Download 10 - Parkway C-2

Chapter 10 From Seven Hills to Three Continents:
The Art of Ancient Rome - Notes
With the rise of ancient Rome and the extent of its empire it was the only
civilization of ancient times that approximates today’s multicultural world. The
remains of Roman are still visible in the world it ruled. Even where it did not, its
influence is clearly seen in the many cities and college campuses.
According to legend, Rome was founded by Romulus as a modest village of huts
on April 21, 753 BC. Nine centuries later it was the greatest empire the world had
ever known. Its imperial city awed foreign kings and even its own emperors.
The history of Rome has been divided by historians into five distinct periods.
I. The Monarchy (753 - 509 BC) When Latin and Etruscan Kings ruled Rome. It
ended when the last Etruscan king was thrown out.
II. The Republic (509 - 27 BC) A period of almost 500 years that lasted from the
end of the Monarchy until the bestowing the title of Augustus on Octavian.
III. The Early Empire ( 27 BC - 96 AD) Began with Augustus and his JulioClaudian successors and continued until the end of the Flavian dynasty.
IV. The High Empire (96 - 192 AD) Began with the rule of Nerva and the
Spanish emperors, Trajan and Hadrian, and ended with the last emperor of the
Antonine dynasty.
V. The Late Empire (192 - 337 AD) Began with the Severn dynasty and included
the so called soldier emperors of the third century, the tetrarchs, and Constantine.
The Republic
The Republic vested power mainly in the senate (which means council of elders)
and two elected consuls. A dictator could be appointed for a specific time and
purpose. All leaders came originally from the wealth land owners called
patricians, and later from the plebeian class of small farmers, merchants, and
freed slaves.
The year 211 BC was a turning point for Rome and Roman art. With Marcellus
defeat of the Sicilian Greek city of Syracuse, he brought back the usual spoils of
war, but also the cities artistic patrimony (the art of the city). Thus began in the
words of the historian Livy, “the craze for works of Greek art.” The Romans who
were only concerned with farming and fighting were now interested in things of an
aesthetic nature and those who made them, even to the point of spending much
time in contemplation.
Greece became a Roman province in 146 BC, further increasing their appetite for
Greek art. Even though they had a great desire for and admiration of Greek art,
their own art was not some pale imitation. The Etruscan basis of Roman art and
architecture was never forgotten and instead was part of a highly eclectic blend
along with Greek that made a distinctly Roman style.
Architecture
Eclectic best describes the characteristics of a Republican temple on the Tiber
River in Rome. Known as the “Temple of Fortuna Virilis”, it is actually the
Temple of Portunus, the Roman god of harbors.
Etruscan - High podium, accessible only from the front, columns on a deep porch.
Greek - Ionic columns, built of stone and overlaid with stucco in imitation of
marble, Ionic frieze,
Roman - peripteral column appearance by making half columns on the sides and
back of cella, becomes a pseudoperipteral temple
Sanctuary of Fortuna Primigenia the goddess of good fortune. The structure
made of concrete and was spread over several terraces leading up a hillside. The
layout is influenced by colossal Hellenistic designs, but construction is Roman.
The builder used concrete barrel vaults of enormous strength to support the
terraces and to cover the great ramps leading to the grand central staircase. The
unknown architect transformed the entire hillside into a grandiose complex
symbolic of Roman power. This subjection of nature to human will and
rational order was the first full blown manifestation of the Roman imperial
spirit. It contrasts with the more restrained Greek practice of simply
crowning a hill with a sacred building, as opposed to converting the hill itself
into architecture.
Sculpture
Portraits and Society
The patrons of the Roman Republic’s great temples and sanctuaries were in almost
all cases men from old and distinguished families, often victorious generals who
used the spoils of war to finance public works. The aristocratic patricians were
proud of their lineage and kept likenesses (images) of their ancestors in wooden
cupboards in their homes and paraded them at the funerals of prominent relatives.
Republican Verism
Roman Republican portraits appear to be literal reproductions of individual faces,
but must be understood in context. The style derives to some degree from
Hellenistic, Etruscan, even Ptolemaic Egyptian portraits. Republican portraits are
one way the patrician class celebrated its elevated position in society. The subjects
were almost always men of advanced age, for generally only elders held power in
the republic. They did not ask sculptors to make them nobler; instead they
requested brutally realistic images of distinct features, in the tradition of the
treasured household images. These images are called veristic which means super
realistic. Scholars debate whether such portraits were truly blunt records of actual
features or exaggerated types designed to make a statement about personality:
serious, experienced, determined, loyal to family and state - virtues that were much
admired during the Republic.
The Romans believed the head alone was enough to constitute a portrait. The
Greeks in contrast, believed that the head and body were inseparable parts of an
integral whole, so portraits were almost always full length. In fact in Republican
portraiture veristic heads were often placed on bodies to which they could not
possibly belong. The old grizzled head of a general upon a youthful ideal body
evoked the notion of patrician cultural superiority as well as heroicizing the person
portrayed through an ideal physique.
Pompeii and the Cities of Vesuvius
On August 24, 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius, a long dormant volcano whose fertile
slopes were covered with vineyards during the late Republic and Early Empire,
suddenly erupted. Many towns around the Bay of Naples, among them Pompeii,
were buried in a single day. The ruins lay undisturbed for nearly 1700 years until
archeologists first explored the cities in the 18th century. The excavations at
Herculaneum and Pompeii have permitted a reconstruction of the life and art of
Roman towns of the Late Republic and Early Empire with a completeness that was
far beyond possible any where else.
Pompeii was an old city when it became a Roman colony in 80 BC. When an
earthquake struck in 62 AD the city had a population between 10,000 and 20,000
people. Damage was extensive and repairs still in progress 17 years later when
Vesuvius erupted. Pompeii has been called the living city of the dead because of
its well preserved condition.
The heart of Pompeii, as with other Roman cities, was the forum or public square,
usually located at the cities geographic center. Shortly after the Romans took
control of Pompeii, two of the town’s wealthiest officials used their own money to
build a large amphitheater (which means double theater). This is the earliest
such structure known and could sit 20,000 spectators - more than the entire
population of the town 150 years after it was built.
Greek theaters where built on natural hillsides, but the amphitheater’s continuous
elliptical seating area required building an artificial mountain. Only concrete was
capable of such a job. The amphitheater used a series of radically disposed
concrete barrel vaults that form a giant retaining wall that holds up the earthen
mound and stone seats. Barrel vaults also form the tunnels leading into the arena
(which is Latin for sand which soaked up the blood of the wounded and
killed), where fierce gladiatorial combats and wild animal hunts occurred. The
Roman amphitheater stands in sharp contrast both architecturally and functionally
to the Greek theater, home of refined performances of comedies and tragedies.
Roman Townhouses
Private homes occupied most of the area outside the civic center in Pompeii, as in
modern cities. The preservation of these homes is the most precious by-product of
the catastrophe. The house of Vettii is one of the best preserved houses and was
partially rebuilt after the earthquake of 62 AD. The main features on the house,
like others of the time, were an atrium and a peristyle garden. Upon these walls
and others in the house were splendid mural paintings done in Fresco.
The frescos are the most complete record of changing fashions in interior
decoration found anywhere in the ancient world. The sheer quantities tell us much
about the prosperity and tastes of the times. Initially excavators focused almost
exclusively on the figural panels, and cut them out of the walls to take them
elsewhere. They eventually got the bright idea of leaving them in place and gave
serious attention to the mural designs as a whole. A system of classifying the
Pompeian murals was developed by a German art historian August Mau, toward
the end of the 19th century. He divided the painting schemes into four so-called
Pompeian Styles numbered in the order they were introduced. Though later
refined and modified, they still are the basis for the study of Roman painting.
The First Style and Greece
The First Style has also been called the Masonry Style because the decorator’s aim
was to imitate costly marble panels using painted stucco relief. This practice was
not uniquely Roman and is another example of the Hellenization of Roman
architecture.
Second Style Illusionism
The First Style never went completely out of style, but after 80 BC another
approach became more popular. It was the antithesis of the First Style and was
popular until around 15 BC. The Second Style did not try to create an illusion of
elegant marble, but rather strived to dissolve the rooms confining walls and replace
them with the illusion of an imaginary three - dimensional world. They did this
pictorially.
An early example is the room that gives its name to the Villa of Mysteries at
Pompeii. Many scholars believe this was a chamber used for private celebrations
of the rites of the Greek god Dionysos (Roman Bacchus). Dionysos was the focus
of an unofficial mystery religion among women in Italy at the time. The mural
illustrates mortals (all female and one boy) interacting with mythological figures.
While their is some depth, it is shallow and does not extend beyond the wall.
A mature second style shows how the painters did extend the illusion beyond the
wall. The artist, in this painting from the Villa of Publius Fannius Synistor at
Boscoreale, near Pompeii, has created a magnificent world. The artist clearly had
knowledge of one point linear perspective, even though he was inconsistent in the
use of it. Linear perspective was the favored tool of Second Style painters seeking
to transform windowless rooms into “picture window” vistas.
A second example shows that the painters had also master atmospheric
perspective. This image comes from the Villa of Liva, wife of the emperor
Augustus, at Primaporta, just North of Rome.
The Third Style
In this style the artists no longer tried to create an illusionary 3-D world, but rather
decorated walls with delicate linear fantasies sketched on monochromatic
backgrounds. In our example there are insubstantial and impossibly thin
colonnettes supporting feather weight canopies, somewhat looking like a pediment.
In the center is tiny floating landscape.
The Fourth Style
A taste for illusionism was back in style. It became popular at the time of the 62
AD earthquake. The earliest examples are from the palace of Nero in Rome. It
looks like the featherweight architecture of the third style becomes much more
substantial and the illusionary walls of the Second Style become windows placed
upon a creamy white background.
This developed into a late Fourth Style version that went from elegant to a
crowded and confused, and sometimes garish composition, in which the illusionary
windows are unrelated.
Still Life paintings were often included in the mural arrangement of the Second,
Third, and Fourth Styles. Art historians have found nothing like these Roman
studies if food and inanimate objects until the Dutch still life of the 17th and 18th
centuries. The Roman murals are not as exact in drawing, perspective, or
rendering of light and shadow as the Dutch canvases. Still the painter understood
that form is the function of light.
The Early Empire
The murder of Julius Caesar on the Ides of March, 44 BC, plunged the Roman
world into bloody civil war that lasted 13 years. It ended when Octavian (better
known as Augustus), Caesar’s grand nephew and adopted son crushed the navel
forces of Mark Anthony and Queen Cleopatra of Egypt. They committed suicide
and in 30 BC, what was once the most powerful and wealthiest empire in the
ancient world, Egypt, became a province of the Roman Empire.
Historians reckon the passage from the old Roman Republic to the new Roman
Empire from the day in 27 BC when the Senate conferred the majestic title of
Augustus on Octavian, giving him control of all aspects of Roman public life. The
peace that Augustus fostered became known as the Pax Romana or Roman Peace
that lasted 200 years. During this time the emperors commissioned a huge number
of public works projects throughout the empire. The erection of imperial portraits
recounted the emperor’s great deeds and reminded the people everywhere who
were the source of the benefits. The portraits and reliefs often presented an image
devoid of historical fact, with the purpose to mold public opinion. There were few
equals in the effective use of art and architecture for propagandistic ends.
Augustus and the Julio - Claudians (27 BC - 68 AD)
When Octavian inherited Caesar’s fortune in 44 BC, he was not yet 19 years old.
When he vanquished Antony and Cleopatra in 31 BC and became the undisputed
master of the Mediterranean, he was not yet 32. The rule of the elders that
characterized the Republic for almost 500 years came to an abrupt end. Suddenly,
Roman portraitists were called upon to produce youthful images of the head of
state. Augustus was more than young, though not claiming to be God, he
advertised himself as the son of god. His portraits, produced in great numbers by
anonymous artists paid by the state, were designed to present the image of a
godlike leader, a superior being who miraculously, never aged. Augustus lived
until 14 AD. Portraits made of him later in life continued to look youthful even
though he was aged. This seems ridiculous to us today with our access to images,
but in antiquity very few people had seen the emperor, so his image could be
manipulated.
The models for Augustus’ idealized portraits cannot be found in the veristic
likeness of the Roman Republic. Classical Greece inspired the emperor’s
sculptors. The statue of Augustus found at his wife Livia’s villa at Primaporta
depicts the emperor as general. It is based on Polykleito’s Doryphoros. Here the
emperor addresses his troops with his right arm extended. Although the head is
that of an individual, rather than a nameless athlete, its overall shape, the sharp
ridges of the brows, and the tight cap of layered hair emulate the Polykleitan style.
The relief on his armor depicts the return of the Roman military standards the
Parthians had captured from a Republican general. The cupid at Augustus’ feet
proclaims his divine descent. Caesar’s family, the Julians, traced their ancestry
back to Venus; Cupid was the goddess’ son. Every part is designed to carry a
political message.
On his wife Livia’s birthday in 9 BCE Augustus dedicated the Ara Pacis Auguste
(Altar of Augustan Peace), the monument celebrating his most important
achievement, the establishment of peace. The monument was reconstructed during
the Fascist era in Italy, in connection with the 2000th anniversary of Augustus’
birth, when Mussolini was seeking to build a modern Roman Empire. Figural
reliefs and acanthus tendrils adore the altars outer walls. Four panels on the East
and West ends depict carefully selected mythology. One is a relief of Aeneas, the
son of Venus, and one of Augustus’ forefathers, making a sacrifice. The
connection between the emperor and the important figures in the past was an
important part of Augustus’ political ideology for his new Golden Age.
A second panel on the other end of the altar enclosure depicts a seated matron with
two lively babies on her lap. Her identity is uncertain. She is usually called Tellus
(Mother Earth), although some have named her Pax (Peace), Ceres (goddess of
grain), or even Venus. Whoever she is she epitomizes the fruits of Pax Augusta.
All around her is the bountiful earth is in bloom, and animals of different species
live peacefully side by side. Personifications of refreshing breezes flank her. One
rides a bird, the other a sea creature. Earth, sky, and water are all elements of this
picture of peace and fertility in the Augustan cosmos.
Processions of the imperial family and other important dignitaries appear on the
long North and South sides of the altar. The parallel friezes were clearly inspired
by the Panathenaic processional friezes on the Parthenon. Augustus sought to
present the new order as a Golden Age equaling that of Athens under Pericles. The
emulation of classical models thus made a political statement, as well as an artistic
one.
Even so the Roman procession is very different in character from the Greek. On
the Parthenon the anonymous figures act out an event that occurred every four
years. The frieze stands for all Panathenaic Festival processions. The Ara Pacis
depicts a specific event and recognizable contemporary figures. Among those
portrayed are children, talking, not focused at this solemn event, acting like
children, and not miniature adults as they often are portrayed in the history of art.
Their presences adds charm to the procession, but were not included for that
reason. Never before had children appeared on any Greek or Roman state
monument. Augustus was concerned about the decline in the birth rate among the
Roman nobility, and he enacted a series of laws designed to promote marriage,
marital fidelity, and raising children. The portrayal of men and their families on
the Altar of Peace was intended as a moral exemplar. The emperor again used art
to further his political and social agendas.
Great Building Projects
Augustus initiated many great building projects. In Rome he constructed a new
forum and completed Julius Caesar’s forum. The forums were made of white
marble that came from Carrara. These quarries were the same used by the great
sculptors of the Italian Renaissance. Prior to the opening of these quarries in the
second half of the first century BC, marble had to be imported at great cost from
abroad and was used sparingly. This great increase in the availability of marble led
Augustus to boast that he found Rome a city of brick and transformed it to a city of
marble.
Augustus’ goal was to make Rome the equal of Periclean Athens.
Aqueducts
Aqueducts were built in great quantities throughout the empire to serve far flung
colonies. The Pont-du-Gard located in Nimes, France was built in 16 AD and
demonstrates the great skill of the Roman engineers. It carried more than 100
gallons a day of water for each inhabitant of Nimes from a source 30 miles away.
The water was carried over the great distance by gravity flow which required the
channels to be built with a gradual decline over the entire route. The three story
bridge at Nimes was erected to maintain to the height of the water channel where it
crossed the Gard River. Each large arch spans some 82 feet and is constructed of
blocks weighing up to two tons each. The bridges uppermost level consists of a
row of smaller arches, three above the larger openings below. They carry the
water channel itself. Their quickened rhythm and the harmonious proportional
relationship between the larger and smaller arches reveal that the Roman engineer
had a keen aesthetic, as well as, practical sense.
The Flavians (69 - 96 AD)
Nero was the last of the Julio - Claudian emperors. He was forced to commit
suicide in 68 AD because of his outrageous behavior. A year of bloody strife
followed with Vespasian, who was a general under Claudius and Nero. Hr ruled
from 69-79 AD. His family name was Flavius. He had two sons Titus (79-81
AD) and Domitian (81-96 AD).
Coliseum
The Flavians built the Colosseum, the monument that, for some people, represents
Rome more than any other building. So much so that in the Middle Ages there was
a saying, “While stands the Colosseum, Rome shall stand; when falls the
Colosseum, Rome shall fall; and when Rome falls - the world.” The Colosseum
was known in its own day as The Flavian Amphitheater, and was one of
Vespasian’s first undertakings. It was built upon an artificial lake that had been on
the grounds of Nero’s palace. In doing this Vespasian reclaimed public lands that
Nero had confiscated for his own pleasure. The Colosseum provided the Romans
with the largest arena for gladiatorial combats and other lavish spectacles that had
ever been constructed. The Colosseum could hold 50,000 people. Its name was
not taken from its sheer size but rather from its location beside the Colossus of
Nero, the huge statue of Nero as the sun god and placed outside his villa.
Vespasian died in 79 AD, not living to see the Colosseum in use. Titus completed
it and opened it in 80 AD with 100 days of games at great cost. The highlight was
the flooding of the arena to stage a complete navel battle with more than three
thousand participants. Later emperors would try to “one up” the previous one.
Over the years thousands of lives were lost in the gladiatorial and animal combats
staged in the amphitheater, many of whom were Christians. The Colosseum never
outlived its infamy in this respect.
The Colosseum could not have been built without concrete. A complex system of
barrel vaulted corridors holds up the enormous oval seating area. In the centuries
after the fall of Rome, the Colosseum served as a ready made quarry. Almost all
marble seats were hauled away, exposing the network of vaults below.
Visible today are the arena substructures, which housed waiting rooms for
gladiators, animal cages, and machinery for raising and lowering stage sets as well
as animals and humans. A great velarium once shielded the spectators. Poles
affixed to the Colosseum’s facade held up the giant awning.
The exterior shell of the Colosseum is approximately 160 feet high, the height of a
modern 16 story building. Entrances were numbered and people sat according to
the social hierarchy. The decor of the exterior had nothing to do with function.
The facade is divided into four bands, with large arched openings piercing the
lower three. Ornamental Greek orders frame the arches in the standard Roman
sequence, for multistoried buildings: from the ground up, Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, and
then Corinthian. The sequence is based on the proportions of the orders, with
Tuscan viewed as capable of supporting the heaviest load. The uppermost story is
circled with Corinthian pilasters (and between them the brackets for the wooden
poles that held up the velarium. Like the pseudoperipteral temple, this is an
eclectic mix of Greek orders and Etruscan plan, this way of decorating a
buildings facade of Greek orders with a foreign architectural form, the arch.
Revived in the Italian Renaissance, the motif had a long illustrious history in
classical architecture. The Roman practice of framing an arch with an
applied Greek order had no structural purpose, but it added variety to the
surface. It also unified a multistoried facade by casting a net of horizontals
and verticals over it.
The Revival of Verism
Vespasian was an unpretentious career army officer who desired to distance
himself from Nero’s extravagant misrule. Vespasian returned to the veristic style,
rejecting the tradition Augustus established of depicting the Roman emperor as a
youthful god on earth.
Portraits of people of all ages survive from the Flavian period in contrast to the
Republic when only elders were deemed worthy of depiction. This portrait bust of
a young woman, possibly a Flavian princess. Its purpose was not to project
Republican virtues but rather idealized beauty - through contemporary fashion,
rather than by reference to images of Greek goddesses. In this sculpture a drill
was used instead of a chisel creating a dense mass of light and shadow set off
boldly from the softly modeled and highly polished skin of the face and
swanlike neck. The drill played an increasing role in Roman sculpture in
succeeding periods and in time was used even more for portraits of men, when
much longer hair and full beards were fashionable.
A New Arch for a New God
When Titus died in 81 AD only two years after becoming emperor, his younger
brother Domitian succeeded him. Domitian erected an arch in Titus’ honor on the
Sacred Way leading into the Republican Forum Romanum. This type of arch is the
so-called triumphal arch, has a long history in Roman art and architecture,
beginning in the second century continuing even into the era of the Christian
Roman emperors. Roman arches celebrated more than military victories. Such
freestanding arches, usually crowned by gilded bronze statues commemorated a
variety of events ranging from victories abroad to the building of roads and
bridges.
The Arch of Titus is typical of the early triumphal arch and consists of one
passageway only. As on the Colosseum, engaged columns frame the arcuated
opening, but their capitals are the Composite type, an ornate combination of Ionic
volutes and Corinthian acanthus leaves that became popular at about the same time
as the Fourth Style in Roman paintings. Reliefs depicting personified Victories
(winged women in Greek art) fill the spandrels (the area between the arch’s
framing curve and the framing columns and entablature. An inscription stating that
the arch was set up to honor the god Titus, son of the god Vespasian, dominates the
attic. Roman emperors were normally proclaimed gods after they died, unless they
ran afoul of the Senate and were damned, they had there statues torn down and
names erased from public inscriptions, as was Nero’s fate.
Inside the passageway of the Arch of Titus are two great relief panels. They
represent the triumphal parade of Titus down the Sacred Way after his return from
the conquest of Judea at the end of the Jewish Wars in 70 AD. One of the reliefs
depicts Roman soldiers carrying the spoils from the Temple in Jerusalem. Despite
considerable damage to the relief, the illusion of movement is convincing. The
energy and swing of the column of soldiers suggest a rapid march. The deep
carving creates strong shadows which enhance the drama and movement. The
heads of the forward figures have broken off because they extended out from the
block, which also emphasized their placement in space compared to the lower
reliefs.
The panel on the other side shows Titus in his triumphal chariot. The historical
aspects of the Jerusalem panel contrasts with the allegorical subject in this panel.
Victory rides with Titus and places a wreath on his head. Below her is a bare chested youth who is probably a personification of Honor (Honos). A female
personification of Valor (Virtus) leads the horses. These allegorical figures
transform the record of Titus’ battlefield success into a celebration of imperial
virtues. This is the first known instance of divine beings interacting with
humans in official Roman historical relief. The Arch of Titus was erected
after the death, and the relief carved after bestowing god hood on Titus. Soon
afterward, this kind of intermingling between mortals and immortals became
a staple of Roman narrative relief sculpture, even on monuments honoring a
living emperor.
High Empire
In the second century AD under Trajan, Hadrian and the Antonines, the Roman
Empire reached its greatest geographic extent and the height of its power.
Domitian had followed Titus. He lived an extravagant lifestyle and had an ego
that resembled Nero’s. He demanded to be addressed as lord and god, so angering
the Senate that he was assassinated in 96 AD. He was replaced by Nerva, an
elderly senator who ruled for 16 months. Before his death, he established a pattern
of succession that would be followed for almost a century. Nerva picked Trajan, a
capable and popular general born in Italica (Spain), as the next emperor. Trajan
was the first non-Italian to rule Rome. Under his rule Rome’s Empire expanded
even further and he instituted far sighted social programs for the people. Trajan
was so popular that he was granted the title Optimus (the Best), an epithet he
shared with Jupiter. In late antiquity Augustus the founder of the Roman Empire
and Trajan became the yardsticks for success.
The phrase felicior Augusto, melior Traiano (luckier than Augustus, better than
Trajan.) became the goal of new emperors.
Trajan founded a new colony for army veterans in 100 AD at Timgad, in what is
today Algeria, which is on the continent of Africa.
Trajan's greatest building project in Rome was a huge new forum that was twice
the size of the one Augustus built 100 years before. In addition to the forum there
was an enormous market complex that was that was built next to it. The new
forum glorified Trajan’s victories in his two wars against the Dacians (modern
Romania) and was paid for with spoils from the campaign.
The architect was Apollodoros of Damascus, Trajan’s chief military engineer
during the Dacian wars. He was world-famous for building a bridge across the
Danube River. The forum included the main features of early forums, except that a
huge basilica, not a temple, dominated the colonnaded open square. The temple,
which was completed after the emperor’s death was dedicated to the newest god in
the Roman pantheon, Trajan himself, was set instead behind the Basilica. It stood
at the rear end of the forum, in its own courtyard, with two libraries, and a giant
commemorative column, the Column of Trajan.
Trajan’s forum was entered through a an impressive gateway resembling a
triumphal arch. Entering the gigantic courtyard, one immediately notices the larger
than life-size gilded-bronze equestrian statue of the emperor facing the basilica.
Statues of captive Dacians stood above the columns of the forum porticos.
The Basilica Ulpia (Trajan’s family name was Ulpius), was very large and ornate
compared to previous ones. The entrance to the forum was on the long side, which
is in contrast with later Christian churches that were patterned after basilicas. The
building was 400 feet long and 200 feet wide. Light entered through clerestory
windows, made possible by elevating the timber roofed nave above the colonnaded
aisles. early Christian architects embraced this feature for the design of the first
churches during the reign of Constantine.
The Column of Trajan was probably the brainchild of Apollodoros. The idea of
covering a colossal freestanding column with a continuous spiral narrative frieze
seems to have been invented here, but was often copied in Christian settings
depicting the life of Christ and even as late as the 19th century commemorating the
victories of Napoleon.
Trajan’s Column is 128 feet high. Coins indicate it was once topped by a heroic
nude statue of the emperor that was lost in the Middle Ages. In the 16th century a
statue of St. Peter replaced it. The square base, decorated with captured Dacian
arms and armor, served as Trajan’s tomb. His ashes and those of his wife, Plotina,
were placed inside in golden urns.
The continuous register on the column is 635 feet. The reliefs depict Trajan’s two
successful campaigns against the Dacians. The story is told in more than 150
episodes in which some 2500 figures appear. The band increases in width as it
winds up to the top of the column, so that it is easier to see the upper portions.
Throughout, the relief is very low so as not to distort the contours of the shaft.
Legibility would have been enhanced by paint, but it still would have been very
difficult to follow the narrative from beginning to end.
The narrative is not a reliable account of the Dacian Wars, as was once thought;
nonetheless it recorded the general character of the campaigns. Battle scenes take
up only one quarter of the frieze. The Romans, as do modern armies, spent more
time transporting men and equipment, constructing forts, and preparing for battle,
than fighting. The focus is on the emperor who appears again and again. The
enemy is not belittled.
The Markets of Trajan
On the Quirinal Hill overlooking the forum, Apollodoros built the Markets of
Trajan to house both shops and administrative offices. As earlier at Palestrina, the
transformation of a natural slope into a multilevel complex was only possible with
concrete. The basic unit was called a taberna, a single room shop covered by a
barrel vault. Each taberna had a wide doorway, usually with a window above it
that lets light to enter a wooden inner attic used for storage.
Arch of Trajan
In 109 AD, Trajan opened a new road, the Via Traiana, in Southern Italy. Several
years later a great arch honoring Trajan was built at the point the road entered
Benevento. It is almost architecturally identical to the Arch of Titus, but relief
panels cover both facades of the arch giving it a billboard like quality, advertising
the emperor’s achievements, at war, in regards to social benefits, at peace, “all
things to all people.” He is even seen mingling with deities and receiving a
thunderbolt from Jupiter, awarding him dominion over the earth.
Hadrian (117 - 138 AD)
Was Trajan’s chosen successor, and fellow Spaniard, was a connoisseur and lover
of all the arts, as well as an author and architect. He greatly admired Greek culture
and traveled widely as emperor, often in the Greek East. Everywhere he went they
put up statues and arches in his honor. More portraits of Hadrian exist today than
any emperor except Augustus. He is always depicted as a mature adult who never
ages. Fifth Century BC Greek statues provided the prototype for the idealized
portrait statues of Augustus. The models for Hadrian were statues of mature Greek
men. Hadrian himself wore a beard, a habit, in Roman context was a Greek thing.
Beards then became the norm for all Roman emperors the next 150 years.
The Pantheon
Soon after Hadrian became emperor, work began on the Pantheon, the temple of all
the gods, and one of the best - preserved buildings of antiquity. It has also one of
the most influential designs in architectural history. The Pantheon reveals the full
potential of concrete, both as a building material and as a means for shaping
architectural space. The temple originally was approached from a columnar
courtyard and like temples in Roman forums, stood at one narrow end of the
enclosure. The eight Corinthian columns on the facade were a bow to tradition,
beyond that everything on the Pantheon is revolutionary. Beyond the columnar
porch is an immense concrete cylinder covered by a huge hemispherical dome 142
feet in diameter. The domes top is also 142 feet from the ground. The design is
based on the intersection of two circles, (one horizontal, the other vertical), so that
the interior space can be imagined as the orb of the earth and the dome as the vault
of the heavens.
The cylindrical drum was built up level by level using concrete of varied
composition. Extremely hard and durable basalt was employed in the mix for the
foundations, and the “recipe” was gradually modified until, at the top,
featherweight pumice replaced stones to lighten the load. The domes thickness
also decreases as it nears the oculus, the circular opening 30 feet in diameter is the
only light source for the interior. The domes weight was lessened, without
weakening its structure, through the use of coffers (sunken decorative panels).
These further reduced the dome’s mass and also provided a handsome pattern of
squares within the vast circle. Renaissance drawings suggest that each coffer once
had a gilded bronze rosette at its center, enhancing the symbolism of the dome as
the starry heavens.
In entering the structure one senses not the weight of the enclosing walls, but the
space they enclose. In Pre-Roman architecture, the form of the enclosed the space
was determined by the placement of the solids, which did not so much shape the
space as interrupt it. Roman architects were the first to conceive of architecture in
terms of units of space that could be shaped by enclosures. The Pantheon’s interior
is a single unified, self sufficient whole, uninterrupted by supporting solids. In this
space, the architect uses light not just to illuminate the darkness but to create drama
and underscore the symbolism of the interior shape. On a sunny day the light that
passes through the oculus forms a circular beam, a disk of light that moves across
the coffered dome in the course of a day as the sun moves across the sky itself.
The Antonines
Early in 138 CE, Hadrian adopted 51 year old Antoninus Pius (138 - 161 CE). At
the time he required him to adopt Marcus Aurelius (161 - 180 CE) and Lucius
Verus (161 - 169 CE), thereby assuring a peaceful succession for at least a
generation.
Classical and Non-Classical
Marcus and Lucius erected a memorial column in honor of Antoninus Pius shortly
after his death. Its pedestal has a dedicatory inscription on one side and a relief
illustrating the Apotheosis (ascent to the heaven) of Antoninus and his wife,
Faustina. On the adjacent sides are to identical representations of the decursio, or
ritual circling of the imperial funerary pyre.
The two figural compositions are very different. The apotheosis relief is in the
classical tradition with elegant well proportioned figures, personifications, and a
single ground line corresponding to the panels’ lower edge. War personified
reclines in the lower left. Rome personified, Roma leans on her shield to the right
bidding farewell to the couple rising to the heavens on winged personification of
an uncertain identity. New to this imperial repertoire is the fusion of time
represented. Faustina died 20 years before her husband. By depicting the two as
ascending together, the artist wished to suggest Antoninus Pius was faithful to his
wife for two decades and was now reunited in the afterlife. This notion had been
applied to funerary reliefs of slaves and the middle class but never had been
used in an elite context.
The decursio reliefs break even more strongly with classical convention. The
figures are much stockier than those in the apotheosis relief, and the panel was not
conceived as a window into the world. The ground is the whole surface of the
relief, and marching soldiers and galloping horses alike are on floating patches of
earth. This too had occurred in the art of the lower classes but never before in
imperial art. After centuries of following classical design rules, elite Roman
artists and patrons became dissatisfied with them. When seeking a new
direction, they adopted some of the non-classical conventions of the art of the
lower classes.
Marcus Aurelius
A larger than life size gilded bronze equestrian statue, the emperor possesses
superhuman grandeur and is much larger than any normal human would be in
relation to a horse. Marcus stretches out his right arm in a gesture that is both a
greeting and an offer of clemency. Some evidence suggests that beneath the horses
raised right foreleg an enemy once cowered, begging the emperor for mercy. The
statue displays the awesome power of the godlike Roman Emperor as a ruler of the
whole world.
In the 16th century Pope Paul III selected the statue as the centerpiece for
Michelangelo’s new design for the Capitoline Hill in Rome. The sculpture
inspired many Renaissance sculptors to portray their patrons on horseback.
Recently removed from its Renaissance site and painstakingly restored, Marcus’s
portrait owes its preservation throughout the Middle Ages to the fact that it was
mistakenly thought to portray Constantine, the first Christian Emperor of Rome.
Most ancient bronze statues were melted down for their metal value, because they
were regarded as impious images from the pagan world.
The supreme confidence of Rome is not however seen in the head of Marcus’s
equestrian statue or by the late portraits of the emperor in marble. Our image is a
detail from a lost arch. Portraits of aged emperors were not new, but Marcus’s
were the first to show a Roman emperor weary, saddened, and even worried. For
the first time, the strain of constant warfare on the frontiers and the burden of
ruling a world wide empire show in the emperor’s face. The ruler’s character, his
thoughts, and his soul were exposed for all to see, as he reveled himself in his
Meditations, a deeply moving philosophical treatise setting forth the emperor’s
personal world view. This was a major turning point in the history of ancient
art, marking the beginning of the end of classical art’s domination in the
Greco - Roman world.
From Cremation to Burial
Beginning under Trajan and Hadrian and especially during the rule of the
Antonines, Romans began to favor burial over cremation. This reversal may
reflect the influence of Christianity and other Eastern religions, whose adherents
believed in an afterlife for the human body. This required larger containers for
their remains. This led to a sudden demand for sarcophagi, which are more similar
to modern coffins than any other ancient type of burial container.
Greek Mythology was one of the most popular subjects for the decoration of
sarcophagi. In many cases in the late second and third centuries AD, the portraits
of the deceased were on the bodies of the Greek heroes and heroines. These
private patrons were following the model of imperial portraiture. An early
example of this (although it lacks any portraits) is the sarcophagus with the myth
of Orestes. All examples of this type used the same basic composition. The
repetition of sarcophagus compositions indicates that sculptors had access to
pattern books. In fact sarcophagi production was a major industry during the high
and late empire.
Sarcophagi made in the Latin west differed from those made in the Greek speaking
East. Western sarcophagi have reliefs only on the front and sides because they
were placed in floor level niches inside Roman tombs. Eastern sarcophagi have
reliefs on all four sides and stood at the center of a burial chamber. This contrast
parallels the essentials the essential difference between the Etrusco - Roman and
Greek temple. The Etrusco - Roman was set against the wall of a forum or
sanctuary and approached from the front, whereas the Greek temple was
approached from all sides.
Roman Mummy Portraits
Egypt continued to bury their dead in mummy cases even after it became a
province of Rome. In Roman times, however, painted portraits on wood replaced
the traditional portrait masks of the deceased. These portraits were probably
painted while the subject was alive. Art historians use these mummy portraits to
trace the evolution of portrait painting after Mount Vesuvius erupted.
Late Empire
The 200 years since Augustus established the Pax Romana, Roman power was
beginning to erode. Rome was constantly challenged on the frontiers and from
within. Marcus’s son Commodus, who succeeded him, was assassinated bringing
the Antonine dynasty to an end. The economy was in decline, the efficient
imperial bureaucracy was disintegrating. The state religion was losing ground to
eastern cults, and Christianity, which was gaining large numbers of converts. The
Late Empire was a pivotal era in world history during which the pagan
ancient world was gradually transformed into the Christian Middle Ages.
Civil conflict followed Commodus’ death. When it ended, an African born general
Septimus Severus (193 - 211 CE) was master of the Roman world. Anxious to
establish legitimacy, Severus adopted himself into the Antonine family
proclaiming Marcus Aurelius his father. Official portraits depict him with the
same hair and beard of Aurelius. In our portrait example, of Septimus Severus and
family, we see him depicted with his wife and two children, Caracalla and Geta.
This is the only surviving portrait of any Roman Emperor. This portrait is of
special interest because the face of the emperor’s younger son Geta has been
erased. When Caracalla succeeded his father as emperor, he had his brother
murdered and his memory damned. He also ordered the death of his own wife.
Caracalla
This portrait of Caracalla is of a great technical quality. Even more remarkable is
the powerful psychological portrait that is rendered. Caracalla’s suspicious nature
is glaring through the knotted brow, piecing eyes, and turned head, suspecting
danger from behind. This piece displays further development from the ground
breaking introspective portraits of Marcus Aurelius.
The Non-Classical Style Takes Root
An Arch to Septimus Severus was built in his home town in Libya. The arch was
erected in 203 CE at the intersection of two main roads. It lay in ruins for
centuries and has recently rebuilt. It has friezes on all four sides. The one in our
example shows the chariot procession of Septimus and his two sons. Unlike the
panel from the Arch of Titus, this relief has no sense of motion, a stately stillness.
The chariot and the horsemen behind it are moving forward, but the emperor and
his sons are detached from the procession and facing the viewer. Also different is
the way the figures in the second row have no connection with the ground and are
elevated above the heads of those in the first row so that they can be seen more
clearly.
Both the frontality and the floating figures were new to official Roman art in
Antonine and Severan times, but both appeared long before in the private art
of freed slaves. Once sculptors in the emperors employ embraced these nonclassical elements, they had a long afterlife, appearing in medieval art in
frontal images of Christ and the saints. As is often true in the history of art,
the emergence of a new aesthetic was a by product of a period of social,
political, and economic upheaval. Art historians call this new nonnaturalistic, more abstract style the Late Antique Style.
The Soldier Emperors (235 - 284 CE)
The next half century after the Severan Dynasty was one of almost continuous civil
war. One General after another was declared emperor by his troops only to be
murdered by another in a few years of months. Few building projects were
undertaken, except a new defensive wall for Rome, showing the decay of Roman
power.
Sculptors of imperial portraits were kept busy with the revolving door of emperors.
The sculpted portraits of the third century were some of the most moving ever
produced. The likenesses of the portraits were notable for their technical virtuosity
and their powerful; emotional content.
The larger than life size bronze portrait of Trebonianus Gallus appears in heroic
nudity as many before him had. Instead of the perfect graceful body of the Greeks,
we instead see a wrestler’s body with massive legs and swollen trunk. The heavy
body dwarfs the head, with its nervous expression. Harmonious proportion gives
way to brute force, an image well suited to the times.
Diocletian and the Tetrarchy (284 - 306 CE)
In an attempt to restore order to the Roman Empire Diocletian, whose troops
proclaimed him emperor, decided to share power with his potential rivals. In 293
CE he established the Tetrarchy (rule by four) and adopted the title of Augustus
of the East. The other three tetrarchs were a corresponding Augustus of the West,
and Eastern and western Caesars (whose allegiance to the two Augusti was
cemented by the marriage to their daughters.) Together the four emperors ruled
with out strife until Diocletian retired in 305. Infighting resulted and the empire
collapsed. The division of the empire continued as eastern and western spheres,
surviving into the Middle Ages as the Latin West and the Byzantine East.
Artists did not try to capture the individual appearances and personalities of the
Tetrarchs; rather they tried to portray the nature of the Tetrarchy itself -- that is, to
portray four equal partners in power. Our Piece is from Constantinople and is
made of Porphyry (purple marble). The individuals are impossible to identify.
The all wear the same attire, and our grasping a sheathed sword in the left hand.
With the right hand they embrace each other as an overt display of unity. The
figures have large cubical heads on squat bodies. The drapery is schematic and the
bodies shapeless. The faces are emotionless masks with only a beard on two of the
figures, perhaps distinguishing the older Augusti. In this group portrait, carved
800 years after the Greek sculptors first freed the human form from the
frontal rigidity of the kouros stance; the human figure was once again
conceived in iconic terns. Idealism, naturalism, individuality, and personality
now belonged to the past.
Constantine (306 - 337 CE)
When the short lived peace among the Tetrarchy ended, 20 years of civil war
among Rome's rival armies followed. The eventual victor was Constantine I (the
Great) son of Diocletian's Caesar of the West. After the death of his father
Constantine invaded Italy in 312. At the battle of the Milvian Bridge, the gateway
to Rome, he defeated and killed Maxentius and took control of the capital.
Constantine attributed his victory to the aid of the Christian god. In 313 he and
Licinius, Constantine’s co-emperor in the East issued the Edict of Milan, ending
the persecution of Christians.
In time Constantine and Licinius became foes, and in 324 Constantine defeated and
executed Licinius near Byzantium (modern Istanbul, Turkey). Shortly after this he
founded the “New Rome” on the site of Byzantium and renamed it Constantinople
“The City of Constantine.” A year later in 325 at the Council of Nicaea,
Christianity became the de facto official religion of the Roman Empire. From this
point on, paganism declined rapidly. Constantinople was dedicated on May 11,
330, “by the commandment of God.” In succeeding decades many Christian
churches were erected there. Constantine was himself baptized on his death bed in
337. The transfer of the seat of power from Rome to Constantinople and the
recognition of Christianity, for many scholars, represent the beginning of the
Middle ages.
The Arch of Constantine
After his decisive victory at the Milvian Bridge, Constantine erected a great triple
passageway arch in the shadow of the Colosseum to commemorate the defeat of
Maxentius. It was the largest arch erected in Rome in almost 100 years. Much of
the sculptural decoration, however, was taken from earlier monuments of Trajan,
Hadrian, and Marcus Aurelius. The columns also date to an earlier period.
Sculptors refashioned the second century reliefs to honor Constantine by recutting
the heads of earlier emperors with the features of the new ruler. They also added
labels to the old reliefs, references to the downfall of Maxentius and the end of the
civil war.
The reuse of statues and reliefs on the arch of Constantine has often been cited as
evidence of a decline in creativity and technical skill in the waning years of the
pagan Roman Empire. Though largely deserved, this comment ignores the fact
that the reused sculptures were carefully selected to associate Constantine with the
“good emperors” of the second century. The message is underscored in one of the
new Constantinian reliefs above the arch’s lateral passageways. It shows
Constantine on the speaker’s platform in the Roman forum, flanked by statues of
Hadrian and Marcus Aurelius.
In another relief the emperor is shown with his attendants, distributing largess to
grateful citizens. Constantine is frontal, elevated above the recipients of his gifts.
The figures are squat in proportion. They do not move according to any classical
principle of naturalistic movement, but rather with the mechanical and repeated
stances of puppets. The details are not fully modeled and the reliefs are shallow.
The sculptor depicted a crowd and not individuals. (The head of Constantine is
lost). The frieze is a picture frozen in time in which the imperial donor can be
clearly distinguished from the attendants.
This approach to pictorial narrative was once characterized as a “decline in
form,” and when judged by classical art standards it was. But the rigid
formality, determined by the rank of those portrayed was consistent with a
new set of values. It soon became the preferred mode, supplanting the
classical notion that a picture is a window into a world of anecdotal action.
Comparing this relief with a Byzantine icon reveals that the new
compositional principles of the Late Antique Style are those of the middle
ages. They were different from and not necessarily better of worse than those
of classical antiquity. The Arch of Constantine both respected the past in its
reuse of sculptures, while at the same time rejected the norms of classical
design in its frieze, paving the way for the iconic art of the Middle Ages.
The most impressive by far of Constantine’s preserved portraits is an eight and one
half foot tall head, one of several marble fragments of a colossal enthroned statue
of the emperor that was composed of a brick core, a wooden torso covered with
bronze, and a head and limbs of marble. The sculptor modeled the nude seated
portrait of the emperor on Roman images of Jupiter. The emperor held an orb,
possibly surmounted with the cross of Christ, the symbol of global power, in his
left hand. The nervous glance of the third century portraits is absent, replaced by a
frontal mask with enormous eyes directed at no one or thing of this world, and set
into the broad and simple planes of the head. The emperor’s personality is lost in
this immense image of eternal authority. This all combines to produce a formula
of overwhelming power appropriate for the position of absolute ruler.
The gigantic portrait was set in the western apse of the Basilica Nova (New
Basilica), in Rome. The Emperor’s image dominates the interior of the basilica
like the Greco-Roman deities loomed over the awe struck mortals who entered the
cellas of pagan temples.
The building is huge. The original structure was 300 feet long and 215 feet wide.
Brick faced concrete walls 20 feet thick supported coffered barreled vaults in the
aisles. These vaults also buttressed the groin vaults of the nave, which was 115
feet high. The walls and floors were richly marbled and stuccoed and could be
admired by visitors because the groin vaults permitted ample light to enter the nave
directly. This lighting system is akin to the clerestory of a traditional stone timber
basilica
Conclusion
The remains of Roman civilization are everywhere in Europe, The Middle East,
and Africa. Concrete forms the cores of modern houses and other buildings.
Sporting events still take place in amphitheaters. Roman aqueducts still supply
water to some modern towns. The modern highway system in Western Europe
follows closely the routes of Roman roads. Law, government, languages, and
calendars still display the influence of Rome.
Roman Art speaks in a language everyone can understand. Its diversity and
eclecticism foreshadowed the modern world. The Roman use of art to manipulate
public opinion has its descendent in modern politics. The mastery of concrete
construction is still felt today. The Roman Empire is the bridge in politics art and
religion between the ancient and medieval and modern Western worlds.