Tyranny and the Ring of Gyges: Justice and Freedom in Plato's Political Thought Lexie White McGill

The Centrality of Glaucon’s Myth of the Ring for the Intrinsic Worth of Justice

Alexa Lynn White, McGill

Glaucon’ s story of the ring of Gyges is the pivotal thematic myth in the Republic. As I

hope to show, the story of the ring narratively establishes the central question that the Republic

aims to answer, namely the question of whether justice is intrinsically valuable, while

simultaneously establishing the overarching theme of tyranny and slavery. In addition, Socrates’

myth of Er functions as the philosophical counterargument to Glaucon’ s account of justice

exhibited in the ring of Gyges, indicating the general prevalence of Thrasymachus’ contractual

conception of justice as merely instrumental and Plato’s attempt to subvert this sophistic theory.

There are three kinds of evidence for the philosophical importance of the story of the Gygean

ring. First, Glaucon’ s story of the ring stands in a symmetrical relation to Socrates’ myth of Er,

since both instantiate varying representations of the most important theme of the dialogue,

namely the exhortation to justice and its internal rewards, and share the generic form of the

Greek katabasis. Secondly, the myth of the ring of Gyges is central to the argument that tyranny

and slavery are inseparable from the unjust and unhappy life. Third, evidence for its importance

can be found in Plato’s overlapping use of visual language in Glaucon’ s ‘thought experiment’ (τῇ

διανοίᾳ), the visual language of ‘looking’ upon the form of the Good as an analogue of

philosophical contemplation, and the visual themes of the myth of Er.

The myth of the ring of Gyges is introduced in the Republic in order to elaborate on the

instrumental definition of justice advanced by Thrasymachus at the beginning of the dialogue.

Thrasymachus argues that justice is “the advantage of the stronger,” 254 and that the only reason

that people act justly is due to their inability to act unjustly. As such, Thrasymachus argues that

acting unjustly and self-interestedly is more beneficial than acting justly. Glaucon and

Adeimantus take on the role of devil’s advocate to reformulate the definition of justice postulated

in Book I and insist that Socrates come to the defense of justice’s intrinsic worth. Glaucon invites

Socrates and the reader to consider a ‘thought experiment’ ( dianoia ) to demonstrate

the force of the argument for justice’s instrumentality because “we would perceive [αἰσθοίμεθα]

most clearly that those who practice justice do it unwillingly and because they lack the power to

do injustice, if in our thoughts [ποιήσαιμεν τῇ διανοίᾳ] we grant to a just and an unjust person the freedom to do whatever they like [ποιεῖν ὅτι ἂν βούληται].” 255 He proceeds to tell a vivid

story about a Lydian shepherd who acquired “the power they say the ancestor of Gyges of Lydia possessed,” 256 namely a ring that has the ability to turn the wearer invisible. After the lowly

shepherd acquires this ring, he uses it to “[seduce] the king’s wife,

[attack] the king with her help, [kill] him, and [take] over the kingdom.” 4

The myth of Gyges’ ring in the Republic illustrates that every human being would act

unjustly and self-interestedly if they could escape detection for their crimes and thereby avoid

punishment and the appearance of being unjust. As such, the myth illustrates that justice is only

useful for its extrinsic benefits, such as a good reputation and the avoidance of punishment. On

Glaucon’ s argumentation, the best possible scenario is to appear just to one’s peers while secretly

254 Plato, “The Republic, ” trans. G.M.A. Grube and C.D.C. Reeve, in The Complete Works of Plato, ed. John M. Cooper (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997), I. 338e5-339a3. 255 Plato, “The Republic, ” II.359b6-7, slightly modified. 256 Plato, “The Republic, ” II.359c10. 4 Plato, “The Republic, ” II.360a10-b1.

being unjust and reaping the rewards of self-interested gain. While this is the more obvious

function of Glaucon’ s thought experiment, I would like to argue that the myth of Gyges’ ring

does more than narratively illustrate Thrasymachus’ instrumental definition of justice, but also

suggests that adhering to an instrumental definition of justice transforms one into a tyrant, who

is proven to be the ultimate slave due to his enslavement to the inferior parts of his soul and as

such lives the most wretched life. The myth of the ring of Gyges is thus more important to the

overall philosophical argument than has been previously acknowledged.

The primary evidence pointing to the centrality of the myth of the ring is due to its

relation to Socrates’ myth of Er in Book X. Rachel Barney’s article “Platonic Ring Composition

in Plato and Republic 10” argues that the myth of the ring stands in ring relation to Socrates’ myth

of Er and that “ring composition expresses a conception of philosophical method common to

Plato and Aristotle.” 257 One reason to argue that the myth of the ring and the myth of Er are in

ring relation is because both the story of the ring and the myth of Er share the generic form of

the katabasis. The katabasis was a familiar trope in the Greek literary tradition at the time of

Plato’s intellectual flourishing. The katabasis of Odysseus in Homer’s Odyssey is paradigmatic of

the structure and form that later katabases would share. According to Stamatia Dova, the

katabasis of Odysseus “allows us to sketch a basic outline of the requirements for this unique

experience: the hero descends with divine assistance to the underworld where he performs an

important task, has significant encounters with ghosts, and comes back alive to proceed

successfully with the rest of his endeavours.” 258 In the Odyssean katabasis, the titular character

embarks on a journey into the underworld to receive instructions from the deceased prophet,

257 Rachel Barney, “Platonic Ring-Composition and Republic 10, ” in Plato ’ s Republic: A Critical Guide, ed. M. McPherran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 37. 258 Stamatia Dova, Greek Heroes in and out of Hades (Maryland: Lexington Books, 2012), 1.

Tiresias, and in the process meets with the shades of several of his deceased companions, most

notably Achilles, and is told what he must do in order to successfully return to his homeland of

Ithaca. The katabasis was a significant feature of Greek mythology, as it depicted a hero’s descent

into an unknown and inhospitable realm but nevertheless often granted him prizes or secret

knowledge. Nevertheless, the katabasis signified more than a mere literary motif. A staple

segment of numerous important Greek myths, Radcliffe G. Edmonds III argued that before

finding a definition of katabasis, one must first understand and define ‘myth’.

The term has been notoriously difficult for modern scholars to pin down, since the word

muthos as used by the Ancient Greeks did not denote a fixed or stable notion, but rather

represented a fluidity of meanings which varied with context. Edmonds’ proposed definition of

“myth as an agonistic form of cultural discourse, a traditional language for the communication of

ideas from the author to his audience, in which the competing stories vie for authority,” 259

however, sheds light on the way in which Plato’s katabasis can be understood. According to

Edmonds,

“[t]he idea of a journey to the realm of the dead brings out this contrast between the worlds […] The stories people tell about the journey to the other world, the realm of the dead, thus reveal their implicit assumptions about the world in which they, as the living, dwell. These stories act as a kind of mirror that reflects the picture of their world.” 260

The description of an unknown such as the afterlife is never divorced from a culture’s

implicit beliefs about their understanding of life. If Edmonds is right in suggesting that myth in

Ancient Greece was agonistic, competing for authority and repute with other versions or

259 Radcliffe G. Edmonds III, Myths of the Underworld Journey: Plato, Aristophanes, and the ‘Orphic ’ Gold Tablets (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 5. 260 Edmonds, Myths of the Underworld Journey, 3.

accounts, then the dominantly accepted myths would constitute and reflect accepted cultural

ideologies. If on the one hand the most popular underworld myth represents mythical heroes

lamenting the loss of life, preferring to “labor on earth in service to another, to a man who is

landless, with little to live on, than be king over all the dead” ( Odyssey xi. 489-91 quoted in

Republic III.386c), as famously asserted by Achilles in Odysseus’ katabasis, one might suppose

that a culture favouring that myth would be ‘life-affirming’ and fearful of death. Indeed, this very

quote is utilized by Socrates in Republic III to discredit the usefulness and acceptability of

Homeric epic , as it causes soldiers to fear death more than slavery, since even Achilles, arguably

the greatest warrior in Ancient Greek mythology and the champion of Greek aretē, would prefer

to be a slave than to be a shade in Hades.

It is therefore perhaps not surprising, given Edmonds’ definition of mythology as

agonistic discourse which reflects a culture’s beliefs , that Plato utilizes mythic discourse despite

his constant condemnation of it. The myths that he constructs in his own dialogues compete

with the myths dominantly held by both aristocrats and the hoi polloi alike, and therefore Plato’s

eschatological myths, and in particular the katabasis of Er, represent an inversion of traditional

Greek concepts of the afterlife. Instead of becoming a mindless, gibbering shadow of one’s

former self, “a mere phantasm, with its wits completely gone” ( Iliad xxiii.103-4, quoted in

Republic III.386d), Plato’s version of the afterlife is a mere transition between one’s previous life

and the next, reincarnated life. Each soul in the underworld still possesses their mind, memories,

and reasoning ability, and as such choose their next life based on “the character of their former

life” (X.620a). According to Socrates, so long as an individual devoted herself to the pursuit of

philosophy and the Good in her former life, she will be able to recognize what a truly good life

looks like in the underworld. The character of a person’ s afterlife is not the same for all, but

rather depends upon the moral integrity of the person in question.

The myth of Er is therefore a rival myth to those being perpetuated by Homeric epic and

Hesiodic verse, and Plato clearly understood the power of myth to codify cultural practices and

beliefs. He therefore supposed that replacing stories of the underworld in Homer with his own

mythology would encourage people to act morally and righteously in life, rather than do anything

to avoid death. It has the rather elegant twofold effect of on the one hand proving that death is

not a horrible thing, abolishing any fear of death in life, and on the other, giving people a

powerful reason to act morally and justly in their life so as to procure for themselves a pleasant

afterlife and subsequent reincarnation. The Myth of Er in the Republic thus acts as a competitor

to the versions of the underworld presented by Homer and Hesiod. The katabasis of Er also

competes with Glaucon’ s myth of the Lydian shepherd, which shares the generic form of the

katabasis and portrays the life of injustice as the best, ultimately disproving it by demonstrating

the blessed afterlife of just and philosophical souls. Plato’s version of the katabasis and portrayal

of the afterlife are thus not mere poetic ornamentations, but serve the philosophical thrust of the

dialogue as a whole, by acting as an inversion of the traditional, Homeric-style katabasis, as well

as the counter-argument to the ‘katabasis’ of the Lydian shepherd narrated by Glaucon in Book

III.

It might be objected that the story of the ring of Gyges is not a katabasis per se , since the

shepherd does not explicitly travel into the underworld and the story lacks certain other

structural elements of the katabasis, such as the tripartite construction that Radcliffe G.

Edmonds identified as the presence of “obstacles […] solutions […] and results.” 261 Whatever

261 Edmonds, Myths of the Underworld Journey, 22.

features of the katabasis that Glaucon’ s story seems to lack in terms of specific motifs and plot

structure, however, one can allow given its overall thematic parallels with the traditional katabasis.

Some superficial elements of Glaucon’ s story liken it to a katabasis, such as the fact that

katabases almost exclusively take place via a descent or an ascent into another realm, and the

Lydian shepherd descends into the chasm in the earth, as well as the fact that the shepherd

encounters a corpse (νεκρόν) “of more than human size” (II.359d), establishing a connection to

death and an otherworldly, unhuman realm. Additionally, the language which Glaucon employs in

the description of the shepherd’s descent likens it to a katabasis. After watching the chasm

emerge in the earth, the verb that Plato employs to describe the shepherd’s descent into the

chasm is the verb καταβαίνω , ‘to go down’. This is where the word katabasis comes from, which

means the exact thing, only in the noun form – literally a ‘going down.’

But perhaps most importantly, the story mirrors what some scholars have identified as the

essential symbolic meaning of the Greek katabasis, namely, that “the peculiar pattern of a

person’ s departure from the land of the living and journey to the realm of the dead […] entails

the death of the old self and rebirth into the new mature personality,” 262 constituting a

“replacement of the old self with the new.” 11 This underlying interpretation of the symbolic

meaning of the katabasis is exhibited in the shepherd’s descent and acquisition of the ring. In the

beginning of the story he is a lowly shepherd, whereas after undergoing his own ‘katabasis’ he

emerges as an entirely new person, that of a lawless tyrant who commits great crimes with the

newfound power he received via the katabasis, namely the ring. The notion of the katabasis

symbolically representing a fundamental rebirth or change in a person’ s character is literalized in

the myth of Er, in which souls are literally reincarnated into a new life, based on the memories of

their past – hence, Orpheus chooses “a swan ’ s life, because he hated the female sex because of

his death at their hands”, Ajax the life of a lion “because he remembered the judgement about

the armor”, Atalanta the life of “a male athlete,” and Odysseus the life of “a private individual

who did his own work” (X.620a-d). The katabasis is completed after each soul drinks from the

water of the Lethe, and subsequently ascends “up to their births like shooting stars” (X.621b). If

the rebirth of the Lydian shepherd or Odysseus in their respective katabases appears symbolic,

Plato’s katabasis brought this metaphor into the realm of the literal. Indeed, Plato ending the

Republic with a katabasis holds further significance. The reader, as a passive observer (much like

Er) effectively has her own katabasis, with Plato intending that she will emerge from the dialogue

itself reborn and with a newfound conviction in the intrinsic goodness of justice, the

262 Edmonds, Myths of the Underworld Journey, 18.

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philosophical aim of the entire dialogue, and hence “both in this life and on the thousand-year

journey […] do well and be happy” (X.621d). Further support for this argument is found in the

fact that the first word of the Republic is the verb καταβαίνω , used in the first-person aorist form

by Socrates to describe his ‘going down’ to the Piraeus to see the festival of Bendis. The dialogue

as a whole is therefore a kind of katabasis, with the reader descending, like Er, into the text itself

as an observer of Socrates’ discussions as Socrates himself (deceased at the time in which Plato

was writing this, as well) transitions from the ‘early dialogue’ elenctic and intellectually numbing

questioner of all claims to knowledge, into the paradigmatic teacher of a positive conception of

justice that becomes the Socrates of Plato’s ‘later period’ dialogues. That Plato’s eschatological

myths often occur at the end of his dialogues (e.g. Phaedo and Gorgias ) may in fact indicate that,

throughout the course of reading and engaging with the arguments of the dialogue, Plato hopes

that the reader will be reborn with respect to her philosophical and ethical views.

While the Republic ends with the Errian katabasis, it is arguably the case that the main

bulk of the text, and Plato’s complex argument for the intrinsic worth of justice, begins with the

Lydian shepherd’s katabasis. The two stories therefore mirror each other in interesting ways, and

Rachel Barney has pointed out that “the ‘choice of lives’ depicted in the Myth of Er […] clearly

stands in a ring-relation to Glaucon’ s Book II speech and the myth of Gyges’ ring in particular”

in that “both passages are images of ‘context free choice’, the selection of a destiny in a magical

absence of social constraints and moral convention.” 263 While the Lydian shepherd chooses the

life of a lawless tyrant, the just soul in the myth of Er chooses the life that may not initially

263 Barney, “Ring-Composition, ” 40. 13

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appear to be glamorous and fulfilling, but based on her philosophical training and knowledge is

able to see beyond the superficially attractive life and instead chooses the life of a just, modest

individual. Barney argued that the story of the Lydian shepherd is thus a representation of the

choice of the “unreflective person,” 13 who immediately gravitates towards the life of the tyrant,

mistakenly believing it will allow him to do whatever he desires however he pleases. Ironically

enough, the absolute notion of freedom that is apparently granted to the tyrant however turns

out to be the worst possible slavery according to Plato’s argument.

As such, both the myth of Er and the story of the ring of Gyges exemplify the political

theme of tyranny, slavery, and freedom. Of the individuals in the underworld who had led an

unjust life, “pretty well all […] were tyrants” (X.615d). According to Er, the first individual to

come up from his thousand-year torment below the earth, and who could be a reference to

Glaucon’ s Lydian shepherd, when choosing his subsequent life “chose the greatest tyranny. In his

folly and greed he chose it without adequate examination” (X.619c). On the other hand, Glaucon

explains that once the shepherd of the Lydian king finds the ring, he goes on immediately to

seduce the queen and take over the kingdom of Lydia and is therefore paradigmatic of a Greek

tyrant. The myth of Er is therefore an inversion of Glaucon’ s story, as it condemns the tyrant and

shows him to be the unhappiest of all the souls in the underworld, for they must suffer the worst

punishments for sometimes indefinite amounts of time. As Rachel Barney pointed out, “the

Myth of Er serves to (among other things) correct the Ring of Gyges story, showing that it only

depicts human nature in its uneducated state and thus misrepresents the powers of justice.” 14 The

Myth of Er is, in a sense, Socrates’ counterargument in the same format as Glaucon’ s, creating a

thematic and literary ‘ring’ – funnily enough, the structure of the dialogue mimics the very object

119

which the shepherd uses to perform unjust actions, the daktulion . But worst of all, the

unreflective and unjust person who chooses the life of the tyrant lives is the most wretched not

merely in her death, but even in her waking life. This is because the unjust tyrant has a

fundamentally corrupt understanding of freedom, thinking that true freedom and happiness is

found in one’s ability to do whatever one wants (ποιεῖν ὅτι ἂν βούληται) with no social or civic

restraints (as was the prerogative of the actual ancient tyrant) when in fact Plato proves through

his definition of justice that the life of the unjust person, exemplified in the tyrant, is the life of

greatest enslavement.

There is, however, another important thematic connection between the myth of the ring

and the myth of Er, namely the theme of spectacle and the predominance of visual language.

Many scholars have pointed out that the myth of the Gygean ring is remarkably fabulous.

Glaucon does not merely present the Lydian shepherd and the magic ring, but rather describes

specific and seemingly decorative details of the protagonist’s acquisition of it. Glaucon describes

that “an earthquake broke open the ground and created a chasm […and that] seeing [ἰδόντα] this,

[the shepherd] was filled with amazement [θαυμάσαντα] and went down [καταβῆναι] into it. And

there, in addition to many other wonders of which we’re told [ἰδεῖν ἄλλα τε δὴ ἃ μυθολογοῦσιν],

he saw a hollow bronze horse [… and] a corpse, which seemed to be of more than human size, wearing nothing but a gold ring [χρυσοῦν δακτύλιον] on its finger” ( Republic., II.359d-e). 264

264 Plato, “The Republic, ” 359d-e.

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As Andrew Laird points out, “Glaucon’ s narrative […] contains a great deal of descriptive detail,

apparently superfluous for the ends to which the story is told.” 265 These details do not serve any

specific philosophical purpose on the face of it, and indeed are unnecessary to establish the

overall point of the thought experiment, namely that human beings are predisposed to

self-interested injustice if they are able to get away with it. The literary and fantastic qualities of

Glaucon’ s dianoia have been partly ignored or written off as one of Plato’s mythopoetic

flourishes, which do not necessarily play any significant role in the overall philosophical

argument. The language and narrative details of the myth of the ring, however, serve an

important philosophical role in the Republic by establishing the themes of vision and spectacle

and setting up the contrast between the liberating intellectual sight of the philosopher on the one

hand, and the enslaving sensible sight of the tyrant or non-philosopher on the other.

Visual language is highly prominent in the Republic. In setting out the argument that justice is

intrinsically worthy of choice , Socrates proposes that, in trying to understand what justice is, it

would be easier to ‘see’ it if it were displayed on a larger scale, such as in a collective polis rather

than an individual soul . He uses an analogy of larger and smaller letters, and since the pursuit of

understanding justice “is not easy but requires keen eyesight [οὐ φαῦλον ἀλλ᾽ ὀξὺ βλέποντος]”

( Rep., II.368c, slightly modified), they ought to try to “read the larger ones first and then […]

examine [ἐπισκοπεῖν] the smaller ones” ( Rep., II.368c). In addition, when Socrates and his

interlocutors have constructed Kallipolis , Socrates instructs them to ‘look’ into the city in order

to see where justice is. At first, Socrates is remiss, until with a joyful ‘ iou, iou! ’ he “[catches] sight

of something [καὶ ἐγὼ κατιδών]” (IV.432d), namely, that justice is the ‘minding of one’s own

business’ exhibited between the various classes. Socrates constantly uses visual imagery in trying

265 Andrew Laird, “Ringing the Changes on Gyges: Philosophy and the Formation of Fiction in Plato’s Republic, ” The Journal of Hellenic Studies 121 (2001): 19.

to grasp the nature of justice. The metaphor of seeing as understanding or contemplating is

continued when describing the philosophical process and the education of the philosopher kings.

In both the simile of the sun in Book VI and the allegory of the cave in Book VII, the

philosopher figuratively looks upon the form of the Good, symbolized in both myths as the sun.

Plato uses the sun as an analogy for the form of the Good, which he calls “the offspring of the

good, which the good begot as its analogue. What the good itself is in the intelligible realm, in

relation to understanding and intelligible things, the sun is in the visible realm, in relation to sight

and visible things” (VI.508b-c). Plato argues that the sun, an entity which illuminates and “makes

the things we see visible” (VI.509b) is as an analogue to the Good, which similarly possesses a

property which illuminates or makes intelligible forms and noetic concepts. Just as the sun

produces light which enables one to see her surroundings by means of her eyes, so too the Good

enables noetic concepts beyond the sensible world to be grasped by the human mind.

The allegory of the cave continues the analogy of philosophical enlightenment and

grasping of the forms with the language of vision and sight. When Socrates describes the

allegory of the cave, he exhorts Glaucon to “consider, then, what being released from their

bonds and cured of their ignorance would naturally be like” (VII.514c), with ‘consider’ translating

skopei, meaning literally ‘look’ or ‘examine’. Later, Socrates says that if a philosopher manages to

break free from the cave, and “[looks] up toward the light, [πρὸς τὸ φῶς ἀναβλέπειν] he’d be

pained and dazzled and unable to see [ἀδυνατοῖ καθορᾶν] the things whose shadows he’d seen

[ἑώρα] before” (VII.514c-d). It is only after the philosopher has adjusted to the brightness of the

outside world that she will finally “be able to see the sun itself, in its own place, and be able to

study it [δύναιτ᾽ ἂν κατιδεῖν καὶ θεάσασθαι οἷός ἐστιν]” (VII.516b). ‘Study’ translates theaomai,

which denotes gazing and beholding in general in addition to studying. Interestingly, theaomai also

appears to have the same etymological root as theoria, the act of ‘looking at, viewing, beholding’,

and even ‘sightseeing’, from which we derive our English word ‘theory’.

The allegory of the cave functions as a metaphor for philosophical enlightenment, and

Plato takes great pains throughout the Republic and elsewhere in his corpus to remind his readers

that the forms, or noetic concepts, are not grasped by sense organs, but by the mind itself. The

language of sight works as a proxy for the intellectual activity of Platonic contemplation and

comes across as a puzzling metaphor given Plato’s seemingly rational (as opposed to empirical)

epistemology. One might expect that, given Plato’s rejection of the sensible realm as inherently

unknowable and imperfect, he would attempt to distance his epistemological arguments from

such language rather than actively employ it. Plato constantly reminds his readers that

information derived from the sensible realm is inconstant and unreliable and can only be counted

as ‘opinion’ rather than knowledge proper. On his view it is impossible to truly know anything by

means of the senses, because every sensible object is itself an imperfect image of something more

real, namely the abstract and noetic form of which it is an instantiation. Why, then, does he use

the language of sight when describing the philosopher’s understanding and recognition of the

forms? It seems odd to advocate for a rational epistemology and at the same time linguistically

suggest that sight is imperative to true philosophical understanding.

One reason that I would like to offer as to why Plato used visual language when allegorizing the

process of intellection may be as an ironic critique of Greek empiricists and naturalists emerging

during the Greek pre-Socratic intellectual ‘enlightenment’, as well as colloquial Greek vernacular

in general. Scholars of the Greek language have often pointed to the highly sensory nature of

Ancient Greek, perhaps most notably with words such as the verb οἶδα , ‘to know’, which is the

past perfective form of the verb ὁράω , to see – οἶδα in its original and literal translation merely

means ‘to have seen’. In the Greek context, the notion of having seen something in the past

becomes equated with knowing something in the present moment. Plato, rejecting the notion

that one can have true knowledge from mere sense perception alone, as he reveals for example in

the divided line analogy in the Republic (VI.510a, 511c-e), may have utilized the language of vision

in connection to contemplative activity as a means of usurping its original meaning, as an

empirical activity, into something rational and a priori, not involving sense organs or having as its

objects sensible things. Indeed, after Socrates has elucidated the analogy of the cave, he states

that “education isn’t what some people declare it to be, namely, putting knowledge into souls that

lack it, like putting sight into blind eyes” (VII.517b-c). Rather, education is the process of

‘turning’ the soul’s ‘eye’ away from the changing and illusory realm of sensible objects to the

stable, permanent, and divine realm of the Forms, namely, “where it ought to look” (VII.518d).

The “vicious and clever” individuals Plato alludes to next, who have “keen vision” nevertheless

direct this vision towards objects which it shouldn’t be directed to, the changing and illusory

realm of becoming, and as such “[are] forced to serve evil ends” (VII. 519a) rather than the

divine ends grasped by the philosopher’s ‘vision.’ These vicious and clever individuals are likely

the ‘counterfeit philosophers,’ or, on Plato’s reckoning, the sophists and natural philosophers,

who do not look beyond the realm of the changing and inconstant, directing their intellectual

gaze instead to the world of becoming. Plato’s exhortation is therefore to turn our own eyes and

attentions away from the inferior realm and fixate instead on entities existing beyond the realm

of sense perception.

Plato’s use of visual language in the Republic is an attempt to recontextualize the notion of

‘sight’, specifically to shift the connotations of seeing away from the realm of the material and

ephemeral, which had been customary for Greek Presocratics, historiographers, playwrights, and

even everyday Ancient Greek people, towards the abstract and intellectual sight of the

unchanging, eternal, and divine Forms. In a way, Plato was pioneering his own technical notion

of the concept of seeing. This perhaps should not be seen as radical or surprising of Plato.

Indeed, there seems to be an important connection between the unqualified and radical freedom

to ‘do whatever one wants’ and sight in both the Republic and the Laws. André Laks points to “the

famous description of ‘the excessive development of the free way of life’ […] in Athens,

beginning with disrespect for rules governing music, followed by unchecked democracy, and

ending in the return to our ‘Titanic nature’ (701c) through ‘theatrocracy’ (700a-701b)” 266 as the

passage which “makes abundantly clear […] that essential to Plato’s admission of freedom as a

goal is the question of its scope.” 18 The kind of freedom which the Athenians pursued led to a

θεατροκρατία, literally rule of the spectator or theatre, and is mythologized by Plato in the

allegory of the cave, with the prisoners representing spectators in a theatre and the cave wall

being the theatre itself. The Athenian in the Laws suggests that “music proved to be the starting

point of everyone’s conviction that he was an authority on everything, and of a general disregard

for the law […] The conviction that they knew made them unafraid, and assurance engendered

effrontery.” 267 The imprisoned spectators in the cave similarly believe that they know and

understand the objects of which they only see shadows, even though they are actually ignorant of

the true nature of these objects. It is only the philosopher who redirects her sight to look upon

the objects themselves, and eventually the Forms themselves, and thus gains true knowledge

266 André Laks, “Freedom, Liberality, and Liberty, ” in Freedom, Reason, and the Polis: Essays in Ancient Greek Political Philosophy, eds. David Keyt and Fred D. Miller Jr. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 142. 18 Laks, “Freedom, ” 143. 267 Plato, “Laws, ” trans. Trevor J. Saunders, in The Complete Works of Plato, ed. John M. Cooper (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997), III.701a8-b1.

rather than mere opinion. This suggests that Plato believed that the radical and unqualified

freedom of the Athenian government led to an enslavement to sights and spectacles because they

directed their gaze at the wrong objects. The Lydian shepherd in Glaucon’ s myth similarly directs

his sights towards the spectacles in the chasm, and because of the magic ring is able to ‘do

whatever he wants,’ leading him to become an unjust tyrant. The philosopher on the other hand,

freed from the cave, looks at the right objects and in doing so becomes truly free. The subversive

effect of the Republic is achieved in the very language, to which he assigns new semantic meaning.

Visual language is heavily employed in both the myth of Gyges and the myth of Er in

addition to the allegory of the cave, representing Plato’s attempt to reorient the connotations of

sight away from the transitory world of the senses, and by extension one’s own self-interest, to

the intellectual realm of philosophy and the Forms. When the chasm in the earth opens up, the

Lydian shepherd, “seeing [ἰδόντα] this […] was filled with amazement.” In addition, he “[sees,

ἰδεῖν] a hollow bronze horse,” is described as “peeping in [ἐγκύψαντα],” and “[sees, ἰδεῖν] a

corpse” (359d-e). The seemingly decorative details of the Lydian shepherd’s journey into the

chasm are all punctuated with the language of vision. And indeed, the power of the ring is that it

allows him to be unseen by all when he puts it on. Thus, it could be argued that the shepherd was

only able to see his own self-interest and advantage. The theme of spectacle and freedom/slavery

is artfully established from the very beginning of the dialogue in the story of Gyges and thus

foreshadows Plato’s subsequent philosophical arguments for the intrinsic worth of justice.

In addition, Socrates’ myth of Er contains a great deal of visual language. Glaucon’ s story

of the Lydian shepherd and the myth of Er share an overlapping connection to the visual themes

of the Republic as a whole. In the eschatological myth, the just souls who have come from below

the earth “recalled all they had suffered and seen [ἴδοιεν]” (X.615a) whereas the souls who had

come down from heaven explain to Er “the inconceivably fine and beautiful sights they had seen

[εὐπαθείας διηγεῖσθαι καὶ θέας ἀμηχάνους τὸ κάλλος]” (X.615a). These “inconceivably fine and

beautiful sights” seem to be a reference to the Platonic forms, which again are described

metaphorically as being ‘seen’ just as they were in the allegory of the cave and the simile of the

sun. In the Phaedrus as well, discarnate souls are described by Socrates as catching glimpses of the

forms, some getting a better look and others a worse one, which affects the life they lead once

they become embodied ( Phaedrus, 247c-d, 248b-d). The souls who get a better look at the forms

in their discarnate state have a greater memory of the forms in embodied life, and therefore

become philosophers, or are more disposed to do so, thereby living a more blessed life. Socrates

therefore uses the myth of Er to disprove the supposed happiness of the possessor of the ring, if

she chose to use it for evil and self-serving ends rather than just ends. Whereas the Lydian

shepherd figuratively reveals himself to be an unjust person through his ability to remain unseen

by his peers, the philosopher in contrast becomes just and virtuous due to her visual/intellectual

acquaintance with the forms, with Plato’s conclusion being that the latter live happier lives both

while alive and in death. The spectacles that the Lydian shepherd sees while exploring the chasm

in the earth – the ring, the corpse, the wooden horse, etc. – are all juxtaposed to the beautiful

sights, namely the forms, one of which might be the form of Justice itself, that both Er and the

just souls witness in the underworld. While the possessor of the ring becomes a tyrant, seemingly

gaining everything he wanted such as power, wealth, and sexual gratification, the myth of Er

ultimately reveals that tyrants fare the worst in the underworld, suffering for many years and

choosing lives that are clearly miserable and wretched. The sight of the Lydian shepherd, so

frequently alluded to in the language of the thought experiment, is thus comparable to the sight

of the vicious and clever counterfeit philosophers, who are “forced to serve evil ends” (VII.

519a). On the other hand, the sight of the just soul is directed toward the unchanging and eternal

realm of the forms, the very sight of which allows her to become just by imitating their orderly

patterns and thus lead a blessed afterlife.

In addition, in Book IX when Socrates and Glaucon are determining which of the lives

they have described in the previous books is the most pleasant, Socrates cautions his

interlocutors to “not be dazzled [μὴ ἐκπληττώμεθα] looking at one man – a tyrant – [πρὸς τὸν

τύραννον ἕνα ὄντα βλέποντες] […] since it is essential to go into the city and study [θεάσασθαι] the

whole of it, […and] not give [ἀποφαινώμεθα, literally ‘cause to appear out’] our opinion, till we’ve

gone down and looked [ἰδόντες] into every corner” (IX.576d-e). This is a remarkable passage for

two reasons. First, due to the clear visual language Plato once again employs in seeking the

nature of justice (and in this case, its intrinsic worth particularly, as it is connected to the

judgement that the just life is the most pleasant). Second, Socrates’ advice not to look solely at

the tyrant because he is one man (ἕνα ὄντα), suggests that one kind of seeing involves the seeing

of particulars or individuals (recall the Symposian staircase, wherein admiring particular beautiful

things is the lowest step towards the contemplation of the Form itself), whereas the other

involves looking into “every corner” (εἰς ἅπασαν) of the “whole” city (ὅλην τὴν πόλιν). The

thematic force is captured not only in the fact that it echoes Socrates’ earlier defence against

Glaucon that a legislator ought to aim at the benefit of the entire city, and not merely one

individual or social class, but also insofar as the forms themselves encapsulate all of their

particular instantiations and are thus in some sense “whole”. By looking into the ‘whole city’

rather than at one individual within it, Socrates and his interlocutors seem to be examining the

Form of justice itself, and not an individual instantiation of justice (or the lack thereof). The

contrast between the visual spectacles of the just souls in the myth of Er with the spectacles of

the Lydian shepherd in Glaucon’ s thought experiment serves to solidify and bolster the final

verdict of the Republic , namely that the just individual is supremely happy, and consequently that

choosing to be just is always beneficial for its own sake. While the philosopher turns her gaze at

that which is stable and knowable, i.e. the forms, and as a result is able to order her life in a

patterned and harmonious way, the unjust shepherd on the other hand directs his gaze at riches,

power, and wealth, and consequently becomes a tyrant. Both the myth of the ring and the myth

of Er connect the themes of justice, spectacle, and freedom/tyranny, and reveal that the

philosopher is the only person able to see true justice, whereas the Lydian shepherd only sees his

own gain.

Glaucon’ s myth of the ring of Gyges contains more fundamental philosophical

importance to Plato’s argument for the intrinsic worth of justice than has been previously

recognized. The story of Gyges’ ring represents the dominant political views of the ancient

Athenians in Plato’s time that justice is instrumentally valuable and that the life of the tyrant who

is able to do whatever he wants is the greatest mortal existence. Plato uses Glaucon’ s myth to

represent this false view of justice and demonstrate the opposite view, namely that justice is

intrinsically valuable, by showing that the tyrant is the most wretched individual both in his life

and his death due to his enslavement to spectacles, self-interest, and appetite. On the other hand,

the truly blessed life is awarded to the just philosopher who orients her life around the divine

forms, liberating herself from the material, sensible realm, and in doing so achieves true Platonic

freedom.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

Plato. “Laws. ” Translated by Trevor J. Saunders. In The Complete Works of Plato, edited by John M. Cooper, 1318-1616. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997.

Plato. “The Republic. ” Translated by G.M.A. Grube and C.D.C. Reeve. In The Complete Works of Plato, edited by John M. Cooper, 971-1223. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997.

Secondary Sources

Barney, Rachel. “Platonic Ring-Composition and Republic 10. ” In Plato’s Republic: A Critical Guide, ed. M.

McPherran. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

Dova, Stamatia. Greek Heroes in and out of Hades. Maryland: Lexington Books, 2012.

Edmonds, Radcliffe G. III. Myths of the Underworld Journey: Plato, Aristophanes, and the ‘Orphic ’ Gold Tablets.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.

Laird, Andrew. “Ringing the Changes on Gyges: Philosophy and the Formation of Fiction in Plato ’ s

Republic. ” The Journal of Hellenic Studies 121 (2001): 12-29.

Laks, André. “Freedom, Liberality, and Liberty. ” In Freedom, Reason, and the Polis: Essays in Ancient Greek Political Philosophy, edited by David Keyt and Fred D. Miller Jr., 130-152. Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 2007.

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A Bit of a Fixer-Upper: a Platonic Re-evaluation of Disney and Childhood Educatio n

Sasha Boghosian, McGill

As a child, some of my favorite movies were the Disney Princess movies. I loved the

songs, the beauty and grace of the princesses and the magical storylines. Many children similarly

grew up watching Disney movies and admiring the characters they saw on screen, and in turn,

much scholarship has been done regarding the impact of movies such as Snow White , Cinderella

and Frozen on children’ s behavior and development. Are these movies inherently bad? What

values do they transmit? These are some of the important questions that researchers have sought

to answer since the popularity of Disney boomed in the second half of the twentieth century. In

fact, these are questions that have been surfacing since the ancient world. In The Republic , Plato

details his thoughts regarding the education of children through athletics, but most importantly

through song and storytelling. By first examining Plato’s view on early childhood education, I

aim to examine its relevance in our modern day through an analysis of Disney films in order to

determine the ways in which they might transmit values and expectations onto children. To do

so, modern theory on children’ s education and understanding of television will be consulted,

followed by an examination of the different kinds of stereotypes, beliefs, attitudes and values

Disney films might perpetuate. To conclude, the evidence reveals that Plato’s contemplations in

The Republic are indeed still relevant.

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Plato on education: The Republic , Book 2

Plato’s Republic envisions the creation of a perfect city through a series of philosophical

musings regarding the most essential parts of city-building. As the future generation of archons,

judicial officers and citizens, children and their education are incredibly crucial parts of the

city-planning process. Children must be educated in a way that will ensure that they are prepared

to take on the roles of their mothers and fathers, as well as to make changes and maintain

traditions that reflect the values and beliefs of the society in question. Plato first introduces the subject of children’ s education with a rhetorical question: οὐκοῦν οἶσθʼ ὅτι ἀρχὴ παντὸς ἔργου

μέγιστον, ἄλλως τε δὴ καὶ νέῳ καὶ ἁπαλῷ ὁτῳοῦν; μάλιστα γὰρ δὴ τότε πλάττεται, καὶ ἐνδύεται τύπος ὃν ἄν τις βούληται ἐνσημήνασθαι ἑκάστῳ ( The Republic 377a12-b3). 268 He explains that

children are incredibly impressionable, especially at an early age: “Therefore do you not know

that the beginning of every work is the greatest, especially for those [that are] young and tender?

For then they are most easily moulded, and take on any impression which one wishes to stamp

on each” ( The Republic 377a12-b3).

This then sets up his argument that the stories told to children must be vetted in order to ensure that they will grow up to hold the right values in adulthood: ἆρ ʼ οὖν ῥᾳδίως οὕτω

παρήσομεν τοὺς ἐπιτυχόντας ὑπὸ τῶν ἐπιτυχόντων μύθους πλασθέντας ἀκούειν τοὺς παῖδας καὶ

λαμβάνειν ἐν ταῖς ψυχαῖς ὡς ἐπὶ τὸ πολὺ ἐναντίας δόξας ἐκείναις ἅς, ἐπειδὰν τελεωθῶσιν, ἔχειν

οἰησόμεθα δεῖν αὐτούς ( The Republic 377b5-9). After all, “[shall] we not then carelessly allow the

children to listen to any stories made up by anyone and to allow them to seize in their minds the

268 Murray,, 51.

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many values opposite to ours, until they should grow up and we will think that it is necessary [for

them] to hold these values” ( The Republic 377b5-9)?

The responsibility of relaying the correct stories is delegated to mothers and nurses, the

primary caretakers of children: τοὺς δʼ ἐγκριθέντας πείσομεν τὰς τροφούς τε καὶ μητέρας λέγειν τοῖς παισίν, καὶ πλάττειν τὰς ψυχὰς αὐτῶν τοῖς μύθοις πολὺ μᾶλλον ἢ τὰ σώματα ταῖς χερσίν· ὧν

δὲ νῦν λέγουσι τοὺς πολλοὺς ἐκβλητέον ( The Republic 377c2-5). In this passage, Plato writes that

“[we] will persuade the nurses and the mothers to tell the children the admitted stories, and to

mould their own minds with stories much more than to mould their bodies with hands. Many of

the stories they tell must now be cast out” ( The Republic 377c2-5). According to Plato, stories,

which tended to be transmitted through song, should only be approved if they would mould

children in the right way. The right way to mould children highly depended on the beliefs and

values of the society in which these children were being raised. Does our North American

society today agree and follow Plato’s point of view regarding the education of children through

storytelling?

The effects of television on children

It may come of no surprise that children can be greatly influenced by the various media

they consume in our modern day. Besides books, television and movies are some of the most

popular forms of storytelling encountered by children. There is a plethora of programming

designed to capture children’ s attention and teach them various subjects. The extent of the

influence of television and movies on children’ s development has been widely researched, but

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not yet fully understood. In spite of this, there have been many advancements made in the field

regarding children’ s ability to follow, understand and learn from television and movies.

Amongst those multiple studies, one in particular examined children aged three to five

years old by placing them in a room for three hours with snacks, toys and various television

programming playing in the background. They were then observed to see what aspects of the

programming would catch and maintain their attention. The results showed that sound effects

were most effective in regaining children’ s attention while they were distracted, and an interesting

visual landscape was enough to maintain it. 269 In addition, children have also been tested for their

memory and understanding of plots. It has been determined that as children get older, they are

increasingly able to understand the main plot, remember other information peripherally to the

main story, and identify the emotions portrayed by an actor as well as the causes which led to the

events. 270 As they grow older, from the ages of about three to twelve, children also become better

at differentiating television content that is real and fictional. 271 It is clear, then, that children’ s

ability to pay attention, memorize, understand and follow plots and characters increases with age.

Another important question asked by scholars is whether children select role models to

follow from television programming and modify their behavior accordingly. A study conducted

on nursery-school children found that after watching an adult character on the television be

affectionate towards a toy clown, children tended to follow suit. More specifically, it was found

that boys were most likely to follow this character’s lead if the character was male, but a female

character performing the same action was shown not to have the same effect. This suggests that

even at such an early age, children might already be selecting role models for themselves

269 Gunter and Gunter, 38. 270 Gunter and Gunter, 43-44. 271 Gunter and Gunter, 48.

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according to certain similar characteristics such as sex. 272 Besides behavior, children might also

gain certain values, beliefs and attitudes from characters they perceive as role models. 273 Multiple

viewings of various films and television shows are likely to make an even bigger impact on

children’ s behaviors, attitudes and world view 274 . Whilst there are many blank spaces in this

research, it is possible to see that the types of characters shown in television and movies can

indeed have an effect on children’ s behavior.

Disney and its impact

It’s a tale nearly as old as time: fairy tales have been written and rewritten for centuries,

each version edited and re-edited to remove the old and include the new. 275 Today, one of the

most successful producers of both new and reimagined fairy tales is the Walt Disney company.

As one of the primary producers of children’ s movies, Walt Disney has managed to create an

incredibly far-reaching empire which offers pleasure and fantasy as one of its main attractions. 276

Walt Disney was perhaps one of the first to understand that entertainment such as movies could

be an excellent platform for the promotion of certain values and practices to children. 277 Thus he

created movies that reflected American culture at the time of their creation and release. This is

especially obvious when investigating different aspects of the Disney Princess movies.

272 Gunter and Gunter, 118. 273 Gunter and Gunter, 69. 274 Fouts et al, 16. 275 Taber, 120. 276 Giroux and Pollock, 97. 277 Giroux and Pollock, 18.

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The Disney Princess films are riddled with love stories, most of which have a happy

ending. These love stories, especially earlier ones such as Snow White and Sleeping Beauty , promote

the idea of love at first sight. 278 Throughout the movie, the relationship is pursued through the

persistence of the male character, who often must save the damsel in distress. 279 The male

character’s role as the pursuer still dominates Disney films, but mostly because the films now

tend to move away entirely from romance in order to display other forms of love. 280 Frozen is a

good example: in a moment of danger both to her own and to her sister Elsa’s well-being, Anna

chooses to defend Elsa against the villain rather than to run to Kristoff, who might help her

survive her frozen heart. Later, Elsa’s love for her sister cures Anna’s frozen heart and thaws her

back to life. This warm display of sisterly love was something entirely new for Disney. It played

on expectations that were set by Disney’s preceding movies, in which the prince would surely

have cured Anna’s frozen heart. More recent movies such as Frozen and Princess and the Frog clearly

demonstrate Disney’s response to a changing socio-cultural context which values a portrayal of

more diverse and realistic forms of love. 281 This change could have a more positive impact on the

young viewers of these films regarding romantic relationships, though it might not be enough to

counter the possible impact made by the older films which continue to be popular.

Traditional gender roles and stereotypes are also rampant in the Disney Princess films.

The role of damsel in distress is especially pronounced in the older era of Disney movies, notably

those dating from 1937 to the 1980s. The main characteristics associated with these princesses

were passiveness, obedience and quietness, as well as being seen as dutiful, self-sacrificing and

278 Hefner et al, 512. 279 Hefner et al, 529. 280 Hefner et al, 529. 281 Hefner et al, 527-528.

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subservient to males. 282 The princesses from films dating from the 1990s to the early 2000s such

as Belle, Mulan and Pocahontas were also seen as being dutiful, self-sacrificing and subservient

to males, but slowly began to break from the traditional gender roles through displays of strength

and independence. 283 Finally, in the most recent era, the princesses seem to be completely free of

these gender roles and no longer defined by their relationships to men. 284 This shows an

ever-increasing complexity in the portrayal of gender, but is it enough? Once again, the

ever-present popularity of the older movies must be considered, since they will continue to affect

children’ s development as long as they are being watched. 285 Girls especially have been found to

emulate certain behaviors based on their perception of the Disney Princesses, which shows that

these movies can indeed contribute to a culture of “girly” behavior. 286 When playing as

princesses, girls as young as five years old have been found to make comments regarding

especially their own or another’s physical appearance, one girl noting that she looked as “pretty as

Cinderella.” 287 Girls have also been found to spend a significant amount of time putting on

dresses and various accessories in order to look more like princesses, whilst also making certain

poses which they believed to be the appropriate mannerisms for the princesses to make. 288

What Would Plato Do?

Several parallels can therefore be seen between Plato’s views on children’ s education and

our modern reality. Plato’s belief that children can be moulded by the stories they grow up

282 Hefner et al, 513. 283 Hefner et al, 513. 284 Hefner et al, 513. 285 Coyne et al, 1910.. 286 Coyne et al, 1921. 287 Golden and Jacoby, 305-306. 288 Golden and Jacoby, 306-307.

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hearing has proven to be true, though only to a certain extent. Though perhaps unable to follow,

remember or understand stories at a young age, children have been found to emulate behaviors

seen in characters with whom they identify on the basis of characteristics such as sex.

Additionally, it is clear that as one of the most popular producers of children’ s entertainment,

Disney movies can indeed impress upon children certain values and stereotypes. Disney movies

have been found to perpetuate stereotypes regarding gender roles as well as idealized notions of

romantic relationships. When studied, children behaved and spoke in ways which showed that

they had been moulded by some of the stereotypes seen within the viewed films. Due to this

impact, many have suggested that parents and teachers should help foster a learning

environment around the films by discussing their content with children. In addition, they can

minimize any possibly negative impact by limiting the viewing of certain films. 289 By encouraging

parents and teachers to discuss and perhaps choose to show only those films which are

appropriate for their children, scholars are at least somewhat in accord with Plato’s call to only

tell children the stories which reflect the right values and which will impress upon them the

correct beliefs. Since the ancient world, children’ s fairy tales and stories have been reworked,

censored, approved, read and retold. 290 It is only recently, with the advent of scientific,

sociological and psychological studies, that we are able to ascertain the benefits and the

shortcomings in doing so.

289 Giroux and Pollock, 128. 290 Bacchilega, 3.

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Conclusion

To conclude, based on much newly published research, it is clear that Disney movies, like

any other stories, can and do transmit certain values, stereotypes, beliefs and attitudes to children.

The complexity of romantic relationships as well as the role of women within these films has

evolved over time according to the socio-cultural context within which the films were produced.

Still, the old Disney movies remain incredibly popular with children and may transmit outdated

and immoral beliefs, especially surrounding gender. A suggestion to limit or have a discussion

with children after viewing these films has been proposed by numerous scholars as a way to try

to amend this disparity in thought. These results show that Plato’s philosophical musings

regarding the education of children in The Republic are still incredibly relevant and are actively

being approved by various scholars, though perhaps unknowingly.

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Bibliography

Bacchilega, Cristina. Postmodern Fairy Tales: Gender and Narrative Strategies. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999. Project Muse.

Coyne, Sarah M., Jennifer Ruh Linder, Eric E. Rasmussen, David A. Nelson and Victoria

Birkbeck, “Pretty as a Princess: Longitudinal Effects of Engagement With Disney

Princesses on Gender Stereotypes, Body Esteem, and Prosocial Behavior in Children,” Child Development 87, n. 6 (2016): 1909-1925, Academic Search Complete.

Fouts, Gregory, Mitchell Callan, Kelly Piasentin and Andrea Lawson. “Demonizing in Children’ s

Television Cartoons and Disney Animated Films,” Child Psychiatry and Human Development 37, n. 1 (June 2006): 15-23, Springer Complete Journals.

Giroux, Henry A. and Grace Pollock. The Mouse that Roared: Disney and the End of Innocence. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2010. ProQuest Ebook Central.

Golden, Julia C. and Jennifer Wallace Jacoby. “Playing Princess: Preschool Girls’ Interpretations of Gender Stereotypes in Disney Princess Media,” Sex Roles 79, n. 1 (2018): 299-313,

Springer Link.

Gunter, Barrie and Jill Gunter. Children and Television. London: Routledge, 2019. Francis &

Group.

Hefner, Veronica, Rachel-Jean Firchau, Katie Norton and Gabriella Shevel. “Happily Ever After?

A Content Analysis of Romantic Ideals in Disney Princess Films,” Communication Studies 68, n. 5 (2017): 511-532, Taylor and Francis Group.

Murray, Penelope. ed., Plato on Poetry , New York, Cambridge University Press, 2008.

Tuber, Nancy. “Pedagogies of Gender in a Disney Mash-Up.” In Popular Culture as Pedagogy , edited by K Jubas, Nancy Taber and T. Brown, 119-133. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 2015.

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Torturous Love Magic: Simaetha’s Love Spell as Medicine

Meghan O’Donnell, McGill

Eros is treated as a disease in ancient Greek literature and medical thought, and love

magic was one way in which those suffering from this disease were able to find relief by a kind of

psychological transfer of symptoms onto the target of the spell. Simaetha’s spell in Theocritus’

Idyll 2 is one such example of erotic magic, and is specifically an agōgē spell, intended to “lead” or

“draw” (from the verb ἄγω) the target, in this case Delphis, to the performer of the spell. I argue

that although this is a literary spell, the use of the iunx links it to contemporary agōgē spells, and

acts as a medicine, a pharmakon , for the disease of eros . Greek identity is intertwined with love and

its pains, and the search for a cure to a ‘disease’ which can only be healed by time.

Ancient Greek poets and medical writers alike treat eros as a disease. Faraone argues that

the popular image program of Eros violently attacking his victims with whips or torches is best

understood within the general context of beliefs about the etiology of diseases like epilepsy,

quartan fever, and other illnesses that manifest themselves in violent agitations, shivering, or

feverish outbursts. 291 It is also conceptualized as a mental disease which attacks the heart or

mind. 292 The ferocity with which the author of the Hippocratic treatise On the Sacred Disease

attacks those who claim that diseases like epilepsy are caused by the gods underscores the

popularity of this belief. Sappho famously describes the symptoms of love as such: “For when I

look at you for a moment, then it is no longer possible for me to speak; my tongue has snapped,

291 Christopher A. Faraone, “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion (Eros), ” in Ancient Greek Love Magic, 41-95 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), 46-7. 292 Ibid., 44.

141

at once a subtle fire has stolen beneath my flesh, I see nothing with my eyes, my ears hum, sweat

pours from me, a trembling seizes me all over, I am greener than grass, and it seems to me that I

am little short of dying.” 293 This description of love as a disease which incites burning, trembling,

and other symptoms characteristic of fever or even madness is found throughout Greek

literature.

In regard to the treatment for eros , Faraone writes: “If the ancient Greeks, then,

understood erotic seizure to be an unwanted affliction similar in its symptoms and divine causes

to a violent disease like epilepsy, it should occasion little surpirse that the extant spells for

indicing eros are quite similar in both form and content to traditional Greek cursing techniques.

Or to put it the other way around: if erotic passion is an accursed state, it stand to reason that

techniques of cursing can be used to instill such a passion in another person.” 294 Erotic magic

typically included the destruction of wax effigies or other materials in fire so as to project the

sufferings of the performer onto the target of the spell. 295

This is at the very heart of the ritual found in Theocritus’ Idyll 2, which takes place at

night under the moon as two women, Simaetha and her slave Thestylis, perform love magic to

win back Simaetha’s lover Delphis who has been seeing other lovers. Simaetha vows to “bind

him with fire spells,” and calls upon Hecate to aid her magic. 296 The ἴυγξ, iunx , is then introduced

to the poem, with repeated lines instructing the bird-wheel to “draw that man to my house”

breaking up the stanzas. This bird-wheel, the iunx , is identified with the wryneck, a bird whose

293 Sappho, Greek Lyric, Volume I: Sappho and Alcaeus, trans. David A. Campbell (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982; Loeb Classical Library 142), 31.7-16. 294 Faraone, “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion, ” 49. 295 Ibid., 50. 296 Theocritus, Theocritus. Moschus. Bion., trans. Neil Hopkinson (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015; Loeb Classical Library 28), 2.10-16.

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writhing neck movements to attract mates is probably the reason for its use in magic. 297 The bird

was attached to a wheel with its wings spread out, whereupon the wheel was turned in an

attempt to draw the target of the spell toward its performer. 298 The word is also used, as it is

here, to refer to a magic wheel with no bird attached to it but with the same function. As the iunx

motif is repeated, Simaetha works her fire magic. She instructs her slave to burn sacrificial barley

and bran and say “I scatter the bones of Delphis,” 299 and to burn laurel “against Delphis”

because of the distress he has caused her. 300 Hecate arrives, as indicated by the barking of dogs,

and the first part of the spell is complete, the goal of which is identified by Graf as making the

love, the fire, come back into Delphis’ body. 301 Next, she melts wax so that “Delphis melt at once

with love,” 302 turns a rhombus , an instrument for attracting like the iunx , 303 and pours three

libations. 304 She asks that Delphis “come to this house from the glossy wrestling school, like a

man made mad.” 305 She throws a piece of Delphis’ coat into the fire, pleading to Eros: “Ah, cruel

Love, why, like a leech from the marsh, have you fastened on me and drunk all the black blood

from my body?” 306 Finally, Simaetha instructs Thestylis to take a drink to Delphis that she will

made from a crushed lizard and to rub herbs on his threshold. 307

When the ritual is done, Simaetha follows it by recounting the story of how she became

afflicted by eros in the first place, detailing her first encounter with Delphis. She describes her

297 A. S. F. Gow, “ΙΥΓΞ, ΡΟΜΒΟΣ, Rhombus, Turbo, ” 1-13 in Journal of Hellenic Studies, no. 54 (1934), 3. 298 Ibid., 3. 299 Theocritus, Theocritus. Moschus. Bion., 2.18-21; 2.33. 300 Ibid., 2.23-6. 301 Fritz Graf, “Literary Representation of Magic, ” in Magic in the Ancient World, 175–204 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997), 177. 302 Theocritus, Theocritus. Moschus. Bion., 2.28-9. 303 Gow, “ΙΥΓΞ, ΡΟΜΒΟΣ, Rhombus, Turbo, ” 5. 304 Theocritus, Theocritus. Moschus. Bion., 2.30-1. 305 Ibid., 2.50-1. 306 Ibid., 2.53-6. 307 Ibid., 2.58-62.

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reaction to seeing Delphis and his friend Eudamippus: “And when I saw them I was seized with

madness, and my wretched heart was caught with fire, and my beauty wasted away. I no longer

took notice of that procession, and I had no idea how I got home again, but a burning fever

shook me, and I lay on my bed ten days and ten nights.” 308 Eros is clearly identified here with the

burning, physical disease described by Sappho. The fire magic Simaetha works is analogous to

the blazing love she suffers from, and in performing this spell she seeks to both incite this same

fire in Delphis and draw him to her. Spells of attraction are known as agōgē spells, many of which

make use of fire to offer fumigations, much like Simaetha’s. 309

This, however, is a literary spell, not a real one. Simaetha’s spell does not match material

evidence for love magic. The ingredients she uses invoke rites of sacrifice rather than actual

magic, and the iunx and rhombus do not appear in the papyri detailing erotic spells. 310 They do,

however, appear on fifth century Athenian vase paintings and a pair of fourth century gold

earrings, and Graf argues that Theocritus draws on the real magical tradition to create a sort of

“superritual capable of activating in its readers all sorts of associations connected with magic.” 311

The use of the iunx , however, connects this purely literary spell to contemporary agōgē spells.

Aphrodite invented the first agōgē spell and taught it to Jason so that he could win over Medea, as

described by Pindar:

And the queen of sharpest arrows, Cyprogeneia,

brought down from Olympus the dappled iunx bird

pinned to the four spokes of an inescapable wheel,

308 Ibid., 2.82-6. 309 Graf, “Literary Representation of Magic, ” 178. 310 Ibid., 179-80. 311 Ibid., 184.

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a mad bird, to mankind for the first time,

and she taught Jason to be skillful in prayers and charms,

in order that he might strip Medea of reverence for her parents,

and that desire for Greece might shake her

with the whip of Persuasion as she was burning in her heart. 312

Faraone argues that Pindar uses this myth about Aphrodite and the iunx to explain why

contemporary men used the iunx to drive women from their homes, and that his poem “clearly

reflects both the language of torture and the goals that repeatedly appear in Greek incantations

of the agōgē type.” 313 The torments inflicted on the target of an agōgē spell are the same torments

that eros was thought to inflict on a lover - sleeplessness, a burning feeling, inability to eat or

drink, inability to be with anyone else except the performer of the spell, and madness. 314 The use

of fire in the agōgai has obvious symbolism with the burning felt in the hearts of those afflicted

with eros , and the setting of Simaetha’s spell at night under the moon is consistent with the agōgai

described on papyri. The key to the idea of an agōgē spell, and thereby Simaetha’s spell, as a form

of healing is that the disease vanishes as soon as the target of the spell, the beloved, returns.

While Greek curses torture their victims with fever or pain until they die, erotic spells do so only

until they yield. 315 The idea that the beloved is the cure for the disease of eros is found again in

Sappho: “ You came, and I was longing for you; you cooled my heart which was burning with

desire.” 316 The violence inflicted on the target of an agōgē spell is inflicted only until its aim is

312 Pindar, Pythian 4.213-219, trans. Faraone, ““Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion, ” 56. 313 Faraone, “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion, ” 57-8. 314 Radcliffe G. Edmonds III, “Bewitched, Bothered, Bewildered: Love Charms and Erotic Curses, ” in Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 91-115 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2019), 104. 315 Faraone, “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion (Eros), ” 55. 316 Sappho, Greek Lyric, Volume I: Sappho and Alcaeus, 48.

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accomplished and he or she is drawn to the home of the spell’s performer. So too do the

symptoms of eros only last until the beloved is returned to the arms of the lover, whereupon the

burning and madness are relieved.

The other healing aspect of agōgē spells is the psychological transfer of the symptoms of

eros onto the victim. Simaetha does this in the first part of her spell, where she burns barley,

laurel, and bran with her incantation in order to instill fire, love, in Delphis. Winkler argues that

some of the violence of language and gesture in the agōgai is due to “the projected intensity of the

performer’s own sense of victimization by a power he is helpless to control.” 317 Here again we

see the futileness of other pharmaka in healing the symptoms of eros . The act of burning the

spell’s ingredients, recitation or singing of the incantation, and binding the target act as cathartic

mechanisms in transferring the sufferer’s symptoms onto the target, a replication of the

performer’s experiences in the hopes that the target will submit to eros . Winkler also points out

that the reality of the situation is that the target of the spell is probably peacefully asleep at home

while the performer is supposedly exercising control over the other. 318 The rite assigns a

tormented state to the target, probably simply asleep, and a sense of calm and control to the

sufferer, the performer of the incantation, in an act of transference and displacement.

The material evidence for agōgē spells indicates that the vast majority of them were

performed by men, with women as the intended targets. The iunx , the bird tortured on a wheel,

the whips and goads in the imagery of Eros attacking his victims, and the violent language of the

agōgai are “obvious markers that distinguish the social categories of the free and subjugated.” 319

317 John J. Winkler, “The Constraints of Eros, ” in Magika Hiera: Ancient Greek Magic and Religion, 214-43 (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1991), 216. 318 Winkler, “The Constraints of Eros, ” 225. 319 Faraone, “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion (Eros), ” 68.

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As Faraone points out, this element of subjugation is unsurprising in a patriarchal culture where

the autonomy and agency of women was largely limited to the domestic sphere. 320 This stands in

contrast to characters in ancient Greek literature, where it is primarily women who work their

dreadful magic and resort to such means to win over lovers. Theocritus’ Simaetha is, according to

Gow, in a social position like that of several young women in New Comedy, and her lover seems

to be somewhat higher on the social scale than her. 321 Theocritus seems to be not only playing

with conceptions of gender but also of class: Simaetha’s position in society is like that of many

characters in the literature of the Hellenistic age; she is an ordinary woman, of no prominent

social standing. Delphis is a man of a somewhat higher social class than her, and thus Theocritus

has reversed the dynamics usually present in an agōgē spell: the lower class woman here

‘subjugates’ the man of a higher social rank.

The bucolic genre lends itself well to an incantation: its repeated phrases interrupting the

stanzas enhance the repetitive effect of the spell, adding a further dimension of realism to an

activity which, although embellished for literary purposes, was an ordinary one. Both the

character and genre of Theocritus’ Idyll 2 allow us insight into the woes, anxieties and hardships

of a woman in the Hellenistic world who is suffering from the disease of eros . The iunx motif

links this literary spell to contemporary agōgē spells, which allowed their performers some relief

from the symptoms of eros through the psychological transference of symptoms onto the

beloved, thus acting as a pharmakon .

320 Ibid. 321 A. S. F. Gow, Theocritus: Volume II (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1965), 33.

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Bibliography

Edmonds, Radcliffe G. “Bewitched, Bothered, Bewildered: Love Charms and Erotic Curses.” In

Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World , 91–115. Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press, 2019.

Faraone, Christopher A. “Spells for Inducing Uncontrollable Passion (Eros).” In Ancient Greek

Love Magic , 41–95. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Gow, A. S. F. “ΙΥΓΞ, ΡΟΜΒΟΣ, Rhombus, Turbo.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 54 (1934): 1–13.

Gow, A. S. F. Theocritus: Volume II . Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1965.

Graf, Fritz. “Literary Representation of Magic.” In Magic in the Ancient World , 175–204.

Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997.

Sappho, Alcaeus. Greek Lyric, Volume I: Sappho and Alcaeus. Edited and translated by David A.

Campbell. Loeb Classical Library 142. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.

Theocritus, Moschus, Bion. Theocritus. Moschus. Bion. Edited and translated by Neil Hopkinson.

Loeb Classical Library 28. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015.

Winkler, John J. “The Constraints of Eros.” In Magika Hiera: Ancient Greek Magic & Religion ,

edited by Christopher A. Faraone and Dirk Obbink, 214–43. New York, NY: Oxford

University Press, 1991.

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Les restaurations du Colisée en Antiquité tardive: épigraphie et évergétisme

Maxime Guénette, Université de Montréal

Abstract

L’étude des rénovations et restaurations du Colisée de l’époque de Constantin à celle de

Théodoric le Grand reste à ce jour un sujet fortement débattu par les spécialistes.

L’Amphithéâtre flavien, figure emblématique de la Rome antique, a en effet subi plusieurs

dommages pendant cette période, et ce, principalement à cause de nombreux tremblements de

terre au Ve siècle (dont l’abominandus de 484 ou 508, la date est encore sujet à débat) et des trois

sacs que Rome a subis. Les empereurs, les rois « barbares » ainsi que certains des grands

fonctionnaires de Rome (souvent le préfet urbain) vont alors puiser dans leur richesse pour

remédier aux divers dommages du Colisée, que ce soit le système d’égouts, l’arène, le podium,

etc. Ces nombreuses restaurations, pour qu’elles soient commémorées de façon publique, sont

inscrites dans le marbre du Colisée à la vue de tous. Plusieurs éléments de cette série

d’inscriptions restent toutefois encore flous à ce jour, puisque celles-ci restent parfois très

fragmentaires ou encore illisibles, la datation des inscriptions est souvent incertaine. De plus,

l’identification des préfets ayant mené les travaux reste encore nébuleuse, due à la ressemblance

des tria nomina romains. Ces restaurations étaient toutefois bien représentatives de leur époque :

les installations restaurées étaient celles qui étaient toujours utilisées, c’est donc pourquoi

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certaines infrastructures, comme les sous-sols, utilisées pour les combats de gladiateurs, qui ont

été abolis à l’époque de Valentinien III, n’ont pas été toujours prises en considération lors des

restaurations. Ces restaurations pour un monument qui d’année en année perd de son

importance due aux grandes critiques des jeux du cirque par les chrétiens sont un bel exemple du

phénomène d’évergétisme omniprésent dans la société romaine en Antiquité tardive.

Le Colisée, figure emblématique de Rome, a subi plusieurs changements architecturaux au cours

de son existence. L’unique amphithéâtre de Rome, situé entre l’Esquilin et le Caelius, pouvait

accueillir entre 50 000 et 80 000 personnes (les estimations plus anciennes de 70 000-80 000 étant

toutefois un peu exagérées) 322 et était l’établissement par excellence pour accueillir les nombreux

jeux et spectacles donnés par les empereurs et sénateurs romains. Monument imposant, il

demeure un élément crucial du célèbre adage : « du pain et des jeux » pendant près de 500 ans. Le

surnom du « Colisée » aurait deux origines possibles : soit par rapport à la taille colossale de

l’amphithéâtre, ou bien, plus probablement, soit que ce surnom découlerait de l’ancienne statue

du colosse de bronze ( colossus ) érigé auparavant par Néron près de la Domus Aurea 323 et ensuite

déplacé proche de l’Amphithéâtre flavien. Cependant, comme il est possible de s’en douter, le

Colisée a beaucoup changé à travers les époques, notamment à cause de nombreux dommages

causés par des sacs (le premier par les Visigoths d’Alaric, le deuxième par les Vandales de

Genséric, et le troisième par les barbares de Ricimer), des incendies ou encore des tremblements

de terre. Les diverses restaurations de l’Amphithéâtre flavien sont sujettes à leur époque, et

celles-ci seront en fonction de l’utilisation du Colisée pendant cette période. C’est pour cette

raison que l’on constate par exemple une immense réfection de la structure au IIIe siècle pour

322 Lesley Adkins, Roy Adkins, An Introduction to the Romans, New York, Chartwell Books, 2002, p. 71. 323 Roger Dunkle, Gladiators: Violence and Spectacle in Ancient Rome, New York, Routledge, 2008, p. 257.

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une utilisation complète, puis plusieurs restaurations de moins grande envergure au Ve siècle

pour une utilisation plus modeste. Les sources anciennes d’un tel monument devraient être

nombreuses, et bien que nous ayons plusieurs mentions de l’histoire de l’Amphithéâtre flavien

dans les sources littéraires, celles-ci sont peu utiles pour suivre l’évolution architecturale et

l’historique de ses réfections. Cependant, il se trouve que les sources les plus importantes sont

des données épigraphiques, mais celles-ci restent encore à ce jour souvent problématiques. Ainsi,

pour cette étude, nous nous attarderons dans un premier temps à brièvement décrire l’histoire du

Colisée jusqu’au IVe siècle, puis ses dernières restaurations du Ve-VIe siècle, leurs natures,

quelles en sont les traces, et par qui elles ont été menées. Dans un deuxième temps, il est aussi

justifié de s’intéresser aux raisons pour lesquelles les sénateurs et les empereurs de cette époque

ont voulu restaurer plusieurs fois le Colisée, alors même qu’il est devenu, au Ve siècle, un

monument désuet en raison de la grande chute de population à Rome 324 .

Brève histoire du Colisée : de l’inauguration au IVe siècle

Tout d’abord, il convient de se rappeler brièvement l’histoire du Colisée avant d’entamer

l’étude de ses restaurations en Antiquité tardive. La construction du nouvel amphithéâtre de

Rome est amorcée en 70-72 par l’empereur Vespasien, et est terminée par son fils Titus en 80

apr. J.-C. La nouvelle dynastie flavienne, après la mort de Néron, désirait redonner cette portion

du territoire de Rome au peuple romain, car Néron avait auparavant évincé toute personne vivant

à cet endroit pour y construire sa résidence, la Domus Aurea . C’est notamment grâce aux richesses

de la campagne de Vespasien contre la rébellion des Juifs, qui éclate dès 66 apr. J.-C., que celui-ci

324 Bien que l’événement soit considérablement postérieur à l’époque qui nous intéresse, Totila, lors du siège de Rome de 546, dit n’avoir trouvé que 500 habitants ; voir Procope, Hist. Goth., III, 20, 19.

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peut redonner l’espace de la Domus Aurea au peuple en y construisant un monument à leur

intention, et ainsi démontrer que les richesses des campagnes militaires flaviennes étaient aussi

destinées aux Romains 325 . C’est donc sous la volonté des Flaviens que l’inauguration du Colisée

dura cent jours au cours desquels furent tués plus de 5000 fauves 326 .

Les premiers dommages enregistrés résultent d’un grand feu qui éclate durant le règne

d’Antonin le Pieux (138-161), mais les auteurs anciens commémorent beaucoup plus l’immense

brasier causé par la foudre de 217 327 . Bien que le Colisée soit de nouveau fonctionnel dès 222 lors

du règne d’Alexandre Sévère 328 , les restaurations prennent plus de deux décennies à être

complétées (Gordien III émet une monnaie pour commémorer cet événement). Par la suite,

selon certaines sources 329 , le Colisée aurait encore été endommagé par le feu soit sous le règne de

Dèce (249-251) ou encore sous Trébonien Galle (251-253). Les derniers dommages que nous

mentionnerons ici et qui ne sont pas survenus au Ve-VIe siècle sont ceux causés par la foudre en

320 sous le règne de Constantin. Le Code Théodosien ne spécifie pas les dommages en

particulier 330 , mais on peut supposer que ceux-ci étaient assez légers. Ainsi, les dégâts causés

jusqu’au Ve siècle étaient principalement dus au feu puisqu’une grande quantité de bois était

utilisée pour le sol de l’arène, ainsi que pour les sièges les plus élevés de l’Amphithéâtre flavien. À

cause de sa forme, la cavea (gradin pour le public autour de l’arène) agit comme une cheminée,

325 Mary Beard, Keith Hopkins, The Colosseum, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2005, p. 31-32. 326 Ada Gabucci, Guide de la Rome antique, Milan, Electa, 2000, p. 8. 327 Dion Cassius, Hist. Rom., 79, 25, 2-4 328 Voir l’article de référence à ce sujet de Lynne Lancaster, « Reconstructing the Restorations of the Colosseum after the Fire of 217 », dans Journal of Roman Archaeology, 11, 1998, pp. 67-125. 329 Isidore de Séville, Chronicon, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, 6, 463; Saint Jerome, Chronicon, 218. 330 Code Théo., 16, 10.

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attirant les flammes vers les gradins en bois des niveaux supérieurs 331 . Même si le marbre et le

travertin résistent au feu, la chaleur des multiples brasiers provoque la rupture de la pierre.

C’est aussi à partir de l’époque de Constantin que le déclin du Colisée commence,

puisque la fondation de Constantinople et son Hippodrome provoquera rapidement la chute de

Rome comme ville centrale de l’Empire 332.Toutefois, selon un compte rendu d’Ammien

Marcellin 333 , Constance II lors de sa visite à Rome en 357 se trouve émerveillé par le Colisée qui

est à l’époque en excellente condition. Son déclin est donc lent, mais inéluctable .

Périodes troubles au Ve siècle

Nous pouvons maintenant nous concentrer sur la période qui nous intéresse, c’est-à-dire

les restaurations du Colisée au Ve-VIe siècle. Rome, durant ces deux siècles, vit plusieurs

épisodes traumatisants, dont la déposition du dernier empereur romain, trois sièges de la ville, et

plusieurs tremblements de terre. Le siège de Rome par les Goths d’Alaric en 410 est

probablement l’un des événements clés de ces traumatismes, puisqu’un grand pillage s’ensuit

après la prise de la ville. Le passage au Colisée par les Visigoths semblait obligatoire, et même

privilégié par ceux-ci puisque ils visaient plusieurs monuments importants de Rome 334 . Ce sac

cause l’exode d’un bon nombre de Romains de l’ancienne capitale, et, par le fait même, une

331 Peter Connolly, op. cit., p. 154. 332 Peter Connolly, Colosseum: Rome ’ s Arena of Death, London, BBC Books, 2003, p. 157. 333 Ammien Marcellin, 16, 10, 4. 334 Sur l’importance de prendre possession des monuments liés à l’image et à la renommée de Rome, voir L. de Lachenal, Spolia. Uso e reimpiego dell’ antico dal III al XIV secolo, Milano, Longanesi, 1995, p. 44-45.

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importante chute de la population, qui passe de près d’un million d’habitants vers la fin du IVe

siècle à environ 100 000 à la fin du Ve siècle 335 . La Vallée du Colisée, après le sac d’Alaric, devient

alors un gigantesque cimetière pour accueillir les victimes des Visigoths 336 .

Quant au Colisée en soi, entre la fin du IVe/début Ve siècle, plusieurs de ses matériaux

qui n’étaient plus fonctionnel ont été démantelés pour être réutilisés ailleurs. En effet, le sens

pratique des Romains refait ici surface : le passé est au service du présent, et la demande

pressante de matières premières n’y échappe pas, c’est pourquoi plusieurs bâtiments publics

comme le Colisée se feront « piller » de façon légale due aux divers besoins du moment. C’est par

exemple ainsi que les tuyaux d’adduction de plomb et les fontaines de marbre ont été démontés,

causant une interruption du système d’eau et des salles de bain 337 .

Première restauration documentée : entre 417 et 423

Ceci nous amène donc à notre première restauration documentée du Ve siècle. Après le

sac des Goths en 410, l’Amphithéâtre flavien est inutilisable à cause des dégâts du pillage et des

destructions 338 . Il faudra attendre l’arrivée du préfet de Rome Iunius Valerius Bellicius pour que

des réparations soient faites entre 417 et 423 apr. J.-C. sous le règne conjoint d’Honorius et

Théodose II 339 . L’inscription 340 qui nous renseigne sur cette première restauration était située à

l’intérieur du Colisée et s’étendait tout autour de l’amphithéâtre en une seule ligne, et était

335 Filippo Coarelli et al., The Colosseum, Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, 2000, p. 180. 336 Voir à ce sujet l’article de Rossella Rea, « Roma : l’uso funerario della valle del Colosseo tra tardo antico e alto medioevo » , dans Archeologica Medievale, 20, 1993, pp. 645-656. 337 Filippo Coarelli et al., p. 179-180 338 Ibid., p. 180. 339 A. Chastagnol préfère placer sa magistrature entre 421 et 423 (André Chastagnol, « Trente ans après : les préfets de la ville de Rome (290-423 après J. -C.) », Science de l’Antiquité, 6-7, 1992-1993, pp. 495-496.), qui semble d’ailleurs plus probable, tandis que S. Mazzarino le plaçait en 417 dans son Stilicone. La Crisi Imperiale dopo Teodosio, Roma, Angelo Signorelli, 1942, p. 361. 340 CIL, VI, 32085.

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répétée, selon les rapports de fouilles, en deux exemplaires 341 . Il est intéressant de souligner que

le préfet urbain Iunius Valerius Bellicius a amorcé des travaux à la fois sur le Colisée, mais aussi

sur les bâtiments aux alentours qui lui sont rattachés et qui ont été endommagés pendant le sac

d’Alaric 342 . Ces restaurations sont toutefois vagues : on sait notamment que Bellicius aurait

restauré l’arène puisque les canalisations de l’Amphithéâtre flavien ont été obstruées en 410 et

ont inondé l’hypogée. De plus, une partie de la terrasse supérieure s’était effondrée dans la cavea ,

ce à quoi Bellicius va remédier en la reconstruisant.

Deuxième restauration : entre 425 et 437

Une autre inscription à notre disposition, mais qui n’est généralement que survolée par

les spécialistes en raison de sa nature trop fragmentaire, fait aussi état de restaurations effectuées

par le préfet urbain Anicius Acilius Glabrio Faustus sous Théodose II et Valentinien III 343 .

L’inscription restant incomplète (nous ne pouvons reconstituer que cet extrait : [Sal]vis dd. [nn.

Theodosio et Placi]do Va[lentiniano Augg., Anici]us Aci[lius Glabrio Faustus, v. c., praef. urb …), il nous est

encore impossible de savoir quelles parties du Colisée ont subi des restaurations. A. Chastagnol,

en ce qui a trait à la datation, semble pencher vers la troisième préfecture de Faustus (entre 425 et

437 apr. J.-C.). Ceci coïnciderait environ avec le tremblement de terre de 429, car la première

préfecture de Faustus est antérieure à la mort d’Honorius en 423 et la deuxième daterait de 425 344

341 Surtout par rapport aux rapports rédigés par A. Pellegrini lors des fouilles du sous-sol en 1874-1875, rapports disponibles aux Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Direzione Generale Antichità et Belle Arti, I versamento, 1860-1890, busta 101 fasc. 134, anno 1874, e busta 103, fasc. 135, anno 1875. 342 CIL, VI, 37144, 40803. 343 CIL, VI, 32090. 344 André Chastagnol, Le Sénat romain sous le règne d’Odoacre. Recherche sur l’épigraphie du Colisée au Ve siècle, Bonn, R. Habelt, 1966, p. 5-6.

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. La seule certitude est que cette restauration date d’avant 437. Les restaurations menées par

Faustus n’auraient eu, selon A. Chastagnol, qu’un rôle préliminaire 345 .

Troisième restauration : entre 425 et 450

Par après, l’inscription de Bellicius, commémorant la première grande restauration du

Colisée au Ve siècle, ne fait toutefois pas long feu : quelques années plus tard, celle-ci est effacée

pour faire place à une nouvelle inscription faisant état d’une restauration postérieure 346 . Cette

inscription, reconstituée par André Chastagnol 347 qui s’appuie sur ses prédécesseurs 348 , se trouve

aujourd’hui au nombre de cent douze fragments situés au rez-de-chaussée du Colisée. Tout

comme celle de Bellicius, cette inscription est écrite en deux exemplaires et faisait le tour de

l’arène en demi-cercle. La structure du nouveau texte ainsi que sa technique d’exécution laissent

envisager que c’est le même lapicide, ou du moins le même groupe de lapicide, qui a gravé à la

fois cette inscription ainsi que celle de Bellicius 349 . Elle fait état de travaux durant le règne

conjoint de Théodose II et Valentinien III, ce qui date donc l’inscription entre 425 et 450 apr.

J.-C. Le nom de la personne responsable de ces travaux n’est en revanche pas complet, mais

Chastagnol semble l’identifier, grâce à l’ampleur des travaux qui nous laissent supposer que

ceux-ci ont été postérieurs au premier grand séisme de 429 et grâce aux limites chronologiques

données par l’inscription, à un préfet de la ville du nom de Flavius Paulus. Un tel préfet est

345 Ibid., p. 19. 346 CIL, VI, 32086-32087. 347 Ibid., p. 10. 348 Voir entre autres Rodolfo Lanciani, "Iscrizioni dell'Anfiteatro Flavio," Bulletino Communale 8 (1880), pp. 228-229; P.E. Vigneaux, Essai sur l’histoire de la Praefectura urbis, Paris, Thorin et fils, 1896, p. 325; Hülsen, ad. CIL, VI, 32086-88 349 Silvia Orlandi, « Il Colosseo nel V secolo », dans The Transformations of Vrbs Roma in Late Antiquity, 33 (1999), p. 254.

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justement attesté en décembre 438 lors de la séance sénatoriale de la publication du Code

Théodosien 350 .

S. Orlandi, qui insiste sur l’absence du terme latin iterum (pour la seconde fois) jusqu’alors

présent dans la plupart des reconstitutions de cette inscription, affirme donc que le préfet urbain

en était à sa première investiture, et non à sa deuxième 351 , ce qui nous mènerait donc en 438.

Cette datation permettrait d’associer cette restauration à un événement politique majeur dans

l’empire, l’atteinte de la majorité de l’empereur Valentinien III, qui, dès 437, n’est plus sous la

régence de sa mère, Galla Placidia 352 . Ainsi, l’entrée à l’âge adulte du souverain aurait peut-être

porté le préfet urbain de 438 à restaurer et réinaugurer le Colisée, qui n’était plus en fonction

depuis 429. Quelle que soit la nature de ces restaurations, celles-ci sont certainement en relation

avec le tremblement de terre de 429 qui est identifiable dans les chroniques Consularia Italica 353 ,

mais antérieure au grand séisme de 443 dont nous parlerons plus en détail sous peu.

Cette inscription, au nombre de cent douze fragments situés au rez-de-chaussée du

Colisée, est reconstituée par André Chastagnol de la façon suivante : « [Pro] felicitate dd. nn.

T[heodos]ii et Placidi Valentiniani perpetuorum invictis[s]imorum principum, Flavius Pa[ul]us, vir clarissimus,

praefectus urbi [iteru]m vice s[acra j]udicans, [amph]ith[e]a[tri p]odium et i……. m ca[v]ea[mq.] quae ante non

fuerant …………. Ad majorem gratiam voluptatemq. [populi] romani s………..s instauravit ac de[dicavit]»

354 . Chastagnol précise toutefois qu’il serait imprudent d’essayer d’apporter plus de précision à la

350 Gesta senatus, éd. et trad Mommsen du Code Théo., I, 2e partie, p. 1. 351 Grâce en autre aux fragments CIL VI 32087p et 32087m 352 Sur l’importance que revêt l’entrée à l’âge adulte chez les Romains, voir G. Zecchini, "Filostorgio, " Metodologie della ricerca sulla tarda antichità, Napoli, 1989, 590. 353 Consularia Italica, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, 9, 300. 354 André Chastagnol, op. cit., p. 10.

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reconstruction, dû à la nature beaucoup trop fragmentaire de l’inscription ainsi qu’à la fragilité de

sa reconstitution.

Quelques faits intrigants ressortent de cette épigraphe. Il est certes possible de déceler un

intervalle de neuf ans entre le tremblement de terre de 429 et la restauration de Flavius Paulus.

On peut toutefois penser que certains travaux mineurs aient déjà été effectués durant ce délai,

notamment les restaurations préliminaires menées par Anicius Acilius Glabrio Faustus,

précédemment mentionné. De plus, l’inscription insiste justement sur le fait que les diverses

structures du Colisée rénovées par Flavius Paulus ont été quelque temps inutilisées ou étaient

encore délabrées ( quae ante non fuerant ). D’autres détails intéressants découlent plutôt du choix des

mots dans l’inscription. En ce qui concerne l’inscription de Flavius Paulus, ce qui est nouveau est

la mention explicite du but pour lequel le préfet urbain a fait ces restaurations. En effet, Ad

majorem gratiam voluptatemq[ue]. [populi] romani désigne l’intention de Flavius Paulus de recevoir

l’appréciation ainsi que les faveurs du public. S. Orlandi note notamment l’utilisation du mot

voluptas qui, dans ce contexte, prend la valeur d’un terme indiquant clairement le plaisir que le

public ressentait en assistant aux spectacles dans le Colisée 355 .

L’emploi du terme populi Romani , public visé par cette inscription est un concept qui

prend une valeur particulièrement positive pour l’idéologie politique du Ve siècle, comme il est

notamment possible de voir dans d’autres textes de l’époque 356 . En effet, à partir de l’époque

d’Honorius, le thème de la centralité de Rome revient comme centre d’actualité. Le rôle de la

population de Rome est alors idéalisé en accord avec la classe sénatoriale, puis synthétisé par le

355 Silvia Orlandi, op. cit., p. 255-256. 356 Notamment Symm., Ep.,I, 4.8.

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binôme du Sénat et du peuple de Rome 357 . L’utilisation de ce terme dans un contexte dans lequel

l’amour civique prend la forme du désir de satisfaire les faveurs du peuple de Rome n’est donc

pas surprenante, puisque le préfet urbain comble ainsi le besoin d’avoir une infrastructure pour

accueillir des spectacles 358 .

Ainsi, au final, il est possible de tirer beaucoup d’éléments très utiles à cette

reconstitution, tels que la nature des travaux ainsi que la personne qui les a commandités. Il s’agit

en effet d’une remise en état du podium et de la cavea , et possiblement l’entrée principale qui

regarde au Sud si on reconstruit l’inscription avec [ amph]ith[e]a[tri p]odium et i[ngressu]m ca[v]ea[mq]

359 . Il est aussi théoriquement possible, selon R. Rea, qui confirme la thèse de A. Chastagnol, de

pouvoir remanier les fragments à notre disposition pour former les mots podium, cavea, porticus,

ingressum (entrée) 360 . T. Mommsen, quant à lui, avance que ces travaux auraient aussi porté sur le

système de drainage d’eau, thèse qui est reprise par S. Priuli 361 . Quoi qu’il en soit, la longueur de

l’inscription suffit à témoigner de l’importance des travaux qui s’y sont passés, et ceux-ci auraient

été les plus importants du Ve siècle.

Quatrième restauration : entre 443 et 450

357 Pour approfondir l’utilisation du populus romanus comme population urbaine et avant tout dans le contexte des spectacles de cirque, ainsi que du sens particulier qu’il prend à partir de la fin du IVe siècle, voir V. Neri, « Le populus romanus dans l’Historia Augusta », dans G. Bonamente et G. Paci (éd.), Historiae Augustae Colloquium Maceratense, Bari, Edipuglia, 1995, p. 252-253 et 265-267. 358 Le concept d’amour civique est grandement étudié dans A. Giardina, «Amor civicus. Forme e immagini dell’evergetismo romano nella tradizione epigrafica », dans La terza età dell’ epigrafica, Faenza, 1988, 69; M. Heinzelmann, « Pater populi. Langage familial et détention de pouvoir public (Antiquité tardive et très Haut Moyen Age) », dans Aux sources de la puissance : sociabilité et parenté. Actes du Colloque, Rouen, 1987, 49. 359 André Chastagnol, op. cit., p. 12. 360 Rossella Rea, “The Colosseum through the Centuries” , dans Filippo Coarelli et al., op. cit., p. 187. 361 Filippo Coarelli et al., op. cit., p. 187.

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En poursuivant, il se trouve que nous possédons une autre inscription tout à fait

intéressante qui provient du bloc de marbre qui portait initialement l’inscription inauguratrice du

Colisée en lettres de bronze par Vespasien et Titus. Ces lettres de bronze ont été enlevées pour

faire place à une inscription au sujet de restaurations datant du règne conjoint de Valentinien III

et de Théodose II 362 , donc entre 425 et 450 apr. J.-C, mais vu l’ampleur des dégâts, on estime que

ces travaux se situent après le tremblement de terre de 443 surnommé « abominandus 363 » aussi

présent dans les Consularia Italica 364 . Ce tremblement de terre, bien plus dévastateur que celui de

429, aurait fait écrouler plusieurs bâtiments et monuments de Rome 365 , d’où la nécessité pour le

préfet urbain Rufius Caecina Felix Lampadius (en fonction tout juste après l’ abominandus et

apparenté à Flavius Paulus) de rebâtir plusieurs parties du Colisée 366 .

Ainsi, probablement de sa poche, comme l’inscription semble l’insinuer ( Salvis dd. nn.

Theodosio et Placido V[alen]tinia[n]o Augg., /Rufus Caecina Felix Lampadius, v. c. et inl. praef. urbi,

/harenam amphit(h)eatri a novo una cum podio et portis/posticis sed et reparatis spectaculi gradibus restituit .) 367 ,

Lampadius va entreprendre de reconstruire les marches où les spectateurs étaient assis ( spectaculi

gradus ), reconstruire complètement ( ex novo ) l’arène centrale, ainsi que d’autres parties de

l’amphithéâtre qui restent encore à ce jour nébuleuses à cause de la nature fragmentaire de

l’inscription. Les spécialistes pensent toutefois que le podium aurait été restauré, incluant les

362 CIL, VI, 32089. 363 Les sources ainsi que la bibliographie sur l’ abominandus sont rassemblées dans E. Guidoboni (éd), I terremoti prima del Mille in Italia e nell’ area mediterranea, Bologna, SGA, 1989, p. 608-609. 364 Consularia Italica, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, 9, 301. 365 Paulus Diaconus, Historia Romana, 13, 16. 366 L’inscription en général ne porte pas de problème majeur, la seule difficulté se trouve dans l’extension incertaine à la fin de chaque ligne. Voir à ce sujet les diverses propositions dans Ch. Hülsen, CIL VI 32089; G. Alföldy, “Eine Bauinschrift aus dem Colosseum” , dans Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 109 (1995), pp. 195-226.; S. Priuli, « L’epigrafe », dans Bull. Comm., 91 (1986), 326-328. 367 Les ajouts du XIXe siècle ont été enfin recensés dans R. Rea, T. Dinca, R. Morelli et S. Priuli, «Anfiteatro Flavio. Epigrafe di Rufus Caecina Felix Lampadius », dans Bull. Comm., 91 (1986), pp. 318-339.

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trappes entourant les murs de l’arène ( portis/posticis ) servant pour les fauves à déboucher dans

l’arène lors des venationes , même si ce dernier élément reste à ce jour débattu 368 . Chastagnol

avance aussi qu’ entre autres en raison de l’inscription de Flavius Paulus précédemment

mentionnée, les restaurations menées par Lampadius pourraient être les mêmes que celles de

Paulus, et qu’il ne serait que le successeur immédiat de ce dernier vers 439-440 qui aurait achevé

les travaux. Néanmoins, il est plus probable que les restaurations de Flavius Paulus n’aient pas

tenu le coup avec l’ abominandus de 443, et que Lampadius ait seulement dû refaire les travaux

entrepris par son prédécesseur 369 , ayant un rôle donc plutôt complémentaire.

Cinquième restauration : entre 444 et 445

Aussi de façon complémentaire, une nouvelle inscription 370 jugée auparavant trop

fragmentaire pour être prise en compte est dorénavant plus claire et complète grâce à S. Orlandi

qui a eu accès à de nouveaux fragments jusqu’alors inédits. Probablement quasi contemporaine à

l’inscription de Lampadius, et taillée par le même groupe de lapicide 371 , elle comporte plusieurs

éléments qui intriguent beaucoup les spécialistes. Nous avons à ce jour comme reconstitution : «

d(ominus) n(oster) [Pla]cidus Vale[nti]nianus perenn/is Aug[us]tu[s e]t princeps [Invi]ctissi[mus // pr]op[ter

368 Voir le résumé de ce débat dans Filippo Coarelli et al., op cit., p. 188., ; les principales recherches actuelles se trouvent toutefois dans Géza Alfödy, « Eine Bauinschrift aus dem Colosseum », dans Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 109, 1995, pp. 195-226.; Rossella Rea, Morelli, A., Priuli, S., “Anfiteatro Flavio. Epigrafe di Rufus Caecina Felix Lampadius” , dans Bulletino della Comissione Archeologica Comunale, 91, 1986, pp. 318-339. 369 André Chastagnol, op. cit., p. 13-14. 370 CIL VI 32088, en plus de rajouter les fragments de A. Chastagnol, 1966, p. 65, nos. 1-18. 371 S. Orlandi, op. cit., p. 257; André Chastagnol, op. cit., p. 15

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impe]rii vicen[nalia // ]sim[ //]s ann[ // ]moco[ // ]es[ // ]ni[ // ]oc[ // ]oin[ // ]om[ // ]op[ // ]si[

// ]si[ // ]V[ ». Nous pouvons tout de suite identifier l’empereur Valentinien III, qui est ici

qualifié de perennis Augustus et de princeps Invictissimus , sans toutefois mentionner Théodose II,

selon les fragments à notre disposition. Les autres éléments restent par contre très incertains, ce

qui, selon S. Orlandi, présente des caractéristiques inhabituelles pour une inscription de ce type 372

. Certains fragments isolés présentent toutefois un intérêt certain, dont le « POP » publié par A.

Chastagnol 373 , mais qui restent encore trop incertains pour être insérés dans l’inscription. Une

autre solution serait de mettre en comparaison cette inscription avec un des rares textes

épigraphiques où seul le nom de Valentinien III apparait : l’inscription relative à la construction

des remparts de Naples, dans laquelle la ville est décrite comme étant « nulla securitate gaudentem »

374 . S. Orlandi affirme que même l’inscription du Colisée rappelle une intervention en faveur de la

securitas , thème récurrent durant le règne de Valentinien III 375 .

Encore plus intéressante comme proposition est celle remontant à Hülsen qui combine

trois fragments isolés pour former RII VICEN 376 , à intégrer à l’imperii vicennalibus de Valentinien

III du 23 octobre 444, ou mieux, à l’ob imperii vicennalia 377 . Cette date pourrait constituer un point

de référence chronologique d’importance tant pour cette inscription que pour les autres

concernant les restaurations du Colisée à la même période. Le fait qu’une inscription

commémorant des restaurations pour les vicennales de Valentinien III ait été gravée n’est

372 S. Orlandi, op. cit., p. 257. 373 André Chastagnol, op. cit., p. 65, no 9. 374 Selon l’introduction de T. Mommsen dans CIL X 1485. 375 S. Orlandi, op. cit., p. 257. 376 CIL VI 320881 377 D’après les inscriptions placées à l’occasion des anniversaires impériaux, voir André Chastagnol, « Les inscriptions de monuments inaugurés lors des fêtes impériales », Mélanges de l’école française de Rome 100 (1998), pp. 19-26.

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nullement surprenant, puisqu’il était de coutume pour les vingt ans de règne des empereurs

d’organiser des jeux et des spectacles, en plus d’inaugurer des statues, de frapper monnaie, ou

encore d’inaugurer des monuments publics d’importance toute particulière 378 . Si cette inscription

est en effet pour les vicennales de Valentinien III, cela pourrait possiblement expliquer que seul

son nom soit mentionné, et que des travaux de restauration aient été effectués et terminés à

temps pour la fête impériale, constituant ainsi le terminus ante quem des inscriptions mentionnées

jusqu’à présent 379 .

Néanmoins, la contiguïté des fragments rend la confirmation dans l’inscription incertaine,

et leur poids ainsi que leur emplacement dans l’Amphithéâtre flavien empêche encore à ce jour

toute confirmation définitive. D’autres lectures pourraient donc être faites pour le fragment RII

VICEN 380 , S. Orlandi proposant même d’y voir une indication chronologique du type anno imperii

vicesimo 381 , permettant de trouver des places plausibles à des fragments qui seraient sinon

inutilisés. Suivant les spécialistes 382 , il se pourrait donc que l’inscription ne fasse pas état des

vicennales de Valentinien III en 444, mais plutôt de la prise du consulat (occasion de donner des

jeux à la population) pour la cinquième fois par l’empereur en 445, qui coïncide d’ailleurs avec un

long séjour de ce dernier à Rome 383 .

378 Pour approfondir le sujet, voir André Chastagnol, «Aspects concrets et cadre topographique des fêtes décennales des empereurs à Rome », dans L’ urbs. Espace urbain et histoire, CollEFR 98 (1987), 497-499; Pierre Salama, «Anniversaires impériaux constantino-liciniens à Djemila », dans Institutions, société et vie politique dans l’ empire romaine au IVe siècle ap. J. -C., CollEFR 159 (1992), 156-157 379 Silvia Orlandi, op. cit., p. 258. 380 André Chastagnol, Le Sénat romain sous le règne d’Odoacre. Recherche sur l’épigraphie du Colisée au Ve siècle, p. 15, propose, non sans de multiples doutes [praefectus praeto]rii vice [sacra indicatisi, ou encore [praefectorum praeto]rii vice[s agens]. 381 Silvia Orlandi, op. cit., p. 258. 382 Bibliographie résumée dans Silvia Orlandi, op. cit., p. 258-259. 383 Comme le démontre Otto Seeck, Regesten der Kaiser und Päpste für die Jahre 311 bis 476 n. Chr : Vorarbeit zu einer Prosopographie der christlichen Kaiserzeit, Frankfurt, Minerva, 1984, p. 374-378.

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Sixième restauration : en 470

Toutes les restaurations nécessaires après l’ abominandus n’ont toutefois pas été menées par

Lampadius, c’est pourquoi vingt ans plus tard, d’autres travaux sont entamés au Colisée. Six

fragments de l’inscription commémorant ces restaurations ont été retrouvés à ce jour 384 et nous

donnent l’occasion de reconstruire et d’en identifier plusieurs éléments. Elle daterait de l’époque

du règne conjoint de Léon Ier et d’Anthémius, entre 467 et 472 apr. J.-C., et serait le fruit du

sénateur Messius Phoebus Severus, comme le mentionne explicitement l’inscription « [Sa]lvis

dd(ominis) n[n(ostris) L]eone et Anthemio p(er)p(etui)s Augg(ustis) Messius Phoe[bus Severus] / [v(ir)

c(larissimus)] et inl(ustris) [p(raefectus)] u(rbi) patric(iu)s co[nsul ordin(arius) hare]nam(?) amphitheatri longi

temp[oris 3] / [3 restitutam 3]TIE[3 fu]isset extinctum pro beatitudin[e] saeculi . Celui-ci serait décrit dans

l’inscription comme un sénateur de haut rang, un préfet urbain, un patricien, et qui tient le titre

de consul ordinarius . Ces titres nous permettent de dater avec plus de précision l’inscription, soit en

470, année où Severus est consul et sûrement préfet urbain 385 . La nature même des restaurations

reste toutefois un peu floue, l’inscription incomplète ne nous permettant seulement d’identifier

qu’une partie du Colisée qui n’était plus utilisée depuis longtemps ( hare]nam(?) amphitheatri longi

temp[oris3] / [3 restitutam ).

Ainsi, tout comme pour l’inscription de Lampadius, il est aussi possible de créer un lien entre

cette restauration et une époque particulièrement significative de l’histoire de l’Empire,

restauration qui constitue en soi un choix politique précis. En effet, l’utilisation du verbe

extinguere fait possiblement référence comme terme technique associé à l’idée de la défaite des

384 CIL, VI, 32091-32092. 385 Filippo Coarelli et al., op. cit., p. 189.

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tyrans, c’est-à-dire d’usurpateurs de la dignité impériale 386 . On découvre en 470 un complot

fomenté contre l’empereur Anthémius par le patricius Romano, magister officiorum et ami de

Ricimer. L’événement, quoique relativement insignifiant, se situe tout de même dans un contexte

de tensions politiques entre Ricimer et l’empereur d’Occident, Messius Phoebus Severus, fidèle

partisan du régime d’Anthémius 387 , désirait alors peut-être honorer la victoire de l’empereur.

Septième restauration : entre 484 et 508

L’une des dernières restaurations de l’Antiquité tardive est commémorée dans une inscription

établie sur trois bases de marbre, dont une est aujourd’hui perdue. Les trois blocs présentent le

même texte, quoiqu’organisé de façon différente sur chacun d'entre eux, et font état de travaux

par Decius Macius Venantius Basilius avec l’inscription suivante : « Decius Marius Venantius /

Basilius v(ir) c(larissimus) et inl(ustris) praef(ectus) / urb(i) patricius consul / ordinarius arenam et / podium

qu(ae) abomi/nandi terrae mo/tus ruina pros/travit sum(p)tu pro/prio restituit » 388 . Ce dernier est un

sénateur de très haut rang, un préfet urbain, un patricien, qui a été consul ordinarius . Il aurait

notamment restauré à ses frais l’arène et le podium qui, selon l’inscription, auraient été

endommagés par un tremblement de terre « abominable », nous laissant donc supposer que ces

dommages datent de l’ abominandus de 449. Concrètement, le travail de Basilius porte à détruire la

dernière colonnade debout pour mettre les restes dans les sous terrain de l’arène et y enterrer le

tout. Le problème de la datation de cette inscription persiste toutefois à ce jour puisque plusieurs

386 Pour l’utilisation du terme tyrannus pour désigner un usurpateur à la fin de l’époque impériale, voir R. MacMullen "The Roman concept of robber-pretender, " RivIntDrAnt 10 (1963) 221-22; V. Neri, "L'usurpatore come tiranno nel lessico politico della tarda antichità, " dans F. Paschoud et J. Szidat, Usurpationen in der Sptitantike (Historia Einzelschriften Stuttgart, 111 (1997)) 71-86. 387 Voir notamment L. Vassili, "La cultura di Antemio, " Athenaeum, 16 (1938) 40-42; J. M. O'Flynn, Generalissimos of the western Roman empire, Edmonton, University of Alberta Press, 1983, p. 127. 388 CIL, VI, 32094b.

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sénateurs après 449 ont porté des noms similaires à celui de Basilius. On attribue généralement

cette inscription au consul de 484, mais les récentes études archéologiques 389 semblent plutôt

pointer vers la moitié du règne de Théodoric le Grand (493-526), soit vers 508 apr. J.-C., lorsque

le fils de Basilius, Basilius iunior , était consul 390 . Il semble curieux de noter dans l’inscription

l’absence du souverain de l’époque, normalement partie intégrante des inscriptions du Colisée et

de l’Empire tardif.

Huitième restauration : entre 493 et 529

Bien que tardive, la toute dernière restauration qui nous est connue est une élévation du

sol de l’arène. Elle survient quelques années après les travaux de Basilius, mais pas plus tard que

la troisième décennie du VIe siècle 391 . Comme l’inscription l’indique ( Salvo [d(omino) n(ostro) 3

princ]ipe Anas/tasiu[s v(ir) c(larissimus) et inl(ustris)] patr[icius] / [3]um[ // ] v(ir) c(larissimus?) et [3] /

[3]S[ ), ces travaux auraient été menés par le sénateur Anastasius et ne nous sont connus que par

d’anciennes archives. Tout comme l’inscription de Basilius (ou bien est-ce dû à la nature trop

fragmentaire de l’inscription), le souverain de l’époque, Théodoric le Grand, n’est pas non plus

mentionné.

L’évergétisme romain et son apport au Colisée

Maintenant que nous avons amplement expliqué où en sont les études des nombreux

fragments relatant les diverses réfections du Colisée au Ve siècle, et notamment les nombreuses

difficultés que présentent ces études, attardons-nous plutôt au pourquoi de la chose. En effet,

389 Voir les conclusions dans Peter Connolly, op. cit., p. 170-184. 390 Arnold H.M. Jones, John R. Martindale, John Morris, “Decius Marius Venantius Basilius 13” , dans The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, vol. 2, p. 218. 391 Filippo Coarelli et al., op. cit., p. 190.

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plusieurs restaurations du Colisée semblent belles sur papier, mais il est normal de douter que ces

travaux aient pu atteindre des coûts faramineux. Il est donc justifié de se demander pourquoi

l’Amphithéâtre flavien, monument très coûteux à entretenir et devenu vétuste en raison de sa

taille beaucoup trop importante pour la population romaine du Ve siècle, reçoit encore autant

d’attention monétaire de la part des empereurs et des sénateurs de Rome. Si l’on se questionne

un peu, une des principales caractéristiques de la société romaine en Antiquité tardive vient

rapidement en tête : c’est l’évergétisme.

Néologisme dû principalement à André Boulanger et Henri-Irénée Marrou 392 , puis

popularisé par Paul Veyne 393 , l’évergétisme est connu en Grèce dès l’époque hellénistique. Selon

Paul Veyne, « l’évergétisme est le fait que les collectivités attendaient des riches qu’ils

contribuassent de leurs deniers aux dépenses publiques 394 ». Ces dépenses liées à l’évergétisme

étaient surtout associées aux spectacles du cirque et de l’arène, mais finançaient aussi des

banquets et la construction d’édifices publics. Elles étaient versées soit sans obligation définie,

soit à cause d’une élection à une magistrature publique ( ob honorem ). Une dualité persistera entre

ces deux types d’évergésies : certains notable vont ainsi multiplier les contributions faites à la

société pour y laisser une empreinte indélébile de leur bienfaisance, tandis que d’autres seront

pressés et obligés par le peuple de contribuer à la société 395 en vertu de leur titre.

C’est ainsi qu’à Rome, à l’Antiquité tardive, le principe d’évergétisme sera plus présent

que jamais. En effet, restaurer des monuments publics d’importance était un choix stratégique

392 Voir André Boulanger, Aelius Aristide et la sophistique dans la province d’Asie, Paris, De Boccard, 1923, p. 25 ; Henri-Irénée Marrou, Histoire de l’éducation dans l’Antiquité, Paris, Seuil, 1948, p. 405. 393 Notamment Paul Veyne, Le pain et le cirque, Paris, Seuil, 1976, 800 p. 394 Paul Veyne, op. cit., p. 20. 395 Idem, p. 21.

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pour maintenir la mémoire de la magnificence d’antan tout en reléguant aux oubliettes les

moments les plus sombres de son histoire 396 . Plusieurs questions se posent toutefois quant à cet

évergétisme : était-ce dans un but pratique ou idéologique? Le peuple voyait-il ces monuments

restaurés comme un souvenir honorant un passé glorieux et lui redonnant vie?

Bien que la réponse du public aux projets de restauration soit difficile à mesurer, nous

savons que les sénateurs de l’Antiquité tardive désiraient revendiquer leur capital culturel par le

biais des réseaux sociaux qu'ils avaient créés avec leurs ancêtres; au moyen de ces restaurations, ils

désiraient réaffirmer les hiérarchies du passé 397 . On peut donc trouver à Rome, particulièrement

après le IIIe siècle, une grande quantité d’inscriptions portant le mot restituere , terme latin

signifiant ici : remettre quelque chose dans son ancien état 398 , et qui se retrouve sur plusieurs des

inscriptions mentionnées précédemment. Depuis 331, la responsabilité de maintenir les

bâtiments publics à Rome appartient au préfet urbain, le président du Sénat 399 , ce sont donc des

sénateurs qui effectueront les nombreuses restaurations à Rome, dont celles du Colisée. En ce

qui concerne l’Amphithéâtre flavien, la décision de travaux ne revient qu’au préfet urbain ;

ceux-ci avaient l’obligation d’inscrire le nom des empereurs de l’époque et de leur rendre gloire,

sans quoi le restaurateur sera accusé de haute trahison 400 .

396 Gregor Kalas, “Writing and Restorations in Rome: Inscriptions, Statues, and the Late Antique Preservation of Buildings” , in Caroline Goodson, Anne E. Lester, Carol Symes, Cities, Texts, and Social Networks, 400-1500, Burlington, Ashgate, 2010, p. 21. 397 Ibid., p. 23. 398 Étude complète sur le terme restituere en Antiquité tardive dans Edmund Thomas, Christian Witschel, “Constructing Reconstruction: Claim and Reality of Roman Rebuilding Inscriptions from the Latin West” , in Papers of the British School at Rome, 60 (1992), pp. 135-177. 399 André Chastagnol, La préfecture urbaine à Rome sous le Bas-Empire, Paris, Presses universitaires de la France, 1960, p. 43-63 et 335-339; Bryan Ward-Perkins, From Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages:Urban Public Buildings in Northern and Central Italy, AD 300-850, Oxford, Oxford University Press 1984, p. 38-48. 400 Code Théo., XV, 1, 31 : « Si qui iudices perfecto operi suum potius nomen quam nostrae perennitatis scribserint, maiestatis teneantur obnoxii.

168

Toutefois, des rapports récents nous permettent de penser que les sénateurs usaient de

l’ambiguïté de « travaux complétés » pour attacher leur nom, et donc celui de l’aristocratie locale,

plutôt que ceux des empereurs 401 . Ainsi, un avantage implicite de la restauration, en particulier si

elle était entreprise sans les fonds alloués par la cour impériale, était que le nom de l’empereur

semblait pouvoir être limité dans son importance. En outre, les sénateurs avaient le loisir d'agir

en tant que restaurateurs, même si cela ne signifie pas qu'ils pouvaient présumer être les

fondateurs de nouveaux bâtiments 402 . Ammien Marcellin nous donne d’ailleurs une anecdote

concernant un préfet urbain qui a restauré autour vers 360 sans donner de façon appropriée un

hommage et le crédit aux empereurs régnant 403 .

C’est ainsi que C. Ceionius Rufius Volusianus, avec l’argent de la famille impériale,

rénove plusieurs bâtiments de Rome et inscrit son nom, non pas en tant que restaurateur, mais

bien comme bâtisseur original. En dédaignant ainsi de rendre hommage aux ancêtres et en ne

créditant pas les empereurs, le préfet urbain va s’attirer les foudres du peuple de Rome puisque

celui-ci ne donnera pas de spectacles et n’offrira rien de plus à la population. Une émeute explose

donc et ce dernier est obligé de fuir momentanément Rome, nous laissant supposer dans quelle

mesure les noms et insignes gravés dans la pierre devaient correspondre à des actes généreux

bénéficiant au public 404 . Cette anecdote nous donne un aperçu de la façon dont un sénateur peut

401 Gregor Kalas, op. cit., p. 30. 402 L’édit de 364 du Code Théo., XV, 1, 11, est compris comme donnant l’autorisation aux sénateurs et aux préfets urbains de prendre sous leur aile les restaurations comme une responsabilité locale, tandis que les empereurs s’occupaient de construire de nouveaux bâtiments; voir à ce sujet Heike Niquet, ”Die valentinianische Dynastie und Rom: das Selbstverstandnis der Kaiser und ihre Haltung zur Senatsaristokratie im Licht van Bau- und Ehreninschriften”” , in Geza Alfoldy and Silvio Panciera (eds), Inschriftliche Denkmäler als Medien der Selbstdarstellung in der römischen Welt, Stuttgart, Steiner, 2001, p. 143-4. 403 Amm. Marce., XXVII, 3, 7“Per omnia enim civitatis membra, quae diversorum principum exornarunt impensae, nomen proprium inscribebat, non ut veterum instaurator, sed conditor ” 404 Gregor Kalas, op. cit., p. 31.

169

faire raviver la popularité de la vieille aristocratie, à condition toutefois que certains critères

attendus par le peuple soient remplis.

Preuve écrite de l’évergétisme romain à l’Antiquité tardive, cette anecdote nous en

apprend beaucoup sur les attentes que le peuple a à l’endroit des sénateurs. En ce qui concerne le

Colisée, celui-ci n’est pas épargné par ce phénomène dont les racines sont profondément ancrées

dans la société romaine. En effet, pourquoi les préfets urbains voudraient-ils restaurer ce

gigantesque monument qui donne lieu à de grandes dépenses d’entretien tandis que l’économie

est plus que chancelante ? Plusieurs hypothèses sont possibles : on peut supposer que les

sénateurs voulaient, de façon pratique, avoir un lieu où donner les différents jeux et spectacles

que le peuple réclamait vigoureusement, comme le laisse penser l’épisode de 360 susmentionné.

On peut aussi penser que les sénateurs désiraient, en plus de réinstituer des activités culturelles,

effacer douloureux le passé immédiat pour ne rappeler que des événements conférant de

l’honneur à l’élite locale 405 .

Conclusion

Ainsi, vers la fin du Ve siècle, le Colisée n’est plus que l’ombre de lui-même,de sa

grandeur d’antan : l’Amphithéâtre flavien devient une carrière où le pillage est autorisé par

Théodoric le Grand qui détestait les spectacles, les décrivant comme exécrables et misérables 406 .

C’est donc à partir de cette époque que le Colisée, figure emblématique de Rome, voit sa ruine

précipitée. Nous avons pu constater que plusieurs restaurations furent réalisées sur

l’amphithéâtre dès le IIIe siècle, mais que la plupart des travaux furent menés au Ve siècle,

405 Gregor Kalas, op. cit., p. 43. 406 Cassiodore, Variae 5, 42.

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notamment à cause des grands tremblements de terre. Ces restaurations nous sont parvenues

sous la forme d’inscriptions sur des blocs de marbre et de travertin du Colisée. Bien que celles-ci

soient pour la plupart assez fragmentaires et difficiles à reconstituer, il est possible d’en tirer

plusieurs informations capitales pour notre compréhension de ces nombreux travaux. Plusieurs

points restent encore nébuleux, notamment la datation, les personnes qui ont dirigé les travaux et

la nature même de ces restaurations. Heureusement, des fouilles archéologiques sont toujours en

cours pour tenter de répondre à ces questions, puisque les diverses inscriptions peuvent encore

être reconstituées de façon précise. Il faut aussi voir dans les nombreuses restaurations faites sur

le Colisée lors du Ve siècle un moyen d’organiser des jeux et des cérémonies pour le peuple

romain. Ce dernier, depuis la disparition ou la diminution des assemblés civiques assurant une

participation active des citoyens à la vie politique de la ville, est quelque peu déconnecté des

sénateurs et de l’empereur. Ces sénateurs, pratiquant un évergétisme évident – d’ailleurs attendu

par la population, profitent donc de ces restaurations pour mettre sur un piédestal l’aristocratie

locale qui tentait de regagner de l’influence dans le contexte de confusion politique du Ve siècle.

171

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Évolution de l’analyse iconographique d’une hydrie du Peintre de Leningrad

Lucie Guillemin, Université de Montréal

Introduction

L’analyse iconographique est une grande facette du travail des céramologues, variant d’un

chercheur à l’autre. Une seule image se retrouve donc avec différentes interprétations guidées par

les approches de celui qui l’étudie. Les archéologues contemporains se doivent donc de prendre

en compte chacune de ces interprétations pour présenter les problèmes et les points forts de

chacune de leurs recherches.

Le but de cet article est donc de présenter les problèmes d’interprétation possible d’une

image. Le vase qui sera étudié est le numéro 206567 du corpus de Beazley.. Il semble

qu’aujourd’hui il y ait un consensus, en effet, ce qu’il s’agisse d’une représentation du bain

prénuptial. La scène représentée sur l’épaule du vase est, cependant, passée par un long

cheminement d’études.

Il y aura donc un constat de ce qui a été fait en éclairant les grandes lignes de chacune des

thèses émises jusqu’à présent. L’étude commencera par une description littérale détaillée de

l’œuvre du peintre de Leningrad pour voir tous les éléments présents pour ensuite comprendre

les points forts et faibles de chacune des approches de l’études. Par la suite, chacune des théories

sera présentée avec les auteurs qui les utilisent ainsi qu’une critique de la méthode et de leur

176

pensée. Tout au long de l’étude, il y aura de nombreuses comparaisons avec des vases portant sur

des sujets similaires afin de renforcer l’argumentation.

Développement

Présentation de l’objet avec courte description de l’image

L’analyse de la figure 10-13 dans Oakley et Sinos 407 a été quelquefois étudiée,

principalement dans des catalogues de collections de musées, dans des recherches

iconographiques mais aussi dans des livres sur la religion ou le mariage. C’est une hydrie à figures

rouges datant de la période archaïque (-525/-475) qui a été attribuée au peintre de Leningrad. Il

fait partie du groupe de peintres nommé les maniéristes, il s’agit d’un des seuls courants à figures

rouges archaïques qui nous est parvenu. Ceux-ci développent leur technique durant le Ve siècle

av. J.-C. Ce sont des apprentis qui recopient les techniques de leurs maîtres. Le peintre de

Leningrad serait pour certains auteurs 408celui qui aurait la technique la plus élaborée au niveau

des détails. L’hydrie est conservée au Musée National de Varsovie 409 .

Dans le décor de ce vase, on retrouve des frises similaires dans la partie supérieure et

inférieure représentant des boutons de lotus. Ce motif est très présent dans la figure noire de

l’époque archaïque 410 . Il y a de chaque côté deux colonnes décorées de points reliés par des lignes

sinueuses. Ensuite, à l'extrême droite se trouve un bassin 411 ou un refroidisseur, dans lequel se

trouve un loutrophore . Entre les deux femmes complètement à droite, il y a une petite oenochoé sur un

407 J.H. Oakley et R. Sinos, The Wedding in Ancient Athens, Madison, 1994, p.15. 408Jonh Boardman. Les Vases athéniens à figures rouges : La période archaïque, Thames Hudson, 1997. 409 Attic Vase Inscription, 7995 410 R.S Folsom, Handbook of greek pottery, London : Faber and Faber 1967, p.66. 411 Suit la théorie de shape and use of vase

177

support qui fait penser à un petit foyer 412 . La scène est composée de 5 femmes et un homme. En

partant de la gauche, la première femme a les cheveux noués en queue de cheval basse avec un

élastique au niveau des pointes. Elle porte dans sa main droite une torche. Sur son visage, on

constate un petit sourire archaïque comme pour tous les autres personnages. Elle a un simple

bandeau dans ses cheveux. Son habillement est composé d’un chiton parsemé de points noirs et

d’un himation 413 . Elle ne porte pas de chaussures, comme aucun des autres personnages de la scène.

Elle a de petites boucles d’oreilles. La deuxième femme tient deux torches une qui pointe vers le

bas dans la main droite et l’autre qui pointe vers le ciel dans sa main gauche. Elle a les cheveux

ramassés en chignon bas. Elle porte aussi un bandeau avec une pierre sur le front (à déterminer

puisque c’est un cercle rouge sur son front). Elle est aussi vêtue d’un chiton décoré de lignes cette

fois-ci et d’un himation . La troisième femme tend un plémochoé décoré vers le ciel . 414 Ces cheveux

sont retenus en queue de cheval. Elle porte un bandeau de couleur rouge foncé ainsi qu’un voile

qui couvre ses cheveux. Elle porte aussi un chiton (décorée par des points noirs en groupement de

trois avec deux bandes noires au centre) et d’un himation dont les manches sont décorées de

bandes noires La quatrième femme a le bras droit levé vers le ciel et le gauche levé au niveau de la

tête. Elle porte aussi une queue de cheval. Elle porte un chiton décoré par deux lignes sur l’ourlet et

un himation. Elle porte un bandeau dans lequel il y a un voile qui couvre seulement la queue de

cheval et le dessus du front. La sixième femme tient dans sa main droite, une phiale qui est décorée

415 . Ses cheveux sont agencés en queue de cheval. Elle porte un diadème et des boucles d’oreilles.

412 R.S Folsom, 1967, op. cit. 413 On trouve dans le bas un appendice qui pourrait rappeler à un pompon. Il aurait été possible de déduire que la présence d’un pompon rapporte à un costume traditionnel de mariage et aurait pu justifier la théorie du bain prénuptial. Cette théorie est infondée faute d’études à ce sujet. Il pourrait aussi s’agir de poids pour tenir le manteau en place. 414 R.S Folsom, 1967, op. cit. 415 R.S Folsom, 1967, op. cit.

178

Son chiton est décoré de points noirs et de fines lignes le long des ourlets et elle porte un himation .

Le jeune homme nu est accroupi avec le genou droit qui repose sur le sol. Il a des cheveux courts,

il est imberbe. Son pied gauche est difforme et parsemé de points noirs. Il porte une couronne

d’olivier qui fait souvent partie d’un rituel de purification car c’est synonyme d’élévation. Son pied

droit repose dans une vase en forme de grande assiette. Il est l’élément central de l’image puisque

toutes les femmes sont tournées vers lui.

Présentation des théories élaborées

À l’aide de la sélection d’articles de Beazley, quatre analyses ont été présentées jusqu’à

maintenant.

La première est celle du bain d’un jeune. Cependant, les auteurs qui suivent cet ordre

d’idées n'expliquent pas pourquoi ils pensent ainsi. Beazley, le Attic Vase Inscription(AVI) et le

LIMC (Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae) suivent cette théorie. Cependant, il est

difficile de croire qu’il en est ainsi. Dans la scène peinte sur l’hydrie étudiée, il n’y a ni de bain, ni

de strigile, ni d’aryballe qui sont représentés. Ces éléments sont traditionnellement présents dans

des scènes de bains 416 . Une amphore attribuée au peintre de Priam qui date d’environ de la même

époque présente un groupe de jeunes filles prenant un bain. La baignoire est représentée ainsi

que les strigiles et les aryballes (Beazley, 351080) De plus, le jeune semble assez mature, il est

certes difficile de déterminer son âge réel mais il est fort douteux qu’il ait besoin de cinq femmes

pour le laver. Ces femmes auraient pu être des esclaves mais leurs vêtements et leurs parures

rejettent complètement cette hypothèse.

416 Isabelle Bardiès-Fronty, Michèle Bimbenet-Privat, Philippe Walter. cosmétique de l'Antiquité à la Renaissance, Gallimard, 2009, p. 92-94. Le bain et le miroir: soins du corps et

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La deuxième théorie est celle d’une représentation du rituel de purification appelé

l’expiation de Thésée 417 . Ce rite est fait lorsque quelqu’un commet un crime impliquant du sang.

La purification dans certains cas se ferait par le sang. J. De Witte est particulièrement friand de

cette théorie, de laquelle il a écrit deux articles au courant du XIXe siècle. Il n’explique pas très

clairement pourquoi il pense ainsi et n’offre aucune comparaison avec d’autres vases pour

justifier sa théorie. Cependant, il base sa théorie sur la présence de la toison d’or dans l’image,

représenté par l’élément picoté qui se trouve au niveau du pied gauche du jeune homme 418 . Cet

artefact fait partie du mythe des Argonautiques. Thésée n’est pas présent dans ce récit. De plus,

la représentation de la toison d’or dans l’iconographie grecque est toujours représentée avec la

tête du bélier (Beazley, 250910). C’est une preuve de la faiblesse de l’argument amené par J. de

Witte. Le Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum (CVA) suit aussi cette théorie sans donner plus

d’explication. Cette théorie est la plus ancienne trouvée jusqu’à maintenant 419 . Elle est un peu

douteuse, mais moins que la dernière puisque l’implication d’une couronne végétale ainsi que la

présence de l’eau ramène à un rituel de purification. Cependant, la présence de femmes n’est pas

traditionnelle à moins qu’elles ne soient des prêtresses, mais il n’y a pas la présence de dieux

comme on le voit dans une coupe attique à figures noires (Beazley, 11106). Le sujet du vase n’est

pas le même puisque dans le cas de cette figure, on assiste à une procession en vue d’un sacrifice

pour Athéna. Cependant, on retrouve une jeune femme qui se trouve au côté de la déesse et elle

est considérée comme une prêtresse.À la lecture de ce vase, on peut tenter de créer une relation

entre la présence divine reliée à la présence de prêtresse ce qui n’est pas le cas dans le vase du

417 J. de Witte. L’ expiation ou la purification de Thésée, Gazette archéologique: 1884, p.351-353. 418 J. de Witte. 1884, op. cit. 419 Les capacités linguistiques de l’auteur se réduisent au français. Les documents plus anciens sont inaccessibles. en anglais lui

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peintre de Leningrad. De plus, la présence du loutrophore pose aussi un problème puisque c’est un

vase seulement présent dans les scènes de mariage. Les vases 214899 et 214884 du catalogue de

Beazley en sont l’exemple. En ordre, il y a une procession et un habillement de la mariée 420 . Pour

ajouter à l'argument peu détaillé par J. de Witte, il est possible de comparer l’image avec un autre

vase représentant le rituel de purification de Thésée (Figure 8) selon le ThesCRA (Thesaurus

Cultus et Rituum Antiquorum). Dans cette scène, le jeune Thésée est représenté semi-nu sur un

autel. Il est entouré de nombreuses divinités qui sont présentes dans son mythe notemment

Athéna, Poséidon, Hercule… Il porte une couronne végétale certes mais la scène ne ressemble

en rien à l’oeuvre du peintre de Leningrad.

La troisième théorie est celle du bain prénuptial. Ce rituel de purification a lieu le premier

des trois jours du mariage. Il a pour but de préparer les mariés pour la transition de la vie de

famille à la future vie commune. Il y avait une source d’eau dans les villes spécialement réservée

pour aller chercher l’eau nécessaire à ce rituel et il y avait une procession pour aller la puiser avant

le bain 421 . J.H Oakley et R. Sinos sont particulièrement friands de cette théorie. Ils affirment que

la présence du loutrophore justifie que cette scène soit un bain prénuptial. L. Bodiou et V. Mehl,

sans décrire le vase, assument d’office que celui-ci représente un rite de purification associé au

mariage. Elles affirment d’ailleurs que c’est la seule représentation de ce rite 422 . L’AVI n’écarte pas

la possibilité mais ne donne aucun argument. Tout en restant quelque peu douteuse, cette théorie

est la moins bancale. En effet, comme expliqué plus haut, la présence de l’eau et d’une couronne

ne laisse aucun doute à l’idée d’une purification. De plus, la présence du loutrophore fait en effet

420 J.H. Oakley et R. Sinos, The Wedding in Ancient Athens, Madison, 1994, p.15 421 Idem. C’est d’ailleurs cette scène du rituel du bain prénuptial qui est la plus représentée dans l’iconographie. 422 Lydie Bodiou. et Véronique Mehl . (eds.), La religion des femmes en Grèce ancienne, Mythes, cultes et société, Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2009, p.183-184.

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penser à une scène reliée au mariage 423 . L’habillement et l’ornement des femmes est aussi un

indicateur, puisque celles-ci sont décorées de manière élégante laissant supposer qu’une

cérémonie importante devrait se dérouler. La pyxide de la figure 20 dans J.H Oakley et R.Sinos

(Beazley, 44750) est la comparaison parfaite démontrant le même rituel. En effet, il y a une

femme accroupie qui se fait verser de l'eau sur la tête par un éros . La scène est très similaire à celle

de l’hydrie étudiée. Sur cette pyxide , il est clair que c’est une scène de mariage puisqu’elle est

accompagnée d’autres scènes qui font parties des rites qui ont lieu avant la cérémonie. De plus, la

présence de plusieurs éros confirme le caractère nuptial de la scène 424 .

Ce vase a été analysé pour une quatrième fois dans une tout autre optique par Tsingarida.

La forme biconique qui tient le loutrophore l’a intéressée. Laissant de côté la signification de la

scène dans son ensemble, l’auteure s'est attardée sur la pièce en stipulant que celle-ci est un

bassin. L’image n’était alors analysée que pour justifier son argumentation quant à la

représentation des bassins dans l’art grec 425 .

Le problème dans les théories présentées jusqu’à maintenant est qu’elles sont très peu

justifiées. Le manque de méthodologie laisse douter n’importe quel chercheur qui se penchera sur

l’analyse de ce vase. Le processus de réflexion est peu ou n’est pas présenté menant à une prise

pour acquis direct de la théorie. Il peut s’avérer très frustrant pour un chercheur contemporain

de se pencher sur ce vase. Cependant, la théorie la plus utilisée et la plus plausible est

certainement celle du bain prénuptial qui aurait été élaborée par Rumph. La présence d’une

423 J.H. Oakley et R. Sinos, 1994, Op. cit. 424 Idem. 425 Athena Tsingarida (ed.), Shapes and CReA-patrimoine, 2009, 382 p Uses of Greek Vases (7th-4th centuries B.C.), Bruxelles,

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couronne, la présence du loutrophore , le parfum dans le plomechoe et l’habillement des jeunes

femmes sont des indicateurs d’une représentation du bain prénuptial.

Conclusion

À la lumière de ce qui précède, de nombreuses théories qui sont ressorties à propos de

l’image de l’hydrie composé de 5 femmes habillées richement et d’un homme accroupi nu

accompagnés d’un loutrophore , d’une couronne, d’un plémochoé . La première élaborée par Beazley

est le lavage d’un jeune homme, mais cette théorie n’est pas convaincante. En effet, il manque

des éléments que l’on retrouve habituellement dans les scènes de bains et de lavage comme les

aryballes et les strigiles. La deuxième des théories élaborée par J. de Witte est celle du rituel de

l’expiation de Thésée qui s'appuie sur la présence de la « toison d’or » au pied du jeune homme.

Elle est très contestable vu le manque de méthodologie de l’auteur, mais aussi par le manque

d’explication quant à la présence du loutrophore et l’interprétation rapide des éléments représentant

le sacré de l’image. La troisième théorie – la plus solide – est celle du bain prénuptial 426 , un rituel

qui se déroule lors du premier jour du mariage. Tous les éléments du vase sont pris en compte

pour justifier la cérémonie représentée : le loutrophore , l’habillement, la présence de l’eau et du

parfum, et la couronne. De plus, la similitude avec un autre vase représentant la même scène

réaffirme l’argumentation. De plus, le vase a servi d'argument afin de présenter les

représentations des bassins dans l’art grec par Tsingarida dans Shapes and Uses of Greek Vases

(7th-4th centuries B.C.) . Il ne faut pas oublier qu’il y a un certain manque de méthodologie quant à

l’étude de ce vase ce qui est un obstacle frustrant pour les chercheurs contemporains.

426 Rumph, 1928

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Un élément qui semble avoir échappé à de nombreux auteurs est l’étude du cadre de la

scène, c’est-à-dire les deux colonnes et les frises en boutons de lotus. Il serait pertinent de

rechercher si les deux colonnes représentent l’intérieur d’une maison ou bien qu’elles soient

purement décoratives exprimant un caractère stylistique associé au peintre de Leningrad. De plus,

les frises en boutons de lotus sont des éléments retrouvés sur de nombreux vases. Il serait

pertinent de chercher à comprendre si ce motif à une signification quelconque ou s’il est placé à

titre purement décoratif.

184

Bibliographie

Manuels

Brian A. Sparkes. Greek pottery an introduction, Manchester, New York, Manchester University Press, 1991, 186 p.

R.S Folsom. Handbook of greek pottery, London : Faber and Faber 1967, 213 p.

Tyler Jo Smith and Dimitris Plantzos. A companion to Greek art , Malden, MA, Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2012

Monographies

Athena Tsingarida (ed.), Shapes and Uses of Greek Vases (7th-4th centuries B.C.) , Bruxelles, CReA-patrimoine, 2009, 382 p.

Isabelle Bardiès-Fronty, Michèle Bimbenet-Privat, Philippe Walter. Le bain et le miroir: soins du corps et cosmétique de l'Antiquité à la Renaissance, Gallimard, 2009, p. 92-94.

J.H. Oakley et R. Sinos, The Wedding in Ancient Athens , Madison, 1994.

John Boardman. Les Vases athéniens à figures rouges : La période archaïque, Thames Hudson, 1997.

Lydie Bodiou. et Véronique Mehl . (eds.), La religion des femmes en Grèce ancienne, Mythes, cultes et société , Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2009, p.183-184.

Articles

J. de Witte. L’expiation ou la purification de Thésée , Gazette archéologique: 1884, p.351-353.

Catalogues

Attic Vases Inscriptions, AVI, 7995

Digit LIMC, 50048

Goluchow, Musée Czartoryski, Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum , 23-24, PL.(032) 32.3A.3B

J. de Witte. Description des collections d'Antiquités conservées à l'Hôtel Lambert, Paris, 1886, p.68-70.

Fondation pour le LIMC, ThesCRA, 2004, vol. 1,2.

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Reframing Egyptian Mummy Portraits: (De)Constructing Identity in Freedmen Funerary Portraiture

Avery Warkentin, McGill

Fayum or mummy portraits are a well-defined category of portraiture which includes

around one thousand painted funerary images that come to us from different locales all over

Egypt and are dated most commonly between the early first and mid-third centuries CE. The

majority of the scholarship on these paintings has typically focused on art-historical questions;

academics have been interested in dating via clothing and hairstyles, in isolating specific artists

and schools, and in the function of the portraits within contemporary cultic and religious

practice. 427 As such, much work remains to be done to socially situate these portraits or to

understand their function as products of the complex and malleable landscape of imperial Egypt.

Focusing initially on two case studies, that of the freedman Eutyches and the grammarian

Hermione respectively, this paper will examine mummy portraits as an extension of freedman art

which sought to communicate social and cultural capital after death. After a brief overview and

history of the portraits themselves, Egyptian mummy portraiture will then be situated as an

example of funerary monumentalization that performed the role of identity-construction.

Beginning from the portraits of the freedman Eutyches and the Egyptian woman Hermione, I

will argue that Egyptian mummy portraits provided a unique and vital means of

self-representation for Egyptian freedmen and their descendants. This paper will use Ward

Goodenough’s theory of social personae and Chris Fowler’s concept of mortuary transformation

427 Dominic Montserrat, “The Representation of Young Males in ‘Fayum Portraits’ , ” The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 79 (1993): 215.

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to resituate Egyptian mummy portraits within a longer tradition of mortuary idealization. The

analogous complexity of legal status in Roman Egypt will be used as a foundation to

demonstrate the need for individuals to affirm their status, wealth, or ethnicity in a constantly

changing landscape of legislation. This “flagrant divorce between social reality and juridical

categories” 428 in Roman Egypt thus encouraged individual self-definition. As such, Egyptian

mummy portraits provided an essential opportunity for freedmen to self-assert their identity

through the process of funerary transformation in a region that was in constant ethnic and legal

flux.

Before discussing the mummy portraits themselves, it is pertinent to situate my analysis

within the theoretical framework of mortuary practices. Early archaeological analyses used

cemeteries, burial mounds, funerary monumentality, and, when present, grave goods to construct

cultural, social, or historical interpretations of the deceased individuals. In the 1960s and 1970s

however, there was a shift in focus which sought to examine the theoretical bases and analytical

methods that informed previous archaeological interpretations. In turn, various subdisciplines of

‘Mortuary Archaeology’ arose in academic communities, thus shifting the discipline of

archaeology from a processual belief in the objective materiality of archaeological remains

towards a post-processual, subjective analysis. 429 In my own analysis of artistic funerary practices

in Roman Egypt, it is important to emphasize the deeply contextual nature of archaeological

inquiry as well as the inherent subjectivity of the individuals who are commemorated. As Chris

Fowler explains, “identities are negotiated relationally and contextually,” yet there remains the

428 Susan Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” in Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt. Ed. Susan Walker (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000), 28. 429 Robert Chapman, “Death, Burial, and Social Representation” in Liv Nilsson and Sarah Tarlow (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Death and Burial (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 1.

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issue of how one defines identity, or what aspects of identity one chooses to include in an

academic analysis; ethnicity, age, sex, gender, personhood, kinship, wealth, prestige, and rank are

all intrinsic to the social identity of an individual. 430 The term “social identity” was coined by the

sociologist Ward Goodenough to refer to aspects of identity that depended on social relations

with others, relations that came with duties and rights. 431 In examining the social and relational

nature of identity creation, Goodenough acknowledged that each person has numerous social

identities, or “social personae,” which are “[t]he composite of several activities selected as

appropriate to a given interaction.” 432 The fact that these personae must express an intelligible

biographical reality and must fit conventional social roles means that archaeological inquiries

have often approached mortuary materials and processes as reflecting and affirming social

identities constructed in life. However, as Fowler astutely argues, to view mortuary rites as purely

affirming pre-existing identities fixed at the point of death is to ignore how social relations and,

by extension, the social person are negotiated and transformed repeatedly through mortuary

practices and the mortuary process. 433 As such, “the meanings assigned to such materials and

phenomena are ultimately culturally determined” and thus cannot be understood as self-evidently

descriptive. 434 Fowler’s thesis reinforces this point as he argues that “mortuary transformations

are often important in achieving an idealized form of existence after death.” 435 This theoretical

430 Chris Fowler, “Identities in Transformation” in Liv Nilsson and Sarah Tarlow (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Death and Burial (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 1. 431 Ward Goodenough, “Rethinking ‘Status’ and ‘Role’: Towards a General Model of the Cultural Organization of Social Relationships” in M. Blanton (ed.) The Relevance of Models to Social Anthropology (London: Tavistock, 1965), 7. 432 Goodenough, “Rethinking ‘Status’ and ‘Role’ , ” 7. 433 Fowler, “Identities in Transformation, ” 3. 434 Susan Kus, “Death and the Cultural Entanglements of the Experienced, the Learned, the Expressed, the Contested, and the Imagined” in The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Death and Burial. Ed, Liv Nilsson and Sarah Tarlow, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 9. 435 Fowler, “Identities in Transformation, ” 1.

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framework informs my analysis of the subsequent portraits which depict transformations in the

identities of individuals during the very mortuary process that provides archaeologists with their

evidence. Egyptian mummy portraits, in a very literal sense, reflected the individuals they

commemorated yet their social function must be analyzed within a constructed mortuary

identity. This reality reflects both Goodenough’s theory of social personae and Fowler’s idea of

mortuary idealization. Thus, this examination exists at a nexus of archaeological inquiry and is

subject to a variety of theoretical frameworks which intersect within the context of funerary

commemoration.

Egyptian (or Fayum) mummy portraits is the academic term referring to a type of

mortuary portraiture common in Roman Egypt, the largest quantities of which come from the

Fayum Basin, most notably from Hawar and Antinoopolis. The practice of Roman portraiture

was an artistic tradition dating back much farther than the Roman Imperial period. In the Roman

Republic, funerary portraits were restricted to the nobility and to the families of serving

magistrates. Those portrait masks had an exemplary role; they were intended to instil in younger

members of the family group the virtues practised by their ancestors. 436 The mummy portraits of

Roman Egypt are considered a stylistic evolution of this tradition “though in function they are

integral to the preparation of mummies in the last phase of ancient Egyptian cult of the dead.” 437

The portraits themselves appear in the middle of the first century and continued to be used for

approximately two hundred years, up until the mid third century when the practice slowly fell out

of favour. The title of Fayum portraits speaks to their local function, whose use followed the

Egyptian funerary tradition of covering the head of the mummified individual represented in the

436 Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” 23. 437 Kurt Gschwantler, “Graeco-Roman Portraiture” in Susan Walker (ed.) Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000), 21.

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portrait. To this end, “the portraits were painted on wooden panels that were inserted over the

mummy wrappings or on linen shrouds that covered the mummy.” 438 Portraits were also painted

on plaster heads as plaster became more widely available throughout Egypt. As previously

mentioned, many art historical analyses have used the portraits’ hairstyles, clothes, and jewellery

to date them. While some stylings speak to local tastes, the general reflection of metropolitan

Roman fashion implies that the subjects of the portraits themselves were likely engaged in local

administrations on behalf of imperial authorities. 439 Such an interpretation predicts my

succeeding section on the uniquely malleable landscape of Roman Egypt. Whatever the material

and artistic details, the aesthetic purpose of the portrait remained consistent: to serve as a visual

record of the deceased as he or she had appeared in life. While these paintings have artistic value,

it is also important to acknowledge that these portraits served more than a purely decorative

function. Rather, the artistic register of the mummy portraits allowed for their social function to

be communicated without words and in situ, revealing the process of identity transformation and

construction that occurs in death. The social function of these portraits was intensely

multifaceted. The fact that most of the portraits were likely painted while the subject was still

alive suggests an active form of artistic commemoration that would have involved more than

simply the painter and the subject. 440 Thus, community participation in this apparently

individualized artistic tradition can also be understood as intrinsic to the process of identity

construction; this implies another level of social applicability. Individuals chose to depict

themselves in ways that reflected their economic status, ethnic background, political position, or

familial connections, a fact which speaks to the social nature of the paintings. Each portrait’s

438 Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” 23. 439 Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” 23. 440 Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” 24.

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clothing, jewelry, background, decorative elements (i.e. garlands, markers of employment,

cups/food), or, in some cases, literary inscriptions, communicated a curated identity to those

viewing it. Thus, in order for these portraits to perform the function for which they were

created, a reciprocal social exchange was required between the deceased and the viewer who

encountered the subject’s portrait post mortem.

I turn first to the local context within which both individuals under analysis would have

found themselves. Egypt’s complex ethnic history meant that, by the Roman period, equally

complicated legal structures were required to define and govern the heterogeneous region. This

continued legislative complexity provides a social and political context in which individuals

needed a variety of means, including art, to affirm their status, wealth, or ethnicity. To provide a

brief overview, in the Ptolemaic system all people were divided into two groups: Hellenes

(Greeks) and Egyptians. Hellenic - or “not Egyptian” - status was based on official national

origin, and virtually all foreigners qualified as Hellenes. For most purposes, the term meant

“immigrant” or “foreign settler”. Already in the Ptolemaic period, ethnicity looked increasingly

slippery: “ethnic” categories were neither constant nor clearly defined, but were rather based in

fluctuating historical circumstances and forces. 441 Official ethnicity in the pre-Roman period

moved from representing the national origin of the head of the household to being a heritable

status, and from that to being an acquirable status. 442 As such, Graeco-Macedonian military

settlers, civilians of Greek descent, official Greeks of Egyptian or mixed descent, and Egyptians

441 R.S. Bagnall, “The Fayum and its People, ” in Susan Walker (ed.) Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000), 27. 442 Jean A. Straus, “Slaves and Slavery in the Roman Period” in Law and Legal Practice in Egypt from Alexander to the Arab Conquest: A Selection of Papyrological Sources in Translation, with Introductions and Commentary. Ed. J. Keenan, J. Manning, and U. Yiftach-Firanko (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 453.

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untouched by the presence of foreigners all coexisted in both rural and urban contexts. The

Romans, in response to Egypt’s ethnic malleability, took a different and distinctly legal approach

to categorization and control. They maintained a distinction between Greeks and Egyptians but

classified Hellenes as a subcategory of Egyptians, not as their opposite. As a result, a distinctly

Roman class structure emerged. At the top were holders of Roman citizenship followed by the

citizens of three, then four, Greek cities of Egypt: non-Romans, but still citizens. To complicate

matters even further, citizens of Alexandria retained a slightly higher and legally distinct status

compared to those of Ptolemais, Naukratis, or Antinoopolis. The final and lowest class in

Roman-Egypt included Egyptians, or peregrine non-citizens in Roman terms, hence all

inhabitants that existed outside of the two previous categories. 443

The composite, contested, relational, and mutable character of ethnicity and legal status

in Roman Egypt is undoubtedly at the root of the complexity in constructing and curating

identities via artistic channels such as mummy portraiture. All individuals, whether holders of

Roman citizenship, non-Roman citizens, or non-citizens would have been subject to a continually

fluctuating regional landscape in which maintaining, or creating, a distinct individual identity was

vital in communicating social, political, or economic capital. Freedpeople would have been

doubly interested in self-asserting their identity due to their former enslaved status. Mummy

portraits thus presented an entirely autonomous opportunity, separate from traditional

administrative structures, for individuals to control their own identity. It is no surprise that these

identities were often idealized. The complexity of legal status in Roman Egypt informed the need

for individuals to affirm their status, wealth, or ethnicity in a constantly changing landscape of

legislative and administrative structures.

443 Bagnall, “The Fayum and its People, ” 28.

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Two case studies illuminate my analysis of the role that freedpeople played in this process

of artistic commemoration. First is the portrait of Eutyches which is now housed at the

Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The portrait (H 38 cm x W 19cm) depicts a

young man in three-quarter view; the young man faces out towards the viewer, looking directly

out from the portrait. Scholars have dated the portrait to the first half of the second century CE,

however dating remains somewhat contentious as the provenance of the portrait is unknown.

The inscription is one of the most interesting in the corpus of portraits as it directly refers to the

subject as: Εὐτύχης ἀπελ(εύθεροσ) Κασιανοῦ Ἡρακλειδ() [ Εὐανδ(ρο) σεσημ(είωμαι) ], “Eutyches, freedman of Cassianus Heraclides”. 444 The portrait’s artistic details can be read

through a lens of mortuary identity construction and social communication. To begin, the

inscription itself situates the subject as part of a specific class of freedmen, a fact which would

have immediately communicated a variety of political, economic, and social implications to a

viewer. The painting appears intensely life-like as incredibly fine brushstrokes create a highly

realistic depiction of Eutyches. This constructed realism is notable when compared to the corpus

of mummy portraits as a whole since the vast majority of individuals are depicted with much

rougher brushwork and far less attention to minute artistic detail. The shining, almost completely

smooth, golden skin of Eutyches as well as o ther details again serve to create a naturalistic

delineation of the subject: Eutyches’ hair is a rich dark brown and painted with tiny, wispy

strokes; his eyes are ringed with delicate eyelashes and a subtle ring of dark kohl; the left side of

444 Different readings of the Eutyches inscription have proposed slight variations in translations. Translated by Parlasca (1966) as ‘Eutyches, freedman of Cassianus Heraclides’ , the text has been altered by Clarysse in Doxiadis (1995) to read ‘Eutyches, freedman of Cassianus, son of Heraclides’ . A final alternative reading was proposed by Bagnall and Worp (1981), who suggested the name ‘Evandros’ and the verb ‘signed’ . Thus, their translation reads: ‘Eutyches, freedman of Kasianos’ , then either ‘son of Herakleides, Evandros’ or ‘Herakleides, son of Evandros’ followed by ‘I signed’ . Regardless of the nuances of translation, the most important piece of information to my own investigation, ἀπελ(εύθεροσ), remains consistent.

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his body is softly shadowed and turned slightly away from an external source of light. While all

of these details at a basic artistic level served to reflect how Eutyches actually appeared in life,

they also simultaneously contributed to Fowler’s idea of funerary identity construction. Thus,

such attention to an accurate funerary depiction can be read antithetically as a marker of

mortuary idealization. A freedman such as Eutyches would have had an interest in asserting his

status, whether social, economic, or political, to the community to which he belonged, especially

as someone who was unable to live a long life after manumission.

Other details in the portrait further support such an analysis. Eutyches is dressed in a

white tunic with a purple clavus draped over his right shoulder. A white mantle sits across his left

shoulder under which is written the three lines of Greek text. The choice of clothing, the

augusticlavia , reinforces an idealized identity. The purple clavus , in Roman tradition, served to

indicate a social status above regular citizenry but below senators and magistrates. 445 The exact

contemporaneous function of such dress in Roman Egypt is not as important as the fact that it

communicated a specific kind of Roman identity, one linked to political participation and elite

status. Additionally, the presence of text itself could suggest a certain level of education, another

marker of eliteness or community integration. All of these artistic features were thus chances for

Eutyches, a freedman, to assert an idealized form of his own identity via an intensely malleable

form of artistic commemoration.

A further potential example of freedmen mummy portrait commemoration appears in

the portrait of a woman whose name and profession is inscribed onto her portrait. Discovered

and excavated by Flinders Petrie in 1910-11 at Hawara, the portrait of Hermione Grammatike

445 Norma Goldman, “Reconstructing Roman Clothing” in The World of Roman Costume. Ed. Judith Lynn Sebesta and Larissa Bonfante, (Cambridge: University of Wisconsin Press, 2001), 221.

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now resides in Girton College, Cambridge. The portrait (H 30.5 x W 21 cm), which is dated to

the early first century CE, is set among intricate bandages of the highest quality linen which are

wound in layers in a rhomboid pattern. To the left of Hermione’s neck reads the inscription:

Ἑρμιόνη γραμματική, ‘Hermione, Grammatike’. Unusually, this inscription provides both the

name and profession of the subject in question. Various interpretations of the Grammatike

inscription have provided a myriad of possibilities concerning the position, status, and ethnicity

of the woman Hermione, all dependent on various translations of the mysterious Greek word γραμματική. 446 However, for this analysis, I have chosen to proceed via Dominic Montserrat’s

reading of the inscription as one depicting a wealthy freedwoman whose employment was that of a grammarian or teacher. 447 This interpretation is based on the context of discovery. The painting

style is much less detailed than that of Eutyches. Hermione is depicted in a close set view with

only the edges of a light-coloured tunic top visible above the bottom portrait edge. She wears

large, rounded earrings and her dark hair is drawn away from her face and parted down the

middle of her scalp. These details, together with the portrait’s inscription, can be viewed as

attempts to delineate and curate a form of idealized identity that would be immortalized and

communicated after death. Just as with the portrait of Eutyches, Hermione’s artistic features

communicate a lifelike reality which, while providing a sense of authenticity, also serve to

reinforce a self-asserted identity. Unfortunately, the preservation of Hermione’s portrait is

446 According to Montserrat (1997), this term has been translated variously as ‘teacher’ , ‘teacher of the classics’ , ‘'instructor in the rudiments’ , ‘reader in the Classics’ , ‘lady’ , ‘secretary’ and ‘literate’ . 447 Montserrat (1997) discusses that the portrait of Hermione was found together with the portrait of a man with the inscribed name Heron. As such, an analogous analysis of both portraits provides the potential of their freedperson status. Hermione and Heron’s names are both religious (they are named after gods) and appear in a singular form on their respective inscriptions. While there may be other reasons for this choice of inscriptional commemoration (limited space, difficulty of writing), these naming patterns follow those of slaves and, subsequently, freedmen, who frequently only had a single name, often adjectival (Felix) or religious (Hermione, Heron).

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significantly poorer than that of Eutyches. Nevertheless, Walker suggests that her clothing and

jewelry follow patterns of elite Roman dress and display, thus placing Hermione’s depiction

within a similar visual lexicon of Roman aristocracy. 448 The most important marker, however, of

freedperson self-delineation remains the inscription itself; Hermione most likely chose to include

her profession on her funerary portrait, thus personally creating a narrative of identity. The

gendered dynamic of Hermione’s portrait adds yet another layer of meaning to such a choice.

Hermione’s identity as a woman would have shaped her experience as a slave, freedwoman, and

grammarian. In navigating these varied systems of oppression, the creation of a personal identity

could have presented a vital form of self-preservation for someone who existed at the nexus of

multiple systems of alienation. In asserting her position of employment alongside traditional

artistic elements in her funerary portrait, Hermione was able to curate an individual identity that

transcended systems of legal, patriarchal, and political oppression. This idealized reality would

have been communicated to viewers within the context of a malleable landscape of political and

social competition.

These two case studies provide an intensely focused analysis concerning the potential of

freedperson identity construction. Such an analysis is naturally constrained by the limited

quantity of mummy portraits. It is also limited by the general lack of inscriptions that would

indicate freedperson status as other artistic or visual markers are essentially nonexistent. This

means that while we do not have any other inscriptional evidence confirming the freedperson

status of other subjects in Egyptian mummy portraits, the existence of the Eutyches and

Hermione portraits suggests the possibility that many of the other individuals in these portraits

may also have been freedpeople. Thus, the desire of such freedpeople to self-assert and curate a

448 Walker, “Mummy Portraits and Roman Portraiture, ” 25.

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specific kind of identity via mummy portraits could have much wider implications. Economically,

the mere ability to pay for a portrait would have been an immediate marker of economic and

social status within a community. Demographically, mummy portraits are almost evenly split

across gender and depict a wide variety of ages, the majority being somewhat middle aged, 30-50

years old, as reflects general life expectancy trends of the time. 449 The variety in subjectivity

further reinforces the social role that these portraits performed: a vastly varied contingent of a

diverse population was equally interested in using this specific form of mortuary

commemoration in order to curate a distinct identity in death. The personal artistic details as well

as demographic and economic factors suggest a distinct desire for individuals, whether

freedpeople or elite citizens, to use art as a means of identity construction. If this desire can be

understood as foundational to the creation of Egyptian mummy portraits as a whole, the added

dimension of freedperson status would suggest an even greater need to construct an idealized

funerary identity.

To frame this specific reexamination of mummy portraiture, I turn first to Orlando

Patterson’ s analysis of natal alienation and slavery. Patterson posits that slavery was not only an

economic or legal status, but also a social one as the slave, “alienated from all ‘rights’ or claims of

birth, ceased to belong in his own right to any legitimate social order.” 450 Slaves were innately

socially separate from their free counterparts in that they were not allowed freely to integrate the

experience of their ancestors into their lives or to anchor their living present in any conscious

community of memory. Legitimate, binding markers of status, family, or community were

449 Euphrosyne Doxiadis, The Mysterious Fayum Portraits. Faces from Ancient Egypt, (London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 1995), 36. 450 Orlando Patterson, Slavery and Social Death, (Cambridge, Massachussetts: Harvard University Press, 1982),

5.

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necessarily absent from the social relations of slaves. 451 The loss of ties of birth, the alienation

from all formal enforceable ties of “blood,” and from any attachment to groups or localities

other than those chosen for him by the master inevitably led to profound emotional and social

implications. 452 This foundational function of natal alienation in Roman slavery suggests a system

in which freedpeople, after manumission, would have had a profound desire to reassert their

legality and identity in whatever means were available to them, if only to affirm their newfound

status as not slaves. This desire was often manifested via physical commemorations, of which

mummy portraits are one example. In the context of Roman Egypt, freedperson mummy

portraits can be understood as responding directly to the deracination that slavery brought about.

Not only was the fluctuating legal and ethnic landscape of Egypt intrinsic to this kind of identity

construction, but Egyptian funerary traditions themselves reinforced art as a means of social

communication. Thus, the artistic variables of each mummy portrait presented an opportunity

for the deceased to construct a visual identity that communicated social and cultural capital.

These variables included, most obviously, hairstyles, jewelry, and clothing. However, more subtle

choices of framing, painting style, and additional elements all equally contributed to the process

of mortuary transformation and idealization. In the case studies of Hermione and Eutyches,

elements of elite culture were immediately visible via clothing and jewelry while inscriptions

provided a distinct insight into an individual conception of self.

Lauren Hackworth-Peterson suggests that in order to understand freedmen art one must

take into consideration the contemporary audience(s) for each monument and shift the

perspective from one that privileges only elite ideals to one that prioritizes features that would

451 Patterson, Slavery and Social Death 5-6. 452 Patterson, Slavery and Social Death, 6.

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have commanded a viewer’s attention and thus communicated something about the social

identity of the individual(s) who paid for it. 453 Hackworth-Peterson’ s proposed shift is intrinsic to

what this paper proposes: rather than understanding Egyptian mummy portraits as merely

artistic indicators of elite expenditure and funerary investment, the cases of Eutyches and

Hermione suggest that mummy portraiture served a distinctly social function. Portraits presented

an immediate opportunity for marginalized individuals such as freedpeople to construct and

communicate an incredibly basic element of political, cultural, and social life: identity. However,

identity construction postmortem was “not usually concerned with (or capable of) materially

representing the entire biographical identity of the deceased in a totalized singular form. Rather,

funerary monumentalization commemorate[d] the deceased person while drawing on idealized,

desired identities.” 454 In the case of mummy portraits, individuals, including freedpeople such as

Eutyches and Hermione, sought to construct idealized identities that placed them within

traditional Roman artistic structures, structures which in mummy portraiture communicated

social and cultural capital in a highly competitive and malleable atmosphere. 455 Even as precise

distinctions in status remain difficult to ascertain in the absence of formal status indicators, the

individuals depicted in my two case studies and, by extension, other freedpeople sought

recognition via their own self-delineated and idealized mortuary identity.

Artistic delineations of freedperson identity were not limited to portraiture but can rather

be found in a variety of contexts, including literary. Petronius’ Satyricon provides such an example:

as Encolpius, the work’s protagonist, steps into the home of the wealthy freedman Trimalchio, he

453 Lauren Hackworth-Peterson, The Freedman in Roman Art and Art History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 228. 454 Fowler, “Identities in Transformation, ” 14. 455 Hackworth-Peterson, The Freedman in Roman Art and Art History, 228.

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is amazed at the mural painted on the wall of the entrance hall. The mural depicts “a

slave-market, price-tags and all. Then Trimalchio himself, holding a wand of Mercury and being

led into Rome by Minerva. After this a picture of how he learned accounting and, finally, how he

became a steward. The painstaking artist had drawn it all in great detail with descriptions

underneath” (Petron. Sat . 29). This description of one freedman’ s decorative self-delineation

noticeably reflects many of the elements of mortuary idealization that Egyptian mummy

portraits suggest. Trimalchio, in his own home, commissioned a piece of decorative art in which

he himself is the subject and in which his identity is satirically idealized. While this example is

part of a larger comedic commentary, its existence reinforces an understanding of freedperson

art which prioritizes a process of self-definition and identity curation. Mummy portraits, just like

Trimalchio’s mural, were incredibly effective at conveying an individual sense of social and

cultural identity through their use of a widely understood and accepted visual register. These

idealized identities communicated to the viewers who observed them a distinct sense of self.

Furthermore, in the particular case of freedpeople, a constructed sense of self would have been

incredibly valuable in response to the intrinsic alienation of their previous position as slaves.

Freedmen constituted a separate collective identity that, in many ways, required much more

conscious forms of memorialization. Physical freedperson commemorations, whether portraits,

inscriptions, murals, or monuments were the result of individual initiatives and personal motives

that may not have been uniformly shared by all members of society. 456 Consequently, “there was

no single unified field of competition, but many separate, localized fields, which each developed

their own conventions.” 457 In the case of Roman Egypt, funerary mummy portraiture

456 Henrik Mouritsen, “Freedmen and Decurions: Epitaphs and Social History in Imperial Italy, ” The Journal of Roman Studies 95 (2005): 38. 457 Mouritsen, “Freedmen and Decurions, ” 63.

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represented a vital means of personal self-definition for freedmen. As such, the localized,

competitive, and highly malleable landscape of Roman Egypt in the early centuries CE is intrinsic

to this paper’s artistic analysis. Freedpeople such as Hermione and Eutyches actively sought to

assert their identity through the process of mortuary transformation. As such, mummy portraits

performed a specific funerary function while also serving as a physical marker of social status,

community participation, and self-delineated identity. While no commemorative practice was

universal - throughout the Empire, or even within a region or a single community - the corpus

of Egyptian mummy portraits allows for a more nuanced understanding of the ways in which

freedpeople sought to communicate and construct identity in the ancient world. 458

458 Mouritsen, “Freedmen and Decurions, ” 62-3.

201

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