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A New Roman Mosaic Pavement Found in Dorset

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

J. M. C. Toynbee
J. M. C. Toynbee
Affiliation:
Oxford
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Extract

The Roman polychrome mosaic, which forms the subject of this paper, came to light on 12th September, 1963, at the village of Hinton St. Mary in northern Dorset, 1½ miles north of Sturminster Newton. The field in which the pavement lies is the property of Mr. W. J. White, general engineer, blacksmith, and welder, who recognized as Roman the tesserae revealed by the postholes that were being dug for the foundations of a building near his forge. Mr. White immediately reported the discovery to the authorities of the Dorset County Museum, Dorchester, and invited them to direct the clearance of the whole mosaic with the help of a group of local archaeologists and amateurs. Mr. R. A. H. Farrar, of the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), also took part in the work of clearance; and the vertical photographs reproduced here, of which Mr. White holds the copyright, were taken at his request by the Commission with the aid of an 18-foot gantry.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 54 , Issue 1-2 , November 1964 , pp. 7 - 14
Copyright
Copyright ©J. M. C. Toynbee 1964. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Lysons, S., Reliquiae Britannico-Romanae I (1813)Google Scholar, pl. 5. For the present position as regards the Frampton pavements, see Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society LXXVIII, I956 (1957), 81–3.

2 Meates, G. W., Lullingstone Roman Villa (1955), pls. 3, 7.Google Scholar

3 Lysons, o.c. (n. 1), pl. 4.

4 ibid.

5 Lysons, o.c. (n. 1), pl. 7.

6 Teurnia mosaic: Egger, R., Teurnia (ed. 3, 1963), 35, fig. 7Google Scholar; Cologne spoon: Witte, F., Die liturgischen Geräte der Sammlung Schnütgen in Cöln (1913), pl. 13, fig. 9.Google Scholar

7 e.g. Cabrol, F. and Leclercq, H., Dictionnaire d'Archéologie Chrétienne et de Liturgie III, 1 (1948)Google Scholar, s.v. Chrisme, cols. 1481–4; JRS XVI (1926), 74.

8 ibid., 73–74.

9 e.g. Cabrol and Leclercq, o.c. (n. 7), cols. 1483–1492.

10 e.g. JRS XXII (1932), 11, pl. IV, no. 17 (bronze coin from the Siscia mint); Kähler, H., Rome and her Empire (‘Art of the World’ series, 1963), 212 (silver medallion, from the Ticinum mint, at Munich).Google Scholar

11 Brusin, G. and Zovatto, P. L., Monumenti paleocristiani di Aquileia e di Grado (1957), figs. 34–36, 92, 92a, pls. 3, 6.Google Scholar

12 Delbrueck, R., Die Consulardiptychen (1929), no. 47.Google Scholar

13 Delbrueck, R., Spätantike Kaiserporträts (1933), pl. 79.Google Scholar The letters Α and Ω flanking the monogram are invisible on photographs, but are said to exist on the original (Schweizerische Altertumskunde XXII, 1920, 26, n. 2). The Chi-Rho, flanked by Α and Ω, above the head of a child emperor being crowned by two senior emperors on a gem in Leningrad (Germania XIV, 1930, 38–39 with fig.; Delbrueck, o.c, pl. III, fig. 1) does not designate the boy as assimilated to Christ as His vice-gerent—if it did, the senior emperors would surely have been shown with it too: it simply means that the whole scene is taking place under the patronage of Christ, who looks down in symbolic guise, as it were from heaven, on the ceremony. Similarly, on the bronze roundel from Richborough depicting an emperor, probably Magnentius (Richborough IV, 1949, 140–1, pl. 42, no. 171), with a large Chi-Rho above his raised right hand (not, I think, held in his hand, as the text says, since there seems to be a gap between it and the fingers), the monogram merely indicates his Christian allegiance. The setting of the scene on the Leningrad gem, at any rate, would appear to be politico-historical. But neither on the gem nor on the roundel is the use of the Chi-Rho parallel to the use of it on the Geneva plate; and neither work supports the notion that the Dorset mosaic bust represents an emperor. (I should like to thank Mr. Martin Biddle, of Exeter University, for suggesting to me that the Leningrad gem ought to be mentioned in the context of the Hinton St. Mary pavement). A position similar to that of the Chi-Rho on the Leningrad gem, and a similar significance, must be assumed for the σωτήριον σημεῖον which Eusebius (Vita Constantini III, 3) describes as above (ὑπερκείμενον) the head of Constantine in a picture of him displayed at the entrance to the imperial residence. It is clear that in this passage, as in several others, Eusebius was thinking, not of the monogram, but of the Cross—erroneously, it seems, since Lactantius (De morte persecutorum XLIV, 5–6) states that Constantine's sign was the monogram; and it is the monogram, not the Cross, that normally appears in fourth-century Christian art and inscriptions. We cannot, of course, check the accuracy of Eusebius' description of the picture; and in any case, this passage offers no support to the view that the mosaic bust is that of Constantine.

14 Alföldi, M., Die constantinische Goldprägung (1963), pl. 5, no. 68.Google Scholar

15 Toynbee, J. M. C., Roman Medallions (1944), pl. 4, fig. 3.Google Scholar

16 e.g. G. V. Gentili, La villa erculia di Piazza Armerina (1962).

17 Il proprietario della villa romana di Piazza Armerina (1962).

18 Die Stiftermosaiken in der konstantinischen Suedkirche von Aquileia (1962).

19 Brusin and Zovatto, o.c. (n. 11), pl. 3.

20 ibid., 81, fig. 35.

21 Kaufmann, C. M., Handbuch der christlichen Archäologie (ed. 3, 1922), 396, fig. 184Google Scholar; Enciclopedia Cattolica VI (1951), pl. 2.

22 Morey, C. R. (ed. Ferrari, G.), The Gold-Glass Collection of the Vatican Library (1959), 75, no. 460, pl. 36.Google Scholar

23 Aquileia Nostra XXIV–XXV (1953–54). on p. 119.

24 Wilpert, J., Die Malereien der Katakomben Roms (1903), pls. 252, 253.Google Scholar

25 Art Bulletin XX (1938), 195, fig. 1.

26 Volbach, W. F., Early Christian Art (1961), no. 176.Google Scholar

27 ibid., no. 177.

28 ibid., no. 179.

29 Studi Romani II (1914–15), 402, pl. 24, fig. 1.

30 Volbach, o.c. (n. 26), no. 138.

31 Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana XXXVII (1961), 43, pl. 30; Alinari photo, no. 27591.

32 Garrucci, R., Storia della arte cristiana V (1879), pl. 401, fig. 6.Google Scholar

33 Morey, o.c. (n. 22), 52–53, no. 305, pl. 29.

34 Brasin and Zovatto, o.c, (n. 11), 91, fig. 38.

35 ibid. 210, figs. 92, 92a.

36 Fasti Archaeologici XIII (1960), pl. 37, fig. 107 (no. 6502); G. Brusin, Due nuovi sacelli cristiani di Aquileia (1961).

37 Corpus Iuris Civilis II: Codex Iustiniamts i, 8.

38 See n. 2 above.

39 Adversus Haereses III, XI, 8.

40 I owe this suggestion to Mr. Manfred Bräude of the Museum of Classical Archaeology, Cambridge.