ns9

Leach u the strength to be found in conscription through in criptio n. Altdoiier translate graph ic J ews into arch it ec- tural space. T he ir ab ence becomes the fo rm al presence of "perspeCLiva l"' architeCLure. This tran laLion marks an impor- 1an t sh ift in regi ter from ethnicity to eth nograp hy. Ethnog- raphy is that writing space where others arc re duced to onto logical absence. 12 i\ltdorfer's very act of etching architec- tural space, re nderin g t he synagogue as a n a rchitectura l tudy, becomes constitutive of a new discou rse, ethnography .

T he a rch itectura l space etched by Akdorfer forecloses litr- the r e thnic co nflic t over circumcision between Chri stia ns and J ews. In so d oin g, the etch in g effaces the in scription of circumcision-viole nt pleasure h as become th e " know ledge" of space itself. Architectural re ndering as a new category of repre e ntation coven over the cut foreskin .

The e tching · produce omething new, a c111pt. It i on that tone urface that the e thnographer Altdorfer inscribe hi

new eth nography. which he signs with his mo nogram. Hi s e thnography i not about conte ted ethnic co-pre e ncc of C hristia ns a nd J ews. but the narc iss ism of the Sarne; t he conAict is resolved.

I have a rgued that bodi ly inscri p tions of Baptism and circumcision a nd the cascades of gra phic translatio n which p assed through such d iverse media as po lem ic, torture chambe rs. a nd engravings a nd etc hin gs ca me to constitute Christian-Jewish ethnic relations at the level of the printed graphic itself. By implicati on 1 am say in g th at printing not only rc prcscmed this contei.t bu t actu a lly came to constitu1 e it. As such , gra phic in scriptions sig nifying e thnic confli ct between C hristia n s and J ews linked toge Ll1er cascades or di scursive nerwo rks. Altd orfcr's a rc hi tectu ra l tran lation might then be read not o n ly as the new writing s urface or ethnograp hy bm a l ·o a. the al' p l in which C h1istia n finall y buried the fore kin , thu fo reclosing the possibility of mourn - ing the loss o r corporea l inscription whi ch Paul had dis- avowed so many cemuries earlier. T hi crypt, its grap hic mateda lity, has erved as a site of European e th nograp hic a uth ority for ha lf a m ille n n ium. It · staunch res istance LO brilliant po tcolo nia l critiques should give us pau e and urge u s to think more attentively about the ae thctics o f disappear- a nce and the work of mourn ing.

Kath/ern Biddick tPr1rhPs medie11a/ history and genda studies at thP University of NotrP Dam. fl. Herforthcoming book, Med ieva l ism in Fragments (Duke), ronsiders political links among di.1cif1linary rategories, periodiwtio11, and pleasurr in medieval studirs. Cur- rently she is studyiug the i11lnsectio11s of ethnography and tecl111o/- ogy in medirva/ Europe and llLPir persistence today [Departmmt of History, University of Notre Dame, No tre Dame, Ind . 46556/.

Allilllll IC:S. t I HNIC: l 1 \ . ANO rllE lll S IOK\' OF ART 599

''Just Like Us": Cultural Constructions of Sexuality and Race in Roman Art

j 0 /111 R . Clarke

One o r the g reatest difficu lties p laguing th e study of Roman an is the p ersi ste nt notion that the Roman were 'ju st like us." T hi s prob lematic idea fo rm s the premise and ubtext of five centuries of classical studies. If the Renaissance had a deep stock in estab lishin g the legi1imacy of early capitali st/ bourgeoi conception or the humani ' l individual through the study of classica l tex ls, it wa because th e legitimatio n of princely politics and e thics required a powerful prece- de nt-no less authoritative and powerfu l than the fab led Ro ma n e mpire. Re na i sancc human ist looked to C icero, Vergil, and Livy for ways to define the early modern tate.

ub equc nc attempts to legitim ate the prince, the absolute monarch, colonialism, ninetee nth-centutl' nationali m, and- finally a nd most terrify ingly--Cerman and Italian fasci m, a lways wem back w the ancient Roma n s, to those sa me texts wit h the ir histories of e mperors and e m pire, their great lawyer s, statesmen, r he toricia ns, mora li ts, and poets.

La te twentieth-ce ntury Eu ro-American culture is in many ways the e nd product o r centuri e of adaptatio n of ancien t Roman texts and cu lwral a rti fac ts 10 fi t the requ ire ments of an increasingly capi ta li st, bourgeois, and colonial system. If the Ro ma ns eem to be in a ll thing o much like " us:· it is because ''we" have colon ized their time in history. (In this essay I u se the words "we" and " us" LO denote the white, male elite of Euro-Ame1ican n tlture-1he person I perceive to be the domin ant voice in traditional ·cholarship.) We have appropriated their world to flt the need of o u r ideology.

A revolution ha occuned in the swdy of classical texts, one that h as challenged those five cemurie of scholars hip. On one front, fe minist scholar · have cha llenged and prob- lc matized the source. in their search for that e lu sive person, the Roma n woman. 1 All the texts tha1 have survived , wri tte n c it hc1· by elite wh ite ma les o r by men working fo r them, consuuct-that is, ma ke up-wome n . Both the poet a nd the jurist put words in the ir mouths a nd devise their actions whethe r vile or virtuous. One will search in va in for ~ woma n's comm enca11' o n the condition of women of a ny class, altho ugh by d econstructing texts scholars have s uc- ceeded in extrapolating inform ation about the el ite woma n : her lega l and marital sta LU , ocia l mores, and politica l power. Harder to track arc the nonclitc women-the great- est number of them invi ible because they are ciphe rs, both juridically and socia lly: t hese include free nonelite women, former slaves, slaves, foreigners, and outcasts (infames) like prostitutes.

A seco nd ro u te of inquiry has tried to recover the diver ity of p eople in the Roman e mpire by a pplying the models

l . !'or il~rcc r ecent collcctiom of cssa} , 'cc Na11cy Sorkin Rabinowitz and Amy R1 chhn, eds., F/!'1111111.1/ Theory and thr C/1L1.11r1, New York, 1993. bibl. after each essay and 305-7; Elaine Fant ham et al ., Womm 111 /hf Clri.mral Wnrld: Image rJnd Text, New York, 1994, bibl. after each c'say; and Ri chard Ha,vlev and Barbara Levick. eds .. IV0111en i11 1l n11q1111 v: New A.«r.m 11r111.1 New York 1995. hibl. 248-64. . ' '

600 AR I llLLUTI\; I H: CEMl\ER 19'1fi VOU .. Mf LXXVll l l\l\l llf. R 4

Pompeii, House ofCaeciJius lucundus, peris tyle, Couple on Bed with SPrvant. Naples Archaeological Museum , inv. I I 0569 (photo: Michael Larvcy)

d eveloped in socio logy, economics, cultural anthropology, a nd geography (including urba n tudies a nd popu lation a nalysi ). The picture that has e mer ged is that of a n e mpire loosely organized indeed. Once the Roma ns had conquered va rio us peoples of"Lhc Meditcnanean , they tried to rule with the lig hte L possible to uch , prcfe JTing the lai ·ez-fairc accom- moda tions of relig io us syncrctis m. loca l 11Jle, a nd vas aJ (puppet ) kings w the heavy-handed direct polic in g that was 50 expe n sive to ma imain. N; lo ng as a town or province paid its taxes to Ro me a nd maimained a modicum of civil order, Rome was happy to let indigeno us culture cominue. A1:,rain, it se em s that mode rn ideologies have require d Roman rule to be mo re a ll-e ncompassing than it was in rcality. 2

rr applica tion of the methodo logie of femini t scho larship and the ocia l scie nces has begun to expand the Lunncl- visio n optic of' traditi o nal clas ·ica l studi es of Rome, wha t can the s tudy of visual representatio n accomplish ? Cen tra l Lo a ny project using Ro man visual ans to under ta nd anciem Rom a n peo ple is the realizatio n tha t wherea texts a ddressed the elite , an addressed eve1y bo d y. Fn>m official impe ri al art

t. Peter G.11 mey and Rich ard Saller, 711' Ro111a11 bnp1r'P: Ero1111111.1. Soridy. a nd Cu//u rr, Berkeley. 1987, sy nth csiLc much of the currc n1 rev isio ni st ,c11olarship.

3. See J o hn R. Cla rke, " 1 Iyper ex ual Black :'\te n in Augu>tan Baths: lcleal Som atol) pc> ;u1d Apo1rop.1ic Magic," in ata lie H. Kampen. ed., .\P\/Wltl.\' 111 A11c1ent A11. C.1mbridge. 1996. 18-1-98; ancl id f'm, l11ok111g al ln1wmttla11g: s,xuailty m Roman Art-Co 11.<trurt1on..<. 100 IJ .C.-A.D. 250. Be 1·kclcy. fo nhcom- ing.

4 . rhis pauern wa ' 'ct n p in J ea n Marcade. Roma Amor: £11(tV 011 Erotir Elemn1t.< 111 Etrusmn mid Ruman Ari. Gc 11e\'a, 1963; a n d id em. Ero' Kaloi: r:wzy 011 £rot1r Ele111m1_, m G1-,,k Ail. Gcne\la. 19()5. A p <1rtill 1l:1rl) lame ntable rcct-r;t

to the wall paintings in a Pompeian hou ·e. Roman art con cio usly e mbraced a far broader audience tha n the text . My recent work has focused o n two spec ia lized ge nres of Roman a rt. images of huma n lovema king and r e presenta- tion o f the black African , in a n effort Lo understand the no nelitc viewe r, the fe ma le viewer, a nd even the no n-Roman viewer.:1 It is fro m thi work that I would like to draw two illustrations o f how contextual readings ofvisuaJ representa- tions reveaJ the g rea t differences between Ro ma n cu lture and o ur own.

T he typical lite ra tme o n sex ua l representation in Roma n an presents a variety of imagery in many media-from wall paintings to ceramic and me 1alwork-under the rubric o f "erotic'' an: 1 Autho rs then try to tack texts o nto photographs o f' these re prese ntations: the reader secs a photograph of a atyr a nd maenad copulating o n o ne page, a nd on the fa cin g

page a n excerpt from O vid' Arl of Love. ever mind that the paiming came from the wall of a hou se in Po mpe ii ; lhat it dates fro m o ne hundred year~ la ter than Ovid's poem ; that the couple i mythica l, no t hum an; a nd that Ovid wa writing poeuy fo r the el ite whereas the viewer o f this pa inting may have been ill iterate. Yet with few exceptio ns studies of Roman so-ca lled e rotic art have a ·sumed lha L Roma n visual re prescnlatio ns illustrated tex t and that texts " document" Ro ma n sexuality. Erudite studies of Latin words for sexual positio n cla im to find corrobo ra tion in wall paintings, lamps, even lhe coinlike spintriae-aJ I considered without regard LO their a rchitectural com exts o r date ."

ff we turn the la bles and begin with the C011leXt Of vi ual repre. e nta tions of' lovema king, surprising resul ts e merge. We begin 10 unde rstand how what seems to be erotic-by which I mean a n image meant lO timulate a person cxu- a lly-ha d a torally different mea ning for the a ncie nt Rom an viewer. A good case in poi nt is the pa inting (d a ted A. D. 62-79) cul fro m a wall of the I lo use o f Caecilius lucundus at Pompe ii (Fig. I). Anton io Sogliano, who excavated this la rge reside nce in 18 7 5, deem ed it oh cene and had it car ted o ff ro the infamou s Pornographic Collectio n of the Naples 1\rchaco- logica l Mu ·c um . (To thi day th is room, filled with mosaics, wall paintin gs, and smaJI objects, rema ins ba1Tc d to t he publi c.) Ye t cons ideratio n of the o riginal locatio n of th e picture. alo ng with aspects of it im agery, indicates tha t it was th e pride o f the owner"s hou e: it spe lJcd ''status, " not "sex."

The owner was a freedman who ha d enlarged the ho use LO make fo ur dining roo m . The major dining area was 1he o ne located on the peris tyle; it fo rm ed a suite with a luxurious kind of bedroom , o ne with two niches, immedjatcly to its ri ght. O ur "eroti c" painting occu pied the impo rta nt space o n th e peri -tylc itselr between the doorways to these two

t·xa111p le ol thc tcxt/ im agt' pa•Lidw is Ern.< gru: Amour de, d1r1L\ Pf dP.< hnmmes, «Xh. G il ., Pans , Grn11d Palni~. At he n s, I \l89.

.5. 111i; app roach , pionee red i11 G;1s1011 Vorb crg, Glomm'11111 Erotiw111. S LUugan . I 93t. cominuc• in We rne r Kre nke!, " Figu r.11: \'e 11 cris." Wl\1m1diaji- ilrhr le1lsrlrrrfl tin ll '1'hr/111- P1eck-L'111vernlal Roslork, XXl\11, I 98f1, 50--37.

6. Arnold cit.: Vo>. "Casa di Cecilio G ioumclo," in l'nrnpe1p11t1tff r11101a 1r1, 111, Ro mc. 199 1. !;7!'1.

7. Ari>10o-:i 1 s regularly u sed cubiu1t .1 141r meetings wllh peers o r th eir social hcu.crs. ' I he a 11C'ien t li1t·nn1irc includes five insta1u c' of' Ro man s receivi n g lne 11ds 111 rnlnrulo. three of th ei r co11dur1 ing business there. a nd four ol

rooms. Mod ern scholars, ig n oring both the culture o f Ro- man e nte r tai nme m a nd th e meaning of the pic LUre itself, have assumed that the paiming designated th e bedroom a a place for a tryst a fter dining .1;

We as ociate bedroom s with sleepi ng a nd sexual im im acy; the a ncient Ro mans a l o used well-appo im ed bedrooms to e m e rtain guests o r a status equal to o r hig her th a n their own. T he e ntire Rom a n ho use was a place of business; a gue t's entra nce into a fin e cubiculum like thi s o n e depended e mire ly upon hi ~tatus.7 T h is room is no t, the n . about " privacy"-a concept that does not exist in Roma n la nguage o r tho ug ht- but about high status .

Examination o f the painting itself how that the painter was ·triving to crea te an image o f uppe r-class lu . ury. There is a couple o n a richly o utfitted bed . T he woman ho lds her hand beh ind he r, whether to conceal her de ire to touch the ma n or to locate him is not dear. He lifts hi arm as thou g h in emreaty, but she canno t cc thi ge ·ture. A nice touch is the way his le ft h and curves u p at the wrist. allowing the a rti st to show his virtuosity in depicting delicate fin ger . The viewer ee the ·e deta ils bu c the woman d oc not, a llowi ng the

per on who looks a t th i ce ne of lovema king to unde r tand the man ' s emreaty a nd the woman's hesitation in a way tha t the woman-and perhap her lover a lso-cann o t. In e ffect, the ani t create d these nuances of viewin g to implicate the viewer as a voyeur. He also included the bedroom se rvant, the cubicularius, LO under core that thi was no t a poo r ma n 's bedroom . He even app lie d g-old to hig hli g h t the o pule nce of fabrics a nd jewe lry. These a rc a ll m arks of wealth , luxury, a nd sop hi stica tio n , simila r to the pa intin gs rc pre e nting lovemak ing from the fa mou s villa of the early Augustan period fo und in Ro me unde r the garde n of the Farn c ina. 11

T he pai n ring wa pan of a n exte n sive r ed ecoratio n ca m- paign with a p ointed iconographical program.9 The adjacent dining room received a refined decora cive scheme , including mythological pi ctures or the Judgme nt of Paris a nd T he eus Abando ning Ariad ne. 10 omeone e nte ring the cubiculum wou ld have ccn rela ti vely la rge figures a t the center of rhe wa lls in fro nt, to the r ig h 1, a nd to the le ft. The room· · principal image wa a g roup of Ma rs a nd Venus with a ligure o f C upid s tandin g in the pan e l to the ri g ht. Bacchus pre ·ided over th e rig ht wa ll ; o n the le ft wall stood the muse Erato. h eems clear that the artist intended to expand the the me of

lovema kin g fro m the hum an to the divine by associatin g the vi ·ion of aristocra t ic da lliance in the per-istyle pa nel with a n image of p assio n stirri ng the quinte semial divine lover , Mars and Venus, in the ma in pane l o f the cubirnlum. Wine a nd son g, pei·son ifie d by Bacchus a nd Erat o, muse of love poetry, furthered thi · iconography of a mo ro us plea ures .

empe ror., holding mat~ mtro rubuu/11 111; sec An c!re1• Wallace - Hadrill. /louse' n11d 5or1'lJ 111 f'ompmnml flPr ruln11n1111 . Prin cewn , N .J .. t !)95, 17. n . 2.

8. lre11c Brng~mj111 a nrl Marielle de Vo~. I.I' tleco raz m111 tlella 1•illn rom111111 de/la Farn r m111 , Museo Nuionale Rmmmo. 11. pt. I : /,/' p11t11rr, Ro me . 1982, pb. ·10, 51 . 85. 86. 9 6 . 17':!. .

9. See Augmt Mau . .. , >cavi di l'onipci ,'" H11/lrt1m o drll"f111t1tuln di C11m,po11- dmui Ardunlol(ico. 1876. t 49-5 1, 16 1-68, 2!l3-32, 241 -4 2. fora de~C11p1ion of the now- rl cs1roye d o r removed pai111i n gs.

10. Naples, Archaeological Museum . inl'. 115396: >ee de Vos (as 111 n. 6 ), fig. 7-l ; and Ma u (as in 11. 9), 226.

11. Frescoes 1,rre e1 Tnnrnkhio\ g11es1" a Lrnmpe-l'oci l p a intin g of ,, dog

\ESTIH.1 1 <.~ . FT ll N l l S n ". A1'0 I HF Hl~lOKY Of A R I 60 )

2 Po mpeii, House of the Menander, entryway to cnldarium, Bath A llmdanl (photo: Michael Larvey)

Th i contex tual a n alysis demo nstrates th at rather than havin g an e ro tic functio n , the p a intin g of love making in the House of Caeciliu lucundus was a sign fo r the upper-cla~s prete nsions o f th e ow ne r. Like T rimalchio, the wealthy form er slave of Pe tronius'. Sat)'ricon who delig hts in expl a in - ing hi~ pit:Lurcs to his (bored) guest , 11 the L. Caeciliu lucundu s who di ned in this tricl in ium mu st have fe lt a g low o f pride when a guc ·t recognized the re fin e me nt or his icono- graphical program , uniting the image of upper-class huma n lovemaking with the divine pair of Mar a nd Venu s in the cubiculum an d th e heroic pane ls of th e triclinium . Th is '"erotic" picture was about luxury, not lu st.

In an e ra that advoca te s tudy or e thnic. racia l, a nd cu ltu ra l divers it y, it would seem na rural to tu rn to the grear me ltin g p o t tha t wa ancien t Rome Lo under ·rand how thi. culture con structed the O the r. Again , t here i the danger o f over im- pliticatio n and transference o f o ur Anglo-Euro p ean culture onto the a rn.:ie nt Ro m an s. 12 Carefl1l conte xtual study revea l combinations of racial stereotypes a nd belief system so differe nt from our own tha t they si mply boggle the la te twentie th-cen tury mind .

Th e excavator who di covered the mo ·aic of a b lack bath serva nt in the 1930s was content to ide nti fy him as a n ithyp hallic pyg my (Fig. 2). 1:l Th e figure occupies the e nll)'- way to the caldnrimn in the Ho use of th e Me nander. T he

(wi rh the le gend< wr 1..11\ t.\l-" Bc"are of tl1e Dog .. ) ;rnrl th e slO'l' of his 111<: cold rhrough allcgode• of divine intcrv.-n1io11 (P e1rn11., Sol .. 29). Trima ltln o in rerpre t> the Zodiac in a u elaborate' rli • h 'erved LO hi> g uc>rs P9); oners a .-idiculo11s ico nograp hi cal e x planation o f' 1hc imagery in his sihc:r vess els (52): and 01 den. u p th e irn11 01,rraphirnl prog ra m for hi' 10111 b (7 t ).

12. A rnse o f su ch O\ ersnn p lification i' Frank M . Snowden.Jr., 8 Pj ou Color PrepullfP, Ca mbri dge. :\l as , .. 1983, who arbrucs tha1 Ll1ere wa' no "'nJlur pn;jud 1ce" Lowarrl blacks in cla~si cal amil1ui ty.

I '.l .. '\m edeo Maiuri, /J1 m~o drl Mt110 11dru' ti 511 Te•m·o d1 A rgml l'n a. Rome. 1933, I. f.16.

602 1\RI Ill LL£TIN DH.EMBF.R 19% VOLL M~ l.XXVlll Nl.~lllk: R 4

composition of heraldic strigils fra ming an ointment jar on a cha in fill s Lhe oute r side of the e nu-yway composition, so th at it was the first image that the visitor saw as he or he passed from the dressing room (apod)•fe1ium) to the raldarium. The ma n carries water vesse ls (askoi), identifying him as a bath atte ndant; he wears a kind of short kilt that rides above his enormo us pe nis. A laure l wreath crowns his head. l\.lthough h e is technica lly maa-op hallic (i.e., having a n unusually large pen is) rather than ithyp ha llic (i.e., with an erect pe ni ), his identification as a pygmy i Lhe more serious cn·or. Images o f the pygmy go back to the sixth ce ntury 13.C.: artists made them short in stature, with large heads in relation Lo their bodies, the ma les usually macrophallic. 1'1 The bath attenda nt has a d ifferent body type. Most importa nt, th e a rtist has differentiated him from the pygmy by givi ng him normal proportions. T he mosaicist used a saw-tooth configuration of' black tesserae to indicate his tig htly curled hair. Investiga- tion of comparable image of black men in Roman arr of the period (the mosaic has a firm date of 40- 20 1:1.c.) establishes that the a rtist has represented n ot the mythi cal pygmy hut the real-life Aethiops, a man from the African continent belonging to a racial a nd ethnic group auested in contempo- rary tex ts a nd visua l represen ta t io ns. 1;, Si nce a rti sts made hjm macrophallic only in certain cu lptures a nd mosaics, cont extual s LUdy alone can clarify the mea ning o f this image .

T he bath attendant is poised at the emryway lO the hot room o f a p1-ivate bath in a luxurious Pompeian hou e belo ng ing to an elite fa mily. Fo r the a ncient Roman , this circum stance explains the image: it is a representa tio n with two context- and cu lture-s pecific purpo~cs: 10 warn the bather of the dangers of the supe rheated floor or the room he or she is e nte ring, and to dispel Lhe evil eye th ro ugh la ughter.

The Aeth iops is a logical sig n lO warn the bather about hea l becau se the Rom ans believed that the Aethiops's black skin came from being burned by the s un. Because of thi belie f, the Aethiops became a me tonym for extreme heat. 16 (Sim ila rly, mosa ic images of sanda ls a l o appear a t th e e ntryways to hot rooms of bath s to warn the bather to protect his or he r fee t from getting burned .)

More complex and d ifficul t for u s to understand is our bath attendant's apotropaic fun ction. Ancient Romans be- lieved that the envious person (the phthonero~ or invidus) cou ld cause illn ess, physical harm , a nd even death by

14 . For the iconograp h y ol the pyg111y in Creel.. myth. ;,ce Veronique Dasen. Dwarfs i11 A1irin1/ Egy/11 mid Greect, Oxford. I 993, l 82-9 1.

IJ. ll1e mo> I compre hensive coverage is Jean Vcrcou rter C l al.. The lnWffe of /ht 1:1/ack m Wr.1/tm Art: I . From the Pharnolu lo the Fall oflht ffomtm £111p1u, New York. 1976: see a lso Frank M. Snowden, J r., Bl11rk.1 m A11t1q1111y, Cam bridge. Mass., I 970.

16. For a Ii.ill di~rnssion of the c\'idence, in both Greek and Rom an authors, for thi s e1wironmental 1hcol) of color, >CC nowdcn (as i11 n. l.'i ). 2-3. 172-74. See a lso J ehan Desanges. re\ ie" of Lloyd l11ompson . R 0111m11 cmd /Jlarks, Nor1 n:111, Okla., 1989, Ri11ur dps Eludes lati11Ps. LX\ 111. 1990. 233.

l 7. M. W. Dickie and Ka1hcrine .\1 . D. D11nb:1bin. "Tnmdia nm1/H111/11r peclom: l11e Iconography of Phthono;/111vidia in Gracto· Ro m an Art," Jahrbuc/1/11rA1111lttu11dChnstent11111. xxv1, 1983. 10-l l .

l 8. Doro Levi," Ilic Evil Eye and the Lucky H unchback ," in A1111orh-or1-tlte- Onmte.<, ed. Ri chard Stillwell. 111. Princeton. N.j., 1941 , 22.-,. Luca Gi uliani. " Der >eiigen Kriippe l: Zur De11tung von Mi~gestahcn in der hdlenistischen Kleink11n st." Arrlwnlng1sd1e A11u1ger, l 9R7, 701 - 2 l. sce~ images of php it·all)' defor med people Jess ,,~ charms agaimt the evi l eve than a• vehicle' to rem ind people of their own good fortune a nd well -being. It is po>sible t ha1

focusing his or her eye o n the person whom he or she envied. l\.lthough the re were many theories on just how such harm cou ld come to a p erson withom physical contact, most believed that the invidus was able to focus th is grudging malice through his or h er eye; thi s so-called evil eye ema- nated particles that surrounded and entered its unfortunate victim. 17 A person could e ncounter the envious evil eye a nywhere, but was particularly susceptible in bath s and at passageway spaces. such as doorways. People wore amulets on their persons, and artists freq uently put symbolic image on fl oors or wa lls of dangerous, liminal spaces. These aj1otropaia in mosaic and fresco included the represemauon or the evi l eye itse lf attacked by spears, scorpions, d og , a nd the Ii.kc. a s well as images of the e rect phallus, sometimes in conjunction with the vagina. In the fir t insta nce the image e nacts direct aggression against the evil eye; in the second it invo kes ma le and fema le fertili ty, the life force , for protec- uon from death.

By making the over ize pha llus the anri bute of the Aelh- iops, our mosaic adds yet anothe r apotropaic clement: aTo'TTL<x, or "unbecomingness. " The bath servant is " unbecom- ing'' and therefore q u ite fun ny because he is outside the o ma uc norms of the Ro man elite. Unbecomin gness dis-

pelled the evil eye with la ughter. 11l T h e ma le Aethiops is no t always a comic figure in Roman

a rt; th e key to understanding Roman elite attitudes toward him lie in defining what were their nonns of ideal male beauty. Brie Oy, an idea lly beautifu l man wou ld be of the Caucasian race, of med ium stature, with an ol ive comp lexion a nd wavy brown hair. Tall, blond or red-headed Germans were as fore ign to t his ideal somatotype as the Aethiops. 19 So were me n with large penises.20 It comes as no surp ri e that our barn atten dant ma ke · the perfect apotropaion. H e i the comjc 1·eversal of accepted standards of male beauty, and hi large p e nis makes him d oubly ellective against the evil eye.

Just as in the case of the seemingly erotic picture, the mo aic of the bath attendant seems hypersexua l or "racist" on ly to the modern viewer, who lacks the requisite cultura l condition ing and belie f systems. Analysis of these image in terms of their contemporary cu ltural contexts means g iving them back the efficacy a nd power tha t they heJd fo r the ancient viewer. In my opinion it is the an historian's job to e mpower vi ·ual representation by putting objects that have become "orph a ns" back in their rightfu l cultural homes .

the a rtisr crea ted anot her reference 10 the apotropa ic phallus . this time within a 1•agi 11a. in t he arra ngement or herJldic strigil. on either side of the oi111mcr11 jar on a siring 1ha1 immediately pre~cdes the image of 1he ba1..h attendant. In a visual pu11, the ointment jar bt:1..omes the phallus , and the trigils th t: labia of the vagina. A striking parallel for th is represe ntation

co 111<:> from Sous>e iu Tunisia, where two µubic triangles reprcst:111i ng vaginas Aa11k a fish-s ha ped phallus (~ee U'.\IESCO, T11nisi11: A11cim1 Mosaics, :-.Jew Yori.. , 1962. pl. 21): l owe 1his observation and rctCrcnce to Amhony Corbeil I.

19. Thomp~on (as inn . 16), 16-17. 35-36. 20. Fo r the Greek aes1..hc1ic preference for men 1,•ith small pen isc>, see

KenncthJ. Do1cr. Grnk llomosBrn11itty, Cambridge. Ma ss .. l 978, 125-35: and limot h r J. l\l cN iven, "' n1e U11heroic Penis: Otht:rnes5 Exposed," Source. X\',

110. I. 199j, 10-16. Roman art and literature corroborate and co n1inue this preferenct:: ;is la1.e as ca. A.O. 400 an m n hor vilifies the e mp eror 1-lcliogabalw. by e laborating on hi~ taste for men wit h large penises (Scrip1o re' Historiae J\ugmtae. H~/l()gab .. !l.6. 12.~l. 26 . .'i: lo r different acco11nl5, sec Cassius Dio. /fol. Rom .. 80.6. 80.14. 80.15.4: and Herodian. Hutonn. 5.3.7, E>.8. l ).

Whethe r we have created these orpha ned oqjects by physi- ca Uy removing them from th e ir origina l etti ngs or simply by photograp hing them and discussing them in abstract terms (the reby leve ling differences o f time , place, a nd cu lture), as oon as the ·c objects are removed from their o rigin a l

contexts they are no longer pan of the culture tha t created them: Lhey become parL of Our (or the dominant) culture , expressing our de ires, our preconceptions, and our preju - dice~. It is only in this sen e that our cul ture has succeeded in making the anciem Romans 'ju st like us."

j olm R. Clarkr is Rl'gents Professor of Ari Histm)1 al the University of Trxas at AllS/111. His books mrlude Roman Black-a nd-White Figural Mosaics (1979), The H ouses of Roman Italy : Ri tua l. pace, and Decoration ( 1991 ), and Looking at Lovemaking: ex ua lity in Roma n Art-Construction , 100 B.C.-A.D. 250

(Berkele)1, forthroming) [Department of A11 and Art History, University ofTexa.1, Aus/i11, T1' X. 78712- 11 04}.

A £ S lltl:.l l CS. E' lll N ll.lfY • . \:>ID lllt. lll '> TOR\ O f A RT 603

Triangulating Racism Stephen F. Eisenman

Race was disproved as a coherent scie ntific category by Fran z Boas in 1928, but racism pros per nearly cveryw·here. 1

Am ong scholars, the simple but valuable ob ervation that race is a biological fiction but raci m a ·ocial fact has gained widespread acce ptance, but the re ea rch that receives th e greate t public attention is that which trumpets cntde coJTe- lation s between skin color a nd test scores.2 Even writers directly e ngaged in exam ining a nd auackin g racism omc- Limc . end up bu ttressing a pects or it epi temology. While disclaiming the cie ntific validity of race, they may re ify the term by fa iling to describe h ow it fun ctions to legitimate a who le conflue nce of socia l, culturnl, a nd econo mic inequali- ties. Indeed, the recognitio n of a nother person a racially different is the e nd result of a num ber of learned a ttitudes a nd beh aviors that develop in s pecific historical and cultu ral settings of class and gender hierarchy a nd inequality. Di cu - sions about "race in America," ''race re lations," " race mat- ters." a nd even " racial tolerance," therefore, may tend to reinvest race ubliminally with some of the very essential, soma tic characteristics that past generations were at paim to disprove.3

Racism exists, LO repeat the u cfuJ fommla; race do not. If ocial sciemists are too o ften uncritica l a nd a histo1·ical in

thei r discu ssion or racism and race, art histori ans tend to avoid the ubjcct a ltogether. 4 T his lacuna is ignificant: a

I . Fra111. Boas.A 11t/11opolo10•a11d /111Jdem LifP ( I !!28), New Yo rk , I \l62: also A. .'vl ontagu. Stalmiml ot1 RM•. l.m1dn11 , 1972. ·111c gre~l an·c -.ibili ty of these and other Lexts 11otwiL11sLandin g, there ant periodic "di~coveries" of the fiction of race. 1\ t a rece nt mee1ing ol Lhc Ame ri rn n A'"ociaLion for Lhe Advance ment o f Science, mernhers issued a re po n ,1greeing Lhat race had no biological ba.>i s: / ,o< A ngrlPS T1111P.1, Feb. 20. 1995: the proceeding~ were Jlso ciLcd in Rohen Miles and Rudy Torres. " Does ' R11ce' Mau.er? Transa tl an tic Pc rspenivcs o n Raciom af1 er ' Race Rei a l.ions,' .. in Re-Situating ldmllties: The Polillc.1 of Rau. Etlmtrtl)' m id C11ll11 u , ed. Vered Ami t-Talai a nd Caroline Kn01vl es. Pctersboroug h, O nt ., 1996, 25. For a " world S''~tems" perspec1h c 011 raci>m. see Elicnne Balibarand Immanuel Wallers1ein. Race. Nrmon , Clrm : A111b1gu1111J lde11/1tie.1. Lo ndo n/ Ne"' York. 199 1. For a his1orical/p hilosop hical pcr~penive, sec l) . T . Goldberg . Racist Cullu TP: Philosophy and /he Pohtirs of Mea11111ir. Minnea polis. 1993. O n "whitcnes~:· sec Rmh Fran kenberg, 111r Sona / Comtrnct1011 ofll'lt1tnw,,, Minneapoli:., I \l93; see a lso the ex t raordinary article by Chery l I. Ha.Tis. ··wh iteness as Property." Harot1rd Law Rro1ew. GVI, no. 8. 199:1, 1709- 91. On race an d kin ship 1heory. see M. J. Weismamcl, " Making Kin : Kins hip The"'~ and Zumbl'lguan /\<loplion," Amrrirn r1 Et11110/o- gist, xx 11 , no. 4, 1995, 685- 709. Fo r a survey of' racism in the con Le mp o ra'l U.S .. >Cc Dougla> Mas~ey and Na ncy A. Denton. llml'nca '.1 Apartheid: Segrrga- t1on and th e Mnkmg of the Underrhi-1 , Ca mbridge. Mass., 1993. In 1970, 3:} .!i perce nt of blacks, 23 percent of Hispanics, and 9 percenl ol whi tes li ved below the poven r leve l. l n 1993. th e pe rcemages 1verc 33. 1, 30.6, and 12.2. TI1e rece111 fi gures fo r childhood poverty a re even more gri m: in 1993, 45 percen t of black children. 39.9 percent of I lispanic children, a nd 17 percent of white children lived in po,·eny. (See Uni Led S1a1e> Bureau of the Census, Sta/H/trrtl Ab.1/r(l('/ of th e Uni/rd Sl11 /e1. I I 5Lh ed ., e p1. t 995.)

2. Sec, e.g .. Richard H e n·nstei11 and C h;1rles Mmrdy, The Bell Curoe: /11tr/11gm1·1• a11d Clrll.< S1ruc111rf 111 1'111r rim11 Lift. New York, I 994 ; also .J . Philippe Ru shLOn , /?arr. Euo/u/1011, a 11d 81•/w vmr: A Life l fo tory Penpertive, New Bruns1,ick, NJ .. 1995. Fo r a co rn:i•e a nd cfl'ecti1e crilicism of the lauer, see C . Loring Brace. " Racialism a nd Ra cis1 Agendas:· Amenm11 A11th ropologist. xn•111 , no. I. 1996, t 76- 77.

:1. A pa n irnlarly egregious rnse in my vie"" in a n otherwise s1imu la1ing diSCU>>ion a bout th e need Lo e >tabli sh new cri1ical vocabularies, i found in Lhe 1111roduction 10 David C. Ori>kdl , ed .. Ajnra11 Amrnm11 Vmwl Aestht11c.,, Wa-.hin gton. D.C./ London, 1995. where Dri,,kc ll uses 1he tc nns "racially based aes1he tic" (5). "standard; for 1he race" (5). " both race>" (7). " the progress of Lh e race" (8), "spoke,penon fo r 1hc rnce" (8), and "a racia ll y based et hos in a n " (9).

4 . The re arc a number of c1uitc signi ficant e"cepLion~. Sec, e .g .. the e xte mive bibliograp ht in Glenn J o rda n and Chri< Weedon. C11//11m/ Polit1c.1: C/a;,, Gmder. Rau n11d tlu Post1110<leni ll'orld. Oxlord/ Cam bridgc. Mass .• 1995.