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review of Janet Huskinson's Roman Strigillated Sarcophagi

11/21/2017

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Janet Huskinson's important new monograph on Roman Strigillated Sarcophagi: Art and Social History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015) has been reviewed (by the author of this blog) in the most recent volume of Classical Review.

The full reference:
Allen, Mont. "A Comprehensive Survey of Strigillated Sarcophagi." Review of Roman Strigillated Sarcophagi: Art and Social History, by Janet Huskinson. Classical Review 67, no. 2 (October 2017): 526-528.
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Berlin's Bode Museum online:  360º panoramic tour of the museum's sarcophagi

2/15/2016

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Berlin's gorgeous Bode Museum has launched itself online.  Virtual visitors can now navigate at will through a full 360º panoramic tour of the entire museum, complete with clickable objects.

This panoramic tour includes room 115, the sarcophagus room, offering a nice assemblage of late 3rd- and early 4th-century metropolitan specimens.  Some, but not all, of these feature early Christian imagery — the reason, one suspects, that they were purchased for the museum's 'Byzantine' collection in the first place.

Standouts include:
  • a curious bucolic piece with scenes of grape- and olive-harvesting interrupted by an unexpected equestrian,
  • a Jonah sarcophagus,
  • another important early Christian piece with the (very rare) figures of Cain and Abel,
  • and a strigillated piece whose portraits are unfinished:  not only have their facial features been left uncarved (which is very common), but also — and this is very unusual — their hands too.  (For another unusual example of hands left uncarved, see my blog post on a similar piece in the Capitoline.)

Below is a still screenshot taken from the virtual tour.  Click on it to explore the room and objects yourself.
​
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book by Janet Huskinson:  Roman Strigillated Sarcophagi

12/6/2015

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Strigillated sarcophagi were the single most popular type produced in the city of Rome:  no other genre of Metropolitan sarcophagi were carved in such numbers.  Yet precisely because of this — their daunting numbers, along with their relatively limited figuration — they have long languished in the shadow of the lavish mythological frieze sarcophagi that so dominate the scholarship.

Janet Huskinson's new monograph, published by OUP, seeks to redress things.  The first volume in any language (including German) to devote itself entirely to strigillated specimens, it treats everything from the particulars of their manufacture and their varied contemporary social resonance, both pagan and Christian, to their later reuse and long afterlife in European hands.

The full reference:
Janet Huskinson, Roman Strigillated Sarcophagi: Art and Social History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015).

​The author of this blog will soon review Huskinson's volume for The Classical Review.
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Please bury me in a wine vat....

12/3/2013

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Roman strigillated sarcophagus with lion heads. Ca. 220 AD. New York, Metropolitan Museum (inv. 2005.258).
Strigillated sarcophagus with lion heads. Ca. 220 AD. New York, Metropolitan Museum (inv. 2005.258).
Why does this sarcophagus have rounded ends?  Why the lions' heads, and why are they chomping on rings?

Because — and you'll probably think this kooky — this sarcophagus is carved in the shape of a wooden wine vat.

The rounded ends are characteristic of the large tubs in which Romans pressed grapes to make wine.  More importantly, so are the lions:  we know from ancient depictions of actual Roman wine troughs that they often carried fancy felines' heads, carved in relief near the ends of the vat.  These served as elaborate (and humorous) decoration for the spigots (!) installed in their mouths:  wine flowed from the ferocious maws of lions — if you dared to put your hand directly between their jaws to open the tap.

They met other functional needs as well.  The metal rings used as handles for hoisting and dragging the vat had to be embedded in something; and ideally that something would project outward from the rest of the tub, to make carrying easier.  These leonine bosses thus served as anchors for carrying handles ("Think you can handle a lion? Now you can!") as well as fanciful frames for spigots.

Here the form of one of those elaborate wine tubs has been translated into stone, to hold very different contents.  This was a popular format for sarcophagi:  many elite Romans commissioned this style of coffin, particularly during the third century.  Just imagine a wealthy businessman or an important Senator choosing a stone-imitation wine vat as his vessel for eternity.  This would be unthinkable for us.  But it was entirely unproblematic for Romans, who so often — unlike us — preferred to meet death with humor.

As a side note.... you'll observe that the marble from which this sarcophagus was carved has several bands of darker color that run through the stone.  There's a wide, very dark band near the bottom; and a set of lighter, blue-gray bands that run across the top.  That's a characteristic feature of marble quarried on the island of Proconnesus (now Marmara), not too far from Istanbul, in modern-day Turkey.  It was a popular choice of stone for Roman sarcophagi in the third century.  You might think it an odd choice, given how far Proconnesus is from Rome.  But transport by sea was far easier and faster than transport over land in antiquity.  And the quarries on the island were close to the water — unlike the quarries of Italy.  As a result, shipping marble all the way from Turkey to Rome was actually cheaper than using marble from Italy itself.
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Here's looking at me, kid.

12/1/2013

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Roman strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple flanked by standing mythological figure. Third century AD. Rome, Vatican Museums (inv. 9253).
Strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple flanked by standing mythological figure. Third century AD. Rome, Vatican Museums (inv. 9253).
Detail of a Roman strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple flanked by standing mythological figure. Third century AD. Rome, Vatican Museums (inv. 9253).
Detail of a Roman strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple flanked by standing mythological figure. Third century AD. Rome, Vatican Museums (inv. 9253).
Who is that boy who stands languidly with arms atop his head, doing his best impression of a male pin-up on both ends of this sarcophagus?  And why is there a cupid at his feet, pointing to what looks like a theater mask on the ground?

If he weren't doubled up, you might think he was Dionysus, or even Apollo, given the youthful features and the erotic posturing.  But since he's duplicated, he probably doesn't represent a deity:  Roman carvers often duplicated generic figures, and sometimes even mythological mortals; but they usually refrained from doubling up a god.  So who is he?

The answer:  Narcissus.

He's very uncommon:  out of roughly 15,000 surviving Roman sarcophagi, only 5 (!) show Narcissus.  But this is he.  The cupid — that wee godling of desire — who stands at his feet is pointing not to a theater mask, but to Narcissus's own reflection.  Which Narcissus, of course, is admiring:  the erotic nature of his pose reflects his response to his own image.

The composition seems bizarre to us:  doesn't the Narcissus of Ovid's story (Metamorphoses 3:402-436) bend over the pool, or rather, lie beside it, rather than stand erect over it?  Indeed he does.  But the formal parameters of this particular format of sarcophagus, which left a tall but narrow field for mythological depiction at each end, imposed its own restrictions.  If Narcissus and his reflection — plus a symbolically helpful (though in Ovid's original narrative, entirely absent) cupid — were all to be shown within this constricted space, our self-asorbed hero would have to stand.
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Do my hands look like mushrooms to you?

11/29/2013

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Roman strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple; bucolic scene under clipeus, and philosopher & muse at ends. Third century AD. Rome, Capitoline Museum (inv. MC813).
Strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple; bucolic scene under clipeus, and philosopher & muse at ends. Third century AD. Rome, Capitoline Museum (inv. MC813).
Detail of a Roman strigillated sarcophagus with portrait of a couple; bucolic scene under clipeus, and philosopher & muse at ends. Third century AD. Rome, Capitoline Museum (inv. MC813).
​The portraits of the deceased husband and wife who inhabited this Roman sarcophagus were never finished:  their faces are blank.  That's not very unusual, actually.  What is unusual are the mushroom-like lumps poking out just underneath the busts.  What are those things?
They must be the couple's preliminary and uncarved hands.  But note that while these haven't yet been chiselled, they have been drilled:  the perfectly round drill holes are unmistakable.
This provides insight into the order of operations of a typical Roman workshop.  The drill was used first, for initial indexing (in this case, to index the separation of the fingers).  Only after this did the sculptor plan to turn to the chisel for further differentiation of the digits.  This particular sarcophagus, however, was pressed into service before he had time to complete that next step — ensuring that our dead couple would remain not only faceless, but forever fingerless.
EDIT: I have since been informed that what I took to be uncarved hands are more likely acanthus leaves, for which a handful of other pieces provide precedent. This must surely be right.
Also notable is the vignette directly underneath the central tondo.  It
 shows a marvelous bucolic scene:  a seated shepherd helps a ewe give birth (!).  James Herriot would be proud.  But in a funerary context this motif would have carried extra resonance:  the imminent birth of a lamb stands in counterpoise to the deceased couple directly above, insisting on life's continuity in the face of death.
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    A venue for announcing all that's new and noteworthy in the burgeoning field of sarcophagus studies.

    I hope you, gentle readers, will help make this a collective endeavor.  Should you come across anything new pertaining to Roman sarcophagi — whether a recent article or book addressing them, an exhibition or website featuring them, or an excavation uncovering them — please let me know so I can share it here.


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Mont Allen
Assistant Professor of Classics & Art History
Dept. of Languages, Cultures, & International Trade
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Southern Illinois University
Carbondale, IL  62901
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background:  sarcophagus showing Selene approaching the sleeping Endymion (New York, Metropolitan Museum, inv. 47.100.4a,b)