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DYNASTIC POLITICS, DEFEAT, DECADENCE AND DINING: CLEOPATRA SELENE ON THE SO-CALLED ‘AFRICA’ DISH FROM THE VILLA DELLA PISANELLA AT BOSCOREALE1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

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Abstract

This article examines the so-called ‘Africa’ dish, part of a treasure trove of silver table-ware discovered in a cistern at the Villa della Pisanella, a villa rustica destroyed in the eruption of Vesuvius in ad 79. It proposes a new interpretation of the dish's iconography and argues that the woman in the centre of the emblema is Cleopatra Selene, while the attributes surrounding her reference her parents Cleopatra VII and Marcus Antonius, her brothers Alexander Helios and Ptolemy Philadelphus, her husband Juba II of Mauretania, and their mythological ancestor the demi-god Heracles. Thus the emblema serves as a meditation on the fates of Antony and Cleopatra VII, descendants of Heracles who chose the path of vice, a choice that resulted in their defeat by Octavian at the Battle of Actium. Octavian's virtue, victory and clemency, combined with his guardianship of their children, ensured the subsequent promotion of their daughter Cleopatra Selene as a key figure in his dynastic and political strategy, through her marriage to Juba II and the couple's appointment as client rulers of Mauretania. Also supposedly descended from Heracles, Juba II and Cleopatra Selene chose to follow in their illustrious ancestor's footsteps along the path of virtue. In common with other pieces from the treasure trove, the ‘Africa’ dish alludes to recent historical events and personages, utilizes death as a means of promoting the enjoyment of life, and incorporates popular elements of Greek mythology, all the while offering banqueters an erudite puzzle to solve during the course of their banquet.

Questo articolo esamina il cosiddetto piatto ‘Africa’, parte del tesoro di vasellame da mensa in argento scoperto in una cisterna nella Villa della Pisanella, una villa rustica distrutta nell'eruzione del Vesuvio nel 79 d.C. L'articolo propone una nuova interpretazione dell'iconografia del piatto e deduce che la donna al centro dell'emblema sia Cleopatra Selene, mentre gli attributi che la circondano si riferiscono ai suoi genitori Cleopatra VII e Marco Antonio, suoi fratelli Alessandro Helios e Tolomeo Filadelfo, suo marito Juba II di Mauretania, e il loro antenato mitologico il semi-dio Eracle. Pertanto gli emblemi hanno lo scopo di stimolare una riflessione sui destini di Antonio e Cleopatra VII, discendenti di Eracle che scelsero la via del vizio risultata fatale nella disfatta inflitta da Ottaviano nella battaglia di Azio. La virtù, la vittoria e la clemenza di Ottaviano, combinato con il tutorato dei loro figli, assicurò la seguente promozione della loro figlia Cleopatra Selene come figura chiave nella sua strategia dinastica e politica, attraverso il matrimonio con Juba II e la loro nomina come sovrani clienti della Mauretania. Anche loro supposti discendenti di Eracle, Juba II e Cleopatra Selene scelsero di seguire i passi dei loro illustri antenati lungo la via della virtù. In comune con altri pezzi del tesoro ritrovato, il piatto ‘Africa’ allude a recenti episodi storici e a personaggi, e utilizza la morte come mezzo di promozione della gioia della vita e incorpora elementi popolari della mitologia greca, offrendo per tutto il tempo ai banchettanti un enigma erudito da risolvere nel corso del loro banchetto.

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Copyright © British School at Rome 2012

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Footnotes

1

I would like to thank Mark Bradley and Andreas Kropp in the Department of Classics at the University of Nottingham, and Josephine Crawley Quinn and the three anonymous readers of the Papers of the British School at Rome. I would also like to thank the Fondation Hardt pour l'Étude de l'Antiquité Classique where, as the recipient of a Graduate Bursary, I undertook the initial research and writing of this paper, and the British School at Rome where, as the recipient of a Rome Fellowship, I completed it. All abbreviations follow those listed in The Oxford Classical Dictionary (third edition).

References

2 For the original publication of the silverware, see de Villefosse, A. Héron, Le trésor de Boscoreale (Monuments et mémoires Eugene Piot 5) (Paris, 1899)Google Scholar. See also Baratte, F., Le trésor d'orfèvrerie romaine de Boscoréale (Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux) (Paris, 1986)Google Scholar.

3 Painter, K.S., The Insula of the Menander at Pompeii: the Silver Treasure: Volume 4 (Oxford, 2001), 14Google Scholar.

4 All are exhibited in the Musée du Louvre: BR I and II; BJ 1923 and 1924; and BJ 1969 respectively.

5 See Strong, D.E., Greek and Roman Gold and Silver Plate (London, 1979)Google Scholar, 22 for publication and transcription of the inscription with explanatory notes: PHI(ALA) ET EMB(LEMA) P(ENDENTIA) / P(ONDO) II (= 2 librae) S = =(= dextans) >VI (= 6 scripula) / PHI(ALA) P(ENDENS) P(ONDO) II (= 2 librae) = (= sextans) Σ(= ½ uncia) / EMB(LEMA) P(ENDENS) P(ONDO) S – (= septunx) Σ (= ½ uncia). The first part gives the weight of the dish and the emblema together, the second part the dish alone and the third part the emblema alone.

6 See Elsner, J., Art and the Roman Viewer (Cambridge, 1995), 26Google Scholar, and Elsner, J., Roman Eyes: Visuality and Subjectivity in Art and Text (Princeton, 2007), 67–8Google Scholar, for a discussion of ekphrasis.

7 Zanker, P., The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus (Ann Arbor, 1990), 253Google Scholar.

8 See also Salcedo, G.F., ‘La iconografia de Africa en epoca romana’, Archive Español de Arqueologia 64 (1991), 284–92Google Scholar, for a more recent attempt to argue in favour of the identification of the woman as the personification of Africa Panthea, refuting all other suggestions such as Alexandria, Cleopatra VII and Cleopatra Selene (for these, see below).

9 de Villefosse, Héron, Le trésor de Boscoreale (above, n. 2), 177CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Perdrizet, P., Bronzes Grècques d'Égypte de la Collection Fouquet (Bibliothèque d'art et d'archéologie) (Paris, 1911), 39Google Scholar. See also Rostovtzeff, M., The Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire, second edition (Oxford, 1957), 277Google Scholar.

10 Jentel, M.-A., ‘Aigyptos’, LIMC (1981) 1.1, 379–81, esp. p. 380Google Scholar.

11 Corte, M. Della, Cleopatra, M. Antonio e Ottaviano nelle allegorie storico-umoristiche delle argenterie del tesoro di Boscoreale (Pompeii, 1951), 3548Google Scholar; Linfert, A., ‘Die Tochter — nicht die Mutter. Nochmals zur ‘Africa’ Schale von Boscoreale', in Bonacasa, N. and Vita, A. di (eds), Alessandria e il mondo ellenistico-romano: studi in onore di Achille Adriani (Studi e materiali 4–5) (Palermo, 1983), 351–8Google Scholar.

12 See Walker, S. and Higgs, P., Cleopatra: from History to Myth (London, 2001), 312Google Scholar, for the dish's inclusion in an exhibition celebrating Cleopatra VII (catalogue number 324) and its classification as ‘gilded silver dish, decorated with a bust perhaps representing Cleopatra Selene’.

13 Walker and Higgs, Cleopatra (above, n. 12), 312.

14 See Corte, Della, Cleopatra, M. Antonio e Ottaviano (above, n. 11), 40–3Google Scholar, for the original suggestion that the emblema was a portrait of Cleopatra VII.

15 See Bartman, E., Portraits of Livia: Imaging the Imperial Woman in Augustan Rome (Cambridge, 1999)Google Scholar; Wood, S.E., Imperial Women: a Study in Public Images 40 bcad 68 (Leiden, 1999), 27141Google Scholar; and Winkes, R., ‘Livia: portrait and propaganda’, in Kleiner, D. and Matheson, S.B., I Claudia II: Women in Roman Art and Society (Austin, 2000), 2942Google Scholar for discussion of portraits of Octavia and Livia.

16 See Poole, R.S., A Catalogue of the Greek Coins in the British Museum: the Ptolemies, Kings of Egypt (A. Forni) (Bologna, 1963), 115–17Google Scholar, plates 39.13 for the coinage of Ptolemy XII Auletes and pp. 122–3, plate 30.5–8 for the coinage of Cleopatra VII. The hooked nose is unusual; for a coin issued by Antony in 34 bc to celebrate his victories in Armenia depicting himself on the obverse and Cleopatra on the reverse, both with distinctive hooked noses, see RRC 543; Gruber, H.A., Coins of the Roman Republic in the British Museum (London, 1910), 179Google Scholar. These were discussed by Williams, J., ‘Imperial style and the coins of Cleopatra and Mark Antony’, in Walker, S. and Ashton, S.-A. (eds), Cleopatra Reassessed (British Museum Occasional Papers 103) (London, 2003), 8794, at p. 92Google Scholar. The thick neck is more problematic, as it may not have been a genuine physical characteristic of either Ptolemy XII Auletes or Cleopatra VII, but rather a generic sign of strength and power that was utilized in portraits of numerous Hellenistic rulers. See also Walker, S., ‘From queen of Egypt to queen of kings: the portraits of Cleopatra VII’, in Bonacasa, N. and Roveri, A.-M. Donadoni (eds), Faraoni come dei, Tolemei come faraoni. (Atti del V congresso internazionale Italo-Egiziano, Torino, Archivio di Stato) (Palermo, 2003), 508–17Google Scholar, esp. p. 512 for the suggestion that a monumental Parian marble head found at Iol Caesarea and identified as either Cleopatra Selene or Cleopatra VII derived from the Cleopatra VII ‘queen of kings’ portrait type intended to portray her as the defender of Egypt, which in turn derived from portraits of Cleopatra Thea, queen of Syria.

17 For discussion of the official portraiture of Cleopatra Selene, see Roller, D.W., The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene. Royal Scholarship on Rome's African Frontier (London, 2003), 139–42Google Scholar; and Higgs, P., ‘Resembling Cleopatra: Cleopatra VII's portraits in the context of late Hellenistic female portraiture’, in Walker and Ashton (eds), Cleopatra Reassessed (above, n. 16), 5770Google Scholar.

18 See Svenson, D., Darstellungen Hellenistischer Könige mit Götterattributen (Frankfurt, 1995), 106–15Google Scholar, for discussion of the different uses of the elephant scalp as an attribute on portraits.

19 Maritz, J.A., ‘The image of Africa: the evidence of coinage’, Acta Classica 44 (2001), 105–26Google Scholar. For a coin type depicting the head of Bocchus II on the obverse and an elephant marching on the reverse, see British Museum inv. G1874, 0715.493. For a coin type depicting a diademed bust of Juba II on the obverse and the bust of a woman wearing an elephant scalp on the reverse, see British Museum inv. 1908, 0404.23. For a coin type depicting a diademed head of Juba II on the obverse and Victory holding an elephant scalp and accompanied by an elephant holding a crown on the reverse, see British Museum inv. 1938, 0510.178. For publication and discussion of these coin types, see Alexandropoulos, J., Les monnaies de l'Afrique antique, 400 av. J.-C.–40 ap. J.-C. (Toulouse, 2007)Google Scholar, catalogue numbers 60, 70 and 138 respectively.

20 As inaugurated by Octavian's AEGVPTO CAPTA coinage issued in the period 29–27 bc; see Vecchi, L. and Vecchi-Gomez, J., ‘Of crocodiles and coins: Roman Egypt personified’, Minerva International Review of Ancient Art and Archaeology 13.3 (2002), 51–3Google Scholar.

21 Although attempting to discern personal appearance from coin portraits is notoriously problematic, it is worth noting that the woman on the ‘Africa’ dish does resemble closely the portraits of Cleopatra Selene that appear on the coins issued in her name, such as British Museum, inv. G1874, 0715.491; both have curly swept-back hair, deep-set eyes, a long slightly hooked nose, a strong chin and a thick neck.

22 Plut. Vit. Ant. 36.3.

23 Each of the stars has eight points, as opposed to the seven-pointed star — frequently accompanied by a crescent moon — used to represent the Graeco-Egyptian god Sarapis.

24 For the Emperor Tiberius rededicating the Temple of Castor and Pollux in the Forum in the name of himself and his deceased younger brother, Drusus, see Dio Cass. 55.27.3–5, 55.33.4; Ov. Fast. 1.707.

25 For discussion of the possibility of identifying allusions to the children on the dish, see Linfert, ‘Die Tochter — nicht die Mutter’ (above, n. 11), 352–3. For the eagle as a royal emblem, see Diod. Sic. 1.87.9; Horapollo 2.56. Ptolemy I Soter issued coins depicting an eagle as early as 315 bc, while he was still technically only governing Egypt and Cyprus for Alexander IV. See Poole, The Ptolemies (above, n. 16), 2, plate 1.2–4. The eagle continued to be featured on Ptolemaic coinage through to the reigns of Cleopatra VII and Ptolemy XVI Caesar (Caesarion). See Poole, The Ptolemies (above, n. 16), 122–4, plate 30.5–9.

26 Della Corte, Cleopatra, M. Antonio e Ottaviano (above, n. 11), 36. Griffiths, J.G., ‘The death of Cleopatra VII’, JEg. Arch. 47 (1961), 113–18Google Scholar; Rostovtzeff, The Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (above, n. 9), 277.

27 Plut. Vit. Ant. 54.6.

28 Plut. Vit. Ant. 24.3, 60.3; Dio Cass. 50.5.3.

29 For Antony associated with Dionysus and the lyre, see Plut. Vit. Ant. 26.3. For Cleopatra associated with Isis and the sistrum, particularly using the sistrum as a means to summon her troops to arms, see Verg. Aen. 8.696; Prop. 3.11.43; Luc. 8.832, 10.63.

30 For the peacock as the sacred bird of Hera, see Ath. 655 A. For Hera's preparations for her meeting with Zeus, see Hom. Il. 14.162. Cleopatra VII was not the only royal woman associated with Hera: for a coin of Julia Domna, issued in Alexandria and depicting Hera in conjunction with a peacock, see Poole, R.S., British Museum Catalogue of the Coins of Alexandria and the Nomes (Bologna, 1964), 185Google Scholar. For the etymology of Heracles, Ἥρα κλέος, see J. Boardman, O. Palagia and S. Woodford, ‘Herakles’, LIMC 4.1, 728–838, at p. 728. Another item from the Boscoreale hoard is illustrated with easily recognizable figures from Greek mythology: a silver mirror bears a medallion depicting the encounter between Zeus in the form of a swan and Leda, Musée du Louvre inv. BJ 2159.

31 Plut. Vit. Ant. 4, 36, 60. See also the frequent references to Heracles on the coinage of Antony and Juba in particular. One of Juba's silver coin types, dating to the 35th year of his reign, depicts Heracles wearing his famous lion scalp and the legend REX IUBA on the obverse face with his club and bow on the reverse face, British Museum inv. 1908, 0404.35. Another, dating to the 36th year of his reign, depicts Heracles wearing the lion scalp and the legend REX IUBA on the obverse face with the club, bow and an arrow on the reverse face, British Museum inv. 1938, 0510.183. A third, dating to the 40th year of his reign, depicts Heracles wearing a lion scalp with the club over his shoulder and the legend REX IUBA on the obverse face, while the reverse face encloses the legend CAESAREA, the name of Mauretania's capital city, in a wreath.

32 Plin. HN 5.7; Strabo 17.3.7; Pompon. 1.26–7. See Roller, The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene (above, n. 17), 154, for discussion of Juba's attempts to link himself with the Heracles cycle. According to Plut. Vit. Sert. 9, a genealogy was produced that traced Juba's descent from Heracles.

33 For the Nemean lion, see Apollod. Bibl. 2.65–6, 4, 9–10. For the voyage to Erytheia, see Serv. Dan. 8.299.

34 Apollod. Bibl. 2.71, 4, 11.

35 Hom. Il. 5.392–7; Hom. Od. 11.607; Hes. fr. 33a 29.

36 For an image of Hephaistos forging Heracles's armour dating from the late third–early second centuries bc, see Musée du Louvre, inv. CA 551. Heracles reputedly was given a bow by Apollo (Hes. fr. 33a 29), a sword by Hermes and a club by Hephaistos (Diod. Sic. 4.14.3). For Asklepios Kotyleus healing Heracles after he was injured, see Paus. 3.19.7, 8.53.93. He is depicted frequently with any one or a combination of these weapons.

37 Prodikos fr. 2 DK; Xen. Mem. 2.1.21–34. For discussion of this story and its reception in antiquity, see Stafford, E., ‘Vice or virtue? Herakles and the art of allegory’, in Rawlings, L. and Bowden, H. (eds), Herakles and Hercules: Exploring a Graeco-Roman Divinity (Swansea, 2005), 7196Google Scholar.

38 Cic. Off. 1.118: ‘For we cannot all have the experience of Hercules, as we find it in the words of Prodicus in Xenophon: ‘When Hercules was just coming into youth's estate (the time which Nature has appointed unto every man for choosing the path of life on which he would enter), he went out into a desert place. And as he saw two paths, the path of Pleasure and the path of Virtue, he sat down and debated long and earnestly which one it was better for him to take’ '.

39 For Juba's participation in Julius Caesar's triumph (which also included Cleopatra VII's sister Arsinoe), see App. B. Civ. 2.101; Plut. Vit. Caes. 55. For Cleopatra Selene's participation in Octavian's triumph, see Dio Cass. 51.21.8; Euseb. Chron. 2.140; Zonar. 10.31.

40 For Cleopatra Selene's role in Octavian's triple triumph on the monument at Nikopolis, see Zachos, K.L., ‘The Tropaeum of the sea-battle of Actium at Nikopolis: interim report’, JRA 16 (2003), 6592, at pp. 90–2Google Scholar.

41 On Iol Caesarea and the client kingdom of Mauretania, see Roller, The World of Juba II and Kleopatra Selene (above, n. 17), 119–62.

42 For Cleopatra Selene's role in Octavian's dynastic strategy and propaganda, and the possibility of her appearing on the Ara Pacis, see Kleiner, D.E.E. and Buxton, B., ‘Pledges of empire: the Ara Pacis and the donations of Rome’, AJArch. 112 (2008), 5789, at pp. 83–5Google Scholar.

43 Walker, S., The Portland Vase (British Museum Objects in Focus) (London, 2004), 4158Google Scholar. She has agreed with a previous identification of the subject of the base disc as Paris, who, like Antony, was overly influenced by Eros and plunged his city into war (p. 61). She also has suggested that, in the same vein, the Carpegna Cameo, generally considered to depict Dionysus and Ariadne, actually portrays Antony being both literally and physically intoxicated by Cleopatra, accompanied by two satyrs — one whom is of African appearance — and a panther (pp. 61–3).

44 This was first suggested by Della Corte, Cleopatra, M. Antonio e Ottaviano (above, n. 11), 45. However, with regard to the other attributes, he considered the lyre to refer to Apollo, the bow and quiver to Diana and the sword to Mars, as deities particularly associated with the Julian gens, and could not account for the forceps of Hephaistos, the staff of Asklepios and the club of Heracles. The presence of the dolphin as a reference to the Battle of Actium here is interesting when juxtaposed with Walker's interpretation of the creature coiled in Cleopatra's lap on the Portland Vase as a ketos, or monstrous sea-serpent, indicative of Cleopatra's role supplying arms to Antony for both his eastern campaigns and his war against Octavian; see Walker, The Portland Vase (above, n. 43), 47–8 (chief among her provisions were timber and ships for the construction of a navy). See also Zachos, ‘The Tropaeum of the sea-battle of Actium at Nikopolis’ (above, n. 40), 79, for the use of dolphins in alluding to Actium and the role of Neptune in Octavian's victory on the Nikopolis Tropaeum.

45 These dolphins subsequently were fitted with pipes and turned into a fountain (Tert. De spect. 8).

46 Plin. HN 15.36; Suet. Aug. 7.

47 Plin. HN 15.38.

48 Suet. Aug. 22; Augustus, Res Gestae 34; Plin. HN 15.39.

49 Plin. HN 15.40.

50 For clemency, or clementia, as one of Augustus's virtues, see Galinsky, K., Augustan Culture (New Jersey, 1996), 84–5Google Scholar. Augustus himself later emphasized how he had acted with this in mind following the end of the civil wars, at Res Gestae 3.1. See also Verg. Aen. 6.853.

51 Kuttner, A.L., Dynasty and Empire in the Age of Augustus. The Case of the Boscoreale Cups (Berkeley, 1995)Google Scholar. She also proposed that the individual who originally received or commissioned the Boscoreale cups did so because he had served in the military on the staff of Tiberius and/or Drusus, much like the historian Velleius Paterculus, as a tie between himself and one or both of the brothers, and thus explained why the cups were kept for so long, despite showing signs of significant wear and tear. See also Galinsky, Augustan Culture (above, n. 50), 66–70.

52 On the marriage of Cleopatra Selene and Juba II, see Plut. Vit. Ant. 87; Dio Cass. 51.15.6. For a poem possibly written by Crinagoras to celebrate the occasion, see Anth. Pal. 9.235; see also Braund, D., ‘Anth. Pal. 9.235: Juba II, Cleopatra Selene and the course of the Nile’, CQ 34.1 (1984), 175–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For coins issued in Mauretania in the name of both that have been dated to 20–19 bc, see Mazard, J., Corpus Nummorum Numidiae Mauretaniaque (Paris, 1955–8), no. 357Google Scholar; see also Mazard, J., ‘Un inédit de Juba II et Cleopatre-Selene’, Gazette Numismatique Suisse 31 (1981), 12Google Scholar.

53 See Kleiner and Buxton, ‘Pledges of empire’ (above, n. 42), 84–5, for Cleopatra Selene's political prominence in this period.

54 Walker and Higgs, Cleopatra (above, n. 12), 312.

55 Dunbabin, K.M.D., ‘Sic erimus cuncti … the skeleton in Graeco-Roman art’, Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 101 (1986), 185255, at pp. 224–30Google Scholar.

56 Walker, S., ‘Cleopatra in Pompeii?’, PBSR 76 (2008), 3546, 345–8Google Scholar.

57 For the statue of Cleopatra, see App. B. Civ. 2.102.424; Dio Cass. 51.22.3.

58 Walker, ‘Cleopatra in Pompeii?’ (above, n. 56), 44.

59 Rostovtzeff, The Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (above, n. 9), 277.

60 See CIL X 832 for Augustus's nephew Marcellus acting as a patron of Pompeii. See also Kuttner, Dynasty and Empire in the Age of Augustus (above, n. 51), 7, for a set of salt dishes from the Boscoreale hoard that are inscribed ‘Pamphili Caes L’, perhaps the name of a freedman manumitted by Octavian in the period 44–27 bc.

61 See Meyboom, P.G.P., The Nile Mosaic at Palestrina: Early Evidence of Egyptian Religion in Italy (Leiden, 1995)Google Scholar; and Versluys, M.J., Aegyptiaca Romana: Nilotic Scenes and the Roman Views of Egypt (Leiden, 2002)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, for discussion of the possibility that the Nile mosaics of Palestrina and Pompeii were produced at a workshop in Alexandria.

62 Carrington, R.C., ‘Studies in the Campanian villae rusticae’, JRS 21 (1931), 110–30, esp. p. 113Google Scholar. For an overview of the different sets of silver table-ware recovered from domus and villae in Pompeii and the surrounding area, see Painter, The Insula of the Menander at Pompeii (above, n. 3). For discussion of the Boscoreale hoard as an assemblage accreted over time, see Kuttner, Dynasty and Empire in the Age of Augustus (above, n. 51), 7. However, considering Jucundus's occupation, the possibility that the silverware did not in fact belong to him but was being retained as security for a loan also must be considered.

63 See Dunbabin, K.M.D., The Roman Banquet: Images of Conviviality (Cambridge, 2003), 65–6Google Scholar.

64 Dunbabin, The Roman Banquet (above, n. 63), 86.

65 See Dalby, A., Empire of Pleasures (London, 2000), 1011, 266–9Google Scholar; Edwards, C., The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome (Cambridge, 1993), 187, 204CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For the use of dining in as a means of defamation of character in political invective, see Corbeill, A., ‘Dining deviants in Roman political invective’, in Hallett, J.P. and Skinner, M.B. (eds), Roman Sexualities (New Jersey, 1997), 99129Google Scholar.

66 Luc. 10.156–76, 396–8; Plut. Vit. Ant. 26; Macrob. Sat. 3.17.15. See also Walker, The Portland Vase (above, n. 43), 61–2 for discussion of the image of Antony intoxicated with alcohol and Cleopatra on the Carpegna Cameo.

67 Plin. HN 9.119–21.

68 Ath. 6.299.