Situla with six deities. Constantinople, 613-629/630. Silver

The situla is worked in repousse with ornamental detailing applied as surface engraving and stippling. The upper border is broken in two places and major damage partially obscures four of the six standing figures.

Between the figures, at equal intervals, are swags of stylized foliage and fruits represented as hanging from the upper border; small wreaths, in turn, hang from the swags. A laurel wreath bound with ribbon circles the top and bottom of the situla in opposite directions.

Sufficient remains allow for the identification of the figures as primary deities of the Greco- Roman pantheon. They are grouped in three male-female pairs. Best preserved are the representations of Ares and Aphrodite. Ares is a muscular figure, beardless and nude except for laced boots and cloak; he leans to his right on his spear and holds a lavishly decorated shield in his left hand. Aphrodite turns toward him, proffering an apple. Her costume is distinct, with a long- sleeved, hip-length tunic over a long undergarment; she wears a heavy mantle closed with a brooch and a Phrygian cap (see Dodd, 1961, no. 16). To the right of Aphrodite stands the heavily muscled Heracles, who forms a pair with a damaged figure of Athena; he wears only his lion-skin cloak and leans wearily on his gnarled club.

To the left of the figure are three spheres, perhaps to be understood as the apples of the Hesperides. Athena rests her right arm on a pillar; her left hand is on her hip and her right leg is crossed casually before her. A battle-axe can be seen near her right foot. The damage that obscures her figure continues across a cypress tree and across the hunting dog associated with the female of the third pair, Artemis and Apollo. Only the upper torso of Artemis remains, but her hunting costume and spear are preserved. Apollo rests against a pillar with his left foot on a low pedestal and extends a laurel branch over a tripod to his right. A swan is depicted at the base of the pillar.

The detailed treatment of the attributes and the postural types of the figures indicate a measure of fidelity to classical models, possibly to specific statuary types. The suggestion that the Heracles Farnese, for example, might have been the ultimate model for the Heracles illustrates the point. The heavy use of outline, however, combined with the decreased plasticity of both the bodies and the draperies, indicates a late date. Five imperial control stamps on the base of the pail confirm that it was made in the early years of the reign of the emperor Heraclius.

Found on the borders of the empire, possibly on a trade route, in Kuczurmare, Bucovina, Soviet Union. Bibliography: Matzulevich, 1929, pp. 7, 27, 38-50, no. 14, pis. 7-11; Dodd, 1961, no. 56; Volbach, 1964, no. 488.

Fragment of a tapestry hanging with maenad and satyr. Egypt, 2nd-4th century. Wool and linen on linen

The satyr, identified by an accompanying inscription, wears the usual costume of a Dionysiac devotee, the nebris. The maenad is nude except for a himation seemingly suspended behind her, earrings, a gold chain with pendant, and gold bracelets on arms and ankles. The heads of both are nimbed and adorned with wreaths. On the ground beneath their feet are scattered leafy branches and flowers; a little panther, much damaged, cavorts among them. The pair stands beneath a coffered vault, the supporting arch of which rests on half-fluted columns; one of these carries a "Corinthian" capital and the other, a section of an "architrave." A fragment of a second arch springs from the capital on the left.

The textile is only part of a much larger composition, of which at least two other important sections have survived. One, in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston [Annual Report, 1973, p. 74), preserves a figure of Dionysos carrying a cornucopia and accompanied by his usual panther, and the Abegg-Stiftung, Riggisberg, has another maenad, elaborately dressed in chiton with peplos and a billowing himation; she seems to be dancing as she plays a kithara (Riggisberg, 1976, cover). The three sections are obviously only parts of what must have been a very large hanging of which Dionysos and members of his thiasos were represented under the arches of a long arcade. Since the design was woven at right angles to the warp, the length of the whole composition could have been virtually unlimited. The warps are linen, and the design of polychrome wools is inwoven in a plain linen cloth.

Among the surviving monumental tapestries from Egypt, there are none with which this panel can be convincingly compared. The model may well stem from a Hellenistic textile. The details of the arch, the coffered ceiling, and the half-fluted columns are typical of Alexandrine architecture of the Ptolemaic period. However, the arrangement of the figures in an architectural setting betrays Roman influence and the figure style can best be compared to works of the late empire in fresco and mosaic. The nude Venus in a Roman landscape of the mid-second century (Wirth, 1934, pi. хш) and the water nymph in a fourth-century painted tomb at Ashkelon (Ory, 1938, pi. xxvn) provide equally important parallels for the maenad on the Cleveland fragment.

A precise dating of the tapestry is impossible; textiles of Egyptian provenance are not dated to earlier than the third century—the period when mummification was abandoned for direct inhumation. However, a textile of this importance may have attained considerable antiquity before it had become sufficiently damaged, or outmoded, to have been relegated to serve as a grave cloth— certainly its final office. The monumentality of the textile itself and the quality and character of the design suggest that its original purpose must have been cultic, confirming a date before the end of the empire, when the Dionysiac cult and the official performance of its mysteries still flourished. Bibliography: Shepherd, 1976, pp. 307-313, cover, figs. 1, 3, 9.