Art and Social Identities in Late Antiquity

Introduction
Late Antiquity (c. 3rd to 6th century AD) has traditionally been seen as a period of decline. In certain respects, there is some truth to this assertion. The period is politically and socially characterized by the disintegration of the Roman Empire. New ‘barbarian’ kingdoms develop in the West as a consequence of the great waves of migration. The Eastern Roman Empire over time transforms into the Byzantine Empire. In spite of this complexity, Late Antiquity is a formative period in Western history.

The period is characterized by social polarization. The late antique author ‘Anonymus de rebus bellicis’ wrote, “this great amount of gold was spent by the wealthy on their private houses; these became to the detriment of the poor even more magnificent, while the lower classes were openly suppressed by force (2,4).” This damning critique of society was written in late Constantinian times, and the author is for obvious reasons anonymous. He was one of the few in contemporary society who put the social changes of the period into words. The upper class, honestiores, were few in number but immensely rich and ruled a very large and suppressed lower class, humiliores.

One of three statue base inscriptions commemorating restoration work in the Colosseum, Rome, by Decius Marius Venantius Basilius in the late 5th century AD. Photo: Troels Myrup Kristensen.

The period is also characterized by the rise of Christianity and the decline of the traditional cults. The transition is, however, not as abrupt as has often been assumed. Even in modern research, it is quite common to meet the claims that the Empire was Christianized alongside the conversion of Constantine the Great and that traditional art forms, such as sculpture in the Classical tradition, disappeared simultaneously.

In scholarship, Late Antiquity is situated in a vacuum between two periods: Antiquity and the Medieval period. It was first defined as an independent period by A. Riegl in Spätrömische Kunstindustrie (Vienna 1901). In theology, Late Antiquity is an important area of research as the formative period of Christianity. A considerable interest in the period is also found in history, less in Classical philology and to a limited degree within archaeology, where the art historical tradition overlaps in respect to the later part of the period. This vacuum has created a number of discrepancies between the treatments of the period in different research traditions. An investigation of Constantinian art based on the hypothesis “is it Christian?” would, for example, result in very different answers, depending on the tradition one approaches the question.

Project aims
The main aims of the project are to describe and analyze the cultural and social phenomena that are characteristic of the period, based on the material remains, primarily art. How can we through art interpret the changes that society went through as a consequence of the rising influence of Christianity? And how did different social groups react to societal change? The various subprojects will all investigate the relationship between conflict and peaceful co-existence across different religions in different contexts such as city/countryside, East/West and public/private. Social identity is an essential key to answering these questions, and the subprojects will focus on themes such as gender, status and self representation.

Late antique statuette of a muse from Cremna in Turkey, now in the Getty Villa, Malibu. Photo: Troels Myrup Kristensen.

The main focus will be on honestiores, the social group whose shameful behaviour our anonymous source condemns in the quote above. Their houses were magnificent, whether they were situated in the cities (domus), in the periphery (horti or suburban villas) or in the countryside (villa). In the rich and stabilized 4th century, new villas were constructed and old ones repaired with mosaics and marble statuary in all parts of the Empire. Historically, we are well-informed about this social group through literary sources and epigraphy. One of the project’s aim is to investigate how the percolation of elite culture influenced the lower classes, humiliores, an influence that is especially apparent in the choice of motifs employed in the various media studied by the project.

Late Antiquity is a period, where new power structures and religious trends changed the conditions for social interaction. The societal changes are reflected in the groups of material that the project focus on: sculpture in the round (Niels Hannestad), primarily found in wealthy houses, where figural mosaics also are an integral part of the decoration (Birte Poulsen), sarcophagi, a popular form of burial among the elite that is adopted by the lower classes (Stine Birk Toft), and the occasional destruction of statuary as a result of religious and social changes (Troels Myrup Kristensen). Other media will also be used in comparative studies: architecture and minor arts such as silverware, ivory carvings and cameos. To place the archaeological material in its social context, we will draw on literary sources, historical, apologetic and patristic.

Mutilated statue of Aphrodite from the baths of Faustina, Miletus, now in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum. Photo: Troels Myrup Kristensen.

Art and Social Identity
The elite have usually been interpreted by scholars as homogenous, frequently owning estates in different parts of the Empire. Especially P. Brown has focused on this homogeneity in several works (e.g. The World of Late Antiquity, London 1971). In reality, he takes as his starting point the literary sources that are especially concerned with the aristocracy of Asia Minor. He therefore lacks the Western perspective. Brown states, for example, that villa owners had the same authors in their libraries. Homer and Virgil were there, but it is more doubtful whether authors such as Ausonius, who in the 360s praised the Mosel area was much read in Asia Minor. These regional differences are hinted at in the material culture studied in the project, and one of the aims is to shed light on this diversity and its causes. The elite were in spite of regional differences very self-conscious and regarded itself as the guardian of the Classical heritage.

Sculpture played a special role. It was delivered from the same workshops, among which the Aphrodisias school seems to have dominated. Logistical problems, resulting from the crisis of the 3rd century, had the effect that transportation of large stone blocks was limited. Sculpture became smaller in size and designed with long-distance transportation in mind. Even so, late antique sculpture is characterized by many restorations. Around 500, most sculptures are removed from houses. It happens earlier in the West than the East but there are large regional differences. These sculptures were often buried in pits outside the houses, but they could also be transferred to baths that could take the shape of veritable sculptural galleries.

Mosaic depicting Soteria (Salvation) from a private house, dating to the 5th century. Antakya Archaeological Museum. Photo: Troels Myrup Kristensen.

In the first phase of the disappearance of sculpture, it can be difficult to decide whether we are dealing with a change in taste or religious prejudices. However, deliberate destruction and mutilation of statuary become more common, which marks a contrast to the many statues that still stood in the public spaces of cities, especially Constantinople, where there are well-known collectors up until the Medieval period. Portraits, both imperial and private, continued to be erected, but the raw material now becomes old portraits. Alongside sarcophagi, these constitute the linking elements with the glory days of the Roman Empire in the 1st and 2nd centuries.

Detailed studies of the mosaics in different regions show that some mosaic workshops were mobile and moved according to commissions of work. Among the most important examples are the mosaics from the Great Palace of Constantinople that most scholars now date to c. 530 and agree that they were manufactured by mosaicists from Syria. Considering the disappearance of the sculptural production, it is furthermore remarkable that the mosaic workshops are very active in the 6th century.

Early Christian sarcophagus of Marcus Claudianus with scenes from the Old and New Testament. Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Rome. Photo: Stine Birk Toft.

In terms of mentality history, it will be interesting to analyze what motifs that have captivated the different social groups of Late Antiquity. Several motifs can be seen alongside Christianity, for example Dionysian motifs in all media. It is in this context that the late antique author Nonnos must be seen. He wrote a paraphrase on the Gospel of John in the 5th century, but also a Dionysiaca, as long as the Iliad and the Odyssey combined, about the wine god’s victorious expedition to India. In contrast, the healing god and miracle-worker Asclepius appears only in certain areas. He was the iconographical prototype for the first depictions of Christ and was in some regions worshipped in a parallel cult alongside Christianity. Almost every collection of sculpture in the East contains one or more statuettes of Asclepius. In the West, however, he is rarely seen and completely absent in the Northern provinces such as Germania and Britannia. Another example limited to the East is city goddesses that are common in mosaics and in tondi. In contrast to what could seem obvious, it cannot be detected on the basis of villa decoration whether the owner was Christian or not.

The perception of the cultural koiné and its extent and diversity can best be judged by a collaborative study ranging across the previously mentioned groups of material. Helped by these synergies, it will be possible to form a revised picture of the identity and self-perception of different social groups in Late Antiquity.