Tondo Portrait of the Severan Family

In a previous post we looked at a dynastic portrait on a gem (the Gemma Claudia).  Here we have another dynastic portrait—not a relief carved in stone but a painting on wood (circular in shape, hence called a roundel or tondo).  The paint used was tempera, pigments mixed into egg yolk.  You may recall that some of the Fayum mummy portraits (see the previous post) were made with tempera on wood, although most were painted in encaustic.  And like the Fayum portraits, this tondo was made in Egypt.  What sets it apart is that its subject is the imperial family.  To date it is the only painted imperial portrait to have come down to us.  Unlike the Fayum portraits, its provenance is unknown.  We can only guess how it was displayed. 

Another contrast with the Julio-Claudian group portraits: this portrait is from a later age, that of the Severans.  The dynasty began with Septimius Severus (emperor from AD 193 to his death in 211), shown here with his wife Julia Domna and two sons Geta and Caracalla.  Geta is on the left, and his face has been erased in what was called a damnatio memoriae.  His brother Caracalla had Geta murdered and ordered that his memory be damned, that is, that all of his public images and inscriptions be destroyed.

We can see big changes in the iconography since the period of the Julio-Claudians.  You remember that the Gemma Claudia showed the imperial figures in profile.  Not so in the Severan tondo.  The figures are frontal, with larger-than-life eyes.  They wear the attributes of their elevated rank: scepters, diadems, fancy garments with gold borders.  Julia Domna wears a pearl necklace and pearl earrings.  We are far away from the iconography of the Julio-Claudians: the focus is on imperial majesty, not on the civic virtues that bring bounty to the empire.  Indeed, as Steven Tuck (A History of Roman Art [2015] 276) notes, “the elements of imperial portraiture that would become standard in the fourth century CE are already here at the beginning of the third.”

Gemma Claudia

This is a cameo—a relief carved out of stone with layers of different colors.  The stone used is sardonyx, an onyx that has parallel layers of sard.  The subject is a dynastic group portrait.  Portraits of family members had been shown in public during the Republic.  But from the time of Augustus dynastic groups appear regularly in the archaeological record—in statuary groups and on coins.  This cameo shows two couples facing each other.  Who are they?  Everyone agrees that the man on the left is Claudius—his facial features are distinctive.  We may suppose that the female figure behind him is his wife Agrippina the Younger.  As for the two to the right, there are various opinions.  One is that they are Germanicus (Claudius’ brother) and his wife Agrippina the Elder (the mother of Claudius’ wife Agrippina the Younger).  Another is that they are Tiberius and Livia (but they are son and daughter, not husband and wife).

The male portrait heads emerge out of cornucopiae, horns of plenty, which rest upon heaps of captured weapons.  Both Claudius and Germanicus wear the corona civica, the crown of oak leaves awarded to a Roman who had saved the life of a fellow Roman in battle (from the time of Augustus, this crown became part of the emperor’s iconography).  Between them, Jupiter’s eagle looks up at Claudius.  What does all this mean?  The empire is the fruit, as it were, of the military exploits of these men, the “saviors” of their fellow Romans and guarantors of their continuing prosperity.  And the eagle serves to confirm the emperor’s authority.

What about the women?  On the right, Agrippina the Elder wears a helmet encircled by a laurel wreath, the attribute of Dea Roma, the personification of the city of Rome.  Her daughter wears a crown in the form of a turreted wall, a veil, and a garland of ears of wheat: she may represent Oikoumene, the personification of the inhabited world.

There is room for different interpretations here, to be sure.  But the general import of this dynastic portrait is clear enough: through military action, and with the full approval of the gods, the imperial family maintains the welfare of Rome and the Roman world.  It should be compared with the other great gems that have come down to us from the Julio-Claudian period, the Gemma Augustea and the Grand Camée de France.  The Gemma Claudia is thought to have been a wedding gift to Claudius and Agrippina the Younger.

Fayum Portraits

By Hannah Marier

A number of mummy portraits, painted on wood or linen, came to Europe in the late 19th century from a region in Egypt known as Fayum. Wood and linen have rarely survived elsewhere, but these paintings were preserved, thanks to Egypt’s dry climate.  They were painted in the encaustic or hot wax technique: the artist melted beeswax and combined it with different colored pigments to create a special paint mixture.

Fayum is a low-lying area a little over 37 miles from Cairo. On the higher ground behind the west bank of the Nile, out of reach of the floods, ancient Greek residents had buried their deceased. The wealthy citizens of the region would have portraits made for their mummies. Many of the paintings have inspired awe for their realistic details and use of color.  André Malraux, the French novelist and art theorist, described the portraits as “glowing with a flame of immortal life”. Some of the panels were even decorated with gold.

The portrait shown here is thought to belong to the middle-late Antonine period, ca. AD 161-192.  But dating the portraits is fraught with difficulties. As with most Fayum portraits, the technique used is that of encaustic (sometimes tempera was used, i.e., pigments in egg-yolk). Gold leaf was found in several of the pigments, so the lady in the portrait must have been fairly rich. The woman shown is young, and she is wearing a yellow and blue tunic edged with gold leaf, a golden wreath, a large necklace, also of gold, and emerald earrings. The artist cleverly obtained all of his hues from the colors white, red, black, white, and a minimal amount of green for the emeralds.

This particular panel is currently on display in the British Museum. Most of the portraits found in Fayum are exhibited there. Although the panel is displayed in the Egyptian Antiquities section, it could arguably be considered Greek because of its subject.

Roman Portraiture

This Portrait Head of an Elder below displays the Roman Republic concept of verism very accurately.  Contrasting with the Greek idealism, verism emphasizes the signs of age, wisdom and, experience.  This man, most likely a patrician, is individualized and highly realistic.  Some believe that this extensive portrait sculpture created during the Roman Republic grew from the death mask tradition that is visually expressed in the Barberini Togatus, on the left.  Created around a similar time, this full-length sculpture shows a patrician carrying two generations of his ancestors, likely a father and grandfather.  The patrician also is highly individualized and his age is emphasized through his wrinkles and toga.

Discobolus (Discus Thrower)

Even though the sculptor Myron was famous for creating life-like animal sculptures, he also created humans in the midst of action.  His Discobolus or Discus Thrower created during the Early Classical period is no exception.  Originally, this piece was bronze, but we would not have this sculpture if the Romans had not created a marble copy of it due to the unreliability of bronze over time.  This discus thrower has an idealized body that shows an interest in anatomy, but his hair seems to be stuck in the Archaic period with its cap-like treatment.  Although this piece does have one foot in the classical period, it is rather planar, almost like a relief with no background.  The action Myron chooses to sculpt is also rather static because the thrower is frozen at the top of his motion; he is neither moving forward or backward.  This frozen state changes as the Classical period evolves into the Hellenistic period of Greek art.

The Temple of the Olympian Zeus

The Temple of the Olympian Zeus at the foot of the Athenian Acropolis is simply a very large Greek temple.  Built on the base of a 5^th century Doric temple, this Corinthian remake designed by the Roman architect Cossutius in the 2^nd century BCE seems to dwarf the Parthenon in the distance.  Even though it was not completed until the reign of Hadrian almost three centuries later, this temple is purely Greek peripteral: an enclosed cella surrounded by a wall of columns on all sides.  Since this temple was created over a large span of time, archeologists are unsure whether the 55 ft. 5 in. columns are purely Greek or Roman copies.  Even though these columns are all that remain of this colossal structure, its size and Corinthian decorations can still be admired today.

Arch of Constantine

This massive, three portal, triumphal arch commemorates Constantine’s victory over Maxentius at the battle of Milvian Bridge in AD 312, as the laudatory inscription indicates.  The entire arch suggests his power over any possible threat.  Constantine reused reliefs from Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus Aurelius’ triumphal arches, as seem in the image below.  
The term for repurposed art is spolia.  Each of these reliefs express the Roman ideals of strength, piety, and courage visually.  Compared to the reliefs created in Constantine’s time, the figures from the older triumphal arches are much more idealized and recognizable while Constantine’s reliefs are more in the style of the Late Imperial period: abstracted and symbolic. 

This massive architectural structure, constructed during the Late Roman Empire, represents Emperor Constantine’s power and military victory over the Dacians and Maxentius at the battle of Milvian Bridge in 312 AD. Among the few remaining arches in Rome, Constantine expresses his unification of the Roman Empire from the prior tumultuous tetrarchy. In addition, the domination and might of Constantine is explicitly recognizable through the spolia, a term for reused building materials. Objects from Hadrian, Trajan, and Marcus Aurelius’ monuments were placed on this three portal arch with the intention of dictating to the Roman people that Constantine was as powerful and successful as these previous Roman rulers.

The subject matter of the Arch of Constantine begins at the bottom with depictions of the defeated in a new sense of style with larger bodily features and a more rigid stance as this architecture serves as a bridge from the classical into the medieval world. In the middle, Constantine places spolia from Hadrian’s monument not only linking him with Hadrian but also proving to his people his rounded character with references to hunting and philosophy. Lastly, the top layer illustrates prisoners, those captured from this military defeat, with abnormal clothing—pants, not the conventional togas worn at the time. 

Commodus as Hercules

Emperor Commodus may not have had the best political, administrative, or social skills, seeing how everyone close to him planned his strangulation, he did commission some art works including this bust of himself as Hercules.  On his head, he has the skin of the Nemean lion, in his hands he holds the apples from the Garden of the Hesperides, and he also has Hercules’ club resting on his shoulder: all references to Hercules’ labors.  His likeness does reference his father, Marcus Aurelius (link), but his depiction as Hercules was seen as arrogant and vain.  Despite all this, the drillwork used to produce this bust is extremely refined and well done as it creates a sort of movement when hit by light.  

Basilica of Maxentius and Constantine

Although Maxentius’s rule over Rome was brief, he called for the repair of older buildings which would have a greater effect on future art than could have been expected.  One of the most notable repairs was to the Basilica Nova, now called the Basilica of Maxentius and Constantine, which served as an administrative area and an area where the emperor could be the supreme judge.  In the past, most basilicas were simply halls with columns inside, but Maxentius wanted this basilica to be larger and grander, so he used the barrel vaulting technique usually found in baths.  The central hall was covered with groin vaults and the side aisles, which also served as a buttressing system, were barrel vaulted.  The apse at the end of the hall served as a focal point for anyone entering from one of the three entrances on the opposite side.  This basilican style was adopted later by the Early Christians for their church architecture.

Flavian Women

This Young Flavian Woman bust on the right stares at the viewer with idealized skin and perfect hair, but also with distinct facial features such as deep set eyes and a heavy brow.  Her hair is piled high on her head in the latest fashion, and must have taken skill and drillwork to create in marble.  Her idealized features coupled with real likeness is similar to Augustus Prima Porta and was created in the same Early Imperial art period.  In contrast, this Middle Aged Flavian Woman on the left is less idealized and more natural.  Her skin shows the passage of time, and although her hair is also in a fashionable up do, it is not nearly as complex as her younger counterpart.  Because her age shows, this woman would have been revered and looked up to when this bust was made.  While this sculpture reflects more of the Roman Republic verism, it was created around the same time as the Young Flavian Woman, about the 1^st century CE.