dominant influence
of imperial art, for instance, the immense appeal of Augustan classicism, or, conversely,
the gulf between court art and that of humble citizens (see essay 4.7, Petersen). The ques
tion of gender was first posed at this juncture—when Roman art was viewed in terms of
its full range of patrons, from senators to ex-slaves, from metropolitan Rome to remote
provinces.
Gender refers to the construction of sexual identities, usually articulated in terms of
anatomical and sociocultural differences (Montserrat 2000, 154). In the classical world
male and female were polarized into a binary system in which the male was aligned with
strength, wisdom, virtue, initiative, and integrity, while the female was identified with
weakness, ignorance, vice, indolence, and deceit (Kampen 1996b, 16). Heteronormativity,
in which the sexual norm is presumed to be heterosexuality, also shaped depictions of
gender. Thus the female was inherently secondary and, therefore, powerless, in the patri
archal society of Rome. Yet, women’s biological role as mothers (p. 452) rendered them
crucial to the empire and its well-being, and the good wife and mother were enshrined in
the household (Treggiari 1991; Dixon 1992). In reality, boundaries were somewhat
blurred in the social hierarchy that endowed elite women with honor and respect, as well
as some influence (J. P. Hallett 1984). In the following, we begin with the moment at
which representations of women became significant in the study of Roman sculpture and
then turn to issues of gender in reliefs, portraits, and mythological sculpture. If our in
quiry into gender favors the female, it is because images of women in ancient Rome
demonstrated difference in a male-dominated culture.
Gender and Status
The book that changed the field was Natalie Boymel Kampen’s Image and Status: Roman
Working Women in Ostia (1981). This groundbreaking volume considered the iconography
of female vocation across a variety of activities (from retail trade to artisanal production
and professional services), and pointed out gendered differences in the imagery: maledominated production of tools or equipment in comparison with the prominence of female
social relationships and caregiving (Kampen 1981). Other than minimal antiquarian inter
est in crafts and trades, until this study there had been little interest in art depicting the
lives of anonymous Romans. That labor—and women’s work specifically—was depicted at
all in Roman art had not previously been thought worthy of investigation (Brown 2000).
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Gender
Figure 4.8.1 Greengrocer’s Relief, late second or
early third century AD. Ostia, Museo Ostiense.
Women’s work involved service to customers, represented in scenes of women selling
goods in market stalls or shops, or the care of infants and children, as seen in the sar
cophagi depicting biographical narratives of male subjects from birth to the attainment of
high office (Kampen 1981; 1982, 65). Nurses in the latter appear as subsidiary figures in
scenes of the protagonist’s attainment of political and military power, also evoked with fe
male figures personifying virtues or abstract ideas underlying the social order. Kampen’s
study of the second- and third-century reliefs from Ostia traced the contours of a culture
coexistent with that of the court of Rome and senatorial aristocracies.
The literal, nonsymbolic style of funerary reliefs (although some may have served as shop
signs as well) represent simplified figures and generic scenes of street life (Kampen
1981). They do not reference the ideal forms of Hellenic statuary, and mythological allu
sions are usually absent. For example, one relief represents a produce saleswoman who
stands in a market stall made from trestle tables (figure 4.8.1). She is framed by her
goods, which are rendered with sufficient linear detail to identify garlic, cauliflower, and
zucchini. The half-figure behind the table shows the simplified and rough forms of a
rounded face with hair pulled back and a body clothed in a loose tunic and mantle. Lack
ing the individualized facial features of a portrait, the figure instead appeals with a ges
ture that signals speech with the two little fingers in a closed position while the others
are extended on the oversized hand. The grocer is shown pointing to her goods and ad
dressing a potential customer in the characteristic tactic of the “hard sell,” (p. 453)
demonstrating her mettle at attracting customers in a crowded market (D’Ambra 2007,
139). The saleswoman appeals directly to the viewer, who stands in for the passersby at
the marketplace. The reliefs commissioned by working-class patrons tend to depict fig
ures placed frontally who are dominated, if not subsumed, by objects, the goods they sell
or produce. The scenes and settings typically appear to be containers for the inventory of
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Gender
items, arranged in rows or stacks in a shallow space. Often more closely observed and
finely detailed than the figures, the trade goods come into sharp focus as the means of
making a living.
This relief and many others like it commemorate saleswomen in scenes that characterize
the teeming, competitive atmosphere of the marketplace. The corpus of Latin inscriptions
includes epitaphs of a female dealer in grains, a mosaic worker, and perfumer, among
many others. The reliefs depict the most public aspects of their jobs: the greengrocer
hawking her wares, a poultry seller carrying out a transaction at her stall, and so on;
women are the focus of attention and activity. This aspect of their labor made the women
appear disreputable and degraded to elite men, who characterized them as aggressive,
shameless, and surely willing to sell their bodies as easily as they would a head of garlic
(D’Ambra 2007, 140). Notably, the reliefs celebrate the qualities that ensured the
women’s success and also demonstrated their marked difference from the (p. 454) modest
and demure matrons of means. The reliefs and inscriptions indicate that women worked
alongside their husbands or supported themselves in a variety of occupations or profes
sions, yet they remain largely invisible in the texts of poets and historians who provided
the standard accounts of Roman life.
Figure 4.8.2 Relief from the Basilica Aemilia, Punish
ment of Tarpeia. Augustan period. Rome, Antiquari
um of the Roman Forum.
Natalie Kampen’s contribution lies in her focus on the status and public roles of women in
one community within a circumscribed period. Her analysis of the rather style-less style
of the reliefs from Ostia, with their shallow spatial setting, the clutter of sharply-con
toured objects, and the simplified figure style with no individualization, also applies to re
liefs in the provinces. Working people across the empire conveyed their identity in art
through their occupations. Rather than reflecting regional differences, reliefs commemo
rated artisans and merchants in a remarkably similar style, as seen in the blacksmiths’ re
liefs from the Isola Sacra Necropolis in Ostia and Aquileia in northern Italy, as well as in
monuments to service staff, such as the wet nurse Severina in Cologne (Kampen 1976,
164–6, 178–9, fig. 61).
In subsequent essays, Kampen extended her interest in gender to the state reliefs of the
Augustan period with mythological or allegorical subjects (see essay 3.5, Sobocinski and
Wolfram Thill). The themes from the founding of Rome conveyed a sense of the social or
der and the ideal roles of men and women, rulers and their subjects, Romans and barbar
ians. Patriarchy maintained a strict hierarchy of values that privileged the dominant male
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Gender
citizen at the expense of the female, characterized by scholars in the eighties as “the oth
er,” that is a lower being, chaotic, unruly, and closer to nature. In the ancient accounts of
the early city, female sexuality was seen to undermine the institutions of family and the
state if not kept in check. In particular, unmarried women served as intermediaries for
outsiders to gain access to Rome, as in Livy’s accounts of the Sabine women and Tarpeia
(Kampen 1988, 15–19). Indeed, a public building in the center of the Roman Forum, the
Basilica Aemilia, featured a sculptural frieze representing scenes from the legendary
founding of Rome, with the Rape of the Sabine Women and the Punishment of Tarpeia
among the extant panels (figure 4.8.2). The fragmentary reliefs depict (p. 455) the Sabine
women under assault with their arms flung out and streaming locks of hair. The Sabine
women, however, become Roman wives and are thus transformed from outsiders to insid
ers: their identity and allegiances change. The Roman Tarpeia, on the other hand, has al
lowed the enemy to enter the city, and for this she is punished by the foreigners she has
helped: the relief depicts the Sabines crushing her with their shields. Even those who
profited from her treachery scorned her actions. The themes celebrated women who as
sumed Roman values as their own as exemplary citizens. Furthermore, Kampen observed
that the classicizing style of the reliefs, recalling Hellenic art of the fifth to fourth cen
turies BC, underlined the theme’s implications of the overriding triumphalism and destiny
of Rome (Kampen 1988, 19).
Another monument from Augustan Rome, the Ara Pacis Augustae, was decorated with re
lief sculpture that commemorated the dedication of the altar and set the historical event
in the heroic context of early Rome. One panel depicts a resplendent full-figured female
with two babies on her lap. The theme of regeneration of the Roman populace and the
natural world is writ large in the relief that represents the health and well-being of Rome:
the human figures take center stage with the enthroned earth mother flanked by the per
sonification of breezes, as indicated by their billowing drapery, while the stalks of grain
refer to the thriving fields and the diminutive animals to the resilience of the herds. While
the identification of the female figure as Tellus is somewhat controversial (she has also
been called Italia and Pax, among others), the iconography of fertility is very apparent in
her voluptuous body and attendant figures. It is characteristic that the fecund female
body is equated with the land, now blooming forth without interruption due to the Augus
tan peace. In this example of state art, motherhood is idealized as Tellus, the figure with
the handsome facial features of a goddess and whose cleavage and midriff are revealed
through clinging and nearly transparent garments, an outfit that would bring scandal to a
Roman matron. Clearly Tellus is a figure from the realm of art and, as such, would have
been distinguished from a Roman matron by viewers; yet, the pure and rarefied version of
femininity in this scene, with its visual linking of babies and breasts as well as the moth
erly lap cradling fruits of the field, plays into traditional ideals of womanhood. The politi
cal and patriotic aspects of Augustan themes appealed to many citizens throughout the
empire who commissioned works of art and architecture in emulation of the famed Ro
man monuments for their own cities. For example, a relief from Carthage in North Africa
seems to be a close copy of this panel (Zanker 1988, 313–14). A showy edifice in Pompeii
featured the vine scroll ornament of the Ara Pacis, which, no doubt, enhanced its ele
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Gender
gance and demonstrated the worldliness of the woman, Eumachia, who built it for her fel
low citizens (D’Ambra 2012, 400–413).
Natalie Kampen also turned to imperial monuments of later periods to analyze represen
tations of women under imperial rule. The categories of gender and status proved effec
tive in the analysis of female figures, whether Dacian women forced into exile as seen on
the Column of Trajan or Julia Domna depicted on the Quadrifrons Arch in Leptis Magna
(Kampen 2009, 38–63, 82–103). As mothers of the next generation, women maintained
the social order by transmitting values and norms. Imperial women like Julia Domna were
often assimilated to personifications that enlarged their presence (p. 456) and endowed
them with authority, if in name only. The authority of imperial women, however, lacked
any basis in public office, so remained informal and intermittent as they occasionally
stepped in as surrogates. In propaganda the emperors’ wives or daughters were confined
to the domestic and dynastic spheres, with imagery bearing the high gloss of Hellenic art.
On the other hand, those who felt the rough hand of imperial might, such as the van
quished Dacian women, were represented with sufficient ethnographic detail to identify
them as barbarians indigenous to specific contested regions (for costume, see Sebesta
and Bonfante 1994). Despite the curiosity their representations probably aroused in Ro
man spectators, the Dacian women gained a degree of dignity as they were portrayed
struggling to keep their families together. In the pioneering studies of Natalie Kampen,
gender became a trenchant analytical tool, particularly when inflected with the variables
of social status. Rather than conceptualizing woman as other, this fulcrum allowed schol
ars to observe how the category of woman was represented within a highly differentiated
social structure.
Statue Types
Representations of women in Rome were common in both the public and private spheres
(see essay 3.4, Wood). Unfortunately, today, many are unidentifiable, though they were
once labeled by inscriptions on their bases (now lost) and may also have been recogniz
able via portrait heads (often also now detached from preserved pieces). Statues erected
in fora honored outstanding women of the leading families. Since the only public office
women could hold were priesthoods, they were notably disadvantaged in the Roman com
petition for honors, titles, and other marks of public acclaim (Nicols 1989, 117–42). Only
about 10 percent of honorific statues represented women (Trimble 2011, 216). We might
expect that these statues offered realistic depictions of elite women in comparison to the
simplified figures of saleswomen identified by their stock in trade. Female portrait stat
ues, however, appear formulaic and standardized with heavily draped bodies in the man
ner of goddesses. Women were portrayed in a limited number of statue types (the Pudici
tia, Ceres, the Kore Albani, Hera Borghese, and the Small and Large Herculaneum
Woman types) derived from Hellenic tradition (Fejfer 2008, 335; see essay 3.4, Wood).
Whether these statue types were specifically identified with the various goddesses by Ro
man patrons likely did not matter; more important was the presence of the statues amidst
displays of male honorific figures in the most prestigious quarters of cities. The statues
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Gender
endowed honor upon women deemed worthy and gave them visibility. The latter, however,
was tempered by their representation in the form of familiar female figures from the
repertory of classical culture and the state religion. That the statue types had not
changed for hundreds of years enhanced their venerability and linked the women with
tradition and the cultural legacy of Hellenism (p. 457) under Rome (Trimble 2011, 198, on
the type of the Large Herculaneum Woman as “a generic form of classicism”).
The female honorific statue embodies a deep contradiction in Roman society: in order to
be ennobled in the form of a statue, the women assumed the form of goddesses or person
ified virtues. This guise elevated them above their peers but effectively masked their
identity with conventional poses, drapery suited to divinity, and often idealized faces. In
other words, the images of women of substance all looked somewhat alike, as the conven
tional statue types allowed for limited modification or individualization. Male honorific
statues also can be classified into standard types, but these were rooted in the experience
of their political participation celebrated in active, heroic forms. Men were commemorat
ed in statues as orators, warriors, and priests, roles in which they participated in civic life
and through which they made careers, whereas women were distinguished by sculptural
forms that transformed them into divinities or abstractions, figures larger than life but
without reference to their conditions of existence.
In the past scholars have made much of the minor differences among the various female
statue types in order to identify and classify them. Although grounded in closely observed
details, the literature, paradoxically, has demonstrated the rigid replication of types to
create appearances of uniformity (e.g., variations are found in the positions of arms and
patterns of drapery folds with bundles at the shoulders or hips). The monotony of draped
female figures reflects Roman attitudes that, in contrast to public, political men, wives
and mothers should recede from sight and exert moral influence, if at all, within the reli
gious and domestic spheres.
Portraits and Likeness
The popularity of standardized statue types to create the effect of uniformity produced
immediately recognizable, monumental images for esteemed women (Trimble 2011, 200–
205). If the sculptural bodies were not realistic representations of their subjects, then
were the heads also borrowed from the classical repertory? Or were the heads portraits
with individualized likenesses in order to modify or customize the statues? Social proto
cols of gender affected the development of portraits, and to understand the differences in
development and function of both female and male portraits, it is necessary to turn to
their model, the imperial portrait.
The emperor’s portrait forms the Zeitgesicht (the period face), the features and style of
which were emulated in the portraits of citizens. Yet, the male private portraits (that is,
portraits from outside the imperial family) are not identical with the imperial models (Fe
jfer 2008, 270–85), but were individualized for recognition. The emperor’s portrait clearly
leads the way, while the other images follow. The portraiture of imperial women, however,
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Gender
has been more difficult to distinguish from the (p. 458) private female portraits, and, in
fact, the heads of unidentified women often bear elaborate adornment in the form of coif
fures (331–69). It appears that the emperors’ female relatives were not always in the van
guard. First of all, imperial women of the high empire are less visible in the ancient
sources, both written texts and artifacts. They tend to be represented by fewer sculptural
portrait types. In addition, the marble heads of busts or full-length statues were usually
found without inscribed bases to identify them by name.
The study of coins has established the basis for identifying representations of imperial
personages, including imperial women (Wood 1999, 63–70, 88–92, 289–95). Yet coins’
miniature portraits in profile, their shallow relief, and the lack of noses on many sculpted
heads in the round, limit the value of comparisons between these two portrait types (Fe
jfer 2008, 411). Furthermore, on coins imperial women’s images on obverses tend to be
paired with personifications of virtues on reverses, such as Concordia, Fecunditas, and
Castitas (Alexandridis 2010, 201–4). The personified virtues are abstract in concept and
depicted as veiled and draped female figures with attributes. They are virtually inter
changeable as stock types. The canon of female virtues ornamented coins to support the
moral and ethical foundations of society and the empire. The imagery distances viewers
from the imperial women, who appear simply as fixtures to round out the political agenda
of the imperial court.
Imperial female portraiture has long been characterized as realistic heads with fashion
hairstyles (Bartman 2001, 1–25). While modern scholarship has submitted the female
heads to intense analysis in order to delineate features of individual likenesses, minimal
descriptive detail means that many female portraits cannot stand up to this level of scruti
ny. In fact, homogeneity tends to be a marked characteristic of female heads, and faces of
women in the imperial household may not have been at all easily recognized even when
their husbands or fathers ruled Rome. The number of female heads, their limited number
of portrait types, and their relationship to the coin profiles are rather different than those
of the emperor (Alexandridis 2010, 219–24).
The interpretive problem lies in the production of portraits, attitudes about making
women visible, and the tradition of representation. Although we know very little about the
production of portraits, we must question how many women of any rank modeled for
sculptors, given ideals of modesty and, in the case of imperial women, the chasm in social
status between the artisans and the women of the imperial court. Propriety demanded
modesty and self-restraint from women, who receded from public view in most instances.
By adopting portraits with generic or classicizing features, sculptors endowed women
with ennobled presences and greater stature. Portraits were produced after other por
traits, and when depicting women, sculptors often made use of the venerable tradition of
representing them as beautiful, ageless goddesses. Instead of being surprised by unifor
mity among female portraits, perhaps we should be startled by the extent to which their
conventional sets of features were individualized (Dillon 2010, 131–4). There are, howev
er, periods in which female portrait faces assumed a greater degree of individualization.
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(p. 459)
Abstraction and Adornment
Adornment appeared in period styles that featured showy or striking coiffures (Stephens
2008, 110–32). Cultus (i.e., adornment and dress) entailed the regimens of labor, care,
and control over the body and its outward appearance that resulted in refinement and so
phistication (Olson 2008, 9). The style of the Flavian and Trajanic periods is often de
scribed as realistic, with harsh or aging physiognomies sharing broad features under
elaborate or architectonic coiffures. Although the scholarship attributes hairstyles to
tastes of the imperial women, the enduring appeal of the so-called Flavian coiffure sug
gests that other phenomena were at work beyond that of copying the styles of imperial
women (D’Ambra 2013). The hairstyle marked the women beneath it as members of a
group of matrons whose inherent dignity was demonstrated by their impeccable groom
ing and comportment. As the coiffure spread across the empire and endured, it very well
may have expressed a cosmopolitan style projecting high culture and status.
Status has been thought to have been the primary factor in representation that trumped
gender: elite female patrons preferred the classicizing forms that embodied ideals of
beauty, while women of the lower social orders were portrayed in a vernacular style char
acterized by reductive, inorganic forms. This generalization does not hold true in por
traits and funerary statues in which anonymous (many lower-status, occasionally freed
women) women donned elaborate coiffures or adopted the resplendent body of Venus in
styles that overtook those of the imperial women’s imagery (D’Ambra 1996). It is peculiar
in a starkly hierarchical society that the women of the imperial house did not dominate
nor even stand out from the women below them in rank in their imagery (Fejfer 2008,
344–5). Since the emperor’s wife held no political office and performed a loose array of
traditionally female duties involving cult and patronage, neither dedicated costumes nor
attributes defined her iconography. The suppression of explicit individualized features has
confounded scholars, who have retreated to the complexity of the highly wrought coif
fures instead. Yet, the reserved faces with limited descriptive detail were capable of rep
resenting a broad swath of womanhood with a sense of the appropriate characteristics of
dignity and integrity. The definition of the portrait requires some latitude to include these
highly standardized and formulaic heads. But again, we must remember that inscribed
plaques, usually engraved on bases separate from their statues (and now lost), completed
the function of commemorative statues by identifying their subjects specifically (Trimble
2011, 181–96) and often named titles and honors achieved by women (see essays 3.4,
Wood; and 4.5, Tuck).
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(p. 460)
Action Figures
Proto-Barbies
Figure 4.8.3 Doll of Crepereia Tryphaena, mid-sec
ond century AD. Rome, Musei Capitolini, Centrale
Montemartini.
The best testimony of the wide influence and appeal of the female sculptural portrait lies
in its use for girls’ dolls. More commonly made of rags, dolls were also carved of ivory
and a few of these from the second century AD are finely produced with high levels of
workmanship. One in particular evokes the idealized female portraits of the Antonine
women through its pristine facial features and tower coiffure (figure 4.8.3). Its adult fig
ure also appears ready to be dressed in the high-belted tunics favored by the popular
statue types. The doll was found with its seventeen-year-old female owner, Crepereia
Tryphaena, in her sarcophagus in the city of Rome (Sommella Mura 1983, 10–16). Al
though Crepereia Tryphaena was nearing maturity, she apparently had not cast off the
doll that accompanied her to the grave. The doll, with its looks of a sculpture in minia
ture, took part in the girl’s life, rather than being erected as a monument to it.
The ivory doll bears some resemblance to female portrait sculpture of the mid-second
century AD due to the finesse of its workmanship (down to the fingernails) and the
(p. 461) period style of the coiffure. The facial features, however attractive, have been
simplified to the point of caricature with overly large almond-shaped eyes and small,
pursed lips. It does not portray an individual but, rather, projects to the doll’s owner an
image of a lovely, fair maiden. That the doll possessed a grooming kit with a mirror (also
interred with the girl and her doll) suggests that the games played included studying the
face in the mirror and applying the techniques of beautification (D’Ambra 2007, 61–2).
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Gender
Small ivory combs and jewelry also belonged to the doll, who wore a ring to which a tiny
key was attached—the key opened the box of grooming accessories.
Precious possessions under lock and key point to the imaginary world inhabited by
Crepereia Tryphaena and her doll. The fine contours of the doll’s face and figure demon
strate how ideals of sculptural form serve to introduce girls to the requirements of a re
fined and sophisticated appearance. As artifacts deriving from artistic traditions, such
dolls functioned as hand-held sculpture. Hands were intended to move the doll’s limbs,
supplied with joints at the shoulders, elbows, hips, and knees. Tasks such as changing the
doll’s clothes probably kept Crepereia Tryphaena busy with her toy, though in other
games the doll’s movements brought her into the girls’ world with a semblance of life. In
imaginative play, the doll as a sculpture in miniature engaged with Crepereia Tryphaena
in very different ways than statues, which only seemed to step off their pedestals in myth
or poetry (see essay 6.5, Perry). Given that the female body and its beautification was
considered in poetic terms as a work of art, it is fitting that some Roman girls played with
dolls that resembled honorific statues (D’Ambra 2013).
Heroes and Leaders
Toy figures found in boys’ tombs consisted of action figures, such as soldiers or gladia
tors. A preference for action figures also marks the monumental statuary of the emperor
and elite males. Sculpture distinguishes the emperor and the senatorial leadership in
their various roles as statesmen and orators, generals, or priests of the state religion (Fe
jfer 2008, 181–212). Marble or bronze figures feature the heads of state mounted on spir
ited steeds, declaiming with scrolls in hand, or in the act of offering to the gods with
heads veiled. As much as these figures evoke aspects of military command, public ser
vice, or ceremonial duties, they are statuary types with conventions of their own.
Clothing characterizes the role of the figure in male sculpture, and the same subject was
depicted in different costumes that befit his various offices and appointments. As the fe
male honorific sculpture adapted Hellenic models that featured idealization, male statue
types typically represented youthful bodies at their peak of development and among
these, the nude portrait statue raises provocative issues. Nudity is frequently considered
a hallmark of classical visual culture, and contrary to many modern Western conventions,
there was a rather firm division between nudity and eroticism in antiquity—naked figures
were not necessarily sexual. Nakedness had originally been viewed as a shameful state
for outsiders and other non-elites like slaves and prisoners, but later came to signify posi
tive agonistic, heroic, or divine associations for a male portrait sitter when viewed
through a Hellenic lens (Bonfante 1989; C. H. Hallett 2005, chap. 3). As (p. 462) with
many things Greek, nudity in portraiture was initially avoided in the visual crafting of Ro
man male identity, but private patrons had adopted the costume of “heroic nudity” as ear
ly as the first century BC, as seen in the Tivoli General (figure 6.2.1) and the Pseudo-Ath
lete from Delos. Indeed it is not until Greek visual culture effectively usurped the native
Etruscan over the course of the late Republic that the transition from clothed gods (Etr
uscan) to nude ones (Greek) took place. The acceptance of nudity in the Roman visual lan
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Gender
guage came first to images of gods before being deemed appropriate for mortal men (C.
H. Hallett 2005, 89–92). The type of nudity eventually chosen for Roman male portraits
was aspirational, asserting the virility and athleticism of the sitter through an idealized
and muscular physique; this state of undress evoked the perfection and vigor of great
gods and heroes.
Figure 4.8.4 Sleeping Hermaphrodite, first century
AD. Pompeii, Ufficio Scavi.
Nude male portraits frequently employed weapons as attributes, likely to clarify this un
dressed state as heroic rather than vulnerable, yet male nudity need not be motivated by
a specific mythological narrative. The exposure of the female body, however, required jus
tification by the mythological vignette of Venus bathing, which evoked the Roman
matron’s beautification regime and the female stylization of the self (D’Ambra 1996, 219–
32; 2000, 101–114). Both male and female nude portraits employed the attributes of di
vinities, not to suggest apotheosis, but that the sitter possessed the superior characteris
tics of the emulated god (C. H. Hallett 2005, 225–9). The poses of the nude male figures
also communicated physical strength through posture and gesture: well-balanced con
trapposto, a raised arm, face squarely regarding the viewer. Often the wrinkled faces of
the portrait heads seem to clash with their powerfully formed physiques, as in the por
trait statue of Claudius in the guise of Jupiter. The divine body replaces the emperor’s
own figure, known for various physical defects or deficiencies, as accounted in the an
cient written sources (Suet. Claud. 2–4).
Hermaphrodites and Hermaphroditus
Hermaphrodites present a special case in Roman constructions of sexual and gender
identity in their endowment with both male sex organs and female breasts; in Roman eyes
they violated natural laws of anatomy and defied the categories of the social order. While
the myths of Hermaphroditus inspired depiction of hermaphrodites in sculpture and do
mestic wall-painting (Diod. Sic. 4.6.5; Ov. Met. 4.285–388), actual intersex people were
mostly reviled by the Romans and seen as ill portents (Livy 31.12). The fourth-century AD
author Ausonius described hermaphrodites as either sexually apathetic or prone to exces
sive passion. Hermaphroditus more emphatically contravenes expected Roman gender
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Gender
norms than, say Omphale, yet images of the double-sexed figure are more popular, ac
cording to the surviving archaeological evidence (Ajootian 1990; Kampen 1996a). No
doubt, the popularity of the hermaphrodite reflected fascination with the doubling of sex
ual attributes and the abundance of vitality this implied. The most familiar sculptural type
of Hermaphroditus, the Sleeping Hermaphrodite (p. 463) who twists his/her body to
present male and female sex organs to viewers on opposite sides of the sculpture, offer
ing the opportunity for a titillating surprise, has excessively colored modern interpreta
tions of this subject. Yet a number of other depictions of Hermaphroditus offer the viewer
direct access to both male genitalia and female breasts in one glance (figure 4.8.4). The
anasyromenos type wears a garment that reveals the female breasts and lifts the hem of
the dress to reveal male genitals (Ajootian 2000, 220–23). The lifting of the garment is an
essential element of this type of hermaphrodite image: as women’s garments concealed
their pubic region even if the breasts were clearly rendered under the cloth, Hermaphro
ditus must raise his/her skirt to distinguish him/herself as not simply female. The aggres
sive gesture of exposure suggests that statues of hermaphrodites may have served to
avert the evil eye, in the manner of Priapic imagery in Roman domestic gardens (Ajootian
2000, 230; Clarke 2007, 180).
Sexuality and Sexual Behavior in Roman Sculp
ture
Figure 4.8.5 Warren Cup, Augustan period. London,
British Museum.
As has been noted above, much of the iconography of female figures in Roman sculpture
emphasized their fertility and sexual attractiveness to men, yet these images were
(p. 464) not explicitly sexual. Statues of goddesses, as in the Venus types, appropriately
exploited the divinity’s appealing fleshiness in nude representations. The opportunity to
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Gender
eroticize male figures did not go unmissed by Roman sculptors; a class of Idealplastik
representations of vaguely mythological young men has been singled out as a genre of
“sexy boys” because of the subjects’ youthful, lithe, nude forms and poses that draw at
tention to their genitalia (Bartman 2002). This category of eroticized young men in sculp
ture can be viewed as an exception to the rule of heteronormativity in Roman visual cul
ture, as these figures were likely commissioned by men.
Sexuality or eroticism in Roman sculpture can be difficult to interpret, and it should be
noted that overtly sexual scenes are effectively absent, being more the purview of Roman
painting (as in scenes from the Suburban Baths at Pompeii; Clarke 1998, 212–40). Sym
plegmata, however, are indeed scenes of intercourse yet are exclusively mythological in
nature as the couplings include at least one nonhuman, like the group of a satyr and a
hermaphrodite from Villa A at Oplontis or Pan and a goat from the Villa of the Papyri at
Herculaneum (Stähli 1999). Other examples of explicit sexual scenes are found in the socalled minor arts, and the best-known and most controversial example of such a scene is
the silver Warren Cup, with its depiction of homosexual activity on a rather luxurious ob
ject (figure 4.8.5; Clarke 1993; 1998, 61–78). The figured relief scene displays the style
and technique found in monumental relief sculpture, and its subject matter (p. 465) ap
pealed to a rarefied group of connoisseurs or collectors. With its Augustan date, the War
ren Cup forms the antithesis to the Tellus panel of the Ara Pacis. The panel on the state
altar and the silver goblet both display the elegance of high classical style, with graceful
symmetry, masterful balancing of relief layers, fine details, full-bodied figures with chis
eled profiles, and recondite allusions to myth and paideia. Yet the Ara Pacis represents
the female body as nature, t…