Polymnia. Studi di Archeologia n.07

The paper reconsiders the religious tradition of the triens sacer of familia Servilia as told by Pliny the Elder. According to the literary source, the family owned a triens which they worshipped with ritual ceremonies once a year. The acceptance of the offers would have been represented by a miracolous growth in size of the holy object, also symbolising the fatum of the Servilii in terms of honour. On the contrary, any dimensional reduction would have meant a bad omen for the family. The so called ‘Servilian triens’ has been often interpreted as a numinous piece of bronze to which the Servilii worshipped their own gentilician cult. Some aspects of this misterious ritual as the origin and the choice of the triens still remain unresolved.

Per ricostruire adeguatamente il tempio presso la collina Miklavški hrib a Celje, in Slovenia, è essenziale condurre un dettagliato studio degli elementi architettonici conservati. Le caratteristiche principali del tempio sono state determinate in base al confronto con quanto raccomandato da Vitruvio. L’analisi dei resti conservati in situ e dei materiali emersi porterebbe a ricostruire un tempio esastilo pseudoperiptero su podio nonché la presenza di un portico. Il tempio è attualmente attribuito al culto di Hercules ma l’ipotesi resta da verificare.

En este artículo recopilamos las inscripciones de la Lusitania (Hispania Ulterior) en las cuales se hace patente el motivo de la dedicatoria – se trate de una causa o de una finalidad – a través de fórmulas como: ex visu, ex iussu, pro salute, etc. El objetivo es profundizar en el tema de la dinámica de la oferta votiva y, al mismo tiempo, en el estudio de la recepción de la religión romana y de los hábitos epigráficos en esta provincia del Impero romano.

The paper examines an inscribed lead foil from Altinum, of which a new reading is offered. Moreover, the ritual process concerning the votive contract is taken into account, with special reference to its oral and written performance. Finally, some considerations are made on the recent reassessment of the concept of defixio.

Excavations carried out in Pontecagnano nothern sanctuary area have brought to light more than 4000 votive terracottas. Installed during the VI century B.C in a suburban area – near a swamp, the sanctuary was intentionally defuncionalized shortly before Picentia colony foundation. Statuette fragments have been found into important votive deposits concentrated in specialised zones of sacred area. For the sanctuary ‘disinauguration’ ritual, the terracottas have been diffusely discharged in large quantities on the whole sanctuary surface, together with other votive categories and with the Sanctuary furnishings. The wide repertory, made up by 6th and 4th centuries B.C. evidences, has supplied some interesting causes for reflection about sanctuary ritual peculiarities and about the local coroplastic industry practices.

The paper examined two religious buildings in central areas of the ancient Capua: the so-called shrine of the “via de Gasperi” (discovered in 1980) and the Mithraeum (1922) linked by the chronology (full imperial age) and by spaces underground and darken with limited access and installations to attend the rites. The layout of either of two examples gave to the involved people the opportunity to follow a path, to stay in, to interact with structures and consacrated fornitures. In both cases the wall paintings were not a sheer decorum, but was specially designed to create a appropriated atmosphere for the rites. In both cases they provide two different register of representation: one formal and most noble, the second most popular was focused on the partecipation and the self identification of the audience (the faithfuls in the “Sacello di via A. de Gasperi”; the initiates at the Mithraeum). In the first case it appear to be female rites, or however rites where the female element played a prominent role; in the second it is instead the masculine element that is set in evidence whereas the rare female images belong to the divine sphere or to symbolic personifications. Thus it seems to me that they was spaces designed to respond to specifics cultual end ritual needs of the big urban community of ancient Capua between the I and III century A.D.

El espacio doméstico, jardín incluido, acoge un gran número de divinidades: divinidades domésticas propiamente dichas, pero también divinidades por las que la familia tiene una devoción particular o circunstancial. El espacio doméstico sirve también de marco a diversas manifestaciones culturales privadas o privado-públicas, de mayor o menor envergadura. Algunas cotidianas, otras recurrentes y otras puntuales en relación con los acontecimientos particulares que incumben a los miembros de la familia. Los aderezos vegetales efímeros (coronas y guirnaldas constituyen las componentes indispensables al buen desarrollo de esos ritos y un elemento esencial de su puesta en escena como testimonian las pinturas. Los accesorios vegetales del ritual, efímero por naturaleza, inspiran diversos elementos de la decoración perenne dedicada a los Lares. La proliferación de elementos decorativos de inspiración vegetal (penachos y guirnaldas esencialmente) y su carácter estructurante en la organización de la pintura mural hacen pensar que el carácter doméstico es una extensión del altar de los Lares. Las representaciones de guirnaldas, ya sean realistas, estilizadas o estereotipadas revelan la voluntad de estabilizar en lo cotidiano la unión con la divinidad que procura la celebración ritual. Al no dejar nunca sin ornamentación ni el altar y ni siquiera la domus, en su integralidad poblada de dioses, las decoraciones efímeras y perennes generan esta sobreabundancia propiciatoria que es consubstancial al sacrificio en su honor. La invasión de la decoración doméstica por las guirnaldas pone en escena la pietas de la familia. La cual da una forma metafórica y metonímica a la abundancia de los dones recibidos y a la reciprocidad del vinculo y de sus intercambios con los dioses. Las presentaciones de ofrendas vegetales están al servicio de la pax deorum en el espacio doméstico.

Il III Seminario di Archeologia del 'sacro' affronta il tema degli spazi in rapporto agli atti rituali che vi si svolgevano. Il volume raccoglie contributi interdisciplinari su molteplici aspetti, dall'articolazione architettonica e funzionale degli edifici sacri al loro apparato decorativo, nonché agli spazi e ai modi del rito.

The sanctuaries of Athena and Apollo in Pompeii are attested as early as the 6th century BC. But unlike in the Archaic period, when sacred spaces and rituals were used to sanction ‘international’ contacts, in the Sabellian period the sanctuaries became ‘local’ cult places frequented by people from the site who enhanced a sense of community through collective rituals. The long lifespan of the cult places is noteworthy, although there is a lacuna in the evidence between the second half of the 5th and the first half of the 4th century BC which would merit some further investigation. The question of continuity is crucial here. On the basis of a new research project by the Soprintendenza Speciale per Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia, this paper attempts to split up the history of the cult places and ritual activities in Pompeii in order to reconstruct the social context in which religious activities took place in each period under study. The main focus lies on the Republican or “Sabellian” period.

Cilicia is a significant research topic in order to analyse cultural and religious assimilation processes that affected Asia Minor in the Hellenistic period. Thanks to its geographical position, Cilicia was a natural crossroads between different cultural traditions but, due to its geomorphological features, it kept over the centuries its Anatolian background. The interaction between these two attitudes emerges especially in Hellenistic times, contributing to the development of a stratified religious identity, as well as to the architectural definition of worship places. This paper analyses the rise and the development of major Cilician sanctuaries, both urban and extraurban. In spite of the overall lack of archaeological records, the literary, epigraphic and numismatic evidence gives information about main civic cults, primarily devoted to Athena, worshipped in Seleucia on the Kalykadnos river, Elaiussa, Soloi, Aigeai and Mallos. In relation to extra-urban sanctuaries (located in Olba, Magarsos and Kastabala and dating back to pre-Hellenistic times), the Seleucid kings, especially Antiochus IV Epiphanes, enhanced both architectural renewal and assimilation of worships in Hellenic forms. More complex is the case of the Cilician cave known as Korykion Antron, located in the inland of the ancient Korykos; it combines different temple typologies (Doric prostyle temple and cult cave), widespread in the Olbian territory. These small cult sites were gathering-places for rural population and some of them probably played as well a role of border sanctuaries.

Pontecagnano and the site of Monte Vetrano in the Agro Picentino provide some interesting cases for reconstructing cult practices and ritual actions integrated into the frame of the landscape: the paper reports the results of the excavations carried out in the two settlements for the construction of the third lane of the highway Salerno-Reggio Calabria and the WTE plant of Salerno.

The lararium was a shrine to the guardian spirits of the Roman household. Family members performed daily rituals at this shrine to guarantee the protection of these domestic spirits, the most significant of which were the Lares. This paper focus on a new study about the domestic cult in Herculaneum, starting from the creation of a corpus of all the lararia discovered in the ancient city, until the reconstruction of the rituals and offerings that Romans made to the home altars.

Si – comme on a déjà souligné – il n’y a pas un répertoire décoratif exclusive des sanctuaires, mais une adaptation des régimes en vogue dans les différents contextes, à la fois publics et privés, et par rapport aux commissions plus ou moins élevés, les édifices sacres montrent toutefois des moyens expressifs particuliers ou reconnus comme plus adéquat pour eux. On trouve en effet des systèmes – plutôt que des complets programmes décoratifs – qui semblent survivre en continuité pour désigner la fonction de l'éspace sacré, ce qui démontre que ça était une choix consciente dès le début, même si l'évolution de la décoration murale oriente vers differentes expériences formelles avec de nouveaux équipements. La diffusion du premier style dans les sanctuaires de Rome et du Latium, ainsi que des cas bien documentés comme Volterra et Populonia, semblent se référer directement à l'origine de la décoration murale que selon Vincent Bruno doit imiter les perspectives monumentales isodomic des bâtiments publics et des temples dans le monde grec. Très souvent on trouve aussi des peintures rémontant à la phase initiale du deuxième Style avec une parois fermé très rigoureuse et solide (p.e. Brescia, Amplero, Sulmona); en quelque cas il y a un element trés caractèristique comme le rideau peint (velarium) employé dans la partie inferieure des parois, qu’on retrouve souvent dans les salles d'apparat et plus tard dans certaines églises du Moyen Âge.

The paper analyses the ritual practices recorded in the Tas-Silġ sanctuary, in the island of Malta, focusing on what features can be retraced for the historical phases prior to the Late republican age, between 8th and 2nd century BC. The first period (8th-5th century BC) refers to the Phoenician phase of the site: the new structures do not seem to interfere with the prehistoric temple, which is kept unaltered. The worshipped deity – known from the inscriptions – is Astarte: the complex personality of the goddess, featuring traits belonging to the local tradition, has marked chthonian characters, as testified by the existence of the recently explored hypogeum structures. The new elements added in the sacrificial area over the timespan between 4th and 2nd century BC reveal a new openness towards Mediterranean influences; the hypogeum is not used for rituals anymore, and the chthonian traits of the cult clearly lose strenghth, probably under the influence of the new cultural context.

A group of two swords, a leaf-shape spearhead and four flanged axes have been found twenty years ago in the bed of the Cellina stream, near Montereale Valcellina (Pordenone). This hoard is interpreted as votive offering to the river from the Late Bronze Age, in order to favour the water crossing. The weapons are tied to a Roman inscription and two column drums found scattered at the church of San Rocco, in the northern part of the town, to support the hypothesis of the presence of a water cult. Through an examination of the available data and detailed analysis of the proposal is a revision of the problem, to verify the presence and continuity of rituals related to the water in ancient Montereale for the period from the Late Bronze and Roman age.

Space and gestures, two fundamental issues in the history of ancient religions, represent crucial topics for the study of ritual contexts. However, given the difficulty of understanding these categories and the undeniable role (and continuous interweaving) of ritual practices, new interdisciplinary studies are required. This paper proposes some considerations built on researches by De Certeau, Douglas and Cardona in order to define a new research approach shared by historians of religions and archaeologists alike. This approach is aimed at bypassing impervious definitions and formulating new hypothesis in order to address the complexity of the relationship between space and gesture in Ancient Mediterranean cultures.

The contribution concerns, through the study of some specific contexts, the issue of the relation between the ritual act and the sacred spaces. An in-depth analysis is dedicated to the temple of Bona Dea in Tergeste, as an example of an integrated interpretation of the ancient sources.

L’article propose d’analyser les programmes décoratifs des édifices résidentiels et religieux d’époque romaine en Italie du nord. Des synthèses récentes, en fait, ont mis en évidence un conformisme des décors, mais aussi l’existence de particularités liées au type de édifice à orner (sanctuaire ou temple vs domus ou villa). À partir des données du territoire de l’Italie du nord, cet article invite à réfléchir sur plusieurs questions: est-il possible de comparer les schémas décoratifs? Est-il possible d’identifier l’existence de schémas directeurs définissant les modes décoratifs des édifices privés et religieux? On tentera en outre d’établir si la diffusion de certains schémas est liée à une symbolique particulière du décor (par exemple les peintures du deuxième Style du temple tardo-républicain à Brescia) ou plutôt à la caractérisation et la hiérarchisation des espaces (par exemple les peintures et les mosaïques du sanctuaire de Minerve à Breno). La réponse n’est pas simple ni univoque: l’étude des décors en lien avec leur contexte architectural offre, chaque fois, une interprétation différente.