One of the most famous discoveries in Mithraic studies is the text painted on the wall of the Mithraeum of Santa Prisca in Rome which reads “et nos servasti eternali sanguine fuso” – “and you have saved us through the shedding of the eternal blood.” This has been widely compared to Christian ideas, and, outside the scholarly world, almost insanely so.
Yesterday a kind correspondent sent me portions of an article in Italian by Pancieri in which he queries whether the text actually says this. The paintings are badly damaged, after all, and conjecture plays a part in the text above.
I thought that it would be useful to translate what he has to say into English, if only to make his cautious remarks rather better known. I will give the Italian as well, in case I misunderstand it at any point: corrections are welcome!
With regard to the mysteries of Mithras, I note – as has been noted above concerning the nature of its creator, and his saving and merciful character – that, although it is considered reliable in most respects, whatever may be the interpretation to be given of his work of salvation [c.f., leaving aside the cult images, the verse from the Mithraeum of S. Prisca, “et nos servasti eternali sanguine fuso”, according to the reading of the first editor (A. Ferrua, in Bull.Com., LXVIII, 1940, p.85; in Ann.épìgr., 1946, 84), confirmed and corrected CIMRM, I, 485, and by Vermaseren (Excavations, l.c., pp.217-221)**], it is almost never reflected in the dedications [CIMRM, I, 213 (salutaris?), 691 cfr. 891 (propitius), 900b (deo bono, dubious), II, 2265 (epekoos), 2276 (deo bono invicto?)].[1]
One could wish Dr Pancieri had not compressed his thought quite so much! The point being made is that we don’t know what “saving” means in the cult of Mithras, and it features hardly at all in the inscriptions. The last point suggests that it is not exactly an important element in the cult.
The footnote, however, is the bit that interests us. It is printed as one paragraph, but I will split it, for ease of reading:
** The exceptional importance of this verse, for the issue addressed in this seminar, led me to thoroughly review it, after the recent cleaning of the frescoes in the mithraeum of S. Prisca, carried out by the Soprintendenza Archeologica di Roma (restorer Sig.ElioPaparatti). During the restoration, the Soprintendenza has taken some excellent new photographs, from which I took the detail which I have reproduced (fig. 10).
Fig. 10. 1978 photo
Judging from a comparison of these with the photos published by Vermaseren (Excavations, l.c., plate LXVIII, 1-3), and comparing those with even earlier ones, dating from the time of the original discovery and publication (fig. 11), we find that, at this point, against the inevitable damage of time may be contrasted some gains due to the major cleaning of the wall.
Fig.11 How the wall appeared in the 1930’s.
This does not mean that our verse makes easy reading even now, and so, for this reason, the first publishers are to be commended for their ability, starting from quite miserable fragments, to make available to scholars a text of the utmost importance.
The main danger that we now need to avoid (which, it seems to me, that many have been led into, because of the current habit of transcribing the text without any critical marks) is of believing that the reconstruction of this verse is certain at every point; or, at least, is of the same degree of reliability for each part (see, for example, more specifically among those who have dealt with this text: H.D. Betz, in Nov. Test., X, 1968, p. 77 ff.; I.M. Hackethal, in Zeitschr. Papyr. Epigr., III ,1968, pp. 233-238; M.J. Vermaseren, in Meded. Nederl. Inst. Rome, XXXVII, 1975, p. 92 ff.; M. Simon, in Rev. d’hist. et de philos. relig., LVI, 1976, pp. 277-288).
In reality, as may be seen from all the photographs (not only the most recent), and also from the facsimile published by Vermaseren (fig. 12), the painted text from the start was in a gravely fragmentary state. In a new facsimile (fig. 13), I have tried to reproduce as closely as possible what I think can be seen today.
Without pretending to give a new reconstruction of the text, I will limit myself to indicating which elements are confirmed, and which are doubtful, as the new evidence seems to require. Proceeding backwards:
1) Absolutely certain is the word FUSO, which is found in perfect form also in the short text painted on a jar in the same mithraeum (Excavations, l.c., p. 409 fig. 204, plate. XCIX, 1-3).
2) Almost certain, although not readable in full, is the word SANGUINE which precedes it, both because it fits very well both the spaces and the fragments of letters remaining, and because sanguine fuso, as previous editors have noted, is an expression used elsewhere and perfectly in place in this context.
3) Doubtful (and Ferrua also had some doubts) is the word ETERNALI. After carefully analysing the perfectly straight line, slanting from left to right and top to bottom, before the N (which is clearly recognisable), it seems very difficult to recognise this as an R, even if connected to the following letter. In every R present in the inscriptions of this layer (of paintings) it is possible to find a common feature, rising above the top edge of the writing. So this line could belong rather to an A or an M or to two letters joined. There are doubts also because the word is unique, and because the supposed L shows the remains of an upper crossing stroke, which seems a little too strong on the left side to be a mere flourish. I see no sign of the I. What in the photo looks like the remains of an S, near the head of the Leo which interrupts the writing, in fact does not exist on the plaster, which is damaged at this point.
4) Likewise the reading SERVASTI, with the RVA linked together, does not appear convincing when compared with what remains today (but see also Vermaseren’s facsimile). And the E is not certain; it may be an F. The following letter, which has been interpreted as an R, looks like an O in the photos; nothing can be seen on the wall now, where the plaster is missing (and, it would seem, was missing in the past). Apart from this, I am unclear as to whether the signs that follow (which may well be part of a group VA) can be made to follow an S, since they seem to be the remains of a letter joined to an N.
5) Everything before that is no longer verifiable today, in the present state of conservation. The miserable scraps of letters are not definitely identifiable, and do not clearly result in the text above, nor in the old photos.
It seems obvious, after what has been said, that this famous verse should be studied again by epigraphists, as well as by Mithraic specialists. In the meantime, it would seem to be important that this reading of the text is not taken as secure, both to avoid building on shaky foundations, and because the text deserves to return to the centre of scholarly critical attention.[2]
I should add that I have Vermaseren’s description, and further photographs of the wall and inscription – some in colour! – here.
Pancieri’s points are interesting, but clearly there is more to be done. One avenue of exploration would be to see whether the other texts at Santa Prisca would be amendable to similar criticism. Do they actually appear on the wall now? Did they once, but now only exist in the photos? What is the rate of decay of the paintings at Santa Prisca? Or is it the case that decay is not a factor, and that Ferrua and Vermaseren were over-imaginative? What could the text read?
As far as I know, nobody accepted Pancieri’s challenge. Which is now itself, some forty years ago.
[1]h) Altre caratteristiche del dio sono la misericordia e la pietà [per misericordiam tuam, quomodo… misertus es, miserearis, per tuam pietatem] per il cui tramite pare manifestarsi una sua benevola disposizione nei confronti del mondo. Meritevole di discussione mi sembra se la frase introdotta da quomodo (che dovrebbe avere valore causale piuttosto che correlativo [Thes. l. L., Vili, col. 1293 rr. 58 sgg.]) debba essere intesa come riferimento a uno specifico intervento misericordioso del dio, o serva soltanto a sostenere la richiesta individuale con l’argomentazione che della benevolenza che si chiede per sè il mondo intero beneficia. Per quanto concerne Mitra dei misteri, osservo che, così come si è notato per la sua qualità di creatore, anche il suo carattere salvifico e misericordioso, quantunque sia ritenuto certo per più riguardi, quale che sia l’interpretazione da dare alla sua opera di salvazione [cfr., senza tener conto delle immagini di culto, il versetto del mitreo di S. Prisca et nos servasti eternali sanguine fuso nella lettura del primo editore (A. Ferrua, in Bull. Com., LXVIII, 1940, p. 85, inde Ann. épìgr., 1946, 84) confermata, rettificando CIMRM, I, 485, dal Vermaseren (Excavations, cit., pp. 217-221)**] quasi mai appare riflesso nelle dediche [CIMRM, I, 213 (salutaris?), 691 cfr. 891 (propitius), 900b (deo bono, dubbia), II, 2265 (epekoos), 2276 (deo bono invicto?)].↩
[2]** L’importanza eccezionale di questo versetto per il tema affrontato in questo Seminario mi ha indotto ad un suo accurato riesame dopo la recente ripulitura degli affreschi operata dalla Soprintendenza Archeologica di Roma nel mitreo di S. Prisca (restauratore Sig. Elio Paparatti). In occasione del restauro, la Soprintendenza ha assunto anche nuove ottime fotografie, dalle quali ho tratto il particolare che riproduco (fig. 10). A giudicare dal confronto tra questo particolare e le foto pubblicate dal Vermaseren (Excavations, cit., tav, LXVIII, 1-3) e tra queste ed altra, ancora anteriore, risalente all’epoca della prima scoperta e pubblicazione (fig. 11), si riscontra che, in questo punto, ai danni inevitabili del tempo si contrappongono alcuni guadagni dovuti all’attuale maggior pulizia della parete. Ciò non significa che il nostro versetto presenti neanche adesso una lettura agevole e, per questo, i primi editori sono senz’altro da lodare per la capacità che hanno avuto, partendo da lacerti abbastanza miseri, di mettere a disposizione degli studiosi un testo di estrema importanza. Il pericolo principale che credo si deve evitare ora (mentre in esso mi pare siano stati indotti in molti dall’uso corrente di trascrivere il testo senza alcun segno diacritico) è quello di credere che la ricostruzione di questo versetto sia certa in ogni suo punto o, per lo meno, attinga allo stesso grado di attendibilità in ogni sua componente (si vedano, ad esempio, tra coloro che più specificamente si sono occupati di questo testo: H.D. Betz, in Nov. Test., X, 1968, p. 77 sg.; I.M. Hackethal, in Zeitschr. Papyr. Epigr., III ,1968, pp. 233-238; M.J. Vermaseren, in Meded. Nederl. Inst. Rome, XXXVII, 1975, p. 92 sg.; M. Simon, in Rev. d’hist. et de philos. relig., LVI, 1976, pp. 277-288). In realtà, come si vede bene da tutte le foto (non solo dalla più recente) ed anche dal facsimile pubblicato dal Vermaseren (fig. 12), il testo dipinto si è presentato fin dall’inizio in condizioni di grave frammentarietà. In un nuovo facsimile (fig. 13) ho cercato di riprodurre il più fedelmente possibile quello che mi sembra di vedere oggi. Senza pretendere di dare una nuova ricostruzione del testo, mi limito a mettere in evidenza in questa sede qualche conferma e qualche dubbio che il nuovo controllo sembra imporre. Procedendo a ritroso, risulta: 1) assolutamente certa la parola FUSO che trova del resto perfetto riscontro nel breve testo dipinto su un vasetto proveniente dallo stesso mitreo (Excavations, cit., p. 409 fig. 204, tav. XCIX, 1-3); 2) pressoché certa, anche se non leggibile per intero, la parola SANGUINE che precede, sia perché ad essa si adattano assai bene gli spazi ed i frammenti di lettera superstiti, sia perché sanguine fuso, come hanno ben visto i precedenti editori è espressione ricca di confronti e perfettamente a posto in un contesto come questo; 3) dubbia (e qualche dubbio lo ebbe anche il Ferrua) la parola ETERNALI. Dopo aver attentamente analizzato il tratto perfettamente rettilineo ed obliquo da sinistra a destra e dall’alto in basso che precede la N (ben riconoscibile), sembra infatti assai difficile riconoscervi parte di una R, sia pure in legatura con la lettera seguente; in nessuna R presente nelle iscrizioni di questo strato è possibile rintracciare un tratto analogo, per di più nascente dal margine superiore della scrittura; tale segno potrebbe appartenere piuttosto ad una A o ad una M o alle due lettere in nesso. Dubbi si potrebbero avere anche sull’unicità della parola e su altre lettere, come la presunta L i resti della cui traversa superiore potrebbero apparire un po’ troppo estesi a sinistra per un semplice segno di rifinitura; della I non si vede più nulla; quello che nella foto sembra un resto di S, vicino alla testa del Leo che interrompe la scritta, non esiste affatto sull’intonaco, che in questo punto è danneggiato; 4) similmente non appare convincente, se confrontato con quanto oggi rimane (ma si veda anche il facsimile del Vermaseren) la lettura SERVASTI con RVA in nesso; già la E non è del tutto sicura, potendosi trattare anche di una F; della lettera seguente, che è stata interpretata come R e nelle foto sembrerebbe una O, nulla si vede sulla parete che in questo punto manca (e sembrerebbe mancasse anche in passato) dell’intonaco; a parte ciò non mi è chiaro come ai segni che seguono (che potrebbero ben far parte di un gruppo VA) si possa far seguire una S, sembrando piuttosto i resti della lettera appartenere ad una N, anch’essa in nesso; 5) tutto quello che precedeva è oggi inverificabile non vedendosi più, nell’attuale stato di conservazione, che miseri brandelli di lettere non sicuramente identificabili e non risultando chiaramente il testo neppure nelle vecchie foto. Sembra evidente, dopo quanto si è detto, che questo famoso versetto dovrà essere nuovamente studiato tanto dagli epigrafisti, quanto dagli specialisti di cose mitriache. Per intanto, importantissimo sembrerebbe che la sua lettura non fosse data per scontata, sia per non fondare costruzioni su basi malsicure, sia perché questo testo merita di tornare al centro dell’attenzione critica degli studiosi.↩
The Hungarian scholar Istvan Toth died this year. I learn this from his page at Academia.edu, where may be found all his papers and books in electronic form. This is no small thing, for many are quite inaccessible in the west, even in major research libraries. Well done, Dr Toth, for making all this mass of information available.
We all know that Franz Cumont, in his rather slack way, supposed that there was a festival of Mithras on 25 Dec., by presuming that the cultists of Mithras ‘must’ have participated in the Natalis Solis Invicti, attested only after 354 AD. No evidence of this exists, of course. But this carelessness has created a modern myth, often expressed in the unpleasant jeer “Mithras is the reason for the season.”
So what does Toth say? (I shall correct the English, for readability)
It is a fact that, although scholarship connected the festival of natalis Invicti with one of Mithras (too) since F. Cumont(2), until now there was nothing to show this from epigraphical evidence collected for the Cult of Mithras (3). This situation changed because of the epigraph from Poetovio which was found in 1970, and this epigraphical evidence has since been published in several publications (4).
The epigraphical evidence was found at Poetovio (Ptuj, Slovenia) in the immediate vicinity of so-called Mithraeum IV (5), at the same place as the other epigraphical evidence listed for this sanctuary (6). The lead prong, on the top face of the undecorated marble base (7), shows that the object was originally the pedestal of a statue, probably a statue of a figure being born out of a rock. The first line of the inscription is lost. The remaining lines of the text are as follows:
[— ] | M Gong(ius) | Aquilei|ensis pro | salute | sua suor|umq(ue) om|nium v(otum) s(olvit) l(ibens) m(erito) | d(e)d(icavit) VIIII K(alendas) Ian(uarias) | p(osuit) p(ater)
p(ientissimus) Florentiu[s].
The damaged first line, according to J. Sasel, should be read: [D(eo) i(nvicto) M(ithrae)] accounting this: “verisimiliter colligendum est, cum in vicinia vestigia quarti Mithraei reperta sint”(8), and this is all respects acceptable.
Unquestionably the most important element of the inscription is the date on the 9th readable line: 24th December, that is, vigil of natalis Invicti (the “Christmas Eve”), which appears here for the first time in epigraphical evidence related to the cult of Mithras.
The dating of relic can fairly certainly be given as the first half of the third century A.D., possibly about the middle of the third century. J. Sasel pointed that another bearer of this nomen was a certain Gongius Nestorianus who, between 198-211 was procurator of publicum portorium Illyrici and resided in Poetovio; then between 213-217 he was a praefectus classis Ravennatis(9). Considering that the nomen gentilicum of Gongius may be unique(10), it seems very likely that the person who dedicated the inscribed monument under discussion had some relationship to this man of high standing, for example he was his libertus.(11)
All this is interesting; but why a dedication of a monument on what is now 24 Dec. ‘must’ be connected to what is today Christmas Eve is not made clear. The fact that, in 354 AD, there would be a festival of the sun on the following day is not necessarily relevant. Any monument must be dedicated on some date; what the inscription does not show is that the date here was in any way significant.
The article then continues with material of no great relevance, until we reach this section:
It is absolutely certain, that every class of society was imbued with the need to have knowledge of the ceremonies and articles of the cult of Mithras. That social stratum was the one from which was descended Victorinus, the martyred bishop of Poetovio, the first exegete who wrote in Latin (22). However Victorinus of Poetovio – who was executed at the latest in the time of the great persecution of Christians under the reign of Diocletian – in the 260s would have been already adult, and meditating on religious matters as a young man.
The theological interest of Victorinus was exceptionally wide-ranging. He examined besides his exegesis, works on heterodoxies, the origin of world, apocalyptical doctrines(23) and there remains a fragment of his chronological work too(24). In this fragment he concluded the following inferences referring to document of a certain Alexander of Jerusalem: “VIII. Kal Ian. natus est Dominus noster Iesus Christus… etc.” (That is Our Lord Jesus Christ was born on 25 December) – The latest research places the origin of this fragment in the years after 260 (25).
Amongst the monuments of Mithras of Poetovio there are presented in remarkably great strength of those, that which relating to the birth of the god. … One of the representative stone monuments (30) of the Mithraeum founded by Flavius Aper and his officers represented the figure of Mithras being born out from a rock: in the background of the scene appears the figure of Saturn, wreathed by Victoria; to all intents and purposes showing, that in dedication named of god to D(eus) S(ol) i(nvictus) M(ithras) was born on 25 December, and the birth of god means that beginning of the new epoch of world.
We expect so: if we are not mistaken, that in this chronological fragment of Victorinus of Poetovio, indicating the date of natalis Invicti, we can recognise the inner history of the reference to the birth of Jesus and we recognize the events from the history of religion in the native town of the martyred bishop, which happened in his youth, and in our opinion that the Christian exegetist who wrote in Latin earliest and in all probability he was among the first (31) who connected the one of the central ideas of cult of Mithras of Poetovio with the articles of Christian faith.
I think something may have dropped out of the argument here. For it is quite unclear to me just why the presence of Saturn in a Mithraic monument of the rock birth must connect the monument to 25 Dec. – Saturnalia, after all, finished on 23rd Dec. Otherwise a monument of the rock birth is just nothing.
The material about Victorinus is likewise very loosely argued (allowing, always, for the translation difficulties).
The Mithraeum of Santa Prisca in Rome is of great importance to Mithraic studies because it contains striking wall paintings, with text against the images. The scenes depict a procession of the seven grades of initiate, and other interesting items. Among the verses is a statement that “you have saved us after the shedding of the eternal blood”, which has attracted attention. The mithraeum will be open to visitors at 4pm on Sunday 24th August, and I intend to be in Rome and go and see it. Apparently it stands on the Aventine Hill, just south of the Circus Maximus.
A long view of the Mithraeum of Santa Prisca
This week I have been collecting the literature about the place. I have visited Cambridge University Library and stood over their photocopiers, not once but twice!
One item gave me especial difficulty: Krautheimer’s Corpus Basilicarum Christianarum Romae. This contains an English-language article on the church of Santa Prisca, and a fine piece of work it is too. But, quite unnecessarily, the series has been printed in double-size volumes, nearly impossible to handle or photocopy. Each page requires an A3 photocopy; although, thanks to the miracles of modern technology, I was able to photocopy it down onto A4. It’s worth being aware of this series, if you want solid scholarly material, oriented on primary data and with copious bibliography, on the churches of Rome.
The church stands 3 metres above ground level, because it stands atop a platform of Roman brick walls and arches. This is, in fact, the basement level of a Roman house of imposing dimensions, dated by brick stamps to 95 AD. It was possibly the private house of Trajan, but perhaps more likely that of his close friend L. Licinius Sura, whose baths stand immediately to the north of the church (as a fragment of the ancient map of Rome shows) and whose house was adjacent to this. The mithraeum was erected ca. 190 AD in one of the cellars, and destroyed some time at the end of the 4th century (supposedly – it is hard to know exactly when).
I was going to photocopy the archaeological report also, which runs to 520+ pages, with more than a 100 plates, until I realised that this would cost me around $80! Fortunately an interlibrary loan is promised, and my little scanner at home will do the deed.
One reason why I read Krautheimer was that I wanted to know about supposed Christian archaeology in the area. There is a tremendous amount of false information on this point in circulation. Web-pages confidently assert that an early Christian church was also based in the cellars! Others say that a small building next door was “church-like”. All these claims go unreferenced, of course. Apparently the excavation report has a couple of pages making some claim of this sort, but I don’t know on what basis. One writer, in a review of the archaeological report in 1965, went so far as to say:
Why, as stated by the authors, is the same physical proximity between Christians and devotees of Mithras found under San Clemente and at least once in Ostia? How or why did they live side by side rather peacefully for nearly 150 years? Are the similarities between the two cults in the early third century strong enough to postulate that the masculine worshipers of Mithras someway encouraged the female members of their families to attend the neighboring Christian mysteries? These questions might be partially answered if further excavations could be carried out under Santa Prisca
This perhaps tells us rather more about the cultural assumptions of an American man in the 1960’s, that churchgoing was “womens’ stuff”, than anything about the history of the site or the cult of Mithras. Here, as ever, Mithraic studies is bedevilled by too much sheer imagination.
Krautheimer makes clear that there is pretty much no evidence of any Christian activity on the site before the erection of the church in the 5th century in the ruins of the house. The construction of churches in Rome in this period is related to the devastation caused by the Goth and Vandal sacking of Rome, making use of high-status locations now conveniently vacant. Perhaps the house of Sura was one such? An oratory in the garden was discovered in the 18th century, with depictions of apostles, and dated by the finders to the 4th century; but this has since been demolished, and Krautheimer makes the point that frescos of the apostles are generally a medieval decorative feature. The first literary reference is in a synod of 499 AD, to a single priest of the church – suggesting that it was a small and unimportant one. And that seems to be all the data. If there is more data, I have yet to see it.
I must say that I am unimpressed by the scholarly articles, on the whole. Not that I can complain – at least the excavations were published! But there is a vagueness about them, which is quite infuriating, when you want specifics.
What I did was go and find the reports of the original discovery in the 1930’s. These, thankfully, have diagrams that make it MUCH clearer what is where!
It will be interesting to see what can be seen on the ground!
It’s hotter than hell in the office in which I work, which is not helping me get anything done! However I’m also close to Cambridge University Library, and I’ve made two trips there in the evening this week, in search of books and articles.
I’m still thinking about Severian of Gabala. I’ve now obtained a copy of Sever J. Voicu, “Severien de Gabala,” Dictionnaire de spiritualite 14 (Paris, 1990), 752-63. This article is essential for anyone interested in Severian. It lists all his works and adds notes on each, over and above what is found in the Clavis Patrum Graecorum. I must go through this and revise my own list of works accordingly.
My colleague Albocicade, who is collecting French translations of Severian, and OCR’d the Voicu article, has noticed that the Voicu article notes the existence of an unpublished French thesis, J. Kecskeméti, Sévérien de Gabala. Homélie inédite sur le Saint-Esprit, Paris, 1978 (Worldcat and IdRef), on CPG 4947. It might be possible for a Frenchman like himself to access this. Here’s hoping.
Bryson Sewell has sent me a couple of pages of his upcoming translation of Severian’s De Spiritu Sancto. I think this is liable to contain theology: everybody hide now! So far he’s started to talk about the difference between the Son being “begotten of the Father”, while the Spirit “proceeds from the Father”. Good news that this is well underway.
My main other activity in the last couple of days has been obtaining some materials for the Mithras temples at Santa Prisca in Rome (quite amazing, this one), on the island of Ponza, and the one at Santa Capua Vetere. A commenter on my Mithras website asked about the date of the Santa Prisca Mithraeum. It seems to have been setup in the wine-cellar of an imperial property, which had once been the private house of Trajan before he became emperor. The wine cellar even had a little water supply of its own, for cleaning the amphorae. Somewhere else in the cellars is, perhaps, the origins of the church of Santa Prisca. But I haven’t come across anything about that yet.
Lately I’ve been taking an interest in the monuments of Mithras in Egypt. Apparently some are in the museum in Alexandria, while others come from Memphis and are in the Graeco-Roman room in the Cairo museum. I haven’t been very fortunate in finding images from either online. Is it possible that one or both of these museums discourages tourist photographs?
I’m quite tempted to fly out there and take some photos myself. It’s telling that a monument of the lion-headed god appears in various publications in the very same, low-grade, monochrome image! Clearly nobody has access to anything better. On the other hand all the flights that I could see, with British Airways and Egyptair, all fly out at the end of the day, to arrive near midnight. What’s that about, I wonder?
The hour changed last weekend, so everybody is jet-lagged (which is why I am writing this at 7:45 am; no sleep). But I intend to go over to Cambridge University Library late this afternoon, and photocopy an article in Mithras in Egypt, as well as a page from the CIMRM that was accidentally omitted from the PDF that I have.
Last night I managed to do a fix to the code behind the Mithras website, which should make image handling rather easier. Always so much to do!
A note arrived from the typesetter on the Origen volume. He’s working away on fixes to the footnoting, which went awry a revision or two back. Being a publisher is very hard work, let me tell you!
I’m very busy with the Mithras site, uploading more data about monuments. Last night I worked on the page on the Caernarvon Mithraeum, adding information from the excavation report. It was discovered in 1959, during preparatory work by a jerry-builder developer, and is now a set of rather dreary-looking 50’s houses. Today I’ve been looking for images of the finds, and failing.
On my last visit to Wales – to Swansea – I stopped at Caerleon, and was very sad at the obvious poverty there. Judging from Google Street View, north Wales is the same. There used to be a purpose-built museum at the site of Segontium, the Roman fort at Caernarvon. The council handed over responsibility for running it to a local trust, and then, a few years later, removed the council funding. The museum is now closed.
I have been trying to find out what became of the finds from the dig. This itself is not easy. That the council anticipated the final outcome seems obvious to me; the trust was merely a patsy, to take the blame for the inevitable council-driven closure. It is very sad to find a town with so little civic pride that it closes its museums. Shame on the town council. I doubt the cost was much. Other councils are playing the same game and closing down public libraries.
I wonder how long the one in my own town will survive such maneouverings? The running of the library has already been outsourced. How long before the council funding is chopped? A volume on Roman Koln awaits me there this weekend.
I’ve also been looking at an entry in the CIMRM, on a tauroctony from Fala castle, in what is now Slovenia. No trace of this item, or of any museum in the area, to be found online! It is remarkable how archaeology just disappears!
The National Library of Wales is digitising Welsh publications – well done. Among these, according to Wikipedia, is Archaeologia Cambrensis, in which the Segontium Mithraeum was published. But … it is not on the website. I do hope that journal owners are not being obscurantist.
I have been impressed again today with how easy it is to find older publications online. Despite the barriers of copyright!
The Origen book has a load of formatting errors, and needs rework. I shall print it off on sheets of A4, and mark up the sheets in red ink, very precisely. Otherwise we will be at this in a year’s time!
There are endless crank books about Mithras, usually with an anti-Christian twist. They go unnoticed by scholars, as a rule.
A correspondent drew my attention to some remarks made by Maarten Vermaseren on one of them. The title is Mithras: the fellow in the cap, by a certain Mrs Wynne-Tyson, back in 1958 (but reprinted since).
The title is a reference to a curious passage in St. Augustine, in his Tractatus in Joh. Evang. VII, 6. This reads, in the ANF translation, thus:
“And this is a great thing to see in the whole world, the lion vanquished by the blood of the Lamb: members of Christ delivered from the teeth of the lions, and joined to the body of Christ.
“Therefore some spirit or other contrived the counterfeit that His image should be bought for blood, because he knew that the human race was at some time to be redeemed by the precious blood.
“For evil spirits counterfeit certain shadows of honor to themselves, that they may deceive those who follow Christ. So much so, my brethren, that those who seduce by means of amulets, by incantations, by the devices of the enemy, mingle the name of Christ with their incantations: because they are not now able to seduce Christians, so as to give them poison they add some honey, that by means of the sweet the bitter may be concealed, and be drunk to ruin.
“So much so, that I know that the priest of that Pilleatus was sometimes in the habit of saying, ‘Pilleatus himself also is a Christian’. Why so, brethren, unless that they were not able otherwise to seduce Christians?”
The word “pilleatus” is of less than certain meaning – it means the “god wearing a mitre” or wearing a peaked cap. It could mean Mithras, but also Attis, and apparently a number of other gods accustomed to appear with a cap.[1]
Mrs Wynne-Tyson has chosen to render “pilleatus” as “the fellow in the cap”, which is fair enough. But let us now see what professional Mithras scholar and archaeologist M. Vermaseren says, after himself referring to Mithras as “the fellow in the cap”[2]. (I will split this footnote into sections for easier reading).
4. This is the dreadful title of a book by Mrs Wynne-Tyson published in 1972. The Times Literary Supplement said of this work : “The argument of this book, showing that the facts about Mithras reveal the basic pattern of Western civilisation and throw light into many of the darker comers of history, points disturbing conclusions for Christian orthodoxy”.
But reading the astonishing lines “To the Christian and others outside the Mithraic fold, Mithraism, with its bull-slaying God who was also identifiable as the Bull, in whose regenerative blood the Faithful bathed; with its animal masks of Lion and Bull, Horse, Eagle and Gryphon, and its eschatological teachings of metempsychosis, evidently seemed to be the worship of the Beast, even as Pure Christianity has always been the worship of the Perfect Man” etc., one would be tempted to think that Franz Cumont and his successors had all written in vain. I wonder what Stevie Smith in the Observer really meant when writing about this book “Most fascinating and apt to our times.”
Mithraism as the introduction to the anthroposophy of Rudolf Steiner is preached by Alfred Schütze, Mithras, Mysterien und Urchristentum, Stuttgart 1972(2). The petitio principii already is wrong.
The wildest opinions as well as unadulterated twaddle about the revealing excavations in the Mithraeum of Sa Prisca (M. J. Vermaseren – C. C. van Essen, The Excavations in the Mithraeum of the Church of Santa Prisca in Rome, Leiden 1965) can be found in the book by Father Geremia Sangiorgi O.S.A., S. Prisca e it suo Mitreo (Le Chiese di Roma illustrate 101), Roma 1968, which is now the official guide for visitors!
It becomes each year more necessary for scholars to waste their precious time in refuting the many pseudo-scholars = anti- scholars: read, for example, the exemplary review by Theodor Klauser in JAC 11/12, 1968/1969, 215-224 who rightly emphasizes:
“Wer die Wissenschaft wirklich fördern will, darf sich nicht damit begnügen, Einfälle und Lesefrüchte unkontrolliert zu einer verführerischen Synthese zu vereinigen und diese in gefälliger Form vorzutragen, die leiseste kritische Berührung bringt solche Konstruktionen zum Einsturz. Die bewährten Regeln der wissenschaftlichen Methode lassen sich nicht ungestraft ignorieren; auch der Begabteste kann langwierige Arbeitsprozesse, wenn sie nötig sind, nicht nach Belieben überspringen”.
A rough translation of Klauser’s words:
“Anyone who really wants to promote scholarship may not content themselves with uniting uncontrolled ideas and research into a seductive synthesis, written in an attractive form, for the slightest critical touch causes such constructs to collapse. The established rules of scholarly method cannot be ignored with impunity; even the most gifted may not skip over the necessarily lengthy process.”
I think perhaps those words sound more impressive in German!
I’m extremely busy at the moment adding material to the Mithras site. At the moment this is driven by a list of Mithraeums discovered since 1960. I am attempting to research each of these online, grab some text, some images, and create a page for it. This is, inevitably, a very time-consuming business.
Several things have struck me while doing this.
It’s often really hard to work out what is the formal publication of an excavation. You can search the web as much as you like; you will only find the printed sources most commonly referred to. In the case of an obscure site, you may not find this, and will have to be content with webpages.
It’s very hard to get even a site plan of the excavation.
It’s very hard to get a list of “finds”, never mind a list of minor finds which may be of critical importance.
It’s also very difficult to physically obtain publications, in many cases. The Vulci Mithraeum (il Mitreo di Vulci, for the benefit of the search engines, since nearly everything is in Italian) seems to be documented in an exhibition catalogue published by a certain Dr. Anna M. Moretti Sgubini. The exhibition was ephemeral, and no copies of it are present in any Anglophone country. I am considering writing to the author, on the off-chance that she has a PDF of her own work. More and more people do, these days, but it’s not satisfactory.
I have also found that material placed online, in the “Electronic Journal of Mithraic Studies”, in zip files, has gradually become corrupt over the last 10 years and will not open any more. Being in zip format, it isn’t archived anywhere.
All of this seems remarkably unsatisfactory. Archaeology is considered a scientific discipline; yet these are fundamental problems.
Of course it may be that the problem is with me. Perhaps all the archaeologists are “in the know”. Some may read this and say, “What? You mean you didn’t know that it’s all at www.xyz.edu? Haw haw!” Well, if so, I don’t know. Nor has such a resource come my way.
So I suspect that archaeologists need to consider how they use the web. Indexes, catalogues, ways to find data — these are what the web is for.
I’m mainly busy with the Mithras site at the moment.
I’ve been working through a list of new finds since 1960 made by John W. Brandt, together with a list by Szabo Csaba. In each case I do a web search for pictures or sites. I did the Riegel Mithraeum on Friday night. It’s slow, but useful.
I wish I could find a picture of the curious sword found at Riegel. This had a semi-circle in the middle of the blade, as wide as a man’s neck. If put on, it would look as if a sword had been driven through the neck. Undoubtedly it featured in some initiation ceremony.
Today I collected a curious volume from the library – Al. N. Oikonomides, Mithraic art: a search for unpublished and unidentified monuments. It’s only a little book, with monochrome photos of a few such. But it’s still very interesting, if not very scholarly. It’s basically a set of random notes typed up.
The Origen volume has come back from the typesetter with the latest set of corrections, and I have now produced a proof copy for the translator, and another for me. I think that I will allow one set of corrections from this, and then go to print. Somewhere there has to be an end to this task. The typesetter, Simon Hartshorne, has been very good about this indeed, but I am embarassed to trespass on his generosity much more.
I’m probably doing some other things as well: just can’t think of them tonight!
I’ve been back working on the Mithras site in the evenings, and in particular looking at Mithraea found in recent years. I’ve created a page for these, and I’m going through them.
Last night I was searching for material about the Hawarte Mithraeum in Syria. The site was a 5th century church, excavated in the 1970’s. The floor of the church was bowed near the altar, where a mosaic was removed. Some time in the mid-90’s, the floor collapsed revealing a painted chamber underneath. Robbers were quickly on the scene, and their attempts to sell fragments of painting came to the attention of the authorities. Michal Gowlokowski happened to see photos of some of the paintings and realised that the chamber must be a Mithraeum. He the Polish Archaeological Mission reached an agreement with the Syrian authorities, and excavated the site. Pleasingly, all their annual reports are online in English here!
The paintings are 4th century, which makes them some of the latest Mithraic monuments. They are also rather spectacular, as this blog (in Polish – but try using Google Translate on it) indicates! A sample image:
Mithras, his horse, and a chained demon.
Here’s another image, of a fresco restored by the Polish conservation team. The image seems to have been digitally enhanced for sale, but in the process has revealed additional data, especially the face of Luna at top left:
Here’s a picture of the inside of the Mithraeum from the conservators blog here:
I’m collecting images and data, and I need to write all this up. But notice on the left of this image a city wall, surmounted by the heads of demons, each being struck by rays (of light?). The detail at Hawarte is better than this photo may indicate. It adds something to our knowledge of the myth of Mithras. At Hawarte, it begins with the war of Zeus against the Giants, followed by the birth of Mithras and the usual story, and ending with a depiction of the city of demons and the demons being killed by the light of the (unconquered) sun.
More interestingly still, Dr Gowlikowski has managed to demonstrate a connection between Mithras and the winter solstice, the 25 December. For it seems that the chamber was so arranged that a ray of light would shine on Mithras’ face a couple of hours before sunset on that day.[1] However I need to read into this with some care, and make sure that I understand the argument!
One can only praise the Polish team for their exemplary work in preserving and restoring the site. The paintings are today at the museum in Hama. Let us hope that they are safe!
[1]Michał Gawlikowski, Krzysztof Jakubiak, Wiesław Małkowski i Arkadiusz Sołtysiak (2011). A Ray of light for Mithras, Monografie di Mesopotamia XIV s. 169-175. Thank heavens this is online!↩
