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3 - Family Matters: The Long Life of Roman Tombs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2019

Barbara E. Borg
Affiliation:
University of Exeter

Summary

This chapter offers a fresh look at, and a new interpretation of, the change from incineration to inhumation in the second century CE. Recent scholarship has either given up on the issue or reduced it to a change of fashion. Yet why did it become a ‘fashion’ to inhume the dead? I first look at evidence for inhumation over the course of the first centuries BCE and CE and demonstrate that inhumation never went out of use entirely in elite circles and had already become increasingly popular during the later first and early second century CE, owing to the fact that inhumation was considered to be an old Roman practice linked to the kings and some of the most respected Roman gentes. Reviewing literary and material evidence for imperial burial and deification ceremonies, I then argue that Hadrian played an instrumental part in changing the emperors’ form of burial, thus also promoting inhumation in Roman society more widely. In contrast to previous suggestions, I argue that it was not his philhellenism that instigated the change, but his desire to join a growing elite minority in linking himself to Roman tradition.
Type
Chapter
Information
Roman Tombs and the Art of Commemoration
Contextual Approaches to Funerary Customs in the Second Century CE
, pp. 123 - 190
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

The importance in Roman society of the family, and especially of an extensive family line, has long been taken for granted. It is the pattern that dominates literary texts concerned with the social elite as well as legal sources. During the Republic, the family group that mattered most was the gens, an extended clan whose members all descended in the male line from a common ancestor – which is what we call the ‘agnatic family’.Footnote 1 Later, so it is assumed, the agnatic family became less important while cognate family relations – that is, relations that also include kin in the female line – became more relevant.Footnote 2 In 1983, Keith Hopkins challenged this model fundamentally, and argued:

it looks as though, in the period from which such evidence survives (i.e. after about 200 BC), the Roman and Italian family was a small, short-lived social unit. It also seems as though broader kinship units, such as clans or clan segments (gentes), at least from this period onwards, played an unimportant role in burials.Footnote 3

While Hopkins’ conclusions were primarily based on insufficient awareness of the evidence, a year later Richard Saller and Brent Shaw reached similar conclusions through a statistical approach to 12,000–13,000 tomb stones from various parts of the Roman empire. They counted each attested type of relationship between commemorator and commemorated, and then classified and added them up as either nuclear family (i.e. parents with their children) or extended relationships.Footnote 4 For the city of Rome, this resulted in 72 per cent nuclear relationships in the senatorial class, 77 per cent in the first two orders combined and 78 per cent in the lower classes.Footnote 5 Independently of Hopkins, but explicitly endorsing views previously expressed by De Visscher, they concluded that ‘Most tombs of the imperial period were de facto personal tombs and were not tied to any strong conception or practice of maintaining long agnatic family lineages.’Footnote 6

Their approach was challenged in 1996 by Dale Martin, who argued that counting individual relationships would not adequately represent family burials.Footnote 7 While, in Saller and Shaw’s counting, a dedication by a man to his wife, his children, his brother and his parents would result in four nuclear relationships, the actual inscription commemorated three generations, thus representing what in their terms is an extended family. The dedication by a man to his wife, child, brother and amicus would result in three nuclear relationships and one extended, while assessing the epitaph as a whole would again result in the commemoration of one extended group of relations. Drawing on 1,161 epitaphs from seven different places in Asia Minor, and classifying entire inscriptions, Martin arrived at markedly different numbers from those of Saller and Shaw, even though figures for individual places differed considerably. Yet he still maintained that, while not strictly nuclear, the family groups he found were normally small and clustered around a nuclear family unit.Footnote 8

Martin in particular has taken his observations to reflect not only funerary customs, but family structures as such. While Saller and Shaw were more cautious in this regard, they still suggested that funerary customs reflected Roman familial relations more generally, which were dominated by the nuclear family of a married couple and their children as opposed to the extended family. The Roman family thus became an early predecessor of our modern circumstances.Footnote 9 Such far-reaching conclusions have been duly criticised,Footnote 10 and Sabine Huebner has demonstrated for Egypt that the 86.9 per cent of epitaphs representing nuclear family commemorations present a stark contrast to domestic cohabitation practices as documented in census registers.Footnote 11 It is therefore worth keeping in mind that evidence from epitaphs informs us first and foremost about commemorative practices, and the greatest of caution is needed when drawing more general conclusions about family relationships and compositions.Footnote 12 Today, far more flexible models of what a family may have been are prevalent. They allow for the possibility that familial relations may be conceptualised differently in different contexts, for instance in (inheritance) law; in the composition of domestic units; in informal, ideologically determined relationships of obligation; or in personal affection, all potentially varying again depending on social class and economic means. They take account of changes in individual household composition and size over time, resulting from death, marriage, remarriage, childbirth, adoption and so on, and of the fact that the household may be both larger and smaller than a ‘family’ (depending on its definition) as it can include unrelated servants without comprising all kin.Footnote 13

For research on the funerary sphere, however, Saller and Shaw’s conclusions are still hugely influential, not least since they coincide with what legal historians have always thought could be extracted from law codes and epigraphy.Footnote 14 The vast number of inscriptions and tombs preserved, and the very limited attention paid to the later history of tombs by excavators and historians alike, further encourages the general view that, during the imperial period, long family lines were irrelevant in the funerary realm, and any Roman man (and many women as well) who could afford to build a tomb would do so.Footnote 15 Moreover, there is a prevailing assumption among certain scholars that Roman society of the imperial period was on the road to ever-increasing individualism at the cost of both societal and family coherence.Footnote 16

However, there is little actual evidence to support these views. Through a careful analysis of individual tomb contexts, this chapter aims to demonstrate how problematic are both the conclusions and the methodologies by which they were arrived at. In a first step, I take a look at the senatorial class, who proudly presented their family history in their tombs, and sometimes referred to it in their epitaphs, well into late antiquity. I shall then turn to the lower classes and argue that they too shared the ideals of the senatorial elite, but expressed and adapted them in a class-specific manner that differed in key aspects from senatorial habits.

Elite Burials

It is generally acknowledged that at least some of the great families of the Republic erected mausolea that were used over several generations. Most of the evidence comes from literary texts, and it has become customary to quote Cicero’s list of examples outside Porta Capena (Tusc. 1.7.13). Only one of these mausolea has been identified in the archaeological record, the tomb of the Scipios.

The Tomb of the Scipios

The tomb was founded as a family tomb of the patrician Cornelii Scipiones, either by L. Cornelius Scipio Barbatus (cos. 298 BCE) himself or by his sons, and around 280 BCE Barbatus was the first to be buried within it in his unique and famous sarcophagus (Figures 3.1 and 3.2).Footnote 17 Around 150, the main burial chamber probably contained some thirty-three sarcophagi and was filled to capacity, so that a second chamber was cut into the adjacent rock. At the same time, and above a frieze that had long displayed frescoes of military deeds and other political matters in which the family was involved,Footnote 18 the rock face received a showy façade containing three statues (Figure 3.3): of Scipio Africanus, the famous victor over Hannibal; of his brother Scipio Asiagenus (Asiaticus), the victor over Antiochos III of Syria; and of Ennius, who had immortalised the family and its history in his poetry.Footnote 19 The tomb probably continued to be used into the early first century BCE, and may have fallen out of use after the last descendant of the Cornelii Scipiones had died.

Figure 3.1 Tomb of the Scipios off the via Appia, updated plan by Lucia Domenica Simeone and Roberta Loreti

Figure 3.2 Sarcophagus of L. Cornelius Scipio Barbatus, around 280 BCE, copy in situ of the original casket

Figure 3.3 Reconstruction of the façade of the tomb of the Scipios based on recent research by the Sovrintendenza ai Beni Culturali di Roma Capitale

Unfortunately, only eight inscriptions pertaining to these burials have survived and not all the individuals can be identified with certainty. Still, those that feature inscriptions allow for some further conclusions (cf. Stemma 1). According to the epitaphs, the tomb contained the remains of Scipio Barbatus; his son L. Cornelius Scipio (cos. 259 BCE); a grandson of Scipio Africanus; the son and grandson of Scipio Asiagenus; as well as the sons and wife of Scipio Hispallus (cos. 176 BCE). Since both his sons and his wife were buried in the tomb, it is almost certain that Hispallus himself was also put to rest there.

Stemma 1 Stemma of the Cornelii Scipiones and Cornelii Lentuli. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere; ††: violent death

Whether the same is true for Scipio Africanus, who was commemorated in one of the statues, is debated. After his political enemies had accused him of corruption, he had retreated to his villa in Liternum in Campania. It is clear from Livy (38.56.1–4), Seneca (Ep. 86.1) and other sourcesFootnote 20 that some thought he had died and been buried there, but both Livy and Seneca acknowledge that the veracity of this tradition is far from certain.Footnote 21 Be that as it may, even if Africanus was buried in his villa, it would have been a singular and individual decision, and not the end of the family mausoleum or a sign of his family branch opting out of it. Nothing is known about the time or place of Asiagenus’ burial, but since his statue equally decorated the façade and, more importantly, since his son and at least one grandson were buried in the family mausoleum, it is highly likely that the same applies to him.

Two aspects of the epitaphs found in the mausoleum are particularly interesting to note. First, up to this time only agnate relatives were buried in the mausoleum; that is, family in the male line.Footnote 22 Secondly, this is true not just for one single strand of the family, but for members of different family lines, stirpes, which is particularly remarkable since some family members (Africanus and Asiagenus) had offspring and were sufficiently prominent that they could have established separate stirpes, with their own tombs – just as Barbatus had done. The tomb therefore reflects the idea of the family clan, which consists of all male family lines descended from a common ancestor.Footnote 23

It is possible, and generally assumed, that the tomb went out of use for some time after the last agnate descendants of Barbatus had died in the first century BCE. However, three epitaphs for members of the Cornelii Lentuli, and two niches for cinerary urns cut into the rock, attest to further burials during the first century CE.Footnote 24 The Cornelii Lentuli must therefore have inherited the family tomb in the cognate line after the extinction of the Scipios, probably through a daughter of P. Cornelius Scipio Nascia Serapio (cos. 111 BCE), who married P. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus (monetalis in 101 BCE) (Stemma 1). The details of stemmata through the first centuries BCE and CE are debated,Footnote 25 and it is unclear how many first-century CE burials we should expect to have occurred. While only three inscriptions have been recorded, with the change to marble containers and tabulae a material was chosen that was far more prone to being carried away and repurposed or burnt to produce lime.Footnote 26 Nevertheless, some speculation may be permitted. The earliest epitaph commemorates Ser. Lentulus Maluginensis,Footnote 27 who is most likely the consul suffectus of 10 CE.Footnote 28 The latest epitaph commemorates M. Iunius Silanus Lutatius Catulus,Footnote 29 who boasts in his epitaph of being the great-grandson of Cossus (Cornelius Lentulus Gaetulicus, cos. 1 BCE), grandson of Gaetulicus (probably Cn. Lentulus Gaetulicus, cos. 26 CE) and son of D. Silanus.Footnote 30 Some members of the Lentuli therefore used the tomb over at least four generations. Moreover, Cossus and Maluginensis, as well as P. Cornelius Lentulus Scipio (consul suffectus 2 CE), were most likely brothers, whose father took their cognomina from famous but by then extinct branches of the Cornelii.Footnote 31 The strong sense of family tradition displayed in this choice certainly fits very well with the family’s reopening of the Scipios’ tomb.

The Plautii Tumulus

The mausoleum of the patrician Plautii was an impressive tower-like tumulus just across the Ponte Lucano near Tibur (Figure 3.4). Its titulus high up on the tambour commemorates the founder of the tomb, M. Plautius Silvanus, consul in 2 BCE with Augustus, and his wife. The street front of the tomb’s rectangular base featured further inscriptions on panels framed by Corinthian half-columns, three of which have been recorded (cf. Stemma 2).Footnote 32 In the centre we find Silvanus and his wife, as well as their son A. Plautius Urgulanius, who died at the age of nine. Another son of Silvanus, P. Plautius Pulcher, who was elevated to patrician status but died before his consulship in the early 50s, was commemorated together with his wife in the right-hand aedicula. Finally, the left-hand aedicula honoured Ti. Plautius Silvanus Aelianus, who died shortly after his second consulship in 74 (and before 79).Footnote 33 After the tomb had been in use over four generations by the agnate family of its founder, the last descendant of the family seems to have been L. Aelius Lamia Plautius Aelianus, the consul of 80,Footnote 34 and it was closed after the family name became extinct.Footnote 35

Figure 3.4 Tumulus of the Plautii (first century CE) drawn by Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Stemma 2 Stemma of the Plautii. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere

Tomb of the Licinii and Calpurnii

The tomb of the Licinii just outside Porta Collina between via Salaria and via Nomentana is the other most frequently mentioned example of a family tomb used over several generations, although it has long been regarded with equal measures of amazement and suspicion. The excavations were poorly documented, and many of the objects found were exported illegally with the inglorious help of Wolfgang Helbig. Margherita Guarducci cast serious and general doubts on Helbig’s reliability as a source, and consequently it has often been questioned whether all the objects Helbig mentioned actually did come from a single tomb.Footnote 36 However, in 1986 Dietrich Boschung put forward strong arguments against Guarducci’s concerns, and in favour of a common provenance from the Licinian tomb of thirteen portraits now in Copenhagen.Footnote 37 In 2003, Frances Van Keuren published new archival material that clarified matters further, demonstrating not least that Lanciani, who published a plan of the tomb complex in his Forma Urbis Romae (Figure 3.5), visited the tomb on various occasions.Footnote 38 His plan cannot therefore be dismissed as mere fantasy, but rather confirms Helbig’s claim that the three ‘chambers’ eventually excavated all formed one building complex.Footnote 39 We can thus be fairly confident in studying the evidence taken together as attesting to a tomb of one of the most powerful Roman families that was in use for over 150 years.

Figure 3.5 Plan of the tomb of the Licinii and Calpurnii on via Salaria as recorded by Rodolfo Lanciani in his Forma Urbis Romae, location and close-up

Originally, the tomb was a very small building of just 1.5 x 3.6 m, perhaps containing some of the inscribed altars (Figure 3.6) and featuring aediculae containing cinerary urns and possibly also portraits.Footnote 40 The first generation to use the tomb that is attested by inscribed altars is that of M. Licinius Crassus Frugi pontifex and his wife, and it is likely that they were its founders (cf. Stemma 3).Footnote 41 Licinius Crassus Frugi and his family were among the most powerful actors on the political stage during the first century CE, related not only to prominent figures of the Republic, but also to several imperial dynasties. Yet precisely for this reason they posed a threat to the emperors, and none of the more prominent (and some less prominent) family members died of natural causes.Footnote 42 The consul himself, his wife Scribonia and their son Cn. Pompeius Magnus were killed, probably in 47, on the order of Claudius (possibly on the initiative of Messalina), who also was Pompeius’ father-in-law.Footnote 43 Another son, M. Licinius Crassus Frugi, consul in 64, was executed for treason in 67, while yet another, L. Calpurnius Piso Frugi Licinianus, had been adopted by the short-lived emperor Galba, but was murdered together with his wife after the emperor’s downfall in 69, the same year that the fourth brother, Scribonianus, also fell victim to the power struggles.Footnote 44 Further family members buried in the tomb probably include the founder’s daughter Licinia Magna, certainly her sister Licinia, who probably died as a child, and Calpurnia Lepida, probably a granddaughter of Frugi pontifex.Footnote 45 Later, Crassus Frugi’s grandson C. Calpurnius Crassus Frugi Licinianus, consul in 87, plotted against Nerva, and was first exiled and later killed in 117, shortly after Hadrian’s accession. He or his homonymous son, who died at a young age, must have been the last male member of this branch of the family.Footnote 46

Figure 3.6 Four altars from the Licinian tomb, Rome, Museo Nazionale delle Terme inv. 78163 (Cn. Pompeius Magnus), 78163 (L. Calpurnius Piso Frugi Licinianus and his wife Verania Gemina), 78161 (Calpurnia Lepida Orfiti), 78167 (Licinia Cornelia Volusia Torquata)

Stemma 3 Stemma of the Licinii and Calpurnii. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere; ††: violent death

A strong sense of family and pride in its ancestry was expressed and advertised through the famous portraits originating from the tomb, which comprised both statues and busts or herms.Footnote 47 Statues in front of the small mausoleum honoured Licinius Crassus Frugi and his wife as well as a woman of a previous generation, tentatively identified by Van Keuren as Scribonia’s mother (Figure 3.7).Footnote 48 Two portraits of female relatives of roughly the same generation as Scribonia may equally have belonged to statues.Footnote 49 The same goes for a highly expressive head of a youth that is usually identified as Pompeius Magnus, who was killed with his parents.Footnote 50 However, given that this portrait is later than the others,Footnote 51 and that Pompeius was well over twenty when he died – after all, he had held the office of quaestor and been given the honour of announcing in Rome Claudius’ victory over Britain on his return – it is highly unlikely that his commemorative portrait would have depicted him with the features of a boy.Footnote 52 The head must show an anonymous son or, more likely, grandson of Crassus Frugi pontifex.

Figure 3.7 Heads of the portrait statues, herm portraits and busts from the Licinian tomb: a) IN 749 (Crassus triumvir); b) IN 733 (Pompey the Great); c) IN 736; d) IN 738; e) IN 737; f) IN 741; g) IN 734 (Frugi pontifex?); h) IN 751 (Scribonia?); i) IN 747; j) IN 754; k) IN 735

All other portraits associated with the tomb depict ancestors. Their exact number and composition are debated, but a core of four items can be attributed with some certainty based on the documentary evidence mentioned above. The triumvir Pompey the Great, an ancestor of Scribonia who also lent his name to the couple’s son, featured prominently. Whether his head belonged to a bust – the format chosen for the other Republican ancestors – or to a statue is not clear but the latter should not be ruled out, especially since it is the largest head among the group.Footnote 53 The other three portraits, this time busts that were on display either in aediculae inside the tomb or set into herm shafts belong to women and display hairstyles from the 30s BCE, and thus must equally show ancestors (Figure 3.7). As Boschung observed, the age and the fashion of the elderly woman, as well as her family resemblance to Pompey the Great, may suggest that she is his daughter Pompeia, who was the ancestor establishing Scribonia’s relation with the triumvir.Footnote 54 The two young women, so like each other that they could be sisters but quite different in technical execution, cannot be identified.Footnote 55 To these Republican ancestral portraits must probably be added a bust of M. Licinius Crassus triumvir, ancestor of Licinius Crassus Frugi.Footnote 56

It is not necessary for our purposes to discuss in any detail the other portraits potentially belonging to the tomb, as the picture is already clear enough.Footnote 57 An enthusiastic Helbig wrote in 1887: ‘I drew the conclusion that the cella in a certain sense had represented a tablinium adorned with ancestral portraits which, however, were made of marble rather than wax.’Footnote 58 His excitement was certainly justified. Despite all our dissatisfaction with the documentation of this aristocratic tomb, it gives us a rare glimpse into the ways in which elite families used the funerary realm for the display of their ancestry, which, in turn, was a major factor in the establishment of their power.Footnote 59 As Tacitus notes, Scribonia’s uncle dwelled ‘ostentatiously on his great-grandfather Pompeius, his aunt Scribonia, who had formerly been wife of Augustus, his imperial cousins, his house crowded with ancestral busts’ in order to challenge imperial power (Tacitus, Ann. 2.27, transl. A. J. Church), and these types of argument were not uncommon (cf. Tacitus, Ann. 3.76).Footnote 60 What is remarkable about our tomb is the predominance of women’s portraits, while the tomb itself was clearly used and handed down in the agnatic line as long as it continued. It is possible that some male portraits have fallen victim to damnatio memoriae,Footnote 61 or that the family was prevented from displaying the portraits of some of those who were condemned to death.Footnote 62 Yet the display of these women, independently of their original numerical proportion, is certainly also an acknowledgement of their role in establishing the family ties with the famous triumviri, and has parallels in the genealogical praise of women in funerary orations, and women’s role as ancestors more widely.Footnote 63

In any case, the story of the tomb does not end with the termination of the agnate descendants of Crassus Frugi. When the male line became extinct, a branch of the Calpurnii that was related by the female line, probably through the daughter of Crassus Frugi, Licinia Magna, must have inherited the mausoleum and used it throughout the second century (Stemma 3).Footnote 64 This is suggested by a number of observations. First, an extension to the tomb was built in the Antonine period, as Lanciani’s drawing (Figure 3.5) and brick stamps attest.Footnote 65 Secondly, at least ten sarcophagi were found in the tomb that commence around the time when the altars leave off (see earlier Figures 1.281.30). Thirdly, an alabaster bust of Licinia Procula, a close relative of L. Calpurnius Proculus Piso, consul in 175, was found close by and potentially comes from our tomb; and finally, a number of epitaphs from the area attest to the burial of freedmen of the Calpurnii in the vicinity.Footnote 66

No inscriptions for other Calpurnii are preserved, but the sarcophagi from the tomb can be dated fairly well and attributed to adults and children according to their size. They appear to belong to three or four distinct groups, each representing a generation of the family.Footnote 67 In the so-called second chamber, a huge plain sarcophagus appears to be the earliest piece.Footnote 68 It was carefully divided into two separate compartments by a marble panel fixed in grooves on the small sides, and cushion-like headrests supported the deceased. It was probably set up by and for the first Calpurnius family head and his wife. Two sarcophagi of smaller size appear to have belonged to their children (Figure 1.28a–b):Footnote 69 a garland sarcophagus from about 130Footnote 70 and a griffon sarcophagus from c. 130–40.Footnote 71 Whether a garland sarcophagus imported from Asia Minor c. 140–50 (Figure 1.28c) contained another of their children or a grandchild (or the child of another relative) is not entirely clear from its date.Footnote 72 Equally, the next full-size sarcophagus from around 150, showing a Dionysiac thiasos (Figure 1.29a),Footnote 73 may represent an adult son or, less likely, a daughter or first wife of paterfamilias no. 2. The next, more monumental sarcophagus with the Rape of the Leucippidae and Victories sacrificing bulls on the lid, was again extra wide for a double burial, and has a terminus post quem indicated by a coin of Antoninus Pius found within but may date around 170 (Figure 1.29b).Footnote 74 A child’s sarcophagus depicting the childhood of Dionysus from around 160,Footnote 75 and a child’s Cupid Race sarcophagus dated only roughly to 150–75, are likely to be associated with the patrons of this sarcophagus (Figures 1.29cd).Footnote 76

The final three sarcophagi were found in a third chamber that may never have been fully excavated (Figure 1.30).Footnote 77 They are the most imposing pieces from the tomb for both their size and their quality of craftsmanship. Their date is disputed, except for the Ariadne casket from the first decade of the third century.Footnote 78 The sarcophagus showing the Indian Triumph of Dionysus is clearly older, probably dating to the late 170s or 180s, while the Victory sarcophagus with its muscular and still rather stocky putti seems to belong somewhere in between the others.Footnote 79

Without inscriptions, any detailed attribution of these sarcophagi must remain speculative, but it may be worth testing whether a plausible scenario can be suggested at all. Henning Wrede has tentatively and convincingly attributed the Dionysiac Victory sarcophagus from the final group to either Ser. Calpurnius Piso Orfitus (cos. 172), who died after 191, or to his brother L. Calpurnius Proculus Piso (cos. 175), who died after 204.Footnote 80 It is equally tempting to attribute the other casket from the third group with its ostentatious display of victory motifs, which contained one skeleton with some residues that could hint at an attempt at embalming of the corpse, to the other brother. The Ariadne sarcophagus may then have served either a wife of one of the consuls or a daughter or sister of either brother as a final resting place.Footnote 81 The family tree of this branch of the Calpurnii is partly conjectural (Stemma 3). Yet, assuming that the generally accepted prosopography is correct,Footnote 82 the plain double sarcophagus that started the series could have belonged to C. Calpurnius Piso, grandson of Licinia Magna and consul in 111, who could have inherited the tomb after the consul suffectus of 87 had been killed, shortly after Hadrian’s accession, leaving no (male) descendants.Footnote 83 The Leucippidae sarcophagus, equally wider than normal and thus designed for a couple, would have belonged to the father of Orfitus and Piso, who was perhaps Ser. (Calpurnius Piso/Scipio?) Orfitus, and his wife.Footnote 84

This remains mere speculation, but it demonstrates that the dates and types of sarcophagi are in tune with the family history as we know it. Here, it is most important that the evidence strongly suggests that, after it was taken over by another stirps of the Calpurnii, the tomb continued to be used by at least three consecutive generations of the agnate family, most likely including two adult brothers, and thus in a gentilicial fashion. They took pride in the long family history that went back even to the late Republic, a history that was right in front of their eyes through portraits, inscriptions and a multitude of containers for the remains of their ancestors.

The three family tombs discussed so far are clearly the best-documented senatorial mausolea at Rome, which also allow for the greatest detail of information over the longest period of usage. However, additional, more fragmentary evidence suggests that they were not exceptional at their time. In Tusculum, at least eight cinerary urns of the patrician Furii were found in the seventeenth century, all commemorating male members of the family by inscription.Footnote 85 A large tumulus in the horti of Agrippa in the Vatican area, first dedicated to Vipsania Agrippina, daughter of Agrippa, who married C. Asinius Gallus after a forced divorce from Tiberius, was used by the Asinii at least into the early second century.Footnote 86 An even longer period of usage may be attested by an epitaph for Q. Gallonius C. f. Fronto Q. Marcius Turbo and his son.Footnote 87 He has been identified as the governor of Thrace in 145–55, and may be either an adoptive son of Hadrian’s powerful praetorian prefect Q. Marcius Turbo Fronto Publicius Severus, or his biological son, who was later adopted by one Gallonius, which is far more likely.Footnote 88 The two fragments were found with other debris from monuments in one of the towers of the ancient Porta Flaminia. Yet, as the inscription fragments are curved and framed by a kyma that has close parallels in the Augustan period, it is possible that they belong to a tumulus monument of roughly that period.Footnote 89 It is thus possible that Q. Gallonius C. f. Fronto Q. Marcius Turbo’s inscription (also commemorating his son) was added to a family monument of the Gallonii that went back to the late Republic or Augustan period.Footnote 90 According to the Historia Augusta (Did. 8.10), the short-lived emperor Didius Iulianus was buried in the mausoleum of his great-grandfather at the fifth mile of the Labicana.Footnote 91 In other cases, at least the burials of father and adult son are attested for the same tomb.Footnote 92 A rare late third-century double epitaph commemorates two brothers in the same titulus, T. Flavius Postumius Quietus, consul in 272, and T. Flavius Postumius Titianus, consul c. 283–84 and 310, suggesting that both of their families used the tomb.Footnote 93

I have discussed elsewhere further senatorial tombs that are likely to have been used in a similar fashion all the way through to late antiquity. These include the tomb of the Acilii Glabriones, established in the late first or early second century on the via Salaria and used until the family left Rome at the beginning of the fourth century, when the entire area was handed over to the Church.Footnote 94 The tomb of the Sempronii not far from the mausoleum of the Scipios must have been founded at roughly the same time, and was then extended in one or two steps in a similar way to the Licinii tomb.Footnote 95 Some anonymous tombs may equally have belonged to senatorial families due to their prominence, location and treatment. The tower-like tumulus called the Sepolcro dei Servilii at the third mile of the Appia, founded towards the end of the first century BCE, shows signs of continued use until at least the early second century CE.Footnote 96 A tumulus 23 m in diameter at the eleventh mile of the same road was updated with a showy colonnade for sculpture display at the end of the second or beginning of the third century.Footnote 97 A splendid temple tomb attached to the so-called ‘Villa ad duas lauros on the via Latina, one of the largest and most impressive late antique villas in the Roman suburbium, was used, or at least maintained, from its foundation around 200 to the early fifth century (see Figure 1.11).Footnote 98

Admittedly, even including these examples, the sample of senatorial tombs used over several generations is limited. Nevertheless, what we have observed in these examples must actually have been common practice.Footnote 99 This is most clearly demonstrated by the main tituli of senatorial tombs.Footnote 100 The more than seventy examples from the vicinity of Rome that have preserved their patron’s name pertain almost exclusively to homines novi; that is, to social climbers who had only recently been promoted to senatorial status, and who often moved to Rome on that occasion.Footnote 101 It follows that their descendants as well as members of the old families are highly likely to have been buried in the tombs of their forefathers, albeit mostly without leaving any epigraphical trace. Apparently, only those who first achieved a family’s promotion to the highest status group founded tombs.

The evidence, lacunose as it may be, leaves little room for doubt about the great importance not only of the extended family with a long tradition, but of the use of family mausolea for showcasing the fact. Senatorial mausolea were often used over several generations and were preferably bequeathed in the agnatic line. After the extinction of the family line, the tomb may have been closed forever, or else inherited by a cognate branch of the family in the female line.

This result also demonstrates an important methodological point. When we only look at individual epitaphs – say, a single titulus or inscribed altar – we get the statistical pattern that Saller and Shaw produced for the senatorial class more generally. Where a commemorator is mentioned at all, it is normally a close relative. This pattern largely remains the same whether we count individual relationships, as they did, or inscriptions as proposed by Martin, although commemoration beyond the nuclear family becomes more apparent in the latter case.Footnote 102 Counting only tomb tituli, Saller and Shaw’s method results in 75 per cent nuclear family relations, 14 per cent extended family and 11 per cent non-kin relations, while the figures for Martin’s method are 70, 15 and 15 per cent, respectively.Footnote 103 It is notable, however, that over 54 per cent of tituli that are sufficiently well preserved to allow for a judgement are lacking a commemorator, and just over 36 and 11 per cent, respectively, commemorate a single man or woman.

While all these statistics are interesting in their own way, they obviously fail to account for the use of the tombs to which the tituli were affixed, and for the prominent role these monuments played in the promotion of the extended family. Each epitaph is only a snapshot of a moment in time, a single event in the long history of a tomb. This is true even for Hadrian’s mausoleum (see Figure 2.10): its main inscription declares its dedication by Antoninus Pius to Hadrian and Sabina even though it was founded as a dynastic tomb – and by Hadrian.Footnote 104 In some cases, later generations were commemorated in additional inscriptions on the outside of the tomb, as was again the case for the Mausoleum of Hadrian, but also for that of the Plautii, the Asinii and the third-century Postumii,Footnote 105 and probably for the Mussidii and Appii.Footnote 106 Given the lacunarity of our evidence, it is likely that additional tituli from other tombs have been lost. Yet it would also be wrong to draw conclusions about the use of a tomb from its façade tituli only. If we want to assess the role of tombs and commemorative practices in Roman senatorial families, we need to look at both the relationship between commemorator and deceased and that between these two parties and the entire user group of the mausoleum. The first is what Saller and Shaw have in fact examined. Theirs is an important result, as it tells us something about the hierarchy of obligations, pietas in Roman terms, but perhaps also about the closest emotional bonds within a family. The larger context, however, demonstrates very clearly the continuing importance of a long family line, and the key role that the family mausoleum played in promoting it after the use of imagines maiorum in the domestic atria had lost importance.Footnote 107

Sub-elite Tombs

The first element to note when we are considering non-elite Roman burials is that we are really mainly talking about the freedman milieu. As Lily Taylor and Henrik Mouritsen have argued, we know almost nothing about the burial customs of the freeborn non-elite population; they estimated that up to 90 per cent of all extant tomb tituli refer to freedmen and their first-generation descendants.Footnote 108 While this is an important and interesting observation in itself that merits further examination, it also constitutes one of the strongest arguments for the use of their tombs. As in the case of senators, the inescapable consequence is that the descendants of these freedmen normally continued to use their ancestral tomb. The only occasional exception are the first-generation descendants of freedmen, who had achieved a further social advancement since they were freeborn. We thus see the same principles at work as among the elite: only those who had considerably advanced their status founded a new tomb.

Much has been written about the significance of familyFootnote 109 as demonstrated on or in the tombs of freedmen of the first centuries BCE and CE.Footnote 110 Whoever could afford it, so it seems, decorated their tomb with relief portraits, which often depicted entire family groups, and prominently displayed their legal marriage by showing husband and wife clasping hands and by presenting freeborn children in a prominent place with their formal markers of status, the toga and bulla (Figure 3.8).Footnote 111 After all, these were major achievements attached to their new legal status, and freeborn children were expected to fulfil all the ambitions which their parents were barred from achieving by their servile birth. More recently, it has also been pointed out that a legal family had particular value beyond being a marker of status. These freedmen were also celebrating their escape from the precarity of the informal slave family,Footnote 112 which could be broken up any time by its owner or an heir, and whose members were prone to physical, including sexual, assaults.Footnote 113 These relief representations are discontinued after the Augustan period (although they experience a revival in lesser numbers in the second century) and it is hard to tell to what extent busts or statues took over their function in later tombs due to a lack of archaeological context in most cases. A rare exception is the lost Trajanic tomb of the Caltilii at Ostia, where the portraits of three generations were shown in pairs of shallow reliefs on the walls, and additions such as avia or mater clarify their relation to one another.Footnote 114 Yet I would argue that the tomb tituli as we find them in their thousands from tombs of the first to third centuries CE take over a similar function.

Figure 3.8 Tomb relief of the Servilii family, early Augustan; Rome, Musei Vaticani, Museo Gregoriano Profano 10491

Tituli

The reasons for the above statement may not seem obvious. The great legal historian Max Kaser in particular observed that tomb tituli often only name the founder of a tomb, and frequently a spouse, while children and the rest of the family are not always mentioned and, where they are, are often designated only as suis (‘his own’), liberi (‘free’) or posteri (‘descendants’). The explanations Kaser offered were ‘increasing childlessness and a waning sense of family’, as well as the tomb founder’s expectation that his children would build their own tombs.Footnote 115 Yet, in most cases, senatorial tituli equally only mention the tomb’s founder or the individual to whom the tomb was first dedicated (over 74 per cent), and rarely a spouse or child (9 per cent each).Footnote 116 From this point of view, it is remarkable that the freedmen mention their spouses and offspring at all,Footnote 117 and that the numbers are even the reverse. Over 64 per cent of all tituli from the ‘house’ and ‘terraced’ tombs in the Isola Sacra include at least one named child (c. 33 per cent) or unnamed offspring in general (c. 31 per cent), and the collective terms used could easily encompass later generations of descendants as well.

In some instances, the idea of founding a multigenerational family mausoleum modelled on aristocratic patterns is already clear from the titulus. A funerary altar from the early second century, for instance, was dedicated by L. Tossius Successus, who was lictor of the emperor and clearly familiar with elite ideology, to his wife, his parents and his three sons, thus establishing three generations already in the epitaph, and surely implicitly expressing the hope that his sons would carry on the name with their families.Footnote 118

Perhaps the most striking feature distinguishing senatorial from sub-elite tituli is that the latter frequently include freedmen among those with burial rights. This is typically done with the phrase libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum; that is, including not only male and female ex-slaves but even their descendants. In the Isola Sacra, 90 per cent of all ‘house’ tombs feature the phrase. To consider this addition only in legal terms, as is usually done, in fact misses the point, especially since the formula does not signify what it seems to say. It appears to admit to burial all freed slaves of a founder and all of their offspring, and it has often been taken to mean just that by modern scholars.Footnote 119 However, in reality only those libertini and their descendants were admitted who either were themselves heirs of the tomb or got permission from its founder while he was still alive, or from his heirs. This is confirmed by well-documented tombs as well as by the jurists, and first attested for Ulpian, a jurist of the early third century, who explains:

Freedmen can neither be buried nor bury others, unless they are heirs to their patron, although some people have inscribed on their tomb that they have built it for themselves and their freedmen: this view was given by Papinian [142–212 CE], and there has often been a ruling to this effect.Footnote 120

The formula was thus by no means a free-for-all, but neither was it necessary for protection of the rights of heirs to mention them in a titulus as long as a will attested to their admission. The formula’s main function must therefore be sought outside the legal realm. One effect was obviously to demonstrate another achievement of the tomb patrons’ new status. Only as (wealthy) citizens did they have the opportunity to acquire slaves of their own, and to set them free.Footnote 121 Moreover, as John Bodel observes, their care for a respectable final resting place for their dependants presents them as generous benefactors.Footnote 122 Stelae and other small tombs, which are occasionally dedicated to an entire household even when it must have been obvious from the start that there was not enough space for multiple burials over a long period of time, are best suited to demonstrate these points.Footnote 123 In addition, where the tomb was large enough to offer liberti burial space, they were also seen as an insurance for lasting commemoration of the tomb’s founder, especially when no natural descendants could fulfil this duty. As Detlef Liebs has shown, this is sometimes explicitly stated in epitaphs.Footnote 124

However, as with former slaves’ legal offspring, having a familia was not just a one-time achievement, nor was making them heirs only about commemoration of the tomb’s founder. The latter task could easily be performed by external heirs, or by liberti who were not admitted to burial, as is again demonstrated by epitaphs.Footnote 125 Since slaves, being ‘property’, had neither legal parents nor children, freedpeople lacked legal ancestors. Often they will have died without a legal son to become male heir, either because their natural children remained in the possession of their patrons, they died prematurely or the freed slaves’ age at manumission prevented them from producing sufficient numbers of surviving male offspring.Footnote 126 Both these deficits could be mitigated to some extent by drawing upon the familia.

Patrons as Pseudo-ancestors

Occasionally, we find patrons buried with and by their own former slaves. This is less striking a thing to do than one may think. We can probably assume that these patrons often belonged to a similar milieu as the freedpeople with whom they were buried. They will not already have built a tomb of their own, thus appreciating the opportunity of being offered one, especially one in which they received a place of honour and could hope for commemoration for a prolonged period of time. One may even wonder whether at least some of these patrons made their burial in their ex-slaves’ tomb a condition for manumitting them.Footnote 127

One of many cases is Tomb 87 in the Isola Sacra, the necropolis of Portus, the ancient port city of Rome. It comprised a wide range of different types and sizes of tombs, among which the ‘house’ or ‘terraced’ tombs are the most prominent.Footnote 128 Their patrons were mostly freedpeople, but some were freeborn, probably in the first generation. Tomb 87 was erected as a medium-sized but delicately decorated terraced tomb around 140, and consisted of the actual tomb building, a forecourt and two built dining couches in front of the entrance.Footnote 129 The tomb featured two tituli with identical texts, above the street entrance to the courtyard and above the door of the cella, telling us that it was erected by P. Varius Ampelus and Varia Ennuchis for themselves as well as their freeborn patron Varia Servanda, and their freedpeople and their descendants.Footnote 130 Even though Servanda’s name is written in smaller letters than the names of her liberti, it is notable that she is mentioned at all in the titulus. Moreover, she received the place of honour in the central niche of the rear wall, with another inscription giving her name,Footnote 131 while the founders of the tomb and later occupants did not label their own ollae.Footnote 132

A similar arrangement is documented in a Trajanic funerary altar of the Iunii in the Capitoline Museum, which was set up by Iunia Venusta for her patron, her husband, a son and a daughter (Figure 3.9).Footnote 133 Portraits of all four are arranged carefully. The patron is depicted alone in the tympanum, while husband and children feature in the main relief below.

Figure 3.9 Funerary altar of the Iunii family, Trajanic; Rome, Museo Nazionale Centrale Montemartini 2886 (NCE 2969)

Such examples also confirm literary sources that tell us how close could be the relationship between owner and slave, and patron and freedperson.Footnote 134 Freedpeople belonged to the familia of their patrons, whose family name, the nomen gentile, they adopted on manumission. Their patrons could therefore stand in for their ancestors, as Lauren Petersen and others have observed.Footnote 135 In the case of women, one might object that they do not make proper ancestry. Yet we have seen their importance in the Licinian tomb and for aristocratic families.Footnote 136 Moreover, in the freedman milieu, they bestowed their family name on their ex-slaves as much as male patrons did, a name that the Varii in Isola Sacra Tomb 87 treasured enough to deny burial to any external heir; that is, an heir with a different family name. The general idea of creating a family line is beautifully illustrated by the Iunii altar (Figure 3.9). The portraits are clearly differentiated in age, with the patron shown as a bald old man and the husband as an adult between his two children. Moreover, all four are depicted in bust format, which is clearly not meant to portray the living, thus hinting at the imagines maiorum of the aristocracy.Footnote 137 The allusion to ancestral portraits, the hierarchical arrangement of the portraits and the explicit portrayal as three generations leave no doubt about Iunia’s intention to present here a multigenerational family with her (their?) patron featuring as its founder.

A patron did not always have to be buried in a freedman’s tomb in order to serve as an ancestor. In the splendid mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, the patron was perhaps depicted in the rich stucco decoration covering the walls.Footnote 138 The western wall features three niches in which the tomb’s founder, his wife Flavia Olympias and their daughter Valeria Maxima are portrayed in the form of statuettes on pedestals, alluding to both public statue honours (which they probably never received) and funerary statues, which could fulfil a similar role (Figure 3.10).Footnote 139 The eastern wall opposite features only one equivalent niche in which the stucco statuette on a pedestal depicts a balding elderly man, whose age and beardlessness suggest that he belongs to a previous generation (Figure 3.11).Footnote 140 As inscriptions are lacking, it cannot be ruled out that the statuette depicts Herma’s natural father, but this is unlikely, and not only because Herma did not legally have a father. The decorative programme does not look like it is ruled by sentimental impulses. The location of this portrait – at a distance, opposite the family and alone on its wall – is reminiscent of the likeness of the Iunii patron on the altar, and suggests that he is in fact Herma’s patron, who would have taken on the role Pompey played in the tomb of the Licinii, as it were.

Figure 3.10 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H, around 160 CE) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, west wall

Figure 3.11 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, east wall

Freedmen as Pseudo-descendants

Conversely, and for the same reasons, freedmen could guarantee the continuity of a family name when there was no natural heir.Footnote 141 Herma’s tomb is again an excellent example.

The Tomb of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H) in Vaticano

Herma’s mausoleum is worth studying in more detail, as no other sub-elite tomb allows for so much detail of the history of its usage to be gleaned from the surviving evidence.Footnote 142 The necropolis, situated on the slope of the Vatican Hill just north of the Circus of Nero and the via Cornelia, was remarkably well preserved by the basilica of St Peter’s that Constantine built over it, since the tombs had to be filled in to create a platform for the church. The area had long been imperial property, and it is fitting that the necropolis was used by many imperial and other wealthy freedmen.Footnote 143

Herma founded his particularly luxurious tomb around 160, when his wife and two children had already died, and it was probably their death that instigated the erection of the mausoleum.Footnote 144 One entered the tomb through an asymmetrical forecourt with twenty niches of two ollae each. The tomb’s façade was built of the finest brickwork, decorated with four pilasters with marble bases and capitals. A large marble titulus, as wide as the door and framed by two pilasters, features above the entrance. The interior consists of a large main chamber and a smaller adjacent room extending westward to pass underneath the stairs to the roof terrace. The entrance wall was covered with twelve niches for twenty-four ollae, while the rest of the chamber was adorned by a particularly rich stucco decoration of aediculae with figures in high relief alternating with rectangular niches for further urns above a dado that contained arcosolia for inhumation (Figures 3.10 and 3.11). The adjacent room featured the same type of decoration only on its north wall.

An unusually large number of inscriptions allows for the partial reconstruction of the tomb’s burial history (Figure 3.12). Herma’s freeborn wife, Olympias, was buried in the central arcosolium of the rear wall that was later to contain Herma’s bones too, while his children occupied the smaller flanking arcosolia, all covered with inscribed marble slabs of identical design and workmanship (a–c).Footnote 145 After his wife’s death, Herma does not seem to have remarried. He buried an alumnus, Valerius Asiaticus, aged four, and donated the space for the burial of another, C. Appaienus Castus, who died aged eight, in front of the entrance wall (d–e).Footnote 146 One Valeria Asia, most likely Asiaticus’ mother, was commemorated and buried in the arcosolium in the small annex’s north wall by (her husband?) Valerius Princeps (f). The style of the inscription, almost identical to those of Herma and his family, suggests that her burial was among the earliest in the tomb. Because of the prominent location, Eck suspected that Princeps may have been Herma’s brother.Footnote 147 It is notable that no involvement of Herma is mentioned, so that Princeps may have had the right to burial there either through a family relationship or, less likely chronologically, as an heir.Footnote 148

Figure 3.12 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, distribution of named burials within the chamber

After Herma’s own departure, the tomb was inherited by some of his freedmen. A certain Valerius Philomelus and his wife Valeria Galatia, surely his liberti, donated or sold the western part to their ‘well-deserving friend’ (locum obt(ulerunt) Valerii Philumenus et Galatia amico bene merenti) T. Pompeius Successus, who buried several children within and in front of the western wall.Footnote 149 Successus himself is likely to have been buried with his homonymous son in the north-western arcosolium, which also carries his name (α).Footnote 150 In the second quarter of the third century, the marble sarcophagus of Pompeia Maritima, suitably decorated with sea creatures and her portrait, was set up by her son, probably against the southern part of the west wall, thus leaving visible Successus’ name and the inscription attesting to rightful ownership (δ).Footnote 151 Later, this part of the tomb must have been inherited by external heirs, who placed two sarcophagi in front of the northern part of the western wall. The first one, a large lenos showing lions savaging their prey, was dedicated to T. Caesennius Severianus by his sons Faustinus Pompeianus and Faustinus Rufinus (ε).Footnote 152 As the name Pompeianus suggests, there may have been a family relationship between the Pompeii and their late heirs, potentially through the female line.Footnote 153

Philomelus and Galatia do not appear again in the epigraphic record, so it is not clear whether they inherited the entire tomb and used the rest of the space for themselves, or whether they only inherited the western part and built a tomb for themselves elsewhere.Footnote 154 Yet it seems clear that the main part of the mausoleum continued to be used by Valerii. Unfortunately, though further Valerii are commemorated by inscriptions, most of these cannot be dated precisely. One Valerius Valens and his son Valerius Dionysius may have been buried in the arcosolium of the western wall, in two terracotta sarcophagi covered by the inscribed tabula (g).Footnote 155 Because of the relatively prominent position within the tomb, we may assume that they were heirs of either Herma or his heirs. If Eck’s restoration of another inscription is correct, an evocatus C. Valerius Iulianus buried his daughter in an unknown location in the tomb (h). He may have been a freeborn son of one of Herma’s freedman heirs, whose rank in the military corps required at least sixteen years of service, so that the burial did not occur before the early third century.Footnote 156 The third century saw continued burial activity in an orderly manner, both in simple terracotta sarcophagi and ‘bench-graves’ and in marble sarcophagi.Footnote 157 In the 270s, Valeria Florentina set up an inscribed hunting sarcophagus for her husband Valerius Vasatulus in the left-hand corner in front of Caesennius’ casket (i), which confirms that the tomb was still in use by Valerii at that time.Footnote 158

The mausoleum of the Valerii is a rare well-documented example of a family tomb founded by a rich freedman that was used continuously over more than 100 years by parts of his familia. Notably, burial took place in a very orderly way; it occurred solely in those parts of the tomb that were inherited by the user group; and only a limited number of people were actually admitted for burial. The most prominent part of the tomb remained in the hands of Valerii, although they were not natural descendants of Herma, and it is also highly doubtful that they were all agnatic descendants of his heirs: Vasatulus’ wife has the same nomen gentile as her husband and confirms that we are still looking at the freedman milieu.

Over all those years, the tomb façade boasted its original titulus and the interior decoration remained unchanged, even though its third-century occupants were obviously wealthy. Herma’s arcosolium and inscription remained visible until a very late stage, and his family’s portraits continued to be on display. They included not just a relief in front of the tomb and the stucco relief portraits (Figures 3.11 and 3.12), but also stucco portraits in the round, including those of Flavia Olympias and Valeria Maxima.Footnote 159 The exact purpose of the death masks of a man (possibly Valerius Herma) and two children is unclear, but the rarely attested practice again harks back to aristocratic tradition.Footnote 160 Whether fragments of gypsum busts also depicted members of the founder’s generation is unclear, but the gilded stucco portrait of a boy with a youth lock of mid to late Severan dateFootnote 161 demonstrates that the heirs of this tomb continued to set up portraits just like the Calpurnii had done in the Licinian tomb. Herma’s later heirs were surely proud of the richly furnished mausoleum, but also of its long-standing tradition and age. In the same way as Herma’s patron had served the tomb’s founder as ancestor, Herma later fulfilled this role for the occupants of future generations. Herma and his family had become the founders of a multigenerational freedman ‘family line’ that replaced natural kin, carried on his name, kept alive his memory as founder and honoured his tomb.

The history of no other tomb’s usage can be reconstructed with as much precision and detail as that of the Valerii, but a few additional examples can demonstrate that the observed burial patterns and the ideology behind them were typical, and only their documentation is unique.

Isola Sacra, Tomb of the Terentii (11)

Tomb 11 in the Isola Sacra was erected around 135–40 in a slightly oblique angle to, but facing, the road (Figure 3.13).Footnote 162 Of its original Greek titulus, only the bottom right part is preserved and legible.Footnote 163 It mentions a [Th]amyres pater, perhaps a son, followed by a daughter and mother. At least the latter two remained anonymous, which makes the focus on family rather than individuals even more obvious. All other epigraphic evidence belongs to a later phase of the tomb. After some time, when also the level of the ground around the tomb had risen, a small forecourt was added to the building. It seems likely that a Latin titulus with a dedication by C. Terentius Eutychus or Eutychianus to his wife Su[l]picia Acte, his son C. Terentius Felix and his natural brother C. Terentius Rufus, as well as libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum, was affixed to this forecourt.Footnote 164 Inside the tomb, which was originally designed for both incineration and inhumation, sarcophagi and pseudo-sarcophagi were added. The first was an inscribed, marble-clad pseudo-sarcophagus in front of the right-hand wall that was originally dedicated by Terentius Vitalis to (his wife?) Terentia Kallotyche and her or their children.Footnote 165 Later, the name Vitalis was replaced by that of Lucifer, and an et added in front of Kallotyche’s name, so that the inscription now reads somewhat oddly: Terentius Lucifer et Terenteae Kallotyceni. After this pseudo-sarcophagus, a strigilated uninscribed marble sarcophagus that eventually contained two bodies was set inside the rear arcosolium, which had to be extended on both sides in order to contain the casket. Finally, another pseudo-sarcophagus, decorated at its front with a banqueting scene, was built in front of the left-hand wall.Footnote 166 It shows among other figures a couch with a sleeping woman and a reclining man holding a kantharos and a wreath, and another, semi-nude woman sitting on the couch and presenting him with a cup. The hairstyles of the women suggest a date for the relief in the late Antonine period,Footnote 167 providing a terminus ante quem for the other burials. A tabula commemorates a dedication to C. Terentius Felix and his wife Ulpia Chrysopolis by C. Terentius Lucifer and his colliberti and coheres. This Lucifer is highly likely to be the one we have already met, while Felix is likely to be the son of Eutych[ian]us featuring in the entrance titulus.Footnote 168

Figure 3.13 Mausoleum of the Terentii family (Isola Sacra Tomb 11), founded around 140 CE

From this evidence, the history of Tomb 11 can be reconstructed with varying degrees of certainty. The date when C. Terentius Eutych[ian]us extended an existing tomb and added a secondary titulus to it has not been established precisely by archaeology, but was prior to the elevation of the terrain in the wake of the resurfacing of the road.Footnote 169 He and his wife were almost certainly buried by their son, C. Terentius Felix, and one would assume that, as they extended the tomb and could be regarded as (re-)founders, they were buried in the most prominent location still available. The strigilis sarcophagus occupies the most privileged position, but seems too small for a couple of adults, and is said to have contained the skeletons of youngsters.Footnote 170 It is therefore tempting to think that Eutych[ian]us and his wife were buried in the left-hand pseudo-sarcophagus. If this is the case, the tomb was used by Terentii before the two took over and extended the mausoleum, since Terentius Vitalis’ pseudo-sarcophagus on the right predates both the strigilis sarcophagus and its counterpart on the left. While we cannot prove that the original founders of the tomb were already Terentii, this is surely possible, and it is notable that Eutych[ian]us did not remove or cover the original titulus above the main entrance to the mausoleum. His son Felix and his wife Ulpia Chrysopolis must have inherited the tomb, but died without children, and were therefore buried by their freedman and heir Lucifer in an unspecified place, possibly in the courtyard.

According to the epitaph for Felix and his wife, Lucifer was not the tomb’s only heir, but probably its main one, and was certainly determined to leave a mark. For his own burial, he chose the existing pseudo-sarcophagus on the right, erasing its original dedicant’s name. This was certainly not de rigueur, but the violation was perhaps not quite as ruthless as one might think. Vitalis does not specify his relationship with Kallotyche, and the inscription leaves it open whether or not he intended to be inhumed in the place as well. Lucifer’s alteration is minimal, only replacing Vitalis’ cognomen and adding an et. The grammar is clearly not correct here and one could amend the inscription in two possible ways. One could either go by the nominative of Lucifer’s name and ignore the et, in which case he would appear to be the donor; but one could also ignore the nominative, already predetermined by the remaining nomen gentile of the original inscription, and focus on the et, which only makes sense if Lucifer was to be buried in the same grave. This intention seems beyond doubt and Lucifer may have liked sitting on the fence with the present formula. His relation to Kallotyche is as uncertain as that of Vitalis, but since her children were admitted to burial in the casket as well, Lucifer may in fact have been one of them.Footnote 171

The Iulii Plot on the Via Appia

An interesting case is also attested by six altars and a tabula from a plot at the first mile of the Appia, close to the so-called ‘columbarium of the liberti of Augustus’. As Dietrich Boschung first recognised, these attest to the burial of several generations of (imperial) freedmen and their descendants,Footnote 172 but also allow unique insight into the way a burial plot, apparently of considerable size, was managed and passed on to later heirs (Stemma 4). The first generation attested is represented by (C.) Iulius Eutactus and C. Iulius Theophilus, who permitted the burial of C. Iulius Atimetus, his wife, her patron and their delicatus (a young boy kept for amusement).Footnote 173 Next, the mother of one-year-old C. Signius C. f. Zoilos obtained permission from Theophilus and two other CC. Iulii, Oriens and Peculiaris, to bury her son. It may be concluded that Eutactus had died in the meantime and left his share in the plot to the two men.Footnote 174 In the next altar, these two are again giving permission, but Theophilus is missing.Footnote 175 He may now have died as well and left his share to three other Julii who join in the permission, Anicetus, formerly Theophilus’ dispensator and so surely his libertus, Lalus Theophili libertus and Anthus, whose relationship with Theophilus remains unclear.Footnote 176 Next, Peculiaris died and was replaced by Iulius Pyrriches.Footnote 177 The final group of socii, attested on an altar from the first quarter of the second century, consists of Lalus and the daughters and heirs of his socii: Iulia Hieria, daughter of Oriens; Iulia Ingenua, daughter of Anicetus; and Iulia Hieria, daughter of Anthus.Footnote 178 In at least two instances we also have evidence that the heirs of the plot cordoned off an area for their own family’s burial.Footnote 179 While not all individuals commemorated share the same nomen gentile, the non-Iulii can be identified as being related to Iulii by marriage, and it is very clear that the socii made an effort to ensure that the burial plot passed on to heirs of the same family name.

Stemma 4 Changing ownership of a funerary precinct of Iulii near the first milestone of the via Appia as attested by permissions given for burial

Consortium Tomb on the Via Appia and Other Renovations

This same intention is made explicit in another inscription that was found near the Porta San Sebastiano on the Appia and provides us with the following information.Footnote 180 The now-lost tomb was founded in 3 BCE by a consortium of four men and a woman, including L. Maelius Papia and Maelia Hilara, who may have been his wife and either his fellow freedwoman or his own former slave. The socii dedicated the monument to their male and female ex-slaves, stating explicitly that this was done in order to preserve their family names:

Lentulo et Corvino | Messala co(n)s(ulibus) | qui hoc monimentum(!) aedificaverunt cum ustrina | L(ucius) Maelius Papia et Maelia Hilara et Rocius Surus et M(arcus) Caesennius et Furius | Bucconius hoc monimentum(!) libertis libertabus ut de nomine non exeat | ita qui testamento scripti fuerint |

In the consulship of Lentulus and Corvinus Messala. Those who erected this monument with ustrinum, L. Maelius Papia and Maelia Hilara and Rocius Surus and M. Caesennius and Furius Bucconius, (dedicated) this monument to their freedmen (and) freedwomen, so that (it) will not go out of the name; so they have written in their will.

In 81, the complex was extended by a plot of land opposite, and the only individuals mentioned by name are one L. Maelius Successus and his mother Maelia Syntychene. Their names not only confirm that that of the Maelii had been preserved for over eighty years, but also that this was done through freedman pseudo-genealogy, since Successus bears the same nomen gentile as his mother. Finally, in 110 the tomb had to be renovated, and we are again given a list of names of the individuals involved. They include some new ones, but also three Maelii, one Furius and one Rocia, whose nomina had all featured in the original, by now over 110-year-old list of founders. Their aim to preserve their family names, despite their tomb or plot being owned by a consortium and despite their apparent lack of (legitimate) children, had been achieved, with impressive results.

Similar intentions are occasionally found in other tituli where a tomb is left to freedpeople with the explicit intention of preserving the family name(s). In CIL 6.26940 (p. 3918), Terentia Secundilla specifies that the tomb must not go out of the name of her male and female ex-slaves and their offspring (ita ne de nomine libertorum libertarum<q>ue meorum posterisqu(e) eorum exeat). In CIL 6.22208, one L. Marius Felix builds a tomb for his patrons as well as for himself and his freedpeople and their offspring ita ne unquam de nomine familiae nostrae hic monument[um exeat]. In CIL 6.1521, the concern is about several family names, most likely because we are dealing with a family comprising imperial freedmen with different names, whose own freedpeople would thus equally carry different names.Footnote 181 In CIL 6.22303, one Mattius Adiutor erected his tomb while still alive for himself and his freedpeople and their offspring for the same reason. The same expectation follows the libertis libertabusque formula in some other cases even when there is, or is hoped to be in the future, natural offspring.Footnote 182

In other cases, the renovation of tombs, which normally required permission from the pontifex maximus, the emperor or a magistrate and was therefore sometimes recorded in an inscription,Footnote 183 attests to the long life of a tomb. The Roman knight L. Salvius [---]ens renovated a tomb, probably around the middle of the third century, to be used by his family, their descendants, their freedmen and freedwomen and their offspring.Footnote 184 The tomb is unfortunately lost, but when Salvius refurbished the tomb, he erased and recarved the titulus except for the final line with the measurements of the plot, which was executed in beautiful letters of the early second century. While it cannot be excluded that he was given the tomb because it had been abandoned for some time and no heirs survived, it is equally possible that it was his ancestral mausoleum.Footnote 185

A marble block from a round tomb at the second mile of the via Latina was erected by C. Iulius Divi Aug. l. Delphus Maecenatianus, who must have been the slave of first Maecenas and later Augustus, for himself, his wife (probably his liberta) and their freeborn daughter. Around a century later, a certain C. Iulius Trophimas, most likely a descendant of one of their liberti, restored (refecit) the tomb for himself, his descendants and his freedpeople.Footnote 186 In this case, the original inscription was not erased but merely supplemented, suggesting that pride over the tomb’s long history and the longevity of the familia was part of the message.

Equestrian Descendants

Arguably, pride in a family tomb becomes most obvious within the freedmen milieu where a descendant achieved further advancement by gaining the status of a knight, but still preferred burial in the family mausoleum. In Ostia’s Porta Romana necropolis, for instance, a certain L. Combarisius Hermianus erected a tomb for himself, his wife and his children as well as his brother.Footnote 187 He was a member of the freedman college of augustales and appears in a list of 196 CE. Through inscriptions from within the tomb, at least three more Combarisii are attested. One of them, perhaps the grandson of the founder, was a Roman knight who had held all of the most prestigious offices at Ostia and was pontifex Laurentium Lavinatium.Footnote 188 Since these offices were only available to the rich, he clearly had the means to erect a tomb for himself elsewhere. And yet he chose to be buried in his family mausoleum, not ashamed of his servile heritage but proud of his ancestors, who had made it from slaves to eminent citizens of Ostia and managed to acquire a burial plot in one of the most prominent locations available.

In another case the evidence looks more elusive, as we have lost not only the tomb but also the inscribed objects in question, but the situation seems to be similar to that of the Combarisii. The tomb near Portus is described by the seventeenth-century sources as particularly impressive.Footnote 189 The titulus gives the size of the unusually large plot as 89 x 29 m, and its lavish decoration included now-lost statues. Several inscribed marble sarcophagi and other objects further confirm the luxurious burial style as well as some features of the history of usage. The tomb was founded by one A. Caesennius Herma, whose patron, A. Caesennius Gallus, is known to have been legatus pro praetore in Asia Minor in 80 and 82, as well as one A. Caesennius Italicus and his wife Caesennia L. l. Erotis.Footnote 190 The exact relationship between these founders and the other Caesennii buried in the tomb is not clear, but we can see that they included liberti of the original founders. At some stage, a garland sarcophagus was dedicated to the knight L. Fabricius Caesennius Gallus by his son, who proudly lists his father’s extraordinary achievements in the epitaph, identical to those of his later peer in Ostia.Footnote 191

Families with Different Nomina Gentilicia

As already indicated, these are some of the best-documented examples of the general ideology I want to demonstrate from Rome and its port cities. Even the relatively well-known necropoleis of Ostia and Porto suffered late antique looting; the modern excavations also paid little attention to contextual detail. For all too long, inscriptions have been treated simply as texts rather than as objects that give away their full message only in the context in which they used to be viewed. Yet it is not only poor preservation or documentation that prevents us from tracing the history of mausolea in detail. Few tombs from Rome and its vicinity are as well-known as those excavated underneath St Peter’s Basilica and the papal palaces, and among these Herma’s has yielded by far the largest number of inscriptions. In most tombs, later generations did not feel the need to set up epitaphs, nor even tabellae marking individual graves.

Admittedly, especially when we do not know the exact original location of inscriptions, even many instances where multiple epitaphs are preserved can look rather messy. Nevertheless, there is no need to conclude that this is the result of carelessness, or even anarchy and usurpation. Where we gain some insight into the way a tomb was used and passed on, this process is normally guided by clear rules. For a range of reasons, parts of a tomb could be given over to a family with a different nomen, usually relatives of a wife or friends, amici, of the heirs, as was the case with Herma’s tomb. The desire to keep the tomb in the family name could recede behind other needs (such as financial ones) or desires, especially that to pass on the tomb within the natural family even when this family does not share the same name. This is the case when daughters inherit, but also within families of imperial libertini, whose members were often enfranchised at different times and by different emperors, and thus given different nomina. Let us look at two examples.

Mausoleum F in Vaticano

In Mausoleum F of the Vatican necropolis, erected in the early Antonine period with an extraordinary façade decorated with multicoloured brick ornaments, the single large interior again provided for inhumation in arcosolia and incinerated remains in ollae and marble urns in the brightly coloured decorated walls above (Figure 3.14).Footnote 192 The main titulus of the tomb is not preserved, but the epigraphic evidence from inside suggests that it was founded by M. Caetennius Antigonus and his wife Tullia Secunda, who were commemorated on an altar that stood in the centre of the space (a).Footnote 193 Tullia already had a burial place assigned in her parents’ tomb, Mausoleum C, just a few metres down the road, but ‘moved’ into Mausoleum F together with her husband.Footnote 194 Before setting up their own altar, however, Antigonus dedicated a cinerary urn to his patron M. Caetennius Chryseros, who appears to be the first person buried in the tomb.Footnote 195 This suggests that Antigonus may have been freed on his master’s death with the obligation to provide him with an adequate burial place. The urn was found not in the central niche of the back wall but to the right of it (b), and it cannot be excluded that Antigonus was not as keen to capitalise on his pseudo-ancestry in the same way as others were. However, is it really plausible to assume that Antigonus assigned his patron a lateral place when the entire tomb was still empty and Antigonus did not intend to use the central niche for himself?Footnote 196 Urns are relatively easy to move around and the lateral niche also seems too narrow for Chryseros’ urn.Footnote 197 In light of the use of tombs as discussed previously, it is therefore possible, if not likely, that the patron’s urn was originally set up in the centre, in the background of and in the line of sight of the founders’ altar, and flanked by their now-lost cineraria.

Figure 3.14 Mausoleum of the Caetennii and Tullii (Mausoleum F, early Antonine) underneath St Peter’s, distribution of named burials within the chamber

Two further marble urns were dedicated to Caetennii by their colliberti and set up in prominent positions, namely in the central niche of the left, western wall and in the upper northernmost niche of the east wall (c–d).Footnote 198 The exact relationships these people had with Antigonus and each other are not clear, but the urns are dated to the second half of the century, when Antigonus had already died.Footnote 199 It is therefore likely that they were Antigonus’ freedmen and heirs, or freedmen and heirs of his heirs.

These are the last Caetennii attested, and evidence is stronger for heirs connected to Tullia. One L. Tullius Hermadion buried his homonymous nineteen-year-old son in a newly built ‘bench’ in the centre of the rear wall (e), the most prominent place for an inhumation, and set up his own cinerary urn in the central niche above, where it was found (f).Footnote 200 For that purpose, he may have moved Antigonus’ patron’s urn, who was Antigonus’ pseudo-ancestor but obviously not his own. Moreover, his son’s grave was built not into the central arcosolium but in front of it, possibly obscuring an earlier inhumation.Footnote 201 It is therefore possible that he was now the only remaining heir to the tomb.Footnote 202 The epitaphs do not give away whether Hermadion the Elder was freeborn or freed. If the former, it would explain his (perceived) right to the most prestigious places in the tomb, although one wonders why, being kin, he would not have preferred burial in Tullia’s ancestral Mausoleum C. Was it because the new mausoleum was so much larger and more impressive? If he was Tullia’s freedman, as is usually assumed (or the son of one of her freedmen), his dominant position could have resulted from his (or his father’s) special importance to his patron, who may have survived her husband for some years, relying on her freedman’s support. His importance is further demonstrated by the burial he provided for his friends (amici) Aurelius Gigantis and Papiria Profutura,Footnote 203 and he must also have determined the burial place of another Aurelius to the left of Hermadion Minor’s grave (g). M. Aurelius Hieron, an evocatus of Marcus Aurelius, dedicated this place to his homonymous son.Footnote 204 As the burial predates that of Hermadion Minor, the most prominent position, still vacant when Hermadion Minor died, must have been reserved for Hermadion Maior’s kin from the outset. It is therefore likely that the Aurelii were introduced into the tomb through him, and it is tempting to think that the relationship was established through marriage.Footnote 205 From now on, no more Tullii are attested and the tomb may have fallen to the Aurelii after Hermadion pater’s death. The latest epitaph from the tomb commemorated the choirmaster Aurelius Nemesius, who was buried by his wife Aurelia Eutychiane in the northernmost arcosolium of the east wall (h).Footnote 206

While many details of this tomb’s usage remain elusive, it is obvious that it was Tullia’s heirs who determined burial practice after her husband Caetennius Antigonus’ death. Moreover, we can see that they must have inherited the entire tomb, or at least its most important part, since the Tullii occupied the central positions at the rear and their friends or relatives, the Aurelii, two relatively prominent places in different parts of the chamber. Freedpeople and descendants in the female line are therefore likely to be responsible for the range of different gentilicia in this mausoleum.

Isola Sacra, Mausoleum 75–76

The impact of belonging to the familia caesaris can be observed in Mausoleum 75 in the Isola Sacra (Figure 3.15). It originally consisted of a large courtyard and a smallish tomb building in the centre of the rear wall of the precinct that was flanked by vaulted open alae and provided for incinerated remains only.Footnote 207 A titulus above the door proclaims that it was dedicated by its founder M. Cocceius Daphnus to his own familia as well as to M. Antonius Agathias and M. Ulpius Domitus, et libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum. Given that the tomb was built in the Trajanic period, Cocceius Daphnus must have been a freedman of Nerva, Ulpius Domitus a freedman of Trajan and Antonius Agathias the (grand)son or freedman of a freedman of Antonia Minor (who died in 37).Footnote 208 Daphnus was the other two men’s father-in-law, which is what must have qualified them for the dedication. The arrangement ensured that Daphnus’ daughters could be buried with their natural family as well as with their husbands, and that these husbands were still commemorated in their own name and would inherit parts of the tomb.Footnote 209 Up to this point, we are faced again with a case where different gentilicia are introduced through female kin. We do not know who was eventually buried in the rear cella,Footnote 210 but some liberti of the Cocceii used the right ala and the space immediately in front of it. One M. Cocceius Onesimus buried his wife within the ala, perhaps in the Hadrianic period (b),Footnote 211 while a Cocceia Tyche gave the space for a double a cassone grave just outside the ala to Sex. Iulius Armenius, who buried his wife in one part, and was later buried in the other by Cocceia Tyche (e–f).Footnote 212 Ulpii appear only once more in an epitaph for Domitus’ grandson or nephew, who predeceased Secunda and Domitus,Footnote 213 but it is possible that their share was inherited by kin who were manumitted by later emperors. A slave of Matidia, niece of emperor Trajan, buried his fellow slave Urbica, with whom he had lived for one year, eight months, twelve days and three hours (!) in a custom-made aedicula in the centre of the rear wall of the same ala (a).Footnote 214 The prominent position, the likely date of the inscription before 119 and the lack of an explicit permission suggest that he or she may have been natural kin of Ulpius Domitus. The same may be true for Aelia Salviana, who is likely to have been a freedwoman of Hadrian, and buried her six-year-old verna Sabina right next to Urbica (d).Footnote 215

Figure 3.15 Tombs 75–76 in the Isola Sacra necropolis of Portus (early second century CE), distribution of named burials within the precinct and chambers

M. Antonius Agathias, however, chose to set himself off from the rest of the family. He partitioned off the part of the tomb he inherited from Cocceius Daphnus, turning the northern ala into a closed mausoleum and cutting a new entrance through the front wall of the precinct, above which he placed the titulus that gives us these details (Tomb 76).Footnote 216 He even left space for two to three lines between the main text and the dedication to his ex-slaves and their offspring, surely to add further relatives (a second wife and children?) later on. Yet if his aim was to avoid the somewhat messy situation in the remainder of Tomb 75, he will have been disappointed. No names were added to the titulus, and if he intended a second marriage, it never happened.Footnote 217 His heir was M. Antonius Pius, but whether he was kin or a freedman is not entirely clear.Footnote 218 He is attested in two inscriptions. One permits P. Aelius Tryphonus burial in his tomb (h).Footnote 219 The other hands over the entire right part of the cella to Aemilia Maiorica, Caminius Silvanus, and their freed people and their offspring (i).Footnote 220 It is situated above the cella entrance and only uses the right half of the marble slab, suggesting an intention to give away the left half of the tomb to other externals. No further Antonii are attested in the tomb, and Pius may have moved on to found his own tomb elsewhere.Footnote 221 This is perhaps confirmed by another Antonius, M. Antonius M. f. Callistianus, who commemorated his grandmother Cocceia Doris on a stele set against the partition wall on the Cocceii side, as is fitting (g). Interestingly, however, 21-year-old Callistianus was later buried next to his grandmother and commemorated on the same stele.Footnote 222 If he was a son of Agathias, as is normally assumed, it is likely that, by then, his father had already died and Antonius Pius given away the Antonii part of the tomb.

These two examples demonstrate very clearly that we should not rush to conclusions about random use of tombs and usurpation when we find different nomina attested in one and the same mausoleum. What looks like inheritance by externals – and is inheritance by externals, when one considers the nomina alone – can easily turn out to be inheritance by kin, albeit in the female line or among former imperial slaves. The desire to preserve a name was here overruled by affection for and pietas towards natural relatives. This circumstance also makes it very difficult to distinguish between sepulcra familiaria (family tombs) and sepulcra hereditaria (hereditary tombs). These terms are explained only once in the legal sources, but have gained some currency in modern scholarship, although they are thought to have been blurred with time.Footnote 223 Looking at the evidence, one wonders whether they really ever existed as fully distinct categories. In all tombs burial right was restricted to heirs, with the sole exception of non-inheriting close kin who, at least from the second century onwards, were permitted to use their father’s tomb under any circumstance.Footnote 224 While inheritance by non-kin liberti could ensure the persistence of the nomen gentile, inheritance by kin could mean that the tomb passed out of the name.

Exact figures on how frequently this was the case are impossible to glean, but there can be no doubt that a substantial percentage of the sub-elite population had a keen interest in the preservation of the family name, and that the examples discussed above are not mere exceptions. One marked difference between freedmen and senatorial tituli lies in the fact that the former often include more detailed provisions about who may or may not be buried in a given tomb. Sometimes the founder explicitly excluded specific individuals with whom he had fallen out or who were considered unworthy for some reason.Footnote 225 More often, tituli specify that the tomb must not go out of the family name when it is passed on to later generations. This provision comes in three forms. It can simply be specified that the tomb must not go out of the family name.Footnote 226 More often, a provision either excludes heirs altogether with the formula H(oc) m(onumentum) h(eredem) non s(equetur) or else it excludes only external heirs – that is, heirs of a different nomen – with the formula H(oc) m(onumentum) h(eredem) (f(amiliae)) e(xterum) n(on) s(equetur) or similar. In the Isola Sacra, we find the former amendment in 12 per cent of all tituli, and the latter in an additional 31 per cent.Footnote 227 The majority of scholars probably rightly assume that the two formulae essentially meant the same thing, and the shorter one could simply have been an abbreviation or used when it was already known that the heirs would not be able, or may not be willing, to leave the tomb in the family name.Footnote 228 These 43 per cent of patrons of larger tombs in the Isola Sacra provide us with a rather strong indication of what was at stake here. A legal, and legally protected, family was not only important from a personal and emotional point of view as the end to a precarious situation. Nor was it merely a one-time achievement obtained with manumission. The aim was to create a family line, for which the name was essential. As I have noted, this was also the idea in elite tombs, it is just that it was not necessary to confirm the provision formally in their tituli.

Conclusions

It is hardly an exaggeration to state that in Roman society the family was a key institution, and remained so throughout its history. As is well known, Augustus intended to restore it after the upheavals of the civil wars, both in the interest of producing sufficient numbers of citizens, and as a key institution of the state that passed on its value system and embodied concordia as a virtue underpinning the res publica. Even in this world of pre-arranged marriages and a high mortality rate among children, there is ample evidence of genuine affection within families. This includes evidence from epitaphs, which often talk about the deceased with warmth, and offered girls of marriageable age places of honour and rich grave goods.

This did not change fundamentally in later centuries. There was neither a growing individualism and waning sense of family, as some scholars have suggested,Footnote 229 nor a general shift towards an increasing focus on the nuclear family, as Saller and Shaw’s seminal paper proposed. Not everyone may have achieved the establishment of a family tradition, and some may even have preferred other allegiances over those of a family, such as collegia (voluntary associations) of various kinds.Footnote 230 Yet there can be no doubt that the ideal of an extended family and a long family line that preserved a name (in the full range of its significance) did not fade throughout the imperial period.

In elite families, the idea of the gentilicial family clan, whose prominent members and their deeds were advertised and honoured in the tituli of their mausolea, lived on into late antiquity and, after the atria with their imagines maiorum may have lost in importance or assumed other purposes, these mausolea constituted the main location at which the longevity and dignity of a family were demonstrated and commemorated. There is some evidence that the elite sometimes admitted multiple and diverse externals to burial in their tombs, probably again mostly cognatic kin – the mausoleum of Artorius Geminus is one example (see Figure 1.1).Footnote 231 We have also seen how the Licinii advertised their family links with the triumviri Pompey and Crassus. However, if we can trust our (admittedly scanty) evidence, this was rather rare among this class, and the Licinii case is explained by the fact that, exceptionally, the pontifex was not actually a homo novus.Footnote 232 It is normally thought that sepulcra gentilicia are a phenomenon of the Republican period. Do we need to revise this assessment? Yes, and no. Christopher Smith has critically reviewed modern views about the Roman clan in the Republican period, and the evidence that does and does not support them.Footnote 233 The result is a much more complex and fluid concept of the gens, of the impacts it had on power and institutions, and of the ways in which an individual gens defined its boundaries. Against this background, any further changes during the late Republican and imperial period appear not to be challenges to the concept and relevance of the gens as such, but rather further continuations of its renegotiation. In our context, it is clear that we lack the archaeological (or other) evidence for tombs or burial grounds that could be attributed to an entire gens (rather than a stirps) that would help us assess the evidence presented here.Footnote 234 This lack is, perhaps, less surprising than it may at first seem given the fluidity of definitions, the number of members belonging to the oldest Roman gentes and the fact that their founders were often mythical.Footnote 235

The pattern of founding, using and bequeathing a tomb over several generations seems in fact to be a novelty of the late Republic, part of the lead-up to the fierce power struggles culminating in the first century BCE, and not abandoned afterwards for several centuries. As Smith notes, only one of the inscriptions of the Scipios refers explicitly to the family, namely to the virtutes of the deceased’s genus and the honour of his stirps.Footnote 236 Yet it is not clear at all that Hispanus (or those commemorating him) would thus have denied the tomb the title of a sepulcrum gentilicium. Mention of the genus and the stirps indicates the general idea of a gentilicial environment, and by stirps he could in fact have been referring to the branch of the family founded by his father Hispallus.

That late Republican- and imperial-period tombs could be called sepulcra gentilicia is demonstrated by literary as well as epigraphic sources, and Cicero is again the earliest attesting to the importance of the tomb to the gens.Footnote 237 In an inscription from Luna in Etruria, one Appuleius, who lists three Sextii as his father, grandfather and great-grandfather, calls himself the last member of the gens.Footnote 238 At least one example is from Rome, an epistyle block now displayed in the Jewish catacomb of the Vigna Randanini that reads [---]RO IS totu genus | [--- A]thanasiorum, while several others are from the Balkans and North Africa.Footnote 239 Taking all this evidence together, and keeping in mind that almost all preserved tomb tituli from Rome and its surrounding area commemorate homines novi, it is hard to escape the conclusion that newly ascended curule magistrates (or their commemorators) did indeed consider themselves founders of a gens, an assumption that is consistent with Cicero’s statement that the first curule magistrate within a family could become the founder of a new gens (Fam. 9.21.2). Their mausoleum was established as manifestation and celebration of the fact, and descendants in the agnatic line and, lacking male descendants, sometimes also in the cognate line, normally continued to use the tomb for burial, and for the promotion of the time-honoured dignity of their family.

This general idea was shared by many freedmen, even though they had to adapt it to their means and circumstances, and some preferred burial, not with whatever kind of family/familia, but with a collegium.Footnote 240 More often than in the first order we find affection and pietas towards kin taking precedence over concerns for the family name, the reasons for which could be both economic and personal. It is likely that the sheer relief and joy felt about having overcome the precarious conditions of an illegitimate family of slaves contributed emotional factors to the choice of who may and may not be given burial right in a family tomb. This may also explain the frequency of epithets, even in short commemorative inscriptions, that not only praise the virtues of a class that was stereotyped as inherently lacking them, but are also affectionate, such as dulcissimus/a or carissimus/a.Footnote 241 In epitaphs of the first order, epithets are almost entirely absent.Footnote 242 Parents may also have offered a share in, and inheritance of, their tomb to their daughters with their husbands and offspring, when these sons-in-law did not have the means to erect a similarly attractive mausoleum, as may have been the case in Isola Sacra Mausoleum 75–76 (Figure 3.15), or when these sons-in-law’s financial contribution was needed for erecting the family mausoleum.

Yet the desire to integrate fully into society as citizens also meant that markers of status were identified and advertised on and in tombs, which must, for many, have been the prime if not the only monument ever erected to them. Mouritsen has recently stressed the extent to which the very idea of enfranchising a slave hinged on the expectation that the freedman or freedwoman would integrate seamlessly into society and (continue to) behave according to a value system that was primarily shaped and determined by their patrons and the hierarchical nature of Roman society in general.Footnote 243 We should therefore not be surprised to find liberti sharing some fundamental elite ideals and commemorative practices. What we are looking at is not a ‘trickle-down effect’ but a set of ideas and values embraced by all social classes.Footnote 244 Like the elite, liberti placed portraits inside and in front of their mausolea, which often resembled honorific dedications that they may never have received in other locations.Footnote 245 Lacking the public offices and honores of the elite, those liberti who held offices in collegia or the imperial administration, or who occupied priestly offices such as the augustalitas, proudly mentioned these on their tomb stones. Where such distinctions were lacking, tomb founders sometimes pointed to other achievements such as their profitable occupation,Footnote 246 wealth, a legitimate family and their own slaves and freedmen. With regard to their households, often more was at stake than emotional bonds between members of the nuclear family. The achievement of now having a legitimate family is illustrated through images (the dextrarum iunctio and children fitted out with togas and bullae: Figure 3.8) and spelt out in inscriptions.Footnote 247 The particularly high number of epigraphic commemorations of children under the age of ten in Ostia (almost 40 per cent) may also be understood in this context.Footnote 248

Nevertheless, as we have seen, all this was not only about a one-time achievement. There was a widespread desire to establish a family line in which the family name was preserved and passed on, as Mouritsen recently concluded from the adoption by ex-slaves of naming habits known from freeborn and even elite Roman families. The practice of ‘naming their children after their parents, grandparents or other relatives’ often even superseded any potential hesitation about giving children Greek cognomina that would give away their servile ancestry.Footnote 249 Mouritsen does not elaborate further on the issue, but the evidence discussed here both confirms his impression and helps flesh it out. Some epitaphs state explicitly that a patron’s liberti have been admitted to burial in order to carry on the name,Footnote 250 and the prevalence of this desire to establish a family lineage is best illustrated by the frequent provision that the tomb must not be passed on to external heirs. The varied but sometimes remarkable success in achieving this goal is demonstrated by some well-documented and -preserved tombs and inscriptions that attest to the continued use of tombs over more than 100 years by people sharing the same nomen gentile. And these same cases also illustrate how this was achieved. Lauren Petersen had already observed that, lacking legal ancestry, freedmen sometimes substituted a parent by their patron, and Mouritsen argued that the patron-freedman relationship was modelled on, and ideally resembled very closely, that of father and son, which established links both of obligation and affection.Footnote 251 Commemorative practices further support his view. What has now become clearer is that they often secured the survival of their name through freedmen heirs, for whom, in turn, the tomb’s founder and other previous generations became ‘ancestry’. While the vast majority of these freedpeople seem to have failed to establish a lasting agnatic family – let alone a gens – they made the most of the concept of familia, which did not distinguish between kin and non-kin and was still a powerful institution of which to be proud. This reference to the familia was quite different from that which we observe in the large household columbaria for the familiae of the most prominent Roman families (including the imperial one). Here, sometimes hundreds of burials presented the deceased as members of the large collective of the familia who referred to their prestigious and powerful patron(s) with pride, but never shared a tomb with them. They found an identity as a collective that was structured and hierarchised internally not by kinship ties – relatively rarely do we see nuclear families being buried in proximity to each other – but by the decuriae that organised and structured the household at large and awarded the greatest honours to their officials.Footnote 252 In contrast, the family tombs I discuss here did not only serve smaller numbers of individuals belonging to less prominent households. They represented a mix of former slaves (and slaves) and freeborn members of a familia that was structured according to personal relationships of kinship and heirship, which also determined the hierarchisation of space within the ‘house’ tombs.Footnote 253 They shared with the elite key ideas embodied by their family and gentilicial tombs, composing their own ‘family’ (i.e. familia) based on highly selective, personal but not necessarily kinship relationships.

Footnotes

1 On the ancient terminology for types of families and kinship relations, see Corbier, ‘Constructing kinship’. On Smith’s criticism of modern concepts of the gens (in Clan), see my comments below.

2 E.g. Saller, ‘Introduction Part 1’, 24; Saller, ‘Heirship’, esp. 33. See most recently Galen, Women.

3 Hopkins, Death, 206. He goes on to argue in Chapter 2 that ‘they were similarly unimportant in politics’.

4 Types of relationships included spouse to spouse, parent to child, child to parent and sibling to sibling (all classified as ‘nuclear’), extended family (e.g. grandparents, grandchildren, nephews, nieces, etc.), heirs, amici (incl. conservi and conliberti), patron, master, freedperson and slave (all classified as ‘extended’).

5 See the table in Saller and Shaw, ‘Tombstones’, 147.

6 Footnote Ibid., 125, my emphasis. Cf. de Visscher, Droit, chs 6–8, esp. 118. For similar conclusions from epigraphic and legal evidence, see also Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 48, 56, 59.

7 Martin, ‘Construction’.

8 Footnote Ibid., 57–8. Martin goes on to challenge the distinction between nuclear and extended family as such, arguing that, in his inscriptions, he found ‘a “nucleated” centre surrounded by a spectrum of relations of more or less intimacy’ (p. 58). Yet while this describes the situation correctly, his reasoning is circular when he takes for granted that these constellations all represent ‘family’.

9 Saller and Shaw, ‘Tombstones’, 146; Shaw, ‘Epigraphy’, 466; Shaw, ‘Death’, 72; Saller, Patriarchy, 96. Some scholars have denied that they draw conclusions for family structures outside the funerary realm, but while there are some cautionary remarks, other passages are less considerate (e.g. Saller and Shaw, ‘Tombstones’, 145–6: ‘Modern historians have shown that in most areas of western Europe the nuclear family was the main type of familial organization as far back as dependable records are available. On the basis of our evidence, it seems a reasonable hypothesis that the continuity of the nuclear family goes back much further in time and that it was characteristic of many regions of western Europe as early as the Roman empire’, or the quotation above). Cf. Huebner, ‘Household composition’, 81–2.

10 For a critique of Martin’s approach, see Rawson, ‘Family’; Bodel (ed.), Epigraphic Evidence, 36–7; Huebner, ‘Household composition’, 82–3. On Saller and Shaw, see Hopkins, ‘Graveyards’, 115; Bodel, ‘Epigraphy and the ancient historian’, 36–7. For a critical review, see now Huebner, ‘Household composition’. The methodological difficulties in Martin’s approach also become apparent when we consider the epitaphs from Asia Minor’s ‘obsession with genealogical bookkeeping’ (as van Nijf has called it), which attest to the importance of a long family line as a status indicator and the tomb’s role in communicating the fact. See Cormack, Space of Death, 133–9; Van Nijf, ‘Being Termessian’.

11 Huebner, ‘Household composition’, 84–91.

12 Esp. Hopkins, ‘Age structure’; Hopkins, ‘Graveyards’, esp. 115; Bodel, ‘Epigraphy and the ancient historian’, esp. 36–7; Ery (‘Investigations’, 60) observed that Greek-language inscriptions from the city of Rome imply a mean life expectancy of fifty-one years, while Latin-language inscriptions suggest a mean of only twenty-three years. Cf. Bodel, ‘Epigraphy and the ancient historian’, 36; Scheidel, ‘Epigraphy and demography’, 110–12.

13 Dixon, Roman Family, 1–11, and passim; Huebner, ‘Household composition’, with further bibl., as well as the other chapters in Rawson (ed.), Families.

14 See de Visscher, Droit, chs 6–8, esp. 118 and Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 48, 56, 59. On Saller and Shaw, see e.g. Rawson, ‘Family’, 294: ‘truly a breakthrough’; Nielsen, ‘Interpreting epithets’, 172; Parkin and Pomeroy, Social History, 74–5; Hope, Roman Death, 169–70. Treggiari (‘Marriage’, 376) goes even further and thinks that the commemorative practice ‘confirms that the nuclear family was the usual household unit’ (emphasis original). Before Saller and Shaw’s article was published, Hopkins (Death, 205) wrote: ‘It was apparently rare for tombs to contain the remains of family members over several generations’; see also the quotation above p. 124.

15 This assumption is rarely ever stated explicitly, but it underlies the typical treatment and discussion of tombs. Griesbach (Villen und Gräber, 23–4), for instance, suggests that, especially in the late Republic and early imperial period, burial on a villa estate was chosen only when a ‘burial place appropriate to the rank and reputation of the deceased’ was impossible for political reasons. While this may be true, strictly speaking, for members of the imperial families who fell into disrepute and were thus denied burial in the mausolea of Augustus or Hadrian, their burial in ancestral tombs on their natural families’ landed estates suggests that they were buried precisely where they would have been had they not become members of the imperial family in the first place. It is equally problematic when intensively used and sometimes overcrowded mausolea are dismissed out of hand as ‘boxrooms for burials’, and the crammed situation is not even considered a result of a desire to continue burial in a tomb, but seen as an indication of a lack of interest in the burial of the people concerned. Cf. e.g. Hesberg, Grabbauten, 52–3; ditto Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 95–7, and 142–3 for an alleged loss of pietas. Zanker and Ewald, Myths, 25 are slightly more cautious.

16 E.g. de Visscher (Droit), Kaser (‘Grabrecht’), Hopkins (Death, 205–6), Saller and Shaw (‘Tombstones’, 125), Heinzelmann (‘Grabarchitektur’, 189–90), Heinzelmann (‘Einleitung’, 14, 16–18), Hesberg (‘Profumo’, 48), Galvano-Sobrinho (‘Feasting’, 145–8) and Borbonus (Columbarium Tombs, 144–5) talk of growing individualism and indifference towards the familia in relation to the large columbaria of the first centuries BCE and CE.

17 The following description is based on Coarelli, Scipioni; Coarelli, ‘Sepolcro’; Coarelli, Revixit ars, 177–238; LTUR IV (1999) 281–5 s.v. Sepulcrum (Corneliorum) Scipionum (F. Zevi); Etcheto, Scipions, 209–59; Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 152–59 cat. R2; Volpe et al., ‘Scipioni’. For a discussion of the inscriptions, see also Courtney, Musa Lapidaria, 40–3, 216–29 nos. 9–13.

18 Coarelli, Revixit ars, 207; Talamo, ‘Scipioni’.

19 For a recent revised reconstruction of the façade, see Volpe et al., ‘Scipioni’, 182–5 figs. 12–15 (R. Volpe) (cf. here Figure 3.3). Coarelli (‘I ritratti di “Mario” e “Silla” a Monaco e il sepolcro degli Scipioni’), followed by Etcheto (Scipions, 217–18, 274–8), recently revived a suggestion by Giuliani (Bildniskunst, 172–89), that the over-life-size marble portraits of the so-called ‘Marius’ and ‘Sulla’ in Munich and Copenhagen respectively are actually the portraits of Africanus and Asiagenus from the tomb façade, yet Volpe (in Volpe et al., ‘Scipioni’, 184 with n. 20) doubts the attribution, arguing that the statues of the façade would hardly have been much larger than life-size.

20 Valerius Maximus, an author of the first century CE, mentions an inscription that Africanus allegedly put on his grave which read: ‘My ungrateful fatherland, you shall not even possess my bones’ (5.3.2). But neither Livy nor Seneca, who both visited the villa, mention such an inscription.

21 For a discussion see Coarelli (Revixit ars, 209–14), who concludes that Africanus was indeed buried in Liternum. Similarly, see e.g. Verzár-Bass (‘Mausolei’, 408), who thinks that Africanus wanted a monument for himself comparable to those of Hellenistic kings, and therefore chose his villa as the location. No such monument has been found there.

22 For the stemma, see Coarelli, Scipioni, cover; Hölkeskamp, Roman Republic, 88; Etcheto, Scipions, tables 1–5. For the last Scipiones, see Syme, Augustan Aristocracy, 244–54; Canas, ‘Scribonia’.

23 For a further justification of this terminology and reference to Smith, Clan, see the conclusions to this chapter. Etcheto (Scipions) in particular has demonstrated that the Cornelii Scipiones deliberately styled themselves as a gens, possibly as the first – or one of the first – families to do so.

24 CIL 6.1392, 1439, 41049: Coarelli, ‘Sepolcro’, 58 with n. 60; Etcheto, Scipions, 209–10. Cf. Faßbender, Untersuchungen, 52 (where the inscriptions are wrongly attributed to sarcophagi), 227 nos. 340.1–3.

25 For a stemma of the Lentuli, see Scheid, ‘Scribonia’; Canas, ‘Scribonia’, with Stemma 5; Settipani, Continuité, 86; Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, Stemma VII.

26 A Flavian portrait head (Nicorescu, ‘Tomba degli Scipioni’, 52 fig. 30) and fragments of a kline sarcophagus may suggest continued use until at least the second century. On the other hand, space was limited, and these objects could just as well constitute contaminations.

27 CIL 6.41049.

28 PIR2 C 1394. Thus G. Alföldy in CIL ad loc. Cf. Settipani, Continuité, 86.

29 PIR2 I 836.

30 On the epitaph, see also Kolb and Fugmann, Tod in Rom, 64–5.

31 Settipani, Continuité, 86. Cf. Sumner (‘Family connections’, 135), who had already suggested that Maluginensis was named after the first consul of the gens Cornelia, Ser. Cornelius Maluginensis (cos. 485 BCE), and suggests that his father Cn. (Cornelius Lentulus) could have been the consul of 14 BCE.

32 CIL 14.3605 (tambour), 3606 (middle aedicula), 3607 (left), 3608 (right). Cf. Mari, Tibur IV, 196–210 no. 128; Beard, ‘Vita inscripta’, 98–114; Impeciati, Mausoleo dei Plauzi.

33 His relation to the family has been suggested to be by adoption, but Christian Settipani has argued convincingly, in my view, that he was the son of another son of Silvanus, M. Plautius Silvanus, the praetor of 24. See Settipani, Continuité addenda, 101–3 with stemma. For the adoption view, see PIR VI, stemma 20; Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, stemma IV; Settipani, Continuité, 278.

34 PIR I A205.

35 Two of Silvanus’ natural sons seem not to have survived long enough to have produced any (surviving) offspring, so it is difficult to know whether the tomb was meant to serve several male lines of descendants in a gentilicial fashion, as that of the Scipios was, but the burial of both Plautius Pulcher and Silvanus Aelianus suggests that it was. Aelianus’ father, the praetor of 24, is likely to have been commemorated on one of the lost panels.

36 Guarducci, ‘Fibula prenestina’, esp. 137–43. Still sceptical are some authors in Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb; as is Meinecke (Sarcophagum posuit, 328–32), who seems to be unaware of the arguments in Van Keuren’s ‘Unpublished documents’.

37 Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’. His arguments for a common origin of the portraits include their close similarity in terms of workmanship and style, their common state of weathering, the kind and colour of discoloration, and the pattern of root residues on their surfaces. To these can now be added isotopic analyses of the marble: Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 100. For details, see below.

38 Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’.

39 Footnote Ibid., 55. Cf. a letter by Helbig to Carl Jacobson of 20 August 1887, reprinted in Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 118 doc. 26, which describes ‘ein Grab, welches aus drei durch Eingänge verbundenen Kammern besteht’ (‘a tomb which consisted of three chambers connected by doorways’). While Helbig clearly was an art dealer unconcerned by the restrictions of the law, evidence still has to be found that he intentionally made up accounts of the provenance of the items he sold.

40 Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 57–63, on the excavation history, 63–67 with fig. 3 on interior decoration and a reconstruction, all with references to previous literature. Van Keuren tried to fit all the altars into this small tomb chamber and lined them up along its walls (fig. 3). Yet the reconstruction is problematical. First, it creates a rather crammed situation. More importantly, it positions one of the largest altars, that of Cn. Pompeius Magnus, in a corner where it would also be obscured by the altar of his father. The latter ends up next to the entrance rather than opposite it, where one would expect to find it. And finally, two uninscribed altars possibly belonging to two further sons of Frugi pontifex would not fit into the chamber at all (cf. n. 44), neither would that of Licinia Magna (cf. n. 45). It is therefore highly likely that at least some altars stood outside the tomb. The statue niche of Van Keuren’s reconstruction is also pure conjecture.

41 Their altar is CIL 6.31721; cf. Boschung, Grabaltäre, 24, 58, 96 cat. 643 pl. 15. As Boschung (‘Liciniergrab’, 284) has demonstrated, the majority of portraits from the tomb should be dated some years earlier than the death of Frugi pontifex in 47, so that he provided for the family’s tomb while still alive. It is possible that this occurred when his homonymous father (cos. –14) died, who also was the founder of his family branch, as he was the son of M. Piso Frugi (praetor –44) and adopted by M. Licinius Crassus (cos. –30). However, his date of death is unknown and he could have died before the tomb was built.

42 For a summary of the family history, see e.g. Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 260–3; Hofmann-Löbl, Calpurnii; Kragelund, ‘Shadows’.

43 Pompeius’ altar is CIL 6.31722; cf. Boschung, Grabaltäre, 15, 58, 78 cat. 1 pl. 1.

44 The altar of Galba Caesar is CIL 6.31723; cf. Boschung, Grabaltäre, 17, 58–9, 86 cat. 287 pl. 7. Boschung (‘Liciniergrab’, 264) believes that his two brothers, unattested epigraphically, were not buried in the family tomb after the estate had been divided between a Scribonianus and Piso Frugi by Vespasian, with the two brothers getting the Scribonianus plot. However, this argument would only be plausible for Crassus Scribonianus, and not for the consul of 64, as his son and grandson were buried in the original mausoleum. In a newspaper article, Lanciani also lists two uninscribed altars from the tomb, while a letter from the Banca Italiana lists two cinerari quadrati, 60 and 70 cm tall, which are otherwise unknown. Given their size, it is possible that they are the same as Lanciani’s altars. Van Keuren (‘Unpublished documents’, 109–10) argues that they were identical to the poorly preserved altar with damaged inscription for Licinia Crassi and the one with erased inscription for Frugi Licinianus and his wife. Yet it is hard to imagine that Lanciani would have called damaged but legibly inscribed altars ‘without inscription’. For the cinerari quadrati, see Footnote ibid., 67, 135 Appendix 12).

45 Their altars are CIL 6.1445 (= 31655 (Licinia Magna)), 6.31727 (Licinia) and 6.14235 (Calpurnia Lepida). Cf. Boschung, Grabaltäre, 58–9, 94 cat. 593; 58–9, 97 cat. 657 pl. 18; 58–9, 102 cat. 745. Licinia Magna’s altar was found before the published excavations at an unknown location so that her burial in her father’s tomb is conjectural. Calpurnia Lepida Orfiti’s identity is debated. The majority sees her as the wife of Ser. Calpurnius Scipio Orfitus, cos. 172 (e.g. Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, 172–4 no. 179 with stemma 38), while Boschung (Grabaltäre), followed by Kragelund (‘Emperors’, 207–9) argued that it is unlikely that a member of the family would return to the altar and incineration after a hiatus of some fifty years, which is plausible. He identified her with the wife of (Ser. Cornelius Scipio) Salvidienus Orfitus, killed by Domitian in 93 (suf. some time during 80–87; PIR² C 1445), and Kragelund plausibly suggests that her husband’s execution, and possibly his declaration as hostis, would explain her burial in her ancestral tomb rather than that of her husband, similar to Licinia Magna, whose husband L. Calpurnius Piso (cos. 57) suffered the same fate (provided she was buried in the tomb). Alföldi ad CIL suggested that she might be the daughter of Frugi Licinianus Galba Caesar. This would be consistent with the similarity of her altar to that of Volusia Torquata, although the altar, which has lost its lid, is impossible to date precisely on its own. Yet Settipani (Continuité addenda, 64–6), partly revising his previous reconstruction (Continuité, 94), points out that Alföldi’s suggestion does not explain her name, Lepida, and proposes that she is one generation younger, namely the daughter of a son of Crassus Frugi (cos. 64) and one Lepida, in which case she would have been the wife of Ser. Cornelius Scipio Salvidienus Orfitus (cos. 110). Yet this would leave unexplained why she is not buried in her husband’s mausoleum, as he lived on until after 138. Her burial in her ancestral tomb only makes sense when we assume that her husband was the Flavian consul, which in turn puts her in the generation of Frugi pontifex’s grandchildren. Following Chausson (‘Cornelia Praetextata’, with stemma in fig. 8), I am here (Stemma 3) assuming that Cethegilla, the grandmother of the consuls of 172 and 175, is the daughter of Orfitus (suf. 80/7), and thus of Calpurnia Lepida, who would then descend from another branch of the Calpurnii, through which she would also have acquired the name Lepida. Her burial in Frugi pontifex’s tomb would then be explained through her husband’s conviction and her daughter’s marriage.

46 The consul’s altar is CIL 6.31724; cf. Boschung, Grabaltäre, 44, 58–9, 108–9 cat. 856 pl. 46. The altar shows some attempt at removing the inscription, possibly for a damnatio memoriae. His son’s altar is CIL 6.31725, cf. Boschung Grabaltäre, 16, 58–9, 109 cat. 857 pl. 46. Two further female members of the family attested by altars are hard to place, especially since no relief decoration provides a clear hint at the altars’ dates. Licinia Cornelia Volusia Torquata (CIL 6.31726) is either a granddaughter (thus Boschung, Grabaltäre, 59; Kragelund, ‘Shadows’, 35 on cat. 7) or a great-granddaughter of the tomb’s founder. The latter suggestion, argued for by e.g. Raepsaet-Charlier (Prosopographie, 420–4 no. 492) and Settipani (Continuité, 248–51), assigns her a mother with the name of Volusia Cornelia, which would explain her name. She would then have been born around 70 and married in the 80s, dates which would easily be compatible with Boschung’s date for the altar at the end of the first or beginning of the second century.

47 Cf. n. 37.

48 Crassus Frugi: Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 734 (599); Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 272–3, 284, 286 fig. 17; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 85, 115 cat. 39 fig. 72); Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 99 fig. 30; 104. The head was found in the ‘third chamber’ (on which see below), an area that originally was in front of the tomb. Scribonia: most likely Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 751 (630): Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 268, 284 (here confused with I.N. 754 (635)), 286 fig. 8–9; ditto Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 85, 114 cat. 31 fig. 64; Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 104 fig. 37. Woman of previous generation: Footnote ibid., 106–7: Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 741 (605); cf. also Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 270 fig. 13 (late Tiberian to early Claudian copy of a late Augustan portrait), 286; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 85, 113–4 cat. 28 fig. 61. She may indeed be more likely Scribonia’s than Crassus Frugi’s mother, who was not relevant for establishing links with the triumviral ancestors. The women’s heads were made for insertion and thus belonged to statues. Frugi’s portrait does not seem to be broken but deliberately cut in a wavy line through the neck just underneath the head. Whether this was done in ancient or modern times is not entirely clear, but the patina, which resembles that on the top of the head of the woman I.N.747 (614) (here n. 49) may suggest an ancient cut. In any case, the head should be expected to belong to a statue if the identification is correct.

49 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 747 (614): Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 84–5, 87, 113 cat. 27 figs. 32 and 60. It is referred to in a letter published by Van Keuren (‘Unpublished documents’, 107–9 with figs. 41–2), which further testifies to its origin in the tomb. Van Keuren tentatively identifies her as Licinia Crassi, a daughter of Licinius Crassus known from the altar CIL 6. 311727 (= 41071). However, given that the portrait was set up at about the same time as Scribonia’s and shows a woman of approximately the same age, this is hardly possible (also note that Boschung dates the altar later than Van Keuren: see n. 45 above). Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 754 (635), is attributed on Boschung’s grounds (see n. 37 above). Poulsen had tentatively identified her as Claudia Antonia, wife of Cn. Pompeius Magnus Minor (Poulsen, Portraits, 111 no. 74 pls. 128–9, followed by Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 85, 114 cat. 32 fig. 65; cf. Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 286), but again little difference in age between her and her alleged mother-in-law is visible, even though she was only eleven or twelve years old at her marriage in 41. Both heads cannot definitively be attributed to statues as the first is broken at the neck and the second is made for insertion in such a way that it could also have fitted a herm. If Boschung is correct in suggesting that only ancestors received busts or herm portraits (Footnote ibid., 286), they should both have belonged to statues.

50 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 735 (601): Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 273–4, 284, 286 figs. 18–21; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 84, 113 cat. 25 fig. 58; Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 106. The very straight cutting line of the neck and its ancient (?) patina suggest that it may have been deliberately cut, like Frugi’s probably was (see n. 48 above).

51 The style of the head is Claudian (Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 273–4), giving a date that would fit well with that of his death.

52 Kragelund (‘Emperors’, 196) even considers that the portrait usually thought to represent his father (IN 734) actually shows Pompeius. This is possible, as conventions of portraiture would allow the head to depict a twenty-year-old as well as an older man (especially in the Julio-Claudian period, men could be depicted as rather youthful throughout their life – as Augustus’ portraits demonstrate – while young men could be given more dignitas by depicting them as mature as their age allowed without looking ridiculous).

53 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 733 (597). The suggestion that the head belonged to a bust rather than a statue is based on the assumption that Pompey was treated in the same way as the other Republican ancestors: see Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 286; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 81–4, 113 cat. 24 figs. 30–1, 57; Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 54 fig. 1. Yet, in my view, it cannot be ruled out that the head belonged to a statue, not least since it was cut down in the same way as the heads of Frugi pontifex and the boy (here nn. 48 and 50).

54 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 736 (602): Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 266–8, 285 figs. 6–7; ditto Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 106–7 with n. 237; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 84, 114 cat. 33 fig. 66.

55 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 737 (603) and 738 (604). Their hairstyle points to the 30s BCE (Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 265–8 with figs. 1–5); that is, roughly to the time when the father of Crassus Frugi was adopted. Boschung tentatively identifies the two as Scribonia, wife of Octavian, and Scribonia, wife of Sex. Pompeius (Footnote ibid., 285–6), on the assumption that the two Scribonias were sisters. However, in reality Scribonia Octaviani was the aunt of Scribonia Sex. Pompeii, and of roughly the same generation as Pompeia. If we were to accept that the resemblance between the two young women is more a matter of ideology than blood relationship, they could be Scribonia Sex. Pompeii and Pompeia Magna, daughter of Pompeia and grandmother of Scribonia Crassi Frugi. Yet it can also not be excluded that they show the same person. Cf. also Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 84, 114 cat. 34–5 figs. 67–8; Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 74 figs. 10–11.

56 Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 749 (655); Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 276–82, 284–5 figs. 24–6; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 85, 113 cat. 26 fig. 59.

57 These are the portrait of a woman dated to the Tiberian period (Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 742 (606); Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 271; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 114 cat. 29 fig. 62) and the roughly contemporary portrait of a boy (Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek I.N. 744 (631); Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 274 figs. 22–3; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 114 cat. 30 fig. 63).

58 Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 106, 121 doc. 37.

59 See esp. Flower, Ancestor Masks.

60 On the Licinii’s ostentatious pride in their ancestry, see also Footnote ibid., 257–8; Kragelund, ‘Emperors’.

61 There are clear signs of damnatio memoriae on the altar of Calpurnius Crassus Frugi Licinianus and Agedia Quintina: see n. 46 above; Kragelund, ‘Emperors’, 206–7 and Kragelund, ‘Shadows’, 33.

62 Such restriction was the result of Cn. Calpurnius Piso pater’s trial of 20 CE for treason. See Eck et al., Senatus consultum, esp. 195–7, and Flower, Forgetting, 133–8, on the senatus consultum ll. 76–82. It is also possible that not all portraits found during the excavations have been identified. Boschung (‘Liciniergrab’, 273 n. 67) thinks that a male head mentioned by G. Fiorelli (NSc (1885), 75) is not that identified here as Frugi because of a discrepancy in height, and must therefore be lost.

63 The role of women in the funerary realm deserves a separate and full treatment that cannot be provided here. For the orations see: Pepe, ‘Fama’; Tylawsky, ‘Genealogy’; Valentini, ‘Funerali femminili’. For women as ‘ancestors’ in other contexts see Flower, ‘Women’.

64 Ditto Kragelund, ‘Shadows’, 38. As Kragelund further notes (p. 34), her burial in the tomb may have resulted from the impossibility or undesirability of being buried in her husband’s familial tomb as he and her son-in-law were both killed by the Flavians. For the family stemma cf. also Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, stemmata 22 and 38.

65 Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 87 with n. 137.

66 According to CIL 6.31729, the bust was found in July 1889, that is after the official excavations on the site had ended but while building activities were still going on. See Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 109–13. Kragelund et al. (Licinian Tomb, 21, 38, 104) mistake the bust for a cinerary urn. The date for the now-lost bust is also suggested by the title clarissima femina, which was only introduced in the Antonine period (Raepsaet-Charlier, ‘Clarissima’, 196). For the freedmen see the lists in Boschung, ‘Liciniergrab’, 263 n. 38; Kragelund, ‘Shadows’, 39 n. 9.

67 Cf. Chapter 1 for an analysis of their design and imagery.

68 NSc (1885), 43 (Rl. Lanciani/L. Borsari). For its date see Chapter 1 n. 204.

69 Their lengths vary between 1.27 and 1.55 m. Children were sometimes buried in larger sarcophagi than necessary to fit their body, but the opposite case, of a small sarcophagus used for an adult is not attested. Cf. Huskinson, Children’s Sarcophagi, 2; Dimas, Kindersarkophage, 11–12.

70 MNR I8, 1 (1985) 211–14 no. iv,14 (M. Sapelli); Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116–18 cat. 60 pls. 45.1, 47.2–3; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 15. This casket must have been used for at least two burials, as the double clamp holes on the short sides demonstrate (cf. Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, pls. 47.2–3).

71 Lehmann and Olsen, Dionysiac Sarcophagi, 17–18, 45–7 figs. 16–18; Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116 n. 613; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 18.

72 Lehmann and Olsen, Dionysiac Sarcophagi, with figs. 19–22; Waelkens, Dokimeion, 26–7; Ward-Perkins, ‘Workshops’, 208–9; Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116 n. 613; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 17.

73 Matz, ASR 4.2, 180–2 no. 73 pls. 81.1, 83, 84.1; MNR I8,1 (1985) 262–5 no. vi,3 (L. Musso); Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116 n. 613; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 16 (51 x 219 x 78 cm).

74 It measures 104 x 217 x 114 cm. Ward-Perkins, ‘Workshops’, 216–19 figs. 8, 22; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 20; Zanker and Ewald, Myths, 315–18 doc. 10. The date of the sarcophagus is disputed. As Herdejürgen (Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116 n. 613) observes, the coin only provides a terminus ante quem non for the burial. Her date of 170–80, accepted by Zanker and Ewald (Myths, 315–18), may, however, be slightly too late (cf. Footnote ibid., fig. 79, where the sarcophagus is dated to around 170).

75 Matz, ASR 4.3, 350–1 no. 199; Ward-Perkins, ‘Workshops’, 223–8 figs. 7, 29–34; Herdejürgen, Stadtrömische und italische Girlandensarkophage, 116 n. 613; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112 cat. 19.

76 Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 77–80; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, cat. 12. On the sarcophagus, cf. Schauenburg, Eroten-Sarkophage, 65 no. 19 pl. 18. Østergaard (‘Licinian sarcophagi’, 55–7) tentatively identifies a different cupid sarcophagus as the one found in the first chamber. The case is not entirely clear, but does not matter much in our context. The reason for its deposition in the first chamber – if this is in fact where it was found – is not clear, especially since it would easily have fit into the second chamber.

77 Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 92–101; Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112–3 cat. 21–23. Whether the ‘third chamber’ was actually closed and covered or an open-air space between the other two chambers is unclear from the documentation. The assumption that excavations were not finished rests on an application for an excavation permit dating after the three final sarcophagi were found, and on the missing western wall in Lanciani’s plan. Yet new excavations were never taken up due to the limited prospects of finding anything worthwhile (Van Keuren, ‘Unpublished documents’, 111–13), and the ‘third chamber’ might as well have been an open ala (cf. Mausoleum 75 in the Isola Sacra discussed below).

78 For the Ariadne sarcophagus, see also Matz, ASR 4.3, 386–8 no. 216 pls. 225.1, 226–7, 228.1, 230.1–2.

79 For the various suggestions, cf. Kragelund et al. (eds.), Licinian Tomb, 112–13 on cat. 21–2. Ward-Perkins (‘Workshops’, with a suggested date in the 170s), followed by Wrede (Senatorische Sarkophage, 38–9), who proposes a date around 180, and Herdejürgen (‘Via Latina’, 214 n. 29), who prefers 200–10, argued that the two caskets must have been produced in the same workshop and at the same time because of their quality of workmanship and the use of Thasian marble, which he thought to be rare. However, the style of the two reliefs is rather different and does not support a common date, and Thasian marble has now been shown to have been used much more widely (Van Keuren, ‘Mythological sarcophagi’, 196–204; Russell, Economics, see index), including also for the Childhood of Dionysus sarcophagus from our tomb (cf. n. 75). While it is possible that they all come from the same workshop working with Thasian marble, a common date cannot be established in this way. For the most convincing argument on the date of Dionysius’ Indian triumph, cf. Matz, ASR 4.2, 218–20; 231–3 no. 95 pls. 116–20, who gives a date of 170–80; Zanker and Ewald, Myths, 329–34, also 170–80.

80 Wrede, Senatorische Sarkophage, 16, 38–9. On the consuls, see PIR2 C 295 and 317.

81 No daughter is attested for either of the two brothers, but this does not necessarily mean that they had none.

82 For a discussion of the family’s prosopography, see Hofmann-Löbl, Calpurnii, 303–6, with Dondin-Payre, ‘Longevité’; Raepsaet-Charlier, ‘Cornelia’; Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, 171–4 on nos. 178–9, 247–9 on no. 280, with stemma 38; Settipani, Continuité, 90–3, 107, 110.

83 Settipani, ‘Prosopographie’. If his wife Cornelia Cethegilla remarried (after his death), this may explain why her cinerary altar was found at Tellenae. See De Rossi, Tellenae, 77–9 no. 46 figs. 157–60 (= AE, 1967, 57). The consul may well have ordered and set up the sarcophagus shortly after taking over the tomb, still planning to be buried there with his wife. It is also tempting to think that it was his wife, a member of the Cornelii, who famously continued inhumation through the years when everyone else preferred incineration, who inspired the change in burial custom. Nevertheless, given that she herself was incinerated, this is probably taking speculation too far.

84 According to Settipani, Continuité, 93. The children’s sarcophagi would obviously belong to deceased children, while the Dionysiac of adult length but limited height and depth may have belonged to a predeceased first wife or brother. This generation, which obviously must have existed, is largely unknown to us.

85 See CIL 14.2700–7, with the tomb’s description on p. 269.

86 Alföldy, Studi, 125–43; LTURS I (2001), 161–2 s.v. Asiniorum sepulcrum (M. G. Granino Cecere). Alföldi rightly stresses the unusually large dimensions of the tumulus (c. 25 m in diameter) and points to the fact that Drusus, Agrippina’s son with Tiberius, is mentioned first among the dedicants (p. 138). Feraudi-Gruénais (‘Ewigkeit’, 148 n. 30) thinks that the continued use of this tumulus hinged on the family’s imperial relations, but as the other examples here discussed demonstrate, this is not necessarily the case.

87 CIL 6.31714, cf. p. 4778; LTUR IV (1999), 289 s.v. sepulcrum: Gallonii (E. Papi); Granino Cecere in Adembri et al., ‘Hercules Sospitalis’, 170–5. For the reconstruction of the inscription, see also Piso, ‘Praetorianerpräfekt’, 176–8.

88 Most scholars regard him as the prefect’s adoptive son, but see Granino Cecere (in Adembri et al., ‘Hercules Sospitalis’, 173–5) and Piso (‘Prätorianierpräfekt’), who argue that the sequence of names rather suggests a biological son who was later adopted after his father fell from favour. Hesberg (Grabbauten, 110) mistakes the inscription for that of the prefect.

89 Ditto Hesberg, Grabbauten, 109–10. Unfortunately, the monument cannot be identified as long as no measurements of the fragments are published that would allow us to reconstruct the diameter of the monument, since there were several round tombs between Porta del Populo and the Tiber, most of which are now destroyed: Messineo, Via Flaminia, 9–53.

90 The family line is impossible to reconstruct, but the name of Gallonius is very rare, and an equestrian C. Gallonius attested under Caesar is generally regarded as an ancestor of the second-century Gallonii. Should our Gallonius be the prefect’s biological son, the monument could have belonged to an adoptive grandfather, as the prefect was a hominus novus from Dalmatia (PIR2 M 249); Granino Cecere in Adembri et al., ‘Hercules Sospitalis’, 165–76; Piso, ‘Prätorianierpräfekt’, passim, and 270–1 on his nomenclature. Attribution to the Gallonii may be further supported by the existence of a villa further out on the via Flaminia that belonged to the same family: Adembri et al., ‘Hercules Sospitalis’.

91 According to Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Did. 1.1–2, this great-grandfather’s name was Salvius Iulianus, who is identified by some with the consul of 148 (e.g. Griesbach, Villen und Gräber, 23 n. 214). However, as Settipani (Continuité, 385 n. 9) has noted, this is impossible, since Didius Iulianus was born either in 133 or in 137, and this consul was more likely the emperor’s grandfather. I cannot see any reason why we should doubt, as Griesbach does, that the family had a villa nearby, and that Didius Iulianus was buried precisely where he would have planned to be buried had he not become emperor.

92 E.g. T. Mussidius Pollianus (suff. 40 or 43/44) and his son, who were buried in a tomb near the Theatre of Marcellus: CIL 6.41072 and 41073 (cf. Eck, ‘Miscellanea consularia’, 235–8 no. 5; Faßbender, Untersuchungen, no. 875.1–2); Sex. Pedius Hirrutus, who died in the Trajanic period, and his son Sex. Pedius Hirrutus Licinius Pollio, who died in office as consul suffect in 158: CIL 6.1485 and 1486 with pp. 3142, 4704–5.

93 CIL 6.1419 (= 41224); Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 34–5 fig. 19, with bibl.

94 Footnote Ibid., 125–6 with bibl.

95 The comparison is also drawn by Bentz, ‘Licinian tomb’, 77. On the tomb, see Brizio, ‘Scoperte’; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 126–30; Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 237–40 (who thinks the tomb was a hypogeum and misses the two-step extension), all with further bibl.

96 Rausa, Pirro Ligorio, 63–5; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 132–3, with bibl.

97 De Rossi, Bovillae, 274 no. 262 figs. 458–67; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 132. It must be admitted that continued use, and use by the same family, cannot be established with certainty here.

98 Armellin, ‘Sepolcro a tempietto’, 85–95; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 36–7, 130–1 fig. 20. While the owners remain anonymous, the size and opulence of the late antique villa as well as the treatment of the tomb clearly point to a powerful and long-standing family.

99 On senatorial vita humana sarcophagi showing several generations, see Chapter 1 pp. 48–9.

100 It is important here to distinguish between the tituli from the façades and inscriptions from sarcophagi, cinerary urns and altars, or statue monuments, which do not necessarily attest to the foundation of a tomb but to its varied usage at different times in its history.

101 Licinius Crassus Frugi pontifex is not a homo novus, but his stirps was founded by his father, who himself was adopted by M. Licinius Crassus (cos. 30 BCE). This may have suggested to Frugi pontifex that a new era had started for the family. Equally, the Acilii Glabriones family line goes far back into Republican times. However, the foundation of a new tomb could have been triggered by either of two causes, or even a combination of both: M’. Acilius Glabrio (cos. 91), was murdered on the order of Domitian, and it is possible that his son decided subsequently to discontinue burial in the ancestral tomb. There is uncertainty as to whether the Acilii Glabriones and Acilii Aviolae of the time formed one or two family branches; if they were indeed two, it would have been the consul of 91 who started one of them. For a discussion of possible stemmata, see Dondin-Payre, Acilii Glabriones, 90–2; Settipani, Continuité, 169–75, and Settipani, Continuité addenda, 14–15.

102 Edmondson (‘Family relations’, 193 with table 7.1, 216 with table 7.9) also found little difference comparing the two methods for his epitaphs from Roman Lusitania.

103 My figures differ from those of Saller and Shaw, since they did not limit their calculation to the main tomb tituli.

104 See Davies, Death and the Emperor, 107–8, for the inscription. Cf. Chapter 2 for the tomb.

105 See above, nn. 32–3, 86, 93.

106 On the Mussidii: above n. 92. On the Appii: Faßbender, Untersuchungen, no. 780.1–2; CIL 6.1348–9, pp. 3141, 3805, 4684; LTURS I (2001) 137–8 s.v. Sex. Appii Severi praedium (A. Bianchi).

107 This understanding is mainly based on Pliny, NH 35.2, but Pliny seems to exaggerate here. Cf. Flower, Ancestor Masks, 263–9, on evidence for imagines maiorum in the high and later empire.

108 Taylor, ‘Freedmen’; Mouritsen, ‘Freedmen and freeborn’. It may be argued that such conclusions cannot necessarily be supported by prosopography alone, and figures may actually be lower. However, where we also have supporting contextual evidence, as is the case at Ostia or in the Isola Sacra, these figures appear to be at least roughly convincing. Petersen (Freedman, esp. 193–5) argues that many non-elite tombs, including those in the Isola Sacra, are too readily taken as belonging to freedmen, and should not be used in order to determine typically libertine tastes and habits. While I applaud her caution against stereotyping freedmen, I believe that the evidence shows us a libertine milieu in which not every individual has to be a former slave, but where freeborn and freed lived (and died) closely together, shared the same tombs and intermarried. The following discussion will further support my view.

109 I am going to use here the English term ‘family’ to designate individuals who are related by blood, marriage or adoption, while the Latin term familia includes slaves and freedmen.

110 Zanker, ‘Freigelassene’; Kockel, Porträtreliefs; Borg, ‘Aufsteiger’; George, ‘Family imagery’; Borg, ‘Social climber’, all with further bibl.

111 Arguably, the idea is most obvious in the relief of the Servilii (here Figure 3.8), where the son (in toga and with bulla) is twice designated as filius, his father explicitly called pater and his mother uxor: Kockel, Porträtreliefs, 141–2 no. H 6 pls. 51b, 52a–c; Borg, ‘Social climber’, 27 fig. 1.2. For the suggestion that the dextrarum iunctio scheme was originally invented by and for freedmen to signify a (legal) marriage before it was later taken over into the marriage imagery of the upper classes, see Reinsberg, Vita-Romana-Sarkophage, 75–85, esp. 81–2.

112 George, ‘Family imagery’, 40–1. Mouritsen, ‘Families of Roman slaves’, 141–3, even sees this aspect as the most important one. On the emotional aspects of burial generally, see also Hopkins, Death, 201–55, and Hope, ‘Roman identity’, 113–14, but with a different trajectory.

113 On the precarious state of slave families, see Rawson, ‘Family life’, esp. 78–82; Mouritsen, ‘Families of Roman slaves’, 137–41; Mouritsen, Freedman, 5. Perry (Freedwoman) has much on the legal situation and how Roman society viewed female slaves and freed women, but not much on their families (‘family’ and ‘children’ are even missing from the subject index).

114 Calza, Ritratti, 53 nos. 76–7 pl. 45; Sinn, Grabdenkmäler II, 34–5 cat. 12 figs. 33–4; Liverani, ‘Iconografia imperiale’, 166–7; Fejfer, Roman Portraits, 118–19. Note that the six panels are strikingly similar to the stucco relief portraits on the six pillars in the ‘Basilica Sotterranea’ at Porta Maggiore, which was perhaps the tomb of the Statilii family: see esp. Bendinelli, ‘Monumento sotterraneo’, 796–803 pls. 39–40, 42.1. Sinn and Freyberger (Grabdenkmäler II, 24–6 with 43–5 cat. 4 pls. 5, 7, 65.4) consider that the male aedicula bust from the Haterii mausoleum may depict an ancestor or patron of the tomb’s founder.

115 Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 48. Cf. Footnote ibid., 56, where Kaser explains an alleged decrease in family tombs and increase in hereditary tombs in the same way.

116 The situation is more difficult to assess for senatorial tituli since, unlike the vast majority of freedpeople’s cases, it is not always clear whether the commemorators, at least when they were kin, are also intended to be buried in the same tomb, an assumption that underlies the numbers presented here.

117 Petersen (Freedman, 199, 202) equally stresses the significance of reference to family in tituli.

118 CIL 6.1881; Boschung, Grabaltäre, 80 no. 67; Faßbender, Untersuchungen, no. 171. This case is a good example of the difficulties involved in Saller and Shaw’s approach of counting only individual relationships (as noted by Martin, ‘Construction’). Applying their methodology, we end up with nuclear family relations of parents and children only, and miss the fact that we are dealing with a three-generational tomb already at the start.

119 This view is too commonplace to cite examples, but is explicitly supported even by Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 259, 262; Eck, ‘Rechtsquelle’, 79–80.

120 Digest 11.7.6 pr (Ulpian 25 ad ed.), transl. Watson. Similarly: Codex Justinianus 3.44.6 (Alexander Severus). Cf. Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 49, 75; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 138, 158–9. Kaser’s explanation, that the jurists and emperors had been hostile to the idea of a family tomb is, however, without foundation. Rather, the ruling must have aimed at securing an orderly use of the tomb and protection of the rights (and spaces) of legal heirs. Eck (‘Rechtsquelle’, 79) believes that the ruling had little effect on actual practice. Yet archaeology suggests otherwise (see discussion below at nn. 150 and 204). Moreover, his reasoning verges on being circular since his conclusion is based on the formula on tomb tituli, which he reads as if they were comprehensive legal documents. As with the formula that denies heirs burial in a tomb (on which see below), we must reckon with abbreviated phrases. That, in many tombs, some of the urns provided were never used can hardly be explained by all freedmen erecting their own new tombs – even when many will have aspired to – as not all of them (or their descendants) will have had the financial means to do so. Where we find empty urns but later inhumations, subsequent heirs may have preferred inhumation over incineration.

121 This is not strictly true, as there is evidence for slaves having slaves of their own called vicarii (Weaver, ‘Vicarius and Vicarianus’; Weaver, Familia Caesaris, 200–6). Nevertheless, this must have been rare, and is irrelevant in our context as they were not legally in a position to set their slaves free.

122 Bodel, ‘Columbaria to catacombs’, 213. For funerary benefactions in general, see esp. Schrumpf, Bestattung, 138–44.

123 The same observation made by Bodel, ‘Columbaria to catacombs’, 212 with n. 72, 214 with n. 77. See also the cupa Isola Sacra tomb 60b: Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 79. We need to keep in mind that such small monuments are normally situated within a small plot of land belonging to the tomb, but these areas would not be able to cater for many more burials either: for documented examples, see also Baldassarre et al., ‘Necropoli dell’Isola Sacra’; Angelucci et al., ‘Sepolture e riti’; Steinby, Via Triumphalis.

124 Liebs, ‘Ewiges Gedenken’, esp. 55–6 on CIL 6.10701; 57 on CIL 6.13832. Cf. Crook, Law, 136; Hope, Roman Death, 172. The substitution of children by freedmen is clear from instances where the manumission is made dependent on the lack of a son: Ulpian, Ad Sabinum XIX: Digest 40.4.7.

125 Liebs, ‘Ewiges Gedenken’, 55 on CIL 2.4332 (from Tarragona); 58 on CIL 6.12133 and the epitaph of C. Popilius Heracla. See also Footnote ibid., 52–3 for other types of provision for long-term commemoration.

126 For age at manumission, see Mouritsen, Freedman, 34–5, 188–90, 192–4, with bibl.

127 For slaves freed and made heirs in order to avoid insolvency, see Champlin, Final Judgments, 137.

128 As Wallace-Hadrill (‘Tomb as house’) has pointed out, these tombs do not really look like houses at all. He does admit, however, that there might still be some association with houses. As the term is well established, I shall continue to use it as a convenient shorthand. I shall further use the term ‘terraced tombs’ for what German scholarship calls ‘Reihengräber’ or ‘Fassadengräber’, house tombs built so close to each other that they resemble, to some extent, the terraced houses of today.

129 Calza, Isola Sacra, 84, 85, 113–17, 170–1, 345–6 figs. 32, 46–9, 84 pl. 4; Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 71–4; Petersen, Freedman, 203–10; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 122–7, with further bibl.

130 Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 123–5 nos. 106 and 107.

131 Footnote Ibid., 126 no. 108.

132 The tomb’s founders also stress that they dedicated Servanda’s burial place de suo, probably indicating that it was not a formal obligation but their generosity that made them do so. A similar case is Tomb 93 in the same necropolis, where the titulus is lost but the (female) patron was honoured with a large altar in front of the central niche of the rear wall: Petersen, Freedman, 217 with fig. 135; cf. Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 54–7; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 122–7. It is probably no coincidence that patrons commemorated in their freedpeople’s tombs are often women, who may have lost their husband before their death and did not have any (surviving) children with whom they could be buried.

133 Fittschen and Zanker, Kinderbildnisse, 125–6 n. 134 pls. 130–1.

134 E.g. Champlin, Final Judgments, 131–5; now esp. Mouritsen, Freedman, 36–51; and conclusions below. For further examples from the Isola Sacra of dedications to patrons, see Petersen, Freedman, 196 and Appendix 2; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, nos. 252, 298 and 320. All but one name female patrons, and none of them comes from an identifiable tomb. Only these tituli are relevant in our context, while the additional small monuments dedicated to patrons only contain this one burial: Footnote ibid., nos. 21, 22, 51. For epitaphs from the city of Rome commemorating male patrons, see Perry, Freedwoman, 162–3.

135 Petersen, Freedman, 216–19.

136 See at n. 63 above.

137 For the bust format in freedmen’s reliefs, see also D’Ambra, ‘Ancestor’, 224–30.

138 For the tomb in general, see the following section. Herma does not self-identify as libertus, but this is typical for non-imperial liberti in the second century and, unlike his wife, no filiation is given for him. It is therefore generally acknowledged that he was a libertus.

139 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 166, 169–70, 203 figs. 180–6; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, figs. 475–81. Note that two marble portraits found in the tomb’s forecourt, showing Herma and his wife, are likely to have belonged to a life-size relief representation: Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 151, 186, 190–2.

140 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 170–1, 203–4 figs. 187–8: Herma’s patron C. Valerius?; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, figs. 470–2.

141 Esp. Champlin, Final Judgments, 133, 177–80.

142 This is also why it has been discussed frequently, albeit typically not in the wider context here considered: Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 255–78 nos. 9–28 pls. 16.9–22, 28; Eck, ‘Inschriften und Grabbauten’, 78–84; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 30–3, 79–85 nos. 36–57 figs. 23–41a, 117–18; Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 240–5. But cf. Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 135–9.

143 For the area, see Castagnoli, ‘Circo di Nerone’; Castagnoli, Vaticano; Liverani, Topografia; Liverani and Spinola, Necropoli Vaticana; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane.

144 On the tomb in general see Toynbee and Ward Perkins, St. Peter, pls. 12–13, 15, 30–1; Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 143–208; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 92–108; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 30–3, 45–6; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, 248–80 figs. 419–29. Feraudi-Gruénais (Inschriften, 31) and Eck (‘Rechtsquelle’, 73) think that the mother predeceased her children. This is possible, if not likely, although not because she is not a commemorator (they could all have died at the same time), but because her portrait shows her with a hairstyle that is somewhat earlier than the tomb: Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 190–3 nos. 3–4 figs. 232–3, 235–6, with a different explanation for the observation.

145 This is what suggests that their death instigated the foundation of the mausoleum. Cf. Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 152; Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 257–9 no. 11 pl. 17.11.

146 Asiaticus: Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 255–6 no. 9 pl. 16.9a. Castus: Footnote ibid., 260–1 no. 13 pl. 17.13; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 31–2, 80 no. 37 fig. 24. This alumnus may have died after Herma, as the inscription only mentions Herma’s donation of the burial space, not the burial itself, as in the case of Asiaticus.

147 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 256–7 no. 10; Eck, ‘Inschriften und Grabbauten’, 81 pl. 7b; Eck, ‘Rechtsquelle’, 77–8; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 31 (brother unlikely), 82 no. 48 fig. 36.

148 Note that the epitaph for another early burial, that in the arcosolium of the eastern wall of the annex room of a certain Dynatene who was commemorated by her husband C. Valerius Eutychas, explicitly states permission from Herma (permissu C. Valeri Haermaes patroni optimi): Eck, ‘Inschriften und Grabbauten’, 81 pl. 8b; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 31, 82 no. 46; Eck, ‘Rechtsquelle’, 78.

149 This donation or sale must have happened soon after Herma’s death, since the arcosolia were still free. Successus’ homonymous son was buried in the northwestern arcosolium in an inscribed marble sarcophagus that was then hidden by the inscription attesting the donation/sale (Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 262–3 fig. 18.15; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 32, 81–2 no. 45 fig. 32; Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 240–3 figs. 1–2). A very similar inscribed marble sarcophagus for a child, most likely another son of Successus, probably occupied the southwestern arcosolium (Footnote ibid., 244–5 fig. 4). This is why the built casket of a third son was set atop the sarcophagus of Herma’s alumnus in the southwest corner, or even replaced it (Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 255 n. 44, 264 no. 17 pl. 19.17a; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 32, 81 no. 44 fig. 31). The boy’s name, (C.?) Flavius Pompeius Secundus, may point to a relationship between the Pompeii and Flavia Olympias, as Eck (‘Inschriften und Grabbauten’, 83) notes, so that the friendship between Herma’s freedpeople and Pompeius Successus was not an arbitrary one.

150 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 261–3 nos. 14–15 pls. 18.14–15. Pace Eck (‘Rechtsquelle’, 79–80), who considers it possible that the burial of these externals was illegal, the clear spatial restriction of burials of Pompeii, the permission given by Philomelus and his wife, and the continuation of burials of Valerii in the same tomb, make it clear that the couple did not have a right to their own burial through the dedication on the titulus, but that they were heirs, and therefore at liberty to admit others into the tomb, especially since the burial of externals was not explicitly interdicted.

151 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 159; Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 263 no. 16 pl. 18.16; Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 245; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, fig. 414. It is usually assumed that Pompeia was Successus’ (one and only) wife, but given that the tomb was founded around 160, and Herma did not remarry or bury further relatives, it is perhaps likely that he did not survive his family for more than a decade or two. The accrual of the inheritance would then have happened around 180 at the latest (for a date in the late second or early third century, see Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 243–4, but without explanation), meaning that Pompeia would have survived a nineteen-year-old son by at least forty years. While this is not impossible, it may be more likely that she either was a second wife, or belongs to the next generation of heirs of this part of the tomb.

152 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 159; Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 269 no. 21 pl. 21.21; Stroszeck, ASR 6.1, 159 no. 377 pl. 39; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 106 fig. 61. The second, uninscribed sarcophagus seems to be otherwise unpublished.

153 Ditto Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 264 no. 17.

154 The second option is proposed by e.g. Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 263–4; Eck, ‘Rechtsquelle’, 81; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 136–7. The first option now seems to me at least as likely, since we are lacking epitaphs of the Valerii bridging the gap in our evidence to the late Valerii to be discussed shortly.

155 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 259–60 no. 12 pl. 17.12; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 32, 82 no. 47 fig. 35.

156 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 267–8 no. 20 pl. 20.20.

157 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 157, 159–60. Their suggestion that an anonymous strigilated sarcophagus with the Severan portraits of a couple stood in the centre of the tomb is probably an error. According to Zander (Necropoli sotto la Basilica, 91), it was found on the first fill of the tomb accumilated in the wake of the Constantinian building works, and would therefore come from elsewhere in the necropolis. For the gradual filling and destruction of the tomb, see Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 160–1. The Valerii attested by graffiti on the south wall (Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 264–5 pls. 20.18a–b; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 32, 84–5 nos. 54–7 figs. 41a–b) are likely to have died during the second century because they were cremated. Only in the very last phase of the tomb is there evidence for more anarchical burial practice.

158 Toynbee and Ward Perkins, St. Peter, 91–2; Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 159; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 104–5 fig. 60; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, fig. 428. For the sarcophagus, see also Andreae Jagdsarkophage, 183 no. 240 pl. 44.2.

159 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 192, 196 figs. 235–9; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 98 figs. 54–5.

160 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 196, 198 figs. 246–53; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 101 fig. 58; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, 124 figs. 186–8, 202).

161 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 196 figs. 240–2; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 102 fig. 56; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, 128 figs. 193–4; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, pl. 3b. For the gypsum bust fragments see Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 196 figs. 243–5, and Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 98 fig. 57.

162 On the tomb, see Calza, Isola Sacra, 69, 200–3, 287–9 figs. 104–6; Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 185–91; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 29–32; Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 119, 277–9 cat. B39 fig. 41 pl. 7.1.

163 Baldassarre et al. Necropoli di Porto, 185; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 30 no. 16GR.

164 No context for the titulus is reported (cf. Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 334–5 no. 334), but it was found in the same year as the tomb was excavated. Its belonging to the tomb is further suggested by the many Terentii commemorated inside it, including a C. Terentius Felix, and by the lack of Terentii elsewhere in the necropolis. The only exception is a dedication by C. Terentius Narcissus to his wife found in Tomb 87, which was otherwise only used by Varii, and has both tituli preserved: Footnote ibid., 122–7, esp. no. 109. Unlike the Varii tomb, Tomb 11 received its forecourt later, an opportunity to display a new titulus: cf. Tomb 16 (Footnote ibid., 34–8), and Tomb 94 (Footnote ibid., 143–7) for a similar procedure, but also here on Tomb 75–76 below. The term frater naturalis suggests that both Eutych[ian]us and his brother were former slaves.

165 Footnote Ibid., 31–2 no. 27: D(is) M(anibus). Terentius Bitalis Terenteae Kallotyceni et filis suis fecit. Si qit in aeo sarcofago interet corpus sibe ossa, inferet aerario Saturni s(estertium) XXX m(ilia) n(ummum).

166 Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 188–91 with fig. 68; Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 278 with pl. 7.1. On the decorated item, see also Amedick, Menschenleben, 12–13, 20, 136 no. *84 pls. 3.2, 4.1–2.

167 Meinecke (Sarcophagum posuit, 278) dates the female hairstyles to the 190s or even later, while Amedick (Menschenleben, 136 no. *84) dates them to 152–60. The likely date is in between. The closest parallels to the hairstyle of the reclining woman are found in the portraits of Lucilla and Crispina, while the seated woman’s very low bun equally suggests a mid to late Antonine date (cf. Fittschen, Bildnistypen). The portrait of the man could easily be Severan, but does not have to be.

168 Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 30–1 no. 26. As he notes, the abbreviations used in the inscriptions allow for a reading according to which Lucifer’s colliberti would be heirs of Felix and his wife, and Lucifer the recipient of the dedication. Yet, considering the inscription on the other pseudo-sarcophagus just discussed; the oddity it would create by leaving the dedicants anonymous; and the fact that Lucifer was in a position to donate burial space to externals, and probably within the same tomb or its forecourt (Footnote ibid., 323–4 no. 319), this is unlikely.

169 Three steps lead down into the precinct: Calza, Isola Sacra, 289.

170 Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 119, 278–9. She believes that the adolescents could be the tomb founder’s children mentioned in the titulus. But she does not consider the second titulus, which shows that this is impossible chronologically.

171 As long as the date of the forecourt remains unclear, it cannot be excluded entirely that it was added later, in the Severan period, when the ground level along the street was raised and the earliest cupae were covered by later tombs (Baldassarre, ‘Necropoli’, 129–30; Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 117, 132; Angelucci et al., ‘Sepolture e riti’, 87; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 22). If this were the case, the history of Terentii using the tomb would move well into the third century, while still starting at least with Vitalis’ pre-190 dedication.

172 Boschung, Grabaltäre, 71–2 nos. I 222–7 (= cat. 633, 696, 824, 919 (pl. 51), 955 (pl. 56), 956), with a different interpretation of the records than proposed here.

173 CIL 6.19861.

174 CIL 06.26551. It is unclear whether they were his freedmen or kin.

175 CIL 6.19957.

176 If another altar that one C. Iulius Theophilus dedicated to his freeborn wife Iulia Procula referred to the same person, this transition would have occurred no earlier than the mid-Flavian period, as the woman’s hairstyle closely resembles that of Iulia Titi. Since it was found in the Lateran area, it is perhaps unlikely that the two Theophili were the same man, although it is possible that he sold his share in the plot to the three Julii mentioned when he established his own plot in the ager Vaticanus. On the altar: CIL 6.20645; NSc (1888), 394–5 (G. Gatti); Boschung, Grabaltäre, 79 cat. 16 pl. 2 (who does not consider it in the context of the Iulii plot); Kleiner, Altars, 146–7 no. 34 pl. 21.

177 CIL 6.9344.

178 CIL 6.19833.

179 According to CIL 6.9328, Anicetus set up an altar for his wife Iulia Tyche, daughter Primigenia and himself, and was later commemorated there by C. Octavius Apto and Iulia Aphrodite, who may have been his daughter and son-in-law. CIL 6.8734 refers to Anthus’ daughter, who set up an altar in their burial plot for her husband Philetaerus, an imperial freedman and praeposito ab auro gemmato, herself and their liberti.

180 CIL 6.10243; Gordon, Album, 28–31 no. 172 pl. 75a; Champlin, Final Judgments, 177 (with erroneous initial consular date of 13 BCE); http://gams.uni-graz.at/o:epsg.343 (last accessed 16/01/2017) for a German translation. On some legal aspects, see Schwind, ‘Thesaurus’, 179–80. All three steps in the history of the tomb are dated by consular dates. I am most grateful to John Bodel for discussing the inscription with me.

181 CIL 6.29962 equally has the plural, but is too fragmentary to allow for further assessment.

182 E.g. CIL 6.1825 (pp. 3225, 3818), 10701 (p. 3910), 10848 (pp. 3507, 3910), 13195, 22348, 26940 (p. 3918).

183 Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 26–7.

184 CIL 6.41307 (= AE 1974, 00038); Manacorda, ‘Ex Ascia’, 346–52; Faßbender, Untersuchungen, 235 no. 348.

185 The prominent location close to the city and between via Appia and Latina (the inscription was found in the Vigna Codini) makes it unlikely that he simply usurped a ruin. He may actually have been another case of an equestrian descendant of freedpeople, like the ones discussed in the next section. That he originates from a freedman milieu is suggested by his own nomen, deriving from the town Salvia; his wife’s cognomen, misspelt as Fyrme; and the dedication to their liberti. Cf. Eck, ‘Freigelassene’, 15, on the name and its likely origins from an enfranchised slave of the Urbs Salvia.

186 CIL 6.19926 (= Rome, Museo Nazionale Romano, Garden, inv. 983); Faßbender, Untersuchungen, 216 no. 292.

187 For tomb C4 and the following, see Heinzelmann, Nekropolen, 206–9; Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 27–8, 32, 134.

188 CIL 14.335. On this prestigious priesthood, see Saulnier, ‘Laurens Lavinas’; Scheid and Granino Cecere, ‘Sacerdotes’; Granino Cecere, ‘Laurentes lavinates’.

189 CIL 14.354, 468, 729–33; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 3–8, with further bibl.

190 It is not entirely clear whether Italicus is a conlibertus of Herma or perhaps his son.

191 D’Arms (‘Municipal notables’) thinks that the knight was the tomb’s founder and patron of the other Caesennii. Yet why, then, are all his alleged liberti Aulii while he is a Lucius? More importantly, D’Arms overlooks that the tomb titulus that contained the plot’s measurements does not mention him, while his inscription is on a sarcophagus. That he descends from freedmen is further suggested by his tribus Palatina. Another knight, C. Laecanius Novatillianus, was buried around 230 in an ancestral tomb that may have been well over 100 years old at the time. His father does not seem to have belonged to the first two orders, but his own status is unclear. For details and bibliography, see Borg, Crisis and Ambition, 134.

192 Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 29–30, 75–9 nos. 21–35 figs. 13–22, 115–16. On the tomb, see Toynbee and Ward Perkins, St. Peter, 44–51 fig. 6 pls. 2, 10–11, 14, 20–1; Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen E–I, 93–121; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, 77–83 figs. 38–43 (their fig. 40 gives a beautiful idea of what the tomb looked like, but the cinerary urns are not all in their original place). The tomb has a terminus post quem through a brick stamp of 141: Footnote ibid., 118; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, 223–35 figs. 358–87.

193 Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 29, 77–8 no. 30 fig. 19. On the altar: Boschung, Grabaltäre, 33 n. 474, 111 no. 910; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, fig. 381.

194 Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen A–D, 39–59; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 26–7; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, 197–205.

195 Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 26, 78 no. 31 fig. 20. On the urn: Sinn, Marmorurnen, 20, 220–1 no. 533; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, fig. 198.

196 The altar is not prepared to receive the ashes of the deceased, so they must have had an urn somewhere in the tomb. It seems much less likely that Tullius Hermadion, who later set up his own urn in the central niche, moved the founders’ urn instead of that of their patron, and he obviously respected their altar in the centre of the space.

197 Unfortunately, no measurements of the niches have been published, and photographs are not entirely clear about whether the urn now stands inside the niche or in front of it; but it is clear that the lateral niche is too small for the urn, quite differently from the other cases: Apolloni Ghetti et al., Esplorazioni, pl. 2b (photo taken shortly after excavation); cf. Mielsch and Hesberg, Mausoleen A–D, fig. 100 and colour pl. 16; Liverani et al., Necropoli Vaticane, fig. 40 (actual presentation).

198 Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 78–9 nos. 33–4 fig. 22. Mielsch and Hesberg (Mausoleen E–I, figs. 100–1 and 106) probably show them in situ.

199 One might expect that they would have mentioned his permission if he had still been alive. The lateral position of these urns may confirm further that the founders’ urns occupied the two niches flanking their patron’s.

200 Hermadion Maior: Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 252–3 no. 6 pl. 15.6; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 26, 78 no. 32 fig. 21. The urn: Sinn, Marmorurnen, 20 n. 187; Zander, Necropoli di San Pietro, fig. 195. Hermadion Minor: Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 251–2 no. 5 pl. 15.5; Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 252–6 no. 6 figs. 8–9; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 26, 76–7 no. 26 fig. 12 (the secondary inscription on this slab is only from the late third or early fourth century).

201 This is not entirely clear from the descriptions of the situation: Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 253, quotes Ferrua’s original description.

202 His urn is dated to the later second century and could be later than the Caetennii urns. See Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 30, for a different view.

203 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 247–8, 253 no. 2 pl. 14.2; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 76 no. 24 fig. 15. It is unclear where the small tabula was originally affixed.

204 Eck, ‘Inschriften’, 252–3; Eck, ‘Inschriften und Grabbauten’, 77 pl. 5.5b; Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 77 no. 27 fig. 16. Eck argues in both aritcles for a third-century date for the two inhumation graves, but overlooks that Hieron is not evocatus Augusti, but evocatus Marco Aurelio. Unless we assume that he was already retired when he commissioned the epitaph, the latest date for it would be 180. Eck (‘Rechtsquelle’, 84) also thinks that Hermadion allocated these spaces to his friends illegally. However, rather than imagining rampant usurpation of burial space based solely on the a priori assumption that the tituli may give a full account of the legal situation, it is again far more plausible to accept the jurists’ ruling as valid already in the second century, and to see Hermadion as the legal heir who had the right to grant burial to externals.

205 Marriage bonds are also considered by Eck, ‘Rechtsquelle’, 84–5. None of the men’s wives is named anywhere. A tabula with which a M. Aurelius Filetus commemorates his wife Caetennia Proc(u)la was found in Mausoleum C, and may attest to a more direct relationship between Caetennii and Aurelii. However, as Papi asserts, there is no imprint in the walls of Mausoleum F that would suggest its provenance from there, so that it might have been removed from Mausoleum L, which was erected roughly at the same time as Caetennius Antigonus’ tomb, by M. Caetennius Proculus, to whom Proc(u)la may have been related: Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 75–6 no. 23; Papi, ‘Iscrizioni’, 257–9 no. 8 fig. 11. In any case, the epitaph illustrates the close relationships between Caetennii, Tullii and Aurelii. This also demonstrates that Toynbee and Ward Perkins (St. Peter, 46) give the wrong impression of usurpation and miss the point of what was going on when they state that the tomb was ‘invaded … by inhumation-burials’, when ‘(n)ew family names now appear’.

206 Eck (‘Inschriften’, 248–51 no. 4 pl. 15.4) argues for a third-century date based on the cognomen Nemesius.

207 Calza, Isola Sacra, 74, 329–4 figs. 22, 25; Baldassarre et al., ‘Necropoli dell’Isola Sacra’, 288–97 figs. 23–7; Baldassarre et al., Necropoli di Porto, 89–92; Lazzarini, Sepulcra, 91–100; Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 94–108 (R. Vainio); Cooley, Latin Epigraphy, 140–1.

208 Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 96–7 no. 82; transl. in Cooley, Latin Epigraphy, 140 no. 30.

209 Ditto R. Vainio in Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 95.

210 An inscribed sarcophagus lid or arcosolium cover probably commemorating a daughter of the main founder (Cocciea Secunda) and her husband M. Ulpius Domitus, who also appears in the main titulus, was found in the tomb but with no exact find spot specified: Footnote ibid., 98–9 no. 84. A mosaic inscription related to a fossa grave does not preserve the name: Footnote ibid., 98 no. 83.

211 Footnote Ibid., 100–1 no. 86. This wife’s name, Sabinia Attica, suggests the date.

212 Footnote Ibid., 103–5 nos. 90–1.

213 On the epitaph, see Footnote ibid., 98–9 no. 84. Since the nepos was already seventeen years old when he died, the term may indeed refer to a nephew rather than a grandson.

214 Footnote Ibid., 101–2 no. 87. As Vainio argues, Matidia must be Mindia Matidia Minor, and the inscription dated before her divination in 119.

215 Footnote Ibid., 102–3 no. 89.

216 Footnote Ibid., 105–6 no. 92; transl. in Cooley, Latin Epigraphy, 140 no. 31.

217 Ditto R. Vainio in Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 96.

218 Vainio (in Footnote ibid., 96) thinks that Agathias did remarry and Pius was his son. Yet why, then, were their names not inscribed? Vainio (Footnote ibid., 108) argues that his cognomen suggests free rather than servile birth.

219 Footnote Ibid., 108 no. 94.

220 Footnote Ibid., 107–8 no. 93; transl. in Cooley, Latin Epigraphy, 140 no. 32.

221 Had he and his descendants continued to use the tomb, we would expect him to put his name at least as prominently over the cella door as the names of the people who took over the right-hand wall.

222 Cf. Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 95–6, 99–100 no. 85.

223 See Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 37–60, 37–8, for the one source explaining the distinction, Digest 11.7.5 (Gai. 19 ad ed. prov.) and 6 pr. (Ulp. 25 ad cd.), which belong together, and n. 104 for the few further occurrences of the terms. As Kaser observes, even in this single source the distinction is blurred.

224 Footnote Ibid., 37–8.

225 Crook, Law, 136 with n. 176; Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 51; Champlin, Final Judgments, 177 with n. 33; Orlandi, ‘Heredes’, with examples in lists De and Df; Carroll, Spirits, 103; Bodel, ‘Columbaria to catacombs’, 213 with n. 74; Liebs, ‘Ewiges Gedenken’, 60 with n. 80; cf. Helttula (ed.), Iscrizioni, 155 no. 133 on Isola Sacra Tomb 100, where no reason for exclusion is specified.

226 For examples from Rome, see Orlandi, ‘Heredes’, 373–5.

227 Similar estimates are hard to obtain for Rome despite the lists provided by Orlandi (Footnote ibid., 362–72), with 207 and 93 cases, respectively, since the total number of tomb tituli (as opposed to inscriptions marking individual burial places) is unknown.

228 E.g. de Visscher (Droit, 101 n. 15) who points to two cases where the shorter formula is combined with the provision that the tomb must not go out of the family name (CIL 6.8456 and 22208). See also Crook, Law, 136; Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 42 with n. 123; Lazzarini, Sepulcra, 28 n. 56. For examples with more unusual and specific prescriptions to the same effect, see Liebs, ‘Ewiges Gedenken’, 54–6. The prescript demonstrates once more that, contrary to what has been suggested, the founders of these tombs obviously expected their mausolea to be used by later generations once all the individuals mentioned in the titulus had died; as we found to be the case with senatorial tituli, the list was hardly ever considered to be exclusive: ditto Parkin, ‘Life course’, 277. Edmondson (‘Family history’, 562) notes that ‘those named on a tomb’s façade do not necessarily reflect all those buried within’ and notices the ‘snapshot’ character of individual epitaphs (p. 367), but ironically recommends statistical approaches such as Saller and Shaw’s as a remedy.

229 Cf. nn. 16 and 115 above.

230 On these, see n. 240.

231 For an extensive discussion of the tituli and genealogies, cf. Silvestrini, Sepulcrum, 35–54; 80–2 with stemma fig. 30. G. Alföldy (CIL 6.41057 and p. 4783 on CIL 6.31761) and Raepsaet-Charlier (Prosopographie, 93–4 no. 77; 121–2 nos. 105–6; 161 no. 166; 442–3 no. 525; 590 no. 744 with stemma XI) disagree with Silvestrini on a few details but not in principle.

232 His foundation of a family tomb must probably be seen still in the context of the fierce competition of the late Republic, when we do find new senatorial tombs for members of established families. Moreover, his father was adopted by the last descendant of Licinius Crassus triumvir, while his natural father must have had a rather unremarkable career, and his grandfather, M. Pupius Piso Frugi (cos. 61 BCE), was himself adopted (for the complicated family histories, see Syme, ‘Frugi’; Syme, Roman Revolution, table 5). These circumstances may have contributed to the pontifex’s decision.

233 Smith, Clan.

234 Footnote Ibid., 144–63. See also the more comprehensive survey of Republican tombs with sarcophagi by Meinecke, Sarcophagum posuit, 7–26, 151–96 nos. R1–49, which confirms these conclusions.

235 On mythical founders, see Smith, Clan, 34–44.

236 Footnote Ibid., 48, on CIL 6. 1293. Cf. Courtney, Musa Lapidaria, 42–3, 228–9 no. 13.

237 Cf. Cicero, Off. 1.17.54–5 with Leg. 2.55; Smith, Clan, 47–8. As Smith does, scholars usually connect Cicero’s list of prominent tombs, including that of the Scipios in Tusc. 1.7.13, with his notion of gentilicial tombs. This is probably correct, although it has to be admitted that Cicero here does not use the term gens or one of its derivatives. For further literary examples, see Smith, Clan, 48. To these add examples listed in RE 13 (1910) 1186–8 s.v. gens (B. Kübler), incl. Suetonius, Nero 50: gentile Domitiorum monumentum; Valerius Maximus 9.2.1: sepulcrum Lutetiae gentes. Kübler (col. 1187), proposes that the sepulcrum familiare substituted for the sepulcrum gentilicium, and that in the latter also dependants could be buried. This rests on the jurists, esp. on Gaius Digest 11.7.5, but like the many scholars who followed him, Kübler overlooks that these sources refer to different classes in society.

238 CIL 11.1362: [Sex(to)(?)] Appuleio Sex(ti) f(ilio) | Gal(eria), | Sex(ti) n(epoti), Sex(ti) pro n(epoti), | Fabia Numantina | nato, ultimo gentis | suae. He is most likely PIR A 962, the consul of 14. See e.g. Raepsaet-Charlier, Prosopographie, 308–9 no. 353 stemma 13 with bibl.; Fasolini, ‘Ascrizione tribale’, 232.

239 ILS 7945 (= CIL 6.7649); totu here for totum. Cf. Noy, Jewish Inscriptions II, 329 no. 400. The other examples include CIL 3.14601; CIL 3.2963 with add. p. 1635; CIL 8.5656 (p. 963) (= 18916); CIL 8.7277 (p. 1848); CIL 8.7543. All are referred to in Kaser, ‘Grabrecht’, 43 n. 129.

240 Yet note that this did not necessarily exclude burial with close kin. Moreover, there appears to be a fluctuation in the popularity of communal or collective burial, which is likely to have been more common in the late first century BCE and first century CE, and from the mid-third century onwards, than it was in the second and early third centuries. For early collective tombs, see Borbonus, Columbarium Tombs, with bibl.; for the later ones, Borg, Crisis and Ambition, esp. 30–1, 72–121, 273–4, 277–8; for fluctuation, Galvano-Sobrinho, ‘Feasting’, esp. 135–7.

241 Nielsen, ‘Interpreting epithets’.

242 See Chapter 1 n. 256.

243 Mouritsen, Freedman, esp. 31–5, 136–59, 183–5, 194–205.

244 ‘Trickle-down’-effect models proposed in some previous scholarship have rightly been criticised by Petersen, Freedman, 96, 134; Borg, ‘Social climber’, 40. My view also differs from that of those who propose that the original patrons, when they designed their tituli, could not foresee the later use of the tomb (e.g. Hope, ‘Roof’, esp. 86–7). I much doubt that it was ever a goal to use tituli as a full record of who was (to be) buried within a tomb.

245 For the imitation of elite values in the early tomb reliefs, see Borg, ‘Aufsteiger’; Borg, ‘Social climber’. No systematic study of the use of portraits in tombs of whatever class exists, but both excavation reports from previous centuries and the statistical distribution of Roman portraits in general suggest that portraits were a common feature of wealthier tombs. For examples, see Calza, Isola Sacra on the Isola Sacra, or Bignamini and Claridge, ‘Claudia Semne’, with bibl. on the tomb of Claudia Semne. See also Chapter 1 pp. 32–5 for senatorial tombs.

246 See Kampen, Image; George, ‘Social identity’; Amedick, Menschenleben, for sarcophagi.

247 For the freedmen reliefs, see n. 110 above.

248 Saller and Shaw, ‘Tombstones’, 130; figures after Clauss, ‘Lebensalterstatistiken’, 404 with table 10.

249 Mouritsen, ‘Families of Roman slaves’, 142–3; Mouritsen, Freedman, 39.

250 In addition to the inscription from the consortium tomb discussed above (at n. 180), see e.g. CIL 6.9485 with Liebs, ‘Ewiges Gedenken’, 54–5: vivi sibi fecerunt suisque libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum, ne de nomine exiat nostrorum.

251 Cf. Mouritsen, Freedman, 37–51.

252 On these tombs, see most recently Galvano-Sobrinho, ‘Feasting’; Borbonus, Columbarium Tombs.

253 Petersen, Freedman, 162–3, 212–15, and elsewhere. Cf. also Feraudi-Gruénais, Inschriften, 25–42.

Figure 0

Figure 3.1 Tomb of the Scipios off the via Appia, updated plan by Lucia Domenica Simeone and Roberta Loreti

Figure 1

Figure 3.2 Sarcophagus of L. Cornelius Scipio Barbatus, around 280 BCE, copy in situ of the original casket

Figure 2

Figure 3.3 Reconstruction of the façade of the tomb of the Scipios based on recent research by the Sovrintendenza ai Beni Culturali di Roma Capitale

Figure 3

Stemma 1 Stemma of the Cornelii Scipiones and Cornelii Lentuli. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere; ††: violent death

Figure 4

Figure 3.4 Tumulus of the Plautii (first century CE) drawn by Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Figure 5

Stemma 2 Stemma of the Plautii. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere

Figure 6

Figure 3.5 Plan of the tomb of the Licinii and Calpurnii on via Salaria as recorded by Rodolfo Lanciani in his Forma Urbis Romae, location and close-up

Figure 7

Figure 3.6 Four altars from the Licinian tomb, Rome, Museo Nazionale delle Terme inv. 78163 (Cn. Pompeius Magnus), 78163 (L. Calpurnius Piso Frugi Licinianus and his wife Verania Gemina), 78161 (Calpurnia Lepida Orfiti), 78167 (Licinia Cornelia Volusia Torquata)

Figure 8

Stemma 3 Stemma of the Licinii and Calpurnii. Bold: individuals buried in the family tomb according to epigraphic evidence; regular: individuals likely buried in the family tomb; italics: individuals potentially buried in the family tomb or buried elsewhere; ††: violent death

Figure 9

Figure 3.7 Heads of the portrait statues, herm portraits and busts from the Licinian tomb: a) IN 749 (Crassus triumvir); b) IN 733 (Pompey the Great); c) IN 736; d) IN 738; e) IN 737; f) IN 741; g) IN 734 (Frugi pontifex?); h) IN 751 (Scribonia?); i) IN 747; j) IN 754; k) IN 735

Figure 10

Figure 3.8 Tomb relief of the Servilii family, early Augustan; Rome, Musei Vaticani, Museo Gregoriano Profano 10491

Figure 11

Figure 3.9 Funerary altar of the Iunii family, Trajanic; Rome, Museo Nazionale Centrale Montemartini 2886 (NCE 2969)

Figure 12

Figure 3.10 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H, around 160 CE) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, west wall

Figure 13

Figure 3.11 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, east wall

Figure 14

Figure 3.12 Mausoleum of C. Valerius Herma (Mausoleum H) in the necropolis underneath St Peter’s, distribution of named burials within the chamber

Figure 15

Figure 3.13 Mausoleum of the Terentii family (Isola Sacra Tomb 11), founded around 140 CE

Figure 16

Stemma 4 Changing ownership of a funerary precinct of Iulii near the first milestone of the via Appia as attested by permissions given for burial

Figure 17

Figure 3.14 Mausoleum of the Caetennii and Tullii (Mausoleum F, early Antonine) underneath St Peter’s, distribution of named burials within the chamber

Figure 18

Figure 3.15 Tombs 75–76 in the Isola Sacra necropolis of Portus (early second century CE), distribution of named burials within the precinct and chambers

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