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developments, implications, and precedents 1

As vital expressions of political authority and prestige, imperial portraits permeated all aspects of Roman society. Representations of the em- peror and his family were prominently displayed in civic, sacred, and domestic spaces throughout the empire and were carefully manipulated and disseminated in order to reach multiple audi- ences. The power of these images lay in their ability to speak to disparate members of the so- ciety, from the illiterate and slaves through the most educated members of the Roman elite. However, imperial portraits were neither immu- table nor monolithic, and should an emperor be overthrown, his images were systematically mu- tilated or physically altered into the likenesses of other emperors. This process, popularly known as damnatio memoriae, is the first widespread ex- ample of the negation of artistic monuments for political and ideological reasons and it has inexo- rably altered the material record of Roman cul- ture. Jerome aptly describes the fate of the por- traits of Rome’s” bad” emperors: “When a tyrant is destroyed, his portraits and statues are also deposed. The face is exchanged or the head removed, and the likeness of he who has con- quered is superimposed. Only the body remains and another head is exchanged for those that have been decapitated (si quando tyrannus obtrun- catur, imagines quoque eius deponuntur et statuae, et vultu tantummodo commutato, ablatoque capite, eius qui vicerit, facies superponitur, ut manente corpore, capitibusque prae- cisis caput aliud commutetur).1 Although Jerome was writing in the late fourth/early fifth century, his description clearly reflects centuries of established practices regarding the public images of emper- ors condemned as tyrants.

Beginning in the republican period, the legal sanctions which could be associated with damnatio memoriae provided the mechanisms by which an

individual was simultaneously canceled and con- demned. The Romans themselves realized that it was possible to alter posterity’s perception of the past especially as embodied in the visual and epigraphic record. Sanctions passed by the Sen- ate could mandate the destruction of the monu- ments and inscriptions commemorating capital offenders or hostes, the official enemies of the Roman state.2 As a result, the condemned in- dividual’s name and titles were excised from all official lists ( fasti); wax masks (imagines) represent- ing the deceased were banned from display at aristocratic funerals;3 books written by the con- demned were confiscated and burned; property rights were forfeited; wills were annulled; the birthday of the condemned was proclaimed a day evil to the Roman people (dies nefastus), while the anniversary of the death was celebrated as a time of public rejoicing; houses belonging to the de- ceased were razed; and prohibitions could be enacted against the continued use of the con- demned’s praenomen.4 After Augustus solidified his control of the Mediterranean in 31 B.C. and subsequently established the imperial system, damnationes memoriae and the attendant mutilation and transformation of images were almost exclu- sively enacted against deposed principes, other condemned members of the imperial house, or private individuals who had conspired against the

CHAPTER ONE

DEVELOPMENTS, IMPLICATIONS, AND PRECEDENTS

1 In Abacuc 2.3.14-16.984-88. P. Stewart (1999) 159, 180- 81.

2 F. Vittinghoff (1936) 13. 3 On the imagines, see H.I. Flower (1996). Flower also

discusses the term imago in its narrowest senses as a wax ancestor mask, and its later broader implications of por- traiture in general, 32-52.

4 On the razing of houses, T.P. Wiseman (1987) 393- 4 and n. 3; J. Bodel (1997) 7-11. On the banning of praeno- mina, see H. Solin (1986)70-3; H. Solin (1989) 252-3; H. Flower (1998) 163-5.

Varner, Eric R.. Mutilation and Transformation : Damnatio Memoriae and Roman Imperial Portraiture, Brill Academic Publishers, 2004. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/wsu/detail.action?docID=3003923. Created from wsu on 2017-12-15 14:54:42.

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reigning emperor. Damaged or transfigured imperial portraits survive in vast quantities and include marble, bronze, and painted likenesses, as well as representations in relief, on coins, and gems.

The term damnatio memoriae, literally the dam- nation or condemnation of memory, is modern, but it accurately reflects the Romans’ preoccu- pation with the concepts of memory and fame.5

The Latin term memoria has much broader reper- cussions than its English cognate, memory, and encompasses the notions of an individual’s fame and greater reputation. The belief that a deceased individual enjoyed an afterlife through the per- petuation of his memory or by being remembered is at the core of Roman cultural identity and is amply witnessed by the innumerable surviving works of funerary art and architecture created for all classes of the society, throughout the empire.6

Furthermore, Varro closely links the idea of monumental commemoration with the perpetu- ation of memory.7 In effect, the condemnation, damnation or abolition of an individual’s memory is a posthumous destruction of his or her very essence or being. When discussing the condem- nation of a person’s memory and monuments, ancient authors usually combine the word memoria with particularly strong verbs damnare, condemnare,

accusare, abolere, or eradere.8 These verbs, to damn, condemn, accuse, abolish, or eradicate, them- selves resonate with the process of historical cen- sure which is the basis of damnatio memoriae. Over- all, these sanctions were not conceived of in absolute terms, but were flexible and practical methods of destroying the condemned’s posthu- mous reputation and memory.9

Cancellation of a bad emperor’s identity and accomplishments from the collective conscious- ness was one of the fundamental ideological aims of damnatio in the imperial period. Portrait stat- ues and busts were routinely removed from public and private display and the names and titles of overthrown rulers were ruthlessly excised from the inscriptions that had formerly extolled their virtues. This calculated obliteration of images, effectively an abolitio memoriae (abolition of me- mory), is starkly illustrated by representations which have been chiseled out of relief monu- ments, as for instance portraits of Commodus removed from the series of reliefs honoring his father, Marcus Aurelius, or the excision of Plau- tianus, Plautilla, and Geta from reliefs deco- rating Severan arches in Rome and Lepcis Magna.10 For representations of condemned em- perors in the round, their removal from public display and subsequent storage in secure locations has often led, ironically, to their preservation for posterity. Indeed, damnatio contributed directly to the warehousing of great numbers of imperial images.

Another important aim of post mortem sanctions could be the complete denigration of the con- demned individual’s posthumous reputation as a

5 The term damnatio memoriae covers a wide array of post mortem sanctions against a condemned individual’s memo- ry and monuments. These penalties could be officially mandated by the Senate, emperor, or even army, or they could be unofficial, de facto sanctions; see F. Vittinghoff (1936) 13, 64-74; K. Mustakallio (1994) 9-15; J.M. Paillier and R. Sablayrolles (1994) 12-15; and H. Flower (1998) 155-6. The term first appears as the title of a dissertation completed in 1689 by Schreiter-Gerlach; see P. Stewart (1999) 184, n. 3.

6 On commemoration and perpetuation of memory, see M. Koortbojian in J. Elsner, ed. (1996) 210-34; P.J.E. Davies (1997) 41-65. For the “activity of memory in monu- ments” see, J. E. Young (1989) 69-106.

7 Ling. 6.49: Sic monimenta quae in sepulcris, et ideo secun- dum iviam, quo praetereuntis admoneat et se fuisse et illos esse mortalis. Ab eo cetera quae scripta ac facta memoriae causa monimenta dicta (...so monuments which are on tombs, and in fact along the roads, in order that they can warn anyone coming along that the deceased themselves were once mortal, just as they are now mortal. From this, other things which are written or done for the sake of memory are said to be monuments). See also J. Bodel (1997) 21.

8 For example see, Suet. Dom. 23.1 (abolendamque omnem memoriam); HA.Com.19.1 (memoriam aboleatur), and Cod.Iust. 1.3.23; (memoriam accusare defuncti ) CodIust 1.5.4.4Pap. Dig. 31.76.9 (memoriam damanatam); Cod.Iust. 7.2.2 (memoria ... damnata); Ulp. Dig. 24.1.32.7 (memoria... damnata); Ulp. Dig. 28.3.6.11 (memoria...damnata); Paul. Cod.Iust 9.8.6 (memoria ...damnetur); Inst. 4.18.3 (memoria... damnatur); Inst. 3.1.5 (memoria...damnata); F. Vittinghoff, Staatsfeind 13; 66-69; T. Pekáry (1985) 135.

9 H.I. Flower (1995) 163. 10 Arch of Septimius Severus in the Forum Romanum,

infra; Arch of the Argentarii, infra; and the Arch of Septimius Severus at Lepcis Magna, infra.

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stark political warning to future offenders.11 Al- though posthumous denigration would appear at first glance contradictory to the total eradication of a condemned individual’s memory, in prac- tice the two prove to be neither incompatible nor mutually exclusive. In visual terms denigration was effected through the physical mutilation of portraits. As recognizable signs of an overthrown ruler’s disgrace, deliberately damaged likenesses physically expressed the abstract concepts of in- famia (disrepute, disgrace) and iniuria (insult, af- front, revenge), and must have remained publicly visible for some time after the emperor’s over- throw. The sensory organs comprising the eyes, nose, mouth and ears were specific targets of the attacks on sculpted portraits. The resulting dam- age to the face is T-shaped, but still renders the representation recognizable. The mutilation of images is often described in graphically anthro- pomorphic terms. Pliny recounts the destruction of bronze images of Domitian just like they were living beings, capable of feeling pain and says that the portraits were attacked as if “blood and pain would follow every single blow” (ut si singulos ic- tus sanguis dolorque sequeretur).12 Dio similarly por- trays the destruction of Sejanus’s statues: those who assaulted his images acted as if they were attacking the man himself.13 Although probably historically spurious, the account in the Historia Augusta of the “crucifixion” of a portrait of the North African usurper Celsus is certainly indica- tive of fourth century attitudes and expectations concerning the treatment of representations of condemned rulers, as well as the continued Rom- an perception of images as effigies.14

The anthropomorphic rhetoric employed when discussing the destruction of imperial im-

ages underscores their function as literal embodi- ments of the imperial presence in stone or bronze. Trajan’s posthumous Parthian triumph, in which a statue of the emperor rode in the quadriga, illustrates well the positive, celebratory connota- tions of imperial portraits as effigies.15 Con- versely, deliberate assaults on these images are directly analogous to physical attacks against the emperor’s person, a kind of mutilation or execu- tion in effigy.16 The desecration of the vital sen- sory organs, the eyes, ears, nose and mouth, negates any “power” of these images to see, hear or speak. Furthermore, the disfigurement of imperial likenesses has close conceptual ties to the desecration of the corpses of capital offenders, a process known as poena post mortem.17 Lucan graphically describes the mutilation of a corpse and the attack on the ears, eyes, nose and mouth exactly parallels the disfigurement of imperial images: exsectaque lingua/ Palpitat et muto vacuum ferit aera motu./Hic aures, alius spiramina naris aduncae/ Amputat; ille cavis evolvit sedibus orbes, (And the tongue having been severed, squirms and with silent motion strikes the empty air. Someone amputates the ears, someone else the nostrils of his hooked nose, and another one gouges the eyes out of their hollow sockets).18 Although corpse abuse was not uncommon for criminals and other noxii executed in arena spectacles, the desecra- tion of elite corpses was viewed as an extremely severe form of punishment, and as a result is fairly rare for condemned emperors or other members of the imperial house.19 Nevertheless, the bodies

11 H. Flower discusses the these two approaches (“the tendency to forget” vs. the “urge to remember”) in the case of Gn. Calpurnius Piso (1998) 180.

12 Pan. 52.4-5; for an interpretation of the full passage in its Domitianic context, see infra.

13 58.11.3. 14 Tyr.Trig. 19: et novo iniuriae genere imago in crucem sublata

persultante vulgo, quasi patibulo ipse Celsus videretur (and in a new kind of outrage, his portrait was hoisted on a cross, with the crowd running around as if they were seeing Celsus himself on the gibbet); see infra.

15 As illustrated on Hadrianic aurei of 117-18, BMCRE 244, no. 47; S. Settis, ed. (1988) 78-9, fig. 33.

16 Actual effigies were important components of impe- rial funerals, see S.R.F. Price (1997) 64, 96-7. For the mu- tilation of imperial portraits as effigies, see F. Vittinghoff (1936) 13-19; J. von Schlosser (1910-11) 184; W. Brückner (1966) 192; J.P. Rollin (1979) 165-69; D. Freedberg (1989) 259.

17 On the post mortem abuse of corpses, see F. Vittinghoff (1936) 43-6; D.G. Kyle (1998) 131-3, 220-24, and 183, n. 106 where he calls the “abuse of statues” “surrogate corpse abuse;” E.R. Varner (2001a).

18 BC 2.181-4. 19 Although obviously comic in nature, Apuleius’s story

of the guarding of a corpse at Larissa against mutilation

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of Nero Caesar, Drusus Caesar, Sejanus, Lollia Paulina, Claudia Octavia, Galba, Vitellius, Pertinax, Pescennius Niger, Clodius Albinus, Plautianus, Macrinus, Diadumenianus, Elagaba- lus, Julia Soemias, Maximinus Thrax, Maximus, Pupienus, Balbinus, Gallienus, and Maxentius were all abused in some fashion. Politically, the mutilation of imperial images and corpses was in- tended as a visual expression of dissatisfaction with the policies and personalities of the con- demned emperor, and, concomitantly, loyalty to the new regime. Dio links the concepts of image and corpse abuse in his account of the attacks on Sejanus’s portraits, which the condemned man was forced to witness, thus becoming an unwill- ing spectator of his own imminent death and destruction (6"\ @ÜJT 2g"JZH ô< Bg\FgF2"4 §:g88g< ¦(\(<gJ@).20 After Commodus’s overthrow, the populace mutilated his images, as artistic surro- gates for his corpse.21 Deliberate defacement of images was often the result of spontaneous dem- onstrations against a condemned emperor’s memory and it additionally represents a very physical and violent response to the news of an emperor’s overthrow. Not coincidentally, the mutilation and destruction of imperial likenesses reaches its apogee in the middle years of the third century, c. A.D. 235-85, when the empire was engulfed in a period of military, social, political, and economic unrest, with no single emperor or dynasty able to maintain control or guarantee stability for an extended period.

Sculpted images could also be effectively can- celed and transformed through recarving. Por- traits of condemned emperors were routinely recut to represent victorious successors or es- teemed predecessors. Reuse constitutes a Roman practical response to the economic problems inherent in the destruction of images. Marble portrait sculptures were expensive commissions and recutting representations of condemned in- dividuals is an efficient and cost-effective form of artistic recycling.22 Furthermore sculptural reuse has ideological implications as a kind of visual cannibalism in which the likeness of a successful ruler displaces that of his defeated predecessor. Thus the transformed image has the potential to cannibalize the power and meaning residing in the original portrait. The process of manipulat- ing preexisting images into new more acceptable likenesses occurs throughout the imperial period.

In the early empire vast numbers of the marble portraits of Caligula, Nero, and Domitian were recut and reconfigured into new likenesses and it is the most intensive period for the recycling of imperial images.23 At least 120 extant sculpted representations of these emperors have been transformed. In the second century, there is a hiatus in the process of recarving imperial por- traits. No likenesses of Commodus, Lucilla, or Crispina were recut immediately after their con- demnations. Their images which were refash- ioned were not altered until the third and fourth

of the facial features by witches illustrates the seriousness with which Romans viewed the this kind of desecration, Met. 2.21-22, 30. The mutilation of the ears and nose which is ultimately carried out on the guard, Thelyphron, rather than the dead man, resembles the disfigurement of impe- rial images and corpses. Significantly, Thelyphron views his own mutilation as a great disgrace which will prevent him from ever returning to his hometown. Deiphobus’s corpse has been similarly disfigured with the nose and ears sev- ered in the Aeneid (6.494-9): Atque hic Priamiden laniantum corpore toto/Deiphobum vidit, lacerum crudeliter ora,/ora manusque ambas, populataque tempora raptis/ auribus et truncas inhonesto vulnere naris./vix adeo agnovit pavitantem ac dira tegentem/ supplicia, et notis compellat vocibus ultro. Vergil’s use of supplicia further recalls the language of criminal punishment.

20 58.11.3; D.G. Kyle (1998) 221. 21 Dio 74.2.1.

22 On the high cost of sculpture, recutting, and ques- tions of econmy, see C.B. Rose (1997) 10.

23 Private images were also reworked throughout the imperial period, as for instance a late Flavian/early Trajanic female portrait whose coiffure was completely recut and updated in the late Trajanic period (Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, inv. 1988.327; J.J. Herrmann, jr. (1991) 34-50, figs. 1a-d). I cannot agree with P. Liverani that the reworking of private images provide the impetus for the recarving of imperial portraits (1990-91) 170-71. The sheer number of reworked images beginning with Ca- ligula would seem to argue that the relationship was ex- actly the opposite, with the imperial manifestations influ- encing the private examples. Nevertheless, Liverani is right to stress the widespread nature of the phenomenon, both private and imperial. Furthermore, Liverani is correct to point out that the private examples provide an ongoing context within which to read the recutting of imperial images.

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centuries.24 In the third century, reuse remains relatively rare, with examples essentially limited to portraits of Elagabalus transformed into rep- resentations of his cousin and successor, Severus Alexander. Recutting at this time may have been pragmatically motived by the strong physical resemblance between the two young Severan cousins. Under Constantine, there is a renewed interest in reworking marble portraits as attested by several of his images which have been refash- ioned from earlier likenesses of Maxentius (as well as the recut relief portraits on the Arch of Constantine).25 Altered likeness are not limited to three dimensional marble portraits, but in a few instances also occur in relief, gem, bronze, basalt, and coin portraits. Imperial images were transformed in all parts of the empire with sur- viving examples from Italy, Spain, Gaul, Ger- many, Greece, North Africa, Egypt, and Asia Minor.

Marble images were also transformed and recycled in more utilitarian fashion as building material. A relief representing Nero and Agrip- pina was reused face down as a paving slab in the Sebasteion complex at Aphrodisias, while a mutilated portrait of Julia Mammaea was re- cycled as a paving stone in one of Ostia’s thor- oughfares.26 The use of images as paving stones may also have had further denigrative intent against the memory of the condemned as people literally trampled the portraits underfoot.

The physical removal of banned images from public view resulted in large numbers of portraits being warehoused, stored or hidden.27 Several likenesses were deposited in sculptural caches including portraits of Nero, Lucilla, Commodus, Geta, Macrinus, and Elagabalus.28 The storage of these images has ultimately ensured their sur- vival, and often contributed to their fine states of preservation, as in case of the well known Commodus as Hercules from the Esquiline (fig. 141). Portraits, or other monuments, were also removed to sculptors’ workshops in order to be reworked, as may have been the case with Cancelleria Reliefs.29 The warehousing of images is further confirmed by portraits of Caligula, Nero, Domitian, Lucilla, Commodus, Plautilla, and Geta which were not recut for decades or even centuries, suggesting that they were in good states of preservation and readily accessible at the time of their reuse.30 Portraits could also be buried or hidden from public view, as presum- ably happened to a likeness of Domitian discov- ered in the Tomb of Julia Procula at Isola

24 A marked decline in the instances of reuse is already apparent in the recut images of Domitian: there are 24 recut marble representations of Domitian in the round, versus 53 for Nero and 43 for Caligula. This may reflect in part accidents of preservation, as well as the fact that so many of Domitian’s own portraits had been reworked from portraits of Nero, thus precluding a third recutting, but is also probably due to changing practices.

25 On the recut portraits on the Arch of Constantine, see J. Rohmann (1998) and J. Elsner (2000).

26 Nero and Agrippina, Aphrodisias, infra; Julia Mammaea, Ostia, Museo, inv. 26 infra; Portraits of Lucilla (Palazzo dei Conservatori, Centrale Montemartini 2.91, inv. 2766) and Otacilia Severa (Palazzo dei Conservatori, Centrale Montemartini 2.95, inv. 2765) were incorporated into the fabric of a post-antique wall between the Colos- seum and the Basilica of Maxentius and are likely indica- tive of earlier practices.

27 M. Bergmann and P. Zanker (1981) 320 describe these marble depots as Steingarten (stone gardens); see also D. Kinney (1997) 118, 124-25.

28 Nero, Rome, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Centrale Montemartini 1.25B, inv. 2835, infra; Lucilla, Rome, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Centrale Montemartini 3.85, inv. 1781, infra; Commodus, Rome, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Sala degli Arazzi, inv. 1120, infra; Geta, Oslo, Nasjonal- galleriet 600, inv. 1433, infra; Macrinus, Rome, Palazzo Conservatori, Centrale Montemartini 3.82, inv. 1757, in- fra; Elagabalus, Oslo, Nasjonalgalleriet, inv. 1434 infra. For a brief discussion of sculptural caches, see E. Bartmann (1991) 72 and ns. 3 and 4.

29 Rome, Musei Vaticani, Museo Gregoriano Profano, cat. 5.17.

30 Caligula/Claudius Gothicus?, New York, White-Levy Collection, cat. 1.37; Nero/Gallienus, Columbia, Univer- sity of Missouri, Museum of Art and Archaeology, 62.46, cat. 2.62; Nero/4th century emperor, Rome, Museo Nazionale delle Terme, inv. 126279, cat. 2.63; Domitian/ Constantinian emperor, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, 89.6, 5.30; Lucilla/Helena, Florence, Uffizi, inv. 1914.171, cat. 6.11; Lucilla/Helena, Rome, Museo Capitolino, Stanza degli Imperatori 59, 496, cat. 6.12; Commodus/Pupienus?, Mantua, Palazzo Ducale, inv. G 6812/1, cat. 6.5; Com- modus/Pupienus, Musei Vaticani, Galleria Chiaramonti 27.8, inv.1613, cat. 6.6; Plautilla/fourth century empress, Irvine, Robert K. Martin Collection, cat. 7.3; Geta/mid third century individual, Rome, Museo Capitolino, Salone 51, inv. 675, cat. 7.10.

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Sacra.31 The numerous images of condemned individuals recovered from the Tiber, other bod- ies of water, sewers and wells suggest that more violent and destructive forms of disposal, can also, ironically, contribute to a portrait’s ultimate sur- vival.32 In antiquity, the disposal of portraits in bodies of water, especially the Tiber, closely parallels the disposal of the corpses of arena vic- tims, another aspect of poena post mortem.33 Addi- tionally, the practice has intriguing connections with the Sacra Argeorum, an annual purification ritual of hostile spirits in which human effigies were thrown into the Tiber from the Pons Sublicius every May.34

In the imperial period, the Senate continued to formally pass sanctions in the case of official damnationes. Livilla, Sejanus, Messalina, Nero, Domitian, Commodus, Elagabalus, and Julia Soemias were all officially condemned by the Senate. Condemnations could demonstrate sena- torial autonomy, as in the case of Nero, who was declared a hostis while still living, or Domitian, condemned against the express wishes of the army. Naturally, the emperor could also exert his influence in cases of damnatio. As early as the damnatio of Caligula, his successor Claudius re- fused to permit the senate to formally proscribe his memory, but did allow an unofficial, de facto damnatio.35 In cases of conspiracy (maiestas or perduellio), as for Livilla, Sejanus and Messalina, it seems likely that the emperor took a direct hand in promoting the senatorial sanctions. By the early fourth century, the damnatio of Maxentius appears to have been a necessary response by the

Senate and people of the city of Rome to the new political realities of life under Constantine, as evidenced by the inscription on Constantine’s arch which publicly memorializes the former ruler Maxentius in highly negative terms as a tyrannus.36

Damnatio is the direct antithesis of consecratio, the process by which a deceased emperor was de- clared an official god of the Roman state, and his character, policies, and reign formally and eternally endorsed.37 S.R.F. Price has suggested that in the early imperial period the Senate was able to act with some degree of freedom in cases of consecratio as when they conspicuously refused to deify Tiberius, but by the second century consecrations, while still technically voted by the Senate, were largely at the discretion of the reign- ing emperor.38 Price cites the deification of Hadrian, which was passed by an unwilling Sen- ate at the express instigation of Antoninus Pius as indicative of the new state of affairs and by the end of the century Septimius Severus un- equivocally compels the consecratio of Commo- dus.39 The inverse phenomenon of condemna- tion appears to mirror the decline in senatorial autonomy in matters of consecration. Indeed, by the end of second century, the senate was not only forced by Septimius Severus to consecrate Commodus as a new divus but also, in a more humiliating blow, to rescind the damnatio they had pronounced against him. Caracalla appears to have bypassed the senate entirely, at least in the early stages of his condemnation of Geta, when he demanded that the army, rather than the Sen- ate, declare his brother a hostis.40

The destruction and alteration of images was likely accomplished in much the same way as portrait dedications. In the latter case, the sen- ate or emperor could decree portrait honors, or municipalities, groups, or individuals could pe- tition to erect commemorative images, usually in

31 Ostia, Museo, Magazzini, inv. 19, infra. 32 Portraits allegedly recovered from the Tiber include

several bronze and marble portraits of Caligula (New York, White-Levy Collection, infra; Rome, Museo Nazionale Romano delle Terme, 4256, infra; Switzerland, Private Col- lection, infra) as well as a bronze portrait of Domitian (Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek 664, inv. 768). A portrait of Otho was unearthed from Ostia’s sewer, (Os- tia, Museo, inv. 446). Portraits thrown in wells include: heads of Caligula from Tharsis (Huelva, Museo Provincial), Domitian from Munigua (Munigua, Museo), and Clodius Albinus from Dougga (Tunis, Musée du Bardo). For this kind of “refuse disposal,” see also P. Stewart (1999) 166.

33 D.G. Kyle (1998) 213-28. 34 D.G. Kyle (1998) 215-6. 35 Suet. Claud. 11.3; Dio 60.4.5-6, and infra.

36 CIL 6.1139=ILS 694. 37 On the inverse relationship between damnatio and

consecratio see S. G. MacCormack (1981) 96, 98, 132-3, 149, 254; S. Settis, ed. (1988) 76.

38 (1987) 86-87, 91-3. 39 S.R.F.. Price (1987) 93. 40 HA. Carac. 1.1; Herod. 4.8; see infra.

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response to senatorial or imperial decrees mark- ing important events in the life and reign of the emperor and his family.41 Similarly, municipali- ties, groups, or individuals were expected to re- spond appropriately to senatorial decrees man- dating the dishonoring of an emperor’s memory and monuments. The army may also be impli- cated in the implementation of damnationes, as suggested by their involvement in Geta’s condem- nation, as well as their presumed physical involve- ment in the damnationes of the soldier emperors later in the century.42 As is to be expected in Rome and its environs, compliance with senato- rial sanctions against a condemned emperor’s memory is essentially universal, but elsewhere it could be more sporadic and there appears to have been a certain degree of autonomy in respond- ing to condemnations. Several representations of Caligula, whose condemnation was for the most part unofficial, were allowed to remain on pub- lic display, as were a boyhood portraits of Nero at Velleia (and possibly Rusellae), and a statue of Domitian as prince from the theater at Aphro- disias.43 In the few instances where portraits of condemned emperors or other members of the imperial family were permitted to remain visible, their presence within group dedications as well as their importance for dynastic coherence and imperial continuum must have outweighed con- cerns over canceling or denigrating the indiv- idual’s memory.

The physical destruction and mutilation of an emperor’s images is the direct visual equivalent of the vilification of his character and actions which occurs in literary and historical sources. Literary, historical, or biographical damnatio of- ten relies on rhetorical tropes of invectio and

vituperatio in order to defame the memory of the condemned ruler.44 Indeed, the author of the Historia Augusta acknowledges the distortions and difficulties surrounding the biographies of con- demned emperors or “historical losers” in his biography of Pescennius Niger, the defeated ri- val of Septimius Severus:

Rarum atque difficile est ut, quos tyrannos aliorum vic- toria fecerit, bene mittantur in litteras, atque ideo vix omnia de his plene in monumentis atque annalibus habentur. primum enim, quae magna sunt in eorum honorem ab scriptoribus depravantur, deinde alia supprimuntur, postremo non magna diligentia in eorum genere ac vita requiritur, cum satis sit audaciam eorum et bellum, in quo victi fuerint, ac poenam proferre.45

(It is uncommon and difficult to give an unbiased written account of those men who have come to be characterized as tyrants because of the victory of others and furthermore scarcely anything about these men is accurately preserved in monuments or histories. For indeed, in the first place, great events which accrued to their honor are misrep- resented by historians, and then other events are suppressed, and finally no great diligence is given to recounting their ancestry or life, since it seems enough to reveal their effrontery, the battle in which they were conquered and their punishment.)

Significantly, the author links the literary distor- tions and omissions with the visual distortions and omissions on monuments (in monumentis atque annalibus). Thus, the mutilation and transforma- tion of imperial images can be viewed as a de- liberate rewriting of the visual record of Roman history and society.

The literary vilification of an overthrown ruler which mirrors the mutilation of images was in- tended as a written portrait of the emperor’s evil deeds and moral inadequacies. Like publicly mutilated likenesses, they function as potent re- minders of an emperor’s posthumous disgrace and failure as leader. Literary denigration, like its visual counterpart, could also be actively and officially promoted; indeed, E. S. Ramage has

41 For a discussion of the motivations of portrait dedi- cations in the late Republic and early Empire, see C.B. Rose (1997) 7-10.

42 P.J. Casey (1994) 34. 43 Portraits of Caligula: Iesi, Palazzo della Signoria;

Genoa-Pegli, Museo Civico, inv. 614; Gortyna, Antiqua- rium; Heraklion, Archaeological Museum, no. 64; see in- fra. Statues of Nero: from Velleia, Parma, Museo Nazio- nale d’Antichità, no. 3, inv. 826; see infra; from Roselle, Grosseto, Museo Archaeologico. Statue of Domitian from Aphrodisias: Aphrodisias, depot, excavation inv. nos. 66- 27, 67-282-85, 71-477; see infra.

44 T. Barton in J. Elsner and J. Masters, eds. (1994) 48- 66.

45 HA, Pesc.Nig. 1.1-2; M. Cullhed points out the im- portance of this passage for the study of condemned empe- rors, or historical losers, in his monograph on Maxentius (1994) 9-11.

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pointed out that while images could be removed or transformed, buildings destroyed or rededi- cated, texts favorable to a condemned ruler could never be entirely rescinded, so hostile literary traditions were actively encouraged.46

While the centrality of epigraphical texts to the understanding and interpretation of artistic and architectural monuments for the ancient viewer can be overstated, the phenomenon of damnatio memoriae certainly underscores the interdepen- dence of image and text, at least for the literate segments of Roman society.47 Obvious parallels exist between the treatment of the monumental inscriptions and portraits of condemned emper- ors. Just as the emperor’s name and titles are eradicated in commemorative inscriptions or papyri, so too are his sculpted images removed from public display, and his likenesses erased from reliefs and paintings. Like portraits, inscrip- tions are intended as visual signifiers of the emperor’s position and achievements, and when an emperor is overthrown and damned, his por- traits, like inscriptions, can be “erased” from the public consciousness. The practice of eradicating condemned emperors from the epigraphic record is remarkably long lived, as witnessed by the erasure of Phocas’s name from the inscription on his column, the last commemorative monument known to have been erected in the Forum Romanum.48 Portrait inscriptions, or inscriptions on arches, both of which identify and explain the monuments to which they belong, are places in which imperial images and texts necessarily in- teract. Such inscriptions can also be transformed from commemorations of a condemned ruler into celebrations of a successor or predecessor, as for instance a statue base from the Caserma dei Vigili at Ostia in which the name and titles of Commo- dus have been erased and replaced with those of his successor Septimius Severus.49 Presumably

any image which this statue base supported was similarly transformed. Inscriptions are also liable to mutilation, as when only part of a condemned individual’s name is erased, making the inscrip- tion still readable as a kind of denigrative memo- rial.

The erasure of an overthrown emperor’s name in inscriptions, papyri and on coins is also related to prohibitions against the continued use of a condemned individual’s praenomen. Both high- light the importance of the act of naming in Roman culture. In the realm of religious dedi- cations, the simple naming of the dedicant com- prises the great majority of Roman votive inscrip- tions and M. Beard has suggested that naming is a fundamental and permanent assertion of the dedicant’s membership in the larger pagan com- munity.50 Thus the erasure of a condemned em- peror’s name and the suppression of praenomina are acts of un-naming and effectively exclude the condemned individual from society at large. In addition un-naming acts to deny the physical existence of the nameless individual.51 By the fourth century A.C., there exists a well established rhetorical tradition of not explicitly naming over- thrown emperors or those who were deemed usurpers of legitimate imperial authority.52

Just as imperial representations were created in order to reach multiple Roman audiences, so too were the messages encoded in their destruc- tion and transformation intended to reach differ- ent segments of the public.53 On the most fun- damental level, the negation of images or their alteration into new likenesses signal to the entire populace the political transition to a new regime.

46 Ramage discusses the phenomenon within the con- text of Pliny’s Panegyricus and Juvenal’s Satires (1989) 643, 650.

47 J. Elsner has underscored the function of epigraphical texts as monuments in their own right, in J. Elsner, ed. (1996) 32-53. For epigraphical damnatio, see H.I.Flower (2000).

48 CIL 6.1200 49 R. Lanciani, NSc 75.

50 M. Beard (1991) 46-8. 51 P.J. Casey (1994) 46; naming is also an equivalent

existence in the ancient Near East, and the excision of an inscribed name is tantamount to the suppression or removal of physical being, Z. Bahrani (1995) 377.

52 A.E. Wardman (1984) 222. 53 The widespread nature of the surviving physical

evidence for damnatio in the form of mutilated, transformed, or warehoused portraits, as well as erased inscriptions certainly refutes C. W. Hedrick’s statement that the audi- ence for damnationes is a “small percentage” of the popula- tion, namely the senatorial elite, (2000) 110-11. While the aristocracy are indeed an important audience, as well as agent for condemnations, all strata of the society are im- plicated in the phenomenon.

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developments, implications, and precedents 9

Certainly those illiterate members of the popu- lation who could not read the written history of the failed regime could read its visual history as embodied in mutilated and transformed images.54

But alteration of the visual landscape of impe- rial portraits could also be read in alternative ways by different audiences. Damnationes which were avidly pursued or desired by the Senate such as those of Caligula, Nero, Domitian, Commodus or Elagabalus, served to reaffirm the Senate’s power and prestige for the senatorial aristocrats themselves and for the society at large. Similarly, for the new emperor, his family, and supporters, the mutilation and transformation of a predeces- sors images made tangible the authority of the new regime. For the partisans of the overthrown emperor, the destruction of portraits stand ob- viously as negative exempla. To a certain extent, the new emperor could also read the negation of his predecessor’s likenesses as negative exempla, visual warnings of the consequences to his own images should his regime fail.

In cases where images have been altered, it may have been the intention that visually sophis- ticated Roman viewers recognize the transforma- tion and appropriation of the original portrait. Reworked likenesses which to modern audiences seem less satisfactory because they retain too many traces of the original image may be symp- tomatic of this trend. The Nero/Domitian/Nerva statue from Velleia stands as an extreme example since it contains strong visual elements of its two earlier incarnations as representations of both Nero and Domitian (cat. 2.50/5.13). These por- traits may then exhibit deliberate signs of their own transformation, readable by certain viewers as manifestations of the new emperor visually cannibalizing the power and images of his de- feated predecessor.

If imperial images act on certain levels as ef- figies, intended to embody in marble or bronze the reigning princeps, his family, and revered or

deified predecessors, then another potential au- dience for mutilation and transformation of these representations becomes the images themselves. H. Flower has raised the intriguing possibility that imagines, wax ancestor masks, assembled in the atrium of a Roman house, act as a kind of audi- ence witnessing the actions of their living descen- dants. Similarly, when worn by actors at elite funerals, imagines also function as both participants in, and an audience for, the funerary rites.55

The physical alteration or mutilation of artis- tic objects, such as portraits, also provided an effective means of visual communication between subject and ruler. Official sanctions which man- dated the destruction of images pointedly com- municated the victorious emperor’s new status, while the public’s response to the damnatio could, in turn, proclaim loyalty to the new regime. Spontaneous demonstrations against an over- thrown emperor’s memory and monuments, es- pecially in instances where the ruler was never officially condemned, provided important outlets for public expression.56 Portraits of Severus Alexander, Julia Mammaea, and Gordian III have all been spontaneously attacked, despite the fact the none of them was officially condemned and Severus Alexander and Gordian III were actually deified.57 The spontaneous mutilation, transformation, or destruction of images visually repudiates the failed ruler and simultaneously professes allegiance to his successor.

54 H. Flower discusses the importance of the visual trappings of power and prestige, such as the display of imagines or the erection of important public building and monuments in communicating to the populace at large in republican Rome (1996) 65, 69.

55 H.I. Flower (1996) especially 60-127, and 185-222. 56 T. Pekáry reviews the evidence for spontaneous dem-

onstrations (1985) 134-42; see also C. W. Hedrick, Jr. (2000) 99 for popular demonstrations involving Gn. Calpurnius Piso’s statues during his maiestas trial under Tiberius, and infra for descriptions of spontaneous demonstrations involv- ing the images of Poppaea and Claudia Octavia.

57 Damaged portraits of Severus Alexander: Bochum, Kunstasammlungen der Ruhr-Universität, cat. 7.20; Rome, Museo Capitolino, Magazzini, inv. 1431, cat. 7.22; Swit- zerland, Private Collection, cat. 7.24; Damaged portraits of Julia Mammaea: Bochum, Kunstsammlungen der Ruhr- Universität, cat. 7.25; Paris, Louvre, MA 3552 (inv. MND 2137) cat. 7.27; Ostia, Museo, inv. 26, cat. 7.26; Switzer- land, Private Collection, cat. 7.28; Damaged portrait of Gordian III: Sofia, Archaeological Museum, inv. 1497, cat. 8.9.

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chapter one10

Iconographic Implications

Earlier works have been intent largely on docu- menting the historical dimensions of damnatio or its specific physical effects on individual sculpted portraits, paintings, coins, inscriptions, or papyri. The conceptual implications of the phenomenon have not yet been fully addressed. Obviously, knowledge that a work of art has been trans- formed or intentionally mutilated radically alters assumptions concerning the production and cul- tural context of these images. Implicit in the creation of imperial portraits, then, is the notion that mechanisms and sanctions existed whereby representations could be transformed or de- stroyed. Thus, the imperial image is not inher- ently stable or static.

In formal terms the mutability of imperial images has serious iconographic and stylistic ramifications. Sheer numbers alone reveal the importance of recut images. As already men- tioned, well over 100 surviving early imperial im- ages have been transformed from representations of Caligula, Nero, and Domitian. Altered repre- sentations often retain some or all of the style of the original image. At the most basic level, these trends can be reduced to classicizing or idealiz- ing versus veristic approaches to imperial por- traits. Style functions as a significant bearer of meaning in Roman portraits, especially in peri- ods of political transition, periods also marked by damnationes memoriae and the transformation of images. Important evidence for the ideology of style is furnished by representations of Vespasian whose emphasis on verism is often viewed as a conscious visual repudiation of Nero and the Julio-Claudian past and a return to late Repub- lican values and style. On the other hand, those portraits of Vespasian which are more classiciz- ing can be read as attempts to project the idea of imperial continuum and visually connect the new Flavian emperor with his respected Julio- Claudian predecessors, Claudius, Tiberius, and especially Augustus. These opposing approaches and intentions exist simultaneously in Vespasian’s portraiture and suggest that his images were designed for audiences with different expecta- tions. Vespasian’s veristic likenesses with their

Republican associations may have been intended for the members of the senatorial aristocracy who had grown disaffected with Nero, the Julio- Claudians and the imperial system in general, while the classicizing images may have appealed to the middle and lower classes or inhabitants of the eastern sections of the empire, whose expe- rience of the Julio-Claudians would have been radically different and more positive.58

Significantly the most veristic of Vespasian’s surviving portraits, as well as the most classiciz- ing and Julio-Claudian in style are all reworked from earlier representations of Nero.59 In the former instance, the supra-verism is inspired by a desire to obliterate all trace of the initial im- age and its style, while in the latter instance, the reworked image attempts to co-opt and cannibal- ize the idealizing style of the original. Similar patterns apply for the portraits of Claudius re- cut from Caligula and they challenge basic no- tions about the development of style and stylis- tic trends, since in these examples the heightened verism or classicism of the likenesses is a direct result of and response to the necessity of refash- ioning a pre-existing work of art with its own in- herent iconographical meaning.60 The divergent styles expressed in the reworked images may also reflect differing approaches on the part of artists facing the technical challenges of recarving, dif- fering wishes expressed by the patrons oversee- ing the reworking, or the differing audiences for whom they were intended. Finally, a recognition of the profound stylistic influence which an origi-

58 This interpretation runs counter to R. Bianchi- Bandinelli’s classic Marxist reading of Vespasian’s portrait typology which sees the veristic portraits as more plebeian in style, designed to appeal to the proletariat and to present the emperor as ordinary citizen, while the classicizing portraits are more “intellectual” and stress Vespasian’s position as ruler, (1969) 211-12.

59 Arguably the most veristic of Vespasian’s likenesses is a head recut from Nero in the Terme, inv. 38795 (see cat. 2.23), while his most classicizing is another recut head from Lucus Feronia, Magazzini cat. 2.22.

60 A portrait of Claudius in the Centrale Montemartini refashioned from Caligula is often cited as his most realis- tic likeness, inv. 2443 (cat. 1.31). Claudius’s most classicizing image, also recut from Caligula, is the colossal head from Otricoli in the Sala Rotonda of the Vatican, 551, inv. 242 (cat. 1.30).

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nal portrait can have on its recarved progeny can drastically alter assumptions about whole periods in Roman art, as for instance the colossal Maxen- tius/Constantine in the Cortile of the Palazzo dei Conservatori whose classicism and spirituality are often cited as characteristic of new directions in Constantinian art but which were, in reality, already significant artistic components of the Maxentian original, appropriated wholesale by the new image.61

Furthermore, the wide range and variation of coiffure and physiognomy among recut images, which can have only the most approximate re- semblance to more standardized, unreworked representations, underscore the innate diversity present in the portraiture of any given emperor.62

Inscriptions and context would have aided an- cient viewers in identifying less precisely defined reworked portraits. The latitude within specific portrait types, especially apparent among altered likenesses, is yet another symptom of the flexibil- ity and mutability of imperial images.

Beyond the important stylistic implications for the development and history of Roman portrai- ture, a recognition of altered imperial images has ramifications for other kinds of subsidiary imag- ery. For instance, reworked cuirassed images of Nero suggest that certain motifs on sculpted breastplates, such as that of victories flanking a thymeterium, may be an innovations of Neronian rather than Flavian (or Trajanic) artists. Similarly, a representation of Augustus with a corona spicea which has been transformed from a likeness of Nero suggests that Nero, rather than Augustus, is the first emperor to introduce this important corona in male imperial portraits.63

The recutting of Roman portraits also impacts modern questions surrounding the authenticity and forgery of ancient works of art. Portraits which look strange and unusual, because they were reworked in antiquity have been con-

demned as fakes, as for instance a likeness of Severus Alexander refashioned from Elagabalus in Kansas City (cat. 8.X).64 In fact, the oddities occasioned by recutting can help to validate a portrait’s authenticity. However, E.B. Harrison has sounded an important note of caution con- cerning reworked pieces of ancient sculpture and the art market: “In the art market and in the museums for which the market is the main source, they represent a real danger, for the idea of an anciently recut original can serve as a mask for the ineptitude of a forger.”65

Much scholarly effort has been expended in attempting to recover the lost voices of those members of Roman society who are misrepre- sented, under represented or not represented at all in the literary and historical tradition largely authored by the male elite or in the officially sponsored monuments of Roman art. The po- sition of women, slaves, foreigners, as well as Roman attitudes towards gender, ethnicity, and sexuality have all been explored in recent schol- arship.66 “Bad” emperors like Caligula, Nero, Domitian, Commodus, Elagabalus and Maxen- tius as historical losers have also been deprived of their voices and no longer have the power to speak through their images that revered rulers such as Augustus, Vespasian, Trajan, or Con- stantine have retained. A survey of condemna- tions prompts reappraisals of art created for these “bad” emperors and reveals new insights into various aspects of imperial self-representation including Caligula’s innovations in Julio-Claudian group dedications, the surprising persistence of Neronian military imagery or the extraordinary range of Maxentius’s visual propaganda during his six year rule of Rome. Furthermore, it often calls into question the veracity of certain asser- tions in surviving ancient sources and our own

61 Inv. 1622, cat. 9.4. 62 On diversity within the framework of imperial por-

trait typology, see H. von Heintze, in A. Cambitoglou ed. (1995) 264; R.R.R. Smith (1996) 30-47.

63 Sala dei Busi 274, inv. 715; as proposed by B.S. Spaeth (1996) 23; on the portrait see cat. 2.10.

64 Nelson Atkins Museum 45-66, cat. 7.16. On ques- tions of forgery and authenticity, see R. Cohon (1996).

65 (1990) 180. 66 Scholarship has grown rather vast in these areas, but

important contributions in the field of Roman art include: N.B. Kampen, ed. (1996); D.E.E. Kleiner and S.B. Matheson eds., (1996) and in particular N.B. Kampen, “Gender Theory in Roman Art,” 14-26; J.R. Clarke (1996b) 599-603; and J.R. Clarke (1998) and 2003.

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subsequent historical assumptions. The physical evidence provided by damaged, altered, or mu- tilated portraits also aids in the recovery of the lost political voice of Roman imperial women such as the two Julias, Livilla, Messalina, Lucilla, Crispina, and Fausta.67 Although these women were most often accused of adultery and sexual misconduct, the virulent destruction of their images underscores the political nature of their crimes, namely involvement in conspiracies to overthrow the reigning princeps. Thus, damnatio contributes new avenues for revisionist ap- proaches to Roman art and history.

Sculptors also faced substantial technical ob- stacles when recarving marble portraits. In com- parison to a freshly cut portrait, freshly cut from a block of stone, the volume of marble available for refashioning a likeness is obviously limited to the extent of the pre-existing image. The basic position of eyes, ears, and nose is also established by the original likeness. The recutting of portraits and resulting reduction in sculptural volume, often results in representations with overly large, projecting ears, thick necks, and receding chins.68

Marble also becomes more friable as it ages, so projecting elements such as ears, noses, and crowns can prove especially delicate and prob- lematic. Indeed, ears and crowns, are often left entirely intact from the original likeness. The recutting of the lower sections of the face and in particular the mouth, often a focus in the trans- formation process may have additional ideologi- cal implications as the word for mouth, os can also be used to signify the entire face.69

Precedents and Parallels

The Near East

Prior to the Roman imperial period, represen- tations of rulers were certainly destroyed, dam- aged, or altered for political reasons. Numerous

examples of mutilated royal images survive from the Near East. A vandalized copper head of an Akkadian ruler from Nineveh provides an early example of mutilation in effigy.70 The ears have been severed from the image, the left eye gouged out, the bridge and tip of the nose damaged by chisel blows, and sections of the beard broken off, all acts of deliberate denigration. These vandal- ized features contrast with the rest of head which is well preserved, a hallmark of most intention- ally disfigured images. C. Nylander has pointed out that the portrait’s mutilation finds close par- allels to the mutilation of criminals in the Near East, and in particular of the two Persian pre- tenders Fravartish and Ciçantakhma, whose noses and ears were cut off and one eye blinded by order of Darius.71 Nylander also suggests that the damaged state of much Akkadian hard stone sculpture may be the result of systematic destruc- tion.72 In a relief from Nineveh representing Sen- nacherib, the head of the king has been gouged out, while also at Nineveh, the faces of Ashur- banipal and his queen have been attacked, as have reliefs of Ummanigash.73 In the case of Sen- nacherib’s representation, the identifying inscrip- tion was also defaced.74 At Persepolis, royal re- liefs have also been attacked. In scenes depicting the king enthroned and leading processions, the faces of the king have been obliterated, as have their scepters. Animistic beliefs in these images as effigies or doubles for the rulers may have motivated the deliberate disfigurement of royal representations in the Near East, as well as their abduction by hostile rulers.75 Indeed, the suscep- tibility of Near Eastern royal images to politically motivated mutilation prompted many curse in- scriptions, including that of the eighth century Assyrian king Sargon who cursed “anyone who

67 See infra and E.R. Varner (2001a). 68 M. Pfanner (1989) 218-9; C.B. Rose (1997) 59. 69 H. von Heintze in A. Cambidoglou, ed. (1995) 264.

70 Baghdad, Museum; C. Nylander (1980) 330-31 (with earlier literature). For the politically chaotic context of the mutilation, see A. Kuhrt (1987) 20-55.

71 C. Nylander (1980) 331-2. 72 C. Nylander (1980) 330, n. 6. 73 C. Nylander (1980) 331-2; Z. Bahrani (1995) 365-67,

figs. 19, 21; see also T. Beran (1988). 74 Z. Bahrani (1995) 366, fig. 19. 75 Z. Bahrani (1995) 375-80.

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would alter or damage” the features of his im- ages.76

Pharaonic Egypt

The destruction of royal monuments and imag- es for political reasons was also carried out in Egypt. Representations of Hatchepsut, who ruled as pharaoh together with her nephew and step- son, Thutmoses III, have been extensively mu- tilated and her cartouches often erased.77 In some instances her name and titles have been replaced by those of Thutmoses III, and in others they remain blank. These erasures appear to be part of a concerted effort on the part of Thutmoses III to rewrite the historical record, and he seems to have been largely successful, as the name of his co-ruler Hatcheput is noticeably absent in surviving king lists.78 Images of Hatchepsut were also deliberately mutilated, as attested by the great number of damaged sphinxes bearing her likeness discovered buried together at the site of her great mortuary temple.79 The excavator, H.E. Winlock, estimated that there were origi- nally as many as 200 Hatchepsut shpinxes. The

uraeus, symbol of Hatchepsut’s position as king, has been chiseled off many of these representa- tions, and the noses have been attacked and the eyes carefully gouged out. The destruction of the nose and eyes recalls the mutilation of the Akka- dian copper head and also provides striking early parallels to the later mutilation of Roman impe- rial images. Monuments celebrating Hatchepsut’s advisor Senenmut have also been attacked.80

The reign of Akhenaten witnesses several unusual examples of the transformation of rep- resentations of a royal woman. Reliefs and in- scriptions honoring the pharaoh’s minor wife Queen Kiya appear to have been regularly al- tered to depict one of his daughters by Nefertiti, Meretaten or Ankhesenpaaten and as a result Kiya has virtually disappeared from the artistic record.81 Kiya’s image is often remodeled by simply altering her headress into a “modified Nubian wig,” as in two reliefs in Copenhagen,82

and a relief in New York.83 Identifying inscrip- tions were also recut to honor Meretaten or Ankhesnpaaten.84 It is not entirely clear what prompted the obliteration of Kiya’s memory, but during her lifetime she appears to have enjoyed a great deal of prominence at Akhenaten’s court, and it is tempting to view the transformation of Kiya’s monuments as an indication of the in- creased importance and influence of Nefertiti and her daughters towards the end of the reign.85

76 Z. Bahrani (1995) 372-5; 378-80; I.F. Winter (1997) 368.

77 For the evidence for a “damnatio memoriae” of Hatcehp- sut, see C.F. Nims (1966) 97-100; P.F. Dorman (1988) 46- 65; C. Van Siclen (1989) 85-6; G. Robins (1993); J. Tyldesley (1996) 216-229.

78 Omitting Hatchepsut’s name from the king lists would cause no noticeable chronological gaps in the record, since she ruled together with Thutmoses III and it would then appear that the succession passed directly from her hus- band and brother Thutmoses II to his son by another wife, Thutmoses III. The alteration of the historical record as expressed in inscriptions, reliefs, and statues may have been intended to suppress Hatschepsut role as a successful king and discourage other influential royal women from attempt- ing to rule as pharaoh. In this regard it is telling that it is only representations and inscriptions which celebrate Hatchepsut as pharaoh, and not those which celebrate her proper female role as queen consort, which have been tar- geted for obliteration. G. Robins (1993) 51-52; J. Tyldesley (1996) 223-6.

79 The “Hatchepsut Hole” discovered accidentally by H.E. Winlock in 1922-23; Other damaged images of Hatchepsut were discovered by Winlock in 1926-28 at the “Senenmut Quarry,” H.E. Winlock, 23 (1928) 46 and in 1927-8 (1928) 1-23.

80 P.F. Dorman discusses the complex problems sur- rounding the destruction of Senemut’s monuments and the evidence, or lack thereof, for a concerted proscription of his memory (1988) 141-64.

81G. Robins (1993) 54-55; D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 11, 87-88, 105-6.

82 Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, AE.I.N. 1776; D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 106, 132-3, no. 27, fig. 100.

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, AE.I.N. 1797; D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 87-88, 105-106, 133, no. 28, fig. 79.

83 Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1985.328.8; D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 106, fig. 101.

84 As in one of the Copenhagen reliefs (Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, A.E.I.N. 1776) whose inscription now reads “daughter of the king of his flesh, his beloved...Meretaten,” but beneath it, the beginning of Kiya’s usual titles are still legible: “the wife and [great] beloved of the King of Up- per and Lower Egypt who lives on [Maat],” D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 106.

85 On Kiya, see: R. Hanke (1978)188-96; W. Helck

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After his own death, monuments honoring Akhenaten, his family, and references to the new monotheistic god Aten were systematically de- stroyed as Akhenaten’s new religion was aban- doned and orthodoxy reasserted.86

Sculpted representations of Egyptian rulers were also transformed and recycled in large numbers without being politically motivated. Many statues of Rameses II have been refash- ioned from pre-existing images of Amenhotep III, whose sculpted images were produced in far greater numbers than any of his predecessors. A representation of Amenhotep’s chief wife, Queen Tiye may also have been recut, but not until the Ptolemaic period when it was reworked into an image of Arsinoe II.87 The drapery of the statue has been substantially recut, jewelery removed, the bottom edges of the wig narrowed, the eyes retouched, and the modius crown of Tiye modi- fied into an Isis crown. The image of Queen Tiye may have been deliberately selected by the Ptole- maic artists because of the perceived similarities between the two popular queens and its rework- ing can then be seen as a kind of positive trans- formation, very different from the generally hos- tile transformations of the Roman period.88 In addition, the substantial alterations to the body of the statue are not typical of Roman transfor- mations, which are generally concentrated en- tirely on the facial features and coiffure.

Greece and Sicily

Athens, from the late Archaic through the Hel- lenistic periods furnishes a number of close par- allels to the Roman phenomenon of damnatio. An early example of the politically motivated destruc- tion or alteration of an artistic monument is provided by a painted plaque, attributed to

Euthymides, in which the name of Megakles, one of the Alkmeonidai, in the 6"8@H inscription has been erased, and that of Glaukon substituted.89

In 487, Hipparchos, the son of Charmides was ostracized and his statue on the Akropolis de- stroyed.90 At the end of the fourth century, the Athenians revoked the decrees honoring Dem- etrios of Phaleron and melted down three hun- dred of his metal statues, further denigrating his memory by refashioning some of them as cham- berpots and throwing others into the sea.91 An inventory list of statues on the Acropolis compiled under Lycurgus c. 335 B.C. also provides evi- dence for the destruction and disposal of statues for aesthetic, and perhaps religious reasons.92

In 200 B.C., in defiance of Macedon, the Athenians repudiated the public honors accorded to Philip V and Livy describes the destruction of his monuments in terms which are intended to recall anachronistically Roman practices of damnatio memoriae:

Tum vero Atheniensium civitas, cui odio in Philippum per metum jam diu moderata erat, id omne in auxilii praesentis sepem effudit...Rogationem extemplo tulerunt plebesque scivit ut Philippi statuae et imagines omnes nominaque earum, item maiorem eius virile ac muliebre secus omnium tollerentur delerenturque diesque festi, sacra, sacerdotes, quae ipsius maiorumque honoris causa institutua essent, omnia profanarentur; loca quoque, in quibus positum aliquid inscriptumve honoris eius causa fuisset, detestabilia esse.93

(Then indeed the Athenian state, long restrained in their hatred of Philip through fear, because help was at hand, fully vented their rage...They im- mediately put forth a resolution, and the popu- lace passed it, that all of the statues and portraits of Philip and their identifying inscriptions, and all those of his ancestors, both men and women

(1980) cols. 422-24; W. Helck (1984) 159-67; A.P. Thomas (1994) 72-81; D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 14-5, 105-7; On Nefertiti’s importance towards the end of Akhenaten’s reign and her possible position as co-regent, see G. Robins (1993) 54 and D. Arnold, J.P. Allen and L. Green (1996) 88-9, and n. 28.

86 D. Metzler (1973) 19-20. 87 Miho, Museum. A. Kozloff, xxx. 88 A. Kozloff, in J.N. Newland, ed. (1997) 34-37.

89 Athens, Akropolis Museum, GL 1037; Brouskari, The Acropolis Museum 126-127, no. 67, fig. 241.

90 Lykurg. Leokrat. 117; M. Donderer (1991-2) 271, no. 1.

91 Strabo 9.1.20 Plut. Mor. 820E; Dion. Hal. Chron. 37.41 (where the number of destroyed statues is given as 1500); Diog. Laet. 5.77 (statues thrown into the sea); C. Houser (1987) 269; P. Green (1990) 48; M. Donderer (1991- 2) 271, no. 6.

92 D. Harris (1992) 637-52. 93 31.44.2-5. See also, P. Green (1990) 309; M.

Donderer (1991-2) 272, nos. 7-8. On the “damnatio” of Philip, see H.A. Thompson (1981) 354.

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should be abolished and destroyed and that the festivals, religious rites, and priesthoods which had been instituted in his honor or that of his ances- tors should be desecrated, and that also the sites in which any inscriptions or honors had been placed should be held as abominable.)

Polybius records that, slightly earlier in 220 B.C., votive images at Dion, sacred to the Macedonians were also deliberately attacked and destroyed by the Aetolians.94 The names of Macedonian kings have also been erased in inscriptions from the Athenian Agora, and the Athenians passed sanc- tions against the monuments of Philip V of Macedon and those of his ancestors, c. 200 B.C. Several fragments of a gilded bronze equestrian statue discovered in a well located in the north- western section of the Agora in 1971 may belong to an image of Demetrius Poliorcetes, one of Philip V’s most famous ancestors, destroyed during the Athenian demonstrations and sanc- tions of 200 B.C.95 The Agora well had been used as a dump Like the Romans, the Athenians de- stroyed the dwelling places of those convicted of crimes agains the polis, a process known as 6"J"F6"NZ.96

At Syracuse, after the expulsion of Dionysus II, Timolean encouraged the inhabitants of the city to demolish Dionysus’s citadel, as well as other monuments honoring Dionysus and his predecessors. Plutarch closely associates the de- struction of these works of art and architecture commemorating Dionysus with the charges of tyranny leveled against him; in order to under- score the symbolic intent of the destruction, Timolean built law courts on the site of the obliterated monuments, as an architectural em- bodiment of the triumph of justice over tyranny.97

An early fourth century B.C. Greco-Persian sarcophagus discovered at Çan may also present

evidence of non-Roman damnatio from Ana- tolia.98 The body of the polychrome sarcophagus, which seems to have been created for a local ruler, depicts a stag and boar hunt. The facial features of one of the horsemen in the stag hunt have been intentionally obliterated from the re- liefs. Evidence for this kind of portrait effacement, in which only the head is attacked is generally rare for Roman reliefs, but there are comparable instances for both Domitian and Geta.

The Ptolemies

Several late Ptolemaic portraits have been re- worked for political reasons and stand as impor- tant precursors to the altered likenesses of the Roman imperial period. In particular, three rep- resentations of Ptolemy IX (116-107, 88-80 B.C.) appear to have been remodeled from portraits of his younger brother and successor Ptolemy X (107-88) when the former regained control of Egypt in 88 B.C.99 Iustinus also records the de- struction of images of Ptolemy X by the Alex- andrians.100 A head in Boston which initially depicted Ptolemy X Alexander I Physkon has been transformed into a portrait of his elder brother Ptolemy IX Soter II Lathyros by recarving the eyes and mouth and refashioning the hair and beard with stucco additions.101 The general proportions of the facial features have also been slimmed down from the original rep- resentation of Ptolemy X, whose nickname Physkon, refers to his corpulence. The reworked image may also have been completed with an eagle headdress which would have linked Ptolemy IX, whose epithet was Soter, to the founder of

94 4.62.1-2; M. Donderer (1991-2) 271, no. 3; A.F. Stewart notes that this deliberate destruction of images is an attempt to obliterate “Macedonian historical conscious- ness,” (1993) 25.

95 J.M. Camp (1986) 164-5, fig. 138; C. Housere (1987) 255-81, figs. 16.1-6; P. Green (1990) 307; M. Donderer (1991-92) 267, no. 1.

96 W.R. Connor (1985) 79-102. 97 Plut. Tim. 22.2-3; 23.7; Dion.Hal. Chron 37.20f ; M.

Donderer (1991-2) 272, nos. 9, 12.

98 See N. Sevinç, et al (2001). 99 Late Ptolemaic portraits are notoriously difficult to

identify, but circumstantial evidence based on representa- tions preserved on sealings from Edfu and Nea Paphos suggests that Ptolemy IX and X can be differentiated on the basis of their facial features, the former usually appear- ing with a distinctive underchin beard and with slimmer facial features than his younger brother, see R.R.R. Smith (1988a) 95-7.

100 38.8.12; M. Donderer (1991-2) 273-4, no. 274. 101 Museum of Fine Arts inv. 59.51, h. 0.46 m.; R.R.R.

Smith (1988a) 167, no. 57, pl. 39.1-2 (with earlier litera- ture).

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the dynasty Ptolemy I Soter.102 A portrait in the Getty of Ptolemy IX exhibits similar signs of reworking (fig. 1).103 The eyes and mouth have been recut. Like the Boston likeness, the portrait’s overall volume has been reduced. The neck pre- serves clear evidence of having been cut down and the area below the right ear has been cut back, perhaps to facilitate the addition of another eagle headdress to the altered image. Chisel marks are also clearly visible at the back of the head along a large flat area, perhaps also for securing added headgeart, or, alternatively, for repairs in stucco or marble to damage suffered during Ptolemy X’s overthrow. The head has been broken from a statue whose drapery is visible at the left of the neck. A third portrait of Ptolemy IX in Stuttgart, discovered at Athribis, also appears to have been modified from a like- ness of Ptolemy X.104 The recutting of these images predicts the reworking of Roman marble portraits, although stucco additions are a rela- tively rare form of alteration in the Roman pe- riod.

The Roman Republic

The first recorded example of the destruction of a Roman honorific monument as a result of damnatio occurs in Pliny the Elder: a bronze statue of Spurius Cassius Vecellinus erected in front of the Temple of Tellus was melted down by order of the censors after his condemnation for at- tempted tyranny in 485 B.C.105 The historical veracity of Pliny’s account is called into question by three important inaccuracies: namely, true

commemorative portraiture is probably anach- ronistic for early fifth century Rome, the office of censor had not yet been established in 485, and the temple of Tellus itself was not dedicated until 268.106 Nevertheless, this anecdote is particularly revealing because it indicates that Pliny and the contemporary audiences for whom he was writ- ing, familiar with the damnationes of Gn. Cal- purnius Piso Pater, Livilla, Caligula, Messalina, Nero, and others earlier in the century, expected such a direct link between attempted tyranny, condemnation, and the destruction of portraits. It also underscores the traditional, Republican precedents ascribed to the negation of images in the imperial period. Other early Republican manifestations of damnatio assigned to the fifth and fourth centuries document the razing of houses of condemned individuals, including domås be- longing to the same Spurius Cassius, Spurius Maelius, Marius Manlius Capitolinus, and Marius Vitruvius Vaccus.107 Later, the houses of M. Fulvius Flaccus, a follower of the Gracchi and Lucius Saturninus were similarly destroyed.108

Flaccus’s house, which stood on the Palatine, was replaced by a portico constructed by Q. Lutatius Catullus, further canceling Flaccus’s memory.109

The destruction of Cicero’s house on the Palatine ordered by Clodius and the partial demolition of his villas at Tusculum and Formia can also be viewed as Republican expressions of architectural damnatio memoriae.110 The demolition of houses,

102 On the reworking of portraits of Ptolemy IX and X and the putative eagle headdress, see R.R.R. Smith (1986) 74-8.

103 83.AA.330, h. 0.34 m.; R.R.R. Smith (1988a) 167, no. 59, pl. 40.1-2 (with earlier literature).

104 Würtembergisches Landesmuseum, inv. SS.17, h. 0.233 m; R.R.R. Smith (1988a) 96, n. 65 (with earlier lit- erature); S. Walker and P Higgs, eds. (2000) 81, no. 1.74, with fig., (with earlier literature).

105 NH 34.30. eam vero, quam apud aedem Telluris statuisset sibi Sp. Cassius, qui regnum adfectaverat, etiam conflatam a censoribus. See also T. Hölscher (1994) 32 and n. 98. For further discussion of Spurius Cassius, see K. Mustakallio (1994) 30-38, and B. Spaeth (1996) 71-3.

106 T. Hölscher (1994) 32; for anachronistic elements in later accounts of Republican condemnations, see also C. W. Hedrick (2000) 100.

107Cic. Dom. 100-102; Val.Max. 6.3.1a-b; Livy 2.7.5-12, 2.41.11 (Spurius Cassius), 4.16.1 (Spurius Maelius), 6.20.13 (Marius Manlius Capitolinus), 8.20.8 (Marius Vitruvius Vaccus); T.P. Wiseman (1987) 394 and n. 3; K. Mustakallio (1994) 39-64; J. Bodel (1997) 7-9; C. W. Hedrick, Jr. (2000) 100, 102, 105-6.

108 Cic. de.off. 1.138, Dom 102, 114; Val. Max. 6.3.1c; T.P. Wiseman (1987) 393; J. Bodel (1997) 7-8.

109 Cic. Dom. 102; 114 (ut eius qui perniciosa rei publicae consilia cepisset omnis memoria funditus ex oculis hominm ac mentibus tolleretur [so that every memory of him who had conceived treacherous plots against the Republic should be entirely abolishted); Val. Max. 6.3.1 c; T. Hölscher (1994) 57; J. Bodel (1997) ms. 5..

110 Cic. Dom. 62; Red.Sen 18; Att 4.2.5, 7); J. Bodel (1997) 9.

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even those belonging to condemned individuals outside the imperial family, continued in the early empire, as attested by the partial destruction of a house or houses belonging to Gn. Calpurnius Piso pater under Tiberius as decreed by the Senate and the surviving remains of a domus on the Caelian destroyed under Nero and likely belonging to G. Calpurnius Piso, condemned in A.D. 65 for conspiring against the emperor.111

The Roman aristocratic domus functioned as a semi-public monument to the achievements and social prestige of its owners, and as a result is closely bound up with the memoria and fama of its inhabitants.112 It is not surprising then that the house as monument would be a primary target included in the sanctions associated with damnatio memoriae. This emphasis on the cancellation of memory and reputation sharply differentiates the Roman practice of house razing from the Greek practice, 6"J"F6"NZ, which, as noted earlier, seems motivated more by the desire to remove a polluted dwelling from the polis.113

Although it dates to the reign of Tiberius, the senatorial decree of A.D. 20 concerning the damnatio of Gn. Calpurnius Piso pater which sur- vives in six (or seven) bronze inscriptions from Spain, provides important evidence for the treat- ment of the images of condemned individuals and likely reflects established republican practices.114

Piso, implicated in the death of Germanicus at Antioch in A.D. 19, was accused of maiestas and committed suicide in A.D. 20. In addition to the partial demolition of his domus, the senate ex- pressly ordered the removal of his portraits, wherever they may have been erected and for- bade the display of his imago in any funerals where

it might normally have appeared.115 It is also notable that the Senate’s decree concerning the penalties enacted against Piso’s memory and images survives in several copies.116 Similar pro- hibitions had been passed against the appearance of imagines of M. Scribonius Libo Drusus, after his condemnation for treason in A.D. 16 and slightly later against G. Silius A. Caecina Largus in A.D. 24.117 Libo’s condemnation also included the declaration of public rejoicing on the anni- versary of his death.118 Sanctions against the portraits and imagines of the tyrannicides Brutus and Cassius continued in the early imperial pe- riod, as attested in Tacitus’s description of the funeral of Junia Tertulla in A.D. 22 which was remarkable for their conspicuously absent like- nesses.119 Later, under Nero, Cassius Longinus was prosecuted for displaying an image of his ancestor, Cassius the Tyrannicide.120 This is

111 For Gn. Calpurnius Piso, see J. Bodel (1997) ms. 9; H. Flower (1998) 169-70. These sanctions only targeted additions made by Gn. Calpurnius Piso to the propery. On the destruction of the Caelian domus and its likely associa- tion with G. Calpurnius Piso, see V. Santa Maria Scrinari (1997) 9.

112 T.P. Wiseman (1987) 393-413; B. Bergmann (1994) 225-56; J. Bodel (1997).

113 W.R. Connor (1985) 79-102. 114 M. Kajava (1995) 201-10; W. Eck, A. Caballos, and

F. Fernandez, eds (1996); H. Flower (1996) 23-28; H. Flower (1998) 158-82.

115 Utiq(ue) statuae et imagines Cn. Pisonis patris, quae ubiq(ue) positae essent, tollerentur .... neue imaginibus familiae Calpurniae imago eius interponeretur (the statues and portraits of Cn. Piso, the father, should be removed wherever they have been erected .... nor should his mask be placed among the other masks of the Calpurnian family); 73-80. The phrase quae ubique positae essent is presumably meant to stress the fact that Piso’s images are to be removed from both public and private spaces. The Senate also enacted sanctions against Piso’s name and ordered his son to change is name from Gnaeus (he seems to have adopted Lucius instead). It was also proposed that Piso’s name be erased from the public records (fasti), but this penalty was vetoed by Tiberius and not carried out; Tac. Ann. 3.17; see also H.I. Flower (1996) 28, and n. 45; H. Flower (1998) 160-61.

116 H. Flower makes an important distinction between Gn. Piso’s condemnation, which actually preserved the prestige of his family and descendants, and the much more punitive sanctions against defeated political rivals, which is the norm for condemned emperors. Flower points out the complex and conflicting motivations which could lie behind post mortem sanctions and sees Piso’s punishment as more traditional and characteristic of earlier republican practices, (1998) 179.

117 Tac. Ann. 2.32.1. As with Piso, sanctions were passed against Libo’s name and future Scribonii were forbidden the use of the cognomen Drusus. For Silius, see Tac. Ann.11.35. See also H. Flower (1998) 170-71.

118 II ad Ides of September; C. W. Hedrick, Jr. (2000) 107.

119 Ann. 3.76. There is some ambiguity as to the treat- ment of Brutus and Cassius’s images under Augustus and he may have permitted display of their portraits, despite sanctions; see Tac.Ann. 4. 35; Plut. Comp. Brutus and Dio 5; C.W. Hedrick (2000) 111, 126.

120 Suet. Nero 37.1; Tac. Ann. 16.7; H. Flower (1996) 317, no. T81.

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supported by Dio who claims that in an earlier period, possession of a portrait of Cassius had been a capital offence.121 However, by the principate of Trajan, sanctions appear to have no longer been in force against the portraits of both Cassius and Brutus.122

The desecration of corpses as acts of poena post mortem is also attested in the Republican period. Important examples include Antonius’s insistence that Cicero’s head and hands be cut off and then draped over the ship’s beaks of the Rostra in the Forum Romanum, or Octavian’s order’s that the head of Brutus be sent from Philippi to Rome and thrown at the feet of a portrait statue of Julius Caesar.123

Marius and Sulla

Images played a crucial role in the civil war which Marius and Sulla waged at the beginning of the first century B.C. During the ascendancy of Marius, Sulla was declared a hostis and his house and possessions destroyed during his campaign against Mithradates. It is at this time, as well, that the monument put up by the Numidian King Bocchus in honor of Sulla’s Iugurthine victories may have been deliberately damaged.124 The faces of the Victories flanking a shield have been chiseled from the reliefs. The symbolic intent is clear: by mutilating the victory figures, Sulla’s military accomplishments are denigrated and invalidated. When Sulla regained power (after the death of Marius), Marius’s portrait statues were pulled down and trophies commemorating his

victories on the Capitoline were destroyed.125

Furthermore, Sulla banned the display of any imagines of Marius,126 as well as imagines belonging to partisans of Marius who had been condemned as hostes.127 The first instance of numismatic damnatio also occurs under Sulla when he restrikes (countermarks) coins issued under Marius.128

Marius’s memory was subsequently rehabilitated and the Capitoline trophies which included his portrait were restored and reinstalled by Julius Caesar in 65 B.C.129

Marcus Antonius and Cleopatra VII

Likenesses of Marcus Antonius were produced and widely disseminated after Caesar’s assassina- tion on 15 March 44 B.C. and especially during his struggle for supremacy in the Mediterranean with Octavian. Indeed, P. Zanker has demon- strated how the two rivals waged a virtual war of images.130 Representations of Antonius are preserved on coins and depict him with a full head of hair, fleshy face, prominent hooked nose, and thick neck. Nevertheless, no sculpted like- nesses can be identified with certainty as a result of the removal and destruction of his portraits following the defeat at Actium in 31 B.C. and his subsequent suicide in 30. Three portraits from Egypt, all with a similar coiffure are the best candidates as possible representations of Antonius and if they do depict him, they are likely to have been removed from public display and ware- housed.131 Antonius had been declared a public

121 62.27.2. 122 Plin. Ep. 1.17.3. Although C.W. Hedrick interprets

the passages relating to the portraits of Cassius and Brutus as reflecting the lack of uniform practices associated with condemnations, Pliny’s intent seems to be that it is now possible to display their images, precisely because any sanctions have been rescinded or are not enforced under the more enlightened rule of Trajan, (2000) 101, 275, n. 36.

123 Cicero: Plut. Cic. 48.6; 49.2, Brutus: Suet. Aug. 13.1; D.G. Kyle (1998) 132.

124 Rome, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Braccio Nuovo 2750; T. Hölscher (1994) 71; S. Nodelman (1987) 83-84; T. Hölscher in Kaiser Augustus und die verlorene Republik (Ber- lin 1988) 384-6, no. 214 (with fig.).

125HN 34.20.32; T Hölscher (1994) 50-55. 126 Plut. Caes. 5; H. Flower (1996) 68. 127 Plut. Caes. 5; H. Flower (1996) 123. The proscribed

imagines were exhibited again at the funeral of Caesar’s aunt Julia, the widow of Marius, in 69 B.C.

128 K. Harl (1996) 35; C. W. Hedrick, Jr. (2000) 274, n. 24.

129 Plut. Caes. 6.1-5. For the inclusion of a portrait of Marius in the resurrected monument: ¦46`<"H...9"D\@L... ñH •<JÂ BV<JT< –>4@H gÇ0 Ò •<¬D J0yH 9"D\@L FL((g<\"H.

130( 1987) 33-78. 131 All three portraits have a similar arrangement of

locks over the forehead: limestone statue, Cairo, Egyptian Museum, inv. JE 42891; a marble head in Alexandria, Société archéologique d’Alexandrie; and a basalt pharaonic statuette, Cairo, Egyptian Museum, inv. 13/3/15/3; G.

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enemy of Rome (hosti iudicato)132 and Plutarch specifically states that Octavian, on entering Alex- andria, had Antonius’s statues pulled down.133

Furthermore, both Plutarch and Dio confirm that the Senate in Rome ordered Antony’s monu- ments to be effaced or dismantled, his birthday to be declared a dies nefastus, and his descendants to be forbidden the use of the praenomen Marcus.134 His birthday was further considered ill-omened (vitiosus).135 The destruction of Anto- nius’s images provides important precedents for the treatment of representations of overthrown emperors and political rivals in the imperial period.

Antonius’s memory and reputation did how- ever undergo rehabilitation. This process was begun under Augustus himself. Although ar- chaeological evidence for Augustus’s arches in the Forum Romanum is extremely complicated, it appears that, as part of the damnatio, Antonius’s name was deliberately omitted from the list of

consuls which decorated the interior bay of Augustus’s Actian arch in the Forum Roma- num.136 By 19 B.C., however, when the Actian Arch was replaced by a tripled bayed arch com- memorating the return of the Parthian standards, Antonius’s name is reinstated in the new list of triumphatores.137 The rehabilitation of Antonius’s memory is continued under his direct descen- dants, Caligula and Claudius.138 Antonius’s res- toration prefigures the rehabilitation of the memory of Commodus under Septimius Severus or that of Nero in the 4th and 5th centuries A.C.

As Antonius’s consort and ally, it is Cleopatra against whom Octavian technically waged war. Both Dio and Plutarch indicate that Cleopatra was also declared a hostis, and if so, she is the only woman for whom there is historical evidence of a proclamation as an official enemy of the Ro- man state.139 Indeed, there is a conscious at- tempt made on the part of Octavian and his supporters to portray the civil conflict against An- tonius as a struggle between Rome and a foreign power, Egypt. Nevertheless, there is no evidence

Grimm (1989) 348-353, ns. 12, 30, fig. 1, pls. 84-5. It is important to point out that these images do not have close correspondences to Antonius’s numismatic images and the coiffures of the basalt portrait in Cairo and the Alexandria head are not different enough to support Grimm’s asser- tion that they represent two distinct portrait types: type A, Antonius as Triumvir and type B, Antonius as “sole ruler” in the east, respectively. The basalt statuette has also been associated with Augustus, Z. Kiss (1984) 31-2, figs. 25-6. R.R.R. Smith has more cautiously identified the limestone statue in Cairo as simply representing a late Ptolemy (1988a) 168 no.61, pl. 41. Three other portraits often as- sociated with Antonius (Kingston Lacy, the Banks Collec- tion; Brooklyn, Museum of Art, 54.51, and Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts, 4807) all have divergent hairstyles and physiognomies, nor do they have strong similarites with the three Egyptian images; as a result, they are likely to represent private individuals, see S. Walker and P. Higgs, eds. (2001) 241, no. 261, 243, no. 263, 254-5, no. 277.

132 Suet. Aug. 17.2. 133 Ant. 86.5. 134 Cic.49.4: ¦Nz @Þ JVH Jz gÆ6`<"H º $@L8¬ 6"2gÃ8g<

z!<JT<\@L 6"Â J•H –88"H ²6bDTFg J4:VH 6"Â BD@FgR0N\F"J@

:0*g<Â Jä< z!<JT<\T< Ð<@:" 9VD6@< gÉ<"4; Dio 51.19.3; see also D.G. Kyle (1998) 234, n. 47. On the erasure of Antonius’s name, see Plut. Cic. 49.4; Dio 51.19.3; F. Vittinghoff (1936) 21 and. M. Kajava (1994) 201; see also C.W. Hedrick (2000) 104.

135 Fasti Verulani, Caeretaini, Maffaeiani, Praenestini, and Appiani minores; Dio 51.19.3; H. Flower (1998) 171, and n. 101; see also II 13.3 ad 14 January and ad Kalends of August and C.W. Hedrick, Jr. (2000) 107.

136 R.A. Gurval reviews the rather sparse numismatic, archaeological, and literary evidence for the Actian arch and notes that it is possible that the predecessor to the Parthian arch in fact celebrated Augustus’ victory over Sextus Pompey at Naulochus in 36 B.C., (1995) 36-47, as earlier proposed by F. Coarelli (1985) 258-308. However, the evidence of the omission of Antony’s name in the list of consuls, which seems to have been part of the earlier arch, would favor an identification of the earlier arch as a commemoration of the victory at Actium rather than Naulochus, see A. Degrassi (1945-6) 96-7; A. Degrassi (1947) 133-5, 47 B.C., 42 B.C., 37 B.C.; E. Nedergard in E.M. Steinby, ed. (1993) 80-85 (with earlier literature).

137 A. Degrassi (1947) 86-7, 40 B.C. Tac.Ann. 3.18 in- dicates that Antony’s name was visible under Tiberius, further evidence of the rehabilitation. The idea of recon- ciliation and the rehabilitation of Antonius’s memory is also present in the Ara Pacis. The Apolline and Bacchic ele- ments of its acanthus leaf scrollwork can even be read as a kind of numen mixtum reconciling Apollo, the patron de- ity of Augustus and Bacchus, with whom Antony was of- ten identified. On the scrollwork see J. Pollini (1993a) 181- 217 and D. Castriota (1995).

138 Suet. Cal. 23.1; Claud.11.5; Dio 59.20.1 and A. Barrett, Caligula 218..

139 Dio 50.4.4 (*¥ 58g@BVJD‘ JÎ< B`8g:@<); Plut. Ant 60.1 (R0N\>gJ"4 58g@BVJD‘ B@8g:gÃ<). In the Octavia Nero calls for his wife to be treated as a hostis, which prompts the praefect to whom he is talking to respond by wondering if a woman can really be a hostis 865-6.

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chapter one20

to suggest that Cleopatra’s images were system- atically destroyed or removed after her suicide. In the same passage where Plutarch records the destruction of Antonius’s portraits at Alexandria, he also indicates that Octavian accepted 2000 talents from Archibius in order that Cleopatra’s images should not be pulled down. Three sculpt- ed portraits of Cleopatra have survived in the Vatican,140 Berlin,141 and Cherchel.142 The Va- tican portrait was reportedly discovered in 1784 at the Villa of the Quintilii on the Via Appia. It may have been carved during her sojourn in Rome with Julius Caesar between 46-44 B.C. and then eventually incorporated into the extensive sculptural display at the Villa.143 The Berlin portrait is also likely to have come from the environs of Rome, perhaps in the vicinity of Ariccia or Genzano, and it too may have been created between 46-44.144 In any event, it is ex- tremely unlikely that new images of Cleopatra would have been created in Rome during her

alliance with Antonius and conflicts with Oc- tavian or after the Battle of Actium. Both Appian and Dio mention the gilded bronze portrait of Cleopatra which Julius Caesar placed in the Temple of Venus Genetrix, and Dio’s account indicates that the statue was still in situ in the early 3rd century.145 The statue was apparently not removed after Actium, just as her images were not destroyed at Alexandria. The site of this portrait in the Temple of Venus Genetrix and its strong associations with Divus Iulius may have insured its survival. M. Flory has further sug- gested that Octavian may have added portraits of Octavia and Livia to the temple in order to deliberately contrast his wife and sister’s romanitas and moral virtue with Cleopatra’s foreignness and perceived moral laxity; thus the three statues together would have acted as an exempla of correct versus incorrect female behavior, as valid after Actium as before.146 Posthumous images of Cleopatra do seem to have been produced as evidenced by the Cherchel portrait whose anach- ronistic pin curls framing the face find close correspondences in Julio-Claudian coiffures and suggest that the likeness was produced in the second quarter of the first century A.C. The portrait comes from Iol Caesarea, the capital of Roman Mauretania, and may have been com- missioned by Cleopatra’s grandson, Ptolemy, the last king of Mauretania (r. A.D. 23-40).

140 Museo Gregoriano Profano, inv. 3851, h 0.39 m; R.R.R. Smith (1988a) S. Walker and P. Higgs, eds. (2000) 157-8, no. III.2, with figs. (with earlier literature).

141Antiken Museen, 1976.10, h. 0.27 m.; R.R.R. Smith (1988a) S. Walker and P. Higgs (2000) 159, no. III.4, with figs. (with earlier literature).

142 Museum, S 66 (31); h. 0.31 m.; R.R.R. Smith (1988a) ; S. Walker and P. Higgs (2000) 158, no. III.3, with fig. (with earlier literature).

143 The portrait has also been attributed to the “Tomba di Nerone” near the via Cassia. For the most recent attri- bution to the Villa dei Quinitllii, see S. Walker and P. Higgs (2000) 147, 157, no. III.2.

144 S. Walker and P. Higgs, eds. (2000) 159.

145 App. BC 2.102; Dio 51.22.3 146 (1993) 295-6; see also S. Wood (1999) 32.

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