{Franz Cumont TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY E, D. FRANCIS 13 The Dura Mithraeum Contents Editor’s preface. The Dura Mithracum, 1. Mithra in Syria. 2. Mithraism at Dura, 3. The interior arrangement of the Mithraeum, 4. The bas-relief. 5. The paintings. 6, The graffiti and dipinti, 7. Conclusion. Appendix 13.1. Plutarch's Mithraic pirates, by E. D. Francis. Appendix 13.2. Mammalia in the hunting fresco, by G. Evelyn Hutchinson, Editor's preface In 1896, at the age of twenty-cight, Franz Cumont inaugurated the modern history of Mithraic scholarship by publishing his Textes et monuments figurés relatifs aux mys- teres de Mithra u. Three years later he provided a critical introduction to the evidence assembled in volume u. The second part of this introduction was then printed sep- arately as Les Mystéres de Mithra, a compelling portrait of the biography and nature of Mithra which seemed to illuminate the dark recesses enshrouding the Iranian origin and Roman cult of the god. In his quest for coherent synthesis, however, t sometimes pressed his conclusions beyond the available evidence,? and what many epigoni have on occasion taken to represent an unassailable judgement ‘may rest on little more than an imaginative interpretation of unusually problematic re Brisels, 18965 vol. 1, Brussels, 1899. The titles of other books by Cumont to which will be made are as follows: F. ‘Cumont, Les Mystires de Mithra, Bom 3900 (= TAA 1, pp, 223 5; third edition, in German, by K. Latte, Leipzig, 19233 references it PiePrsent article are to T. J. McCormack’'s English translation (London, 1903] ofthe secs Frat edition, abbr. Mysiris); id., Fouilles de Doura-Europos (1922-)> Paris, 1986 (ty. iid Les Religions orientaes dan lepaganisme romain, sParis, 1929 (abbr Retigonsornrr id. sur le symbolisme fundraire des Romains, Paris, 1942 (abbr. are) on meth.) Lae Perpetua, Paris, 1949 (abbr. Lux perpetua); also, J. Bidex and F Cun, 1938 5 Coroastre, Ostanés et Hystaspe d'aprés la tradition grecque, 1A MO Air py maa tObt. Mages hellénists); M. I. Rostovtce ef al., The excevatins at pase ee (abbr. the Seventh and Eighth Seasons of Work 1933-4 and a gh ‘Leiden, 1968 (abbe, Aponte wn-van); L.A, Campbell, Mithraie eonagraphy and TdCtO% iow (abbr. ‘Gray 5 Es D. Francis, ‘Mithraic grafiti from Dura-Europos’ PP. SCE, fo 5 Jalumbergery Sra example, the erticiams of S. Wikander, EMM (reviewed oy mel to this "ohame (ooo PP. 325-30), and the contributions of R. Gordon ant J’ ” 215 ff, pp. ago ff, respectively) ; cf. also appendix 13+ta. Indeed, the increasing realisation on the part of Mi.: oarle in their field is clearly understood or invites conan part, for the considerable renewal of interest in this ancient cult, > least in Nevertheless, despite this wave of contemporary scepticism, it is both ; and improper to detract from Cumont’s continuing pre-eminence oe AMPossible scholarship which he did so much to establish and to which his contrib, 3 domain without equal. Cumont sought fresh data not only in the library but in hn Temait while he was personally associated with many important archaeological io and, his connection with the excavations at Dura-Europos remains Perhaj discoveries, distinguished.* Not only did he conduct the early excavations at Dine gt, ™ which he promptly published in exemplary detail,¢ but, through his Rien? with Michael Rostovtzeff, he remained in close contact with the subsone ne? French expeditions of 1928-37.5 When the Dura Mithraeum was discovered at the beginning of 1934 it was therefore in every respect a matter of course that Franz Cumont should immediately be informed and invited to the site. Once again Cumont journeyed east to Salihiyeh. Traces of Mithraic worship at Dura-Europos first came to light on Monday 5th February 1934, when a group of workers began to excavate the area of "J7 to the south of tower 2.6 The left-hand portion of Antonius Valentinus’ dedication of the Middle Mithraeum was unearthed and at once pronounced Mithraic.? Two days later the excavators discovered some of the paintings from the Middle Mithraeum and the best preserved of all the dipinti.? On gth February Clark Hopkins left for Beirut and M. I. Rostovtzeff, along with Cte R. du Mesnil du Buisson, took charge of further excavations. By the time Hopkins returned, nearly two weeks later, the whole site had been systematically uncovered. The cult niche, the frescoes and the graffiti were all open to view. On 25th February, after digging below the level of what turned jou to be the raised sanctuary of the Late Mithraeum, the seven-step staircase ie : from the central aisle to the cult niche was revealed. The excavations continue ie March, and on the 8th Franz Cumont arrived at the site. He stayed to wor . iptions (19th 3 Edmond Faral, in eulogising Franz Cumont at L’Académie des Toserinos ie September, 19473 CRAI, 1947, pp. 529-35, especially 533), has ale same verdict (cf. the extended obituary in Lux perpetua, vii-xxx, especially 101) nis 4 Fouilles de Doura-Europos, Paris, 1926. . +5 careet;‘ ‘These ceavacces lketiise repented a major Iandmark in Rostov sero third great life work’, in the words of one biographer (A. D. Momiian®, 7 sdoo, 1 Cambridge Journal vi, 1954, pp. 334-48, reprinted in Studies in Historie 00 pompai® PP. 91-104, 102). Momigliano (0p. cit. p. 92) also draws interesting MT ace his YOU lifelong fascination for Rostovtzelf: ‘Pompeii had been his favooet’ 7 ivy, Dura ca Later he fell in love with Ostia and Leptis Magna. The recovery Of ant geiai ras Euphrates, was one of the great achievements of his life.’ This Do somewhat inaPPE valuable insight into the inspiration for Rostovtzeff’s well know? fy (¢ Francis sobriquet to the effect that Dura was ‘the Pompeii of the Syrian P- 425, n. 4, below). © This sdenmanr’ cain is extracted from the day books ep see director of the excavations (1933-5). (For the city plan of Durr” Tem Ym ad fin). ‘The previous days had been spent in the exca -ytios in blocks m8-N7. is section 7 CE. Reports viv p. 85, No, 847, plate 49, 1. Note that this tion some “4 contained no specific mention of Mithras. Even so, subsequer giaée 00 oi first optimistic appraisal to be correct. Two importantgrafiity No. 864) 2° (ibid., pp. 126 £., No. 865) and patri uita Kamerio (ibid., p- 12% this first day, Sy. Ge Hon eee |The Dura Mitirarum 153 tzeff until, on Sunday 18th March, along wi Roweanil, they left for the season. Before their denceise Cemovte and Cte ‘ aa eir departure C; through study ofthe Mithraic iconography and lad assisted Renee se ce scription and reconstruction of the numerous graffiti.10 ‘. 4 wine Académie des Inscriptions on a7th April 1954.11 and easter ei findings to Rostovtzell’s own Preliminary Report,18 published five years latent eee ‘The Final Report of the Dura Mithraeum meanwhile languished, and on 18 iting from Paris to Rostovtzeff’ ‘ 16 May 1947, Writing fror zef’s successor, C. Bradford Welles, Cumont began his letter in a tone of regret: ‘il semble qu'un deva malfaisant s’attache & contrarier la publication du Mithréum de Doura’. Failing health, he writes, now ents him from assuming direct charge of this publication and he hands evar tn responsibility to C. B, Welles and his colleagues. A few lines later Cumont mentions ‘the one service’ he is still able to perform on behalf of the Dura Mithraeum and refers to a manuscript on the shrine which he had prepared for Rostovtzef but which Rostovizef had utilised only in part.18 He has revised and expanded this essay— partly typed, partly written by hand—and brought it up to date.14 Within a few days he will send it to Yale, evidently as his contribution to the long-delayed Final Report. This manuscript therefore represents Franz Cumont’s last substantial contri- bution to scholarship, probably completed in May of 1947, three months before his death during the night of r9th-oth August at the age of seventy-nine. The package remained in the files of the Dura-Europos collection at Yale University for nearly a quarter of a century until Harald Ingholt kindly brought it to my attention in May 1971. It is published in these proceedings as a tribute to the man to whom Mithraic scholarship owes so much. ‘The Dura Mithracum’ well exemplifies Franz Cumont’s approach to Mithraism: comprehensive, comparative and synoptic. Although his essay is necessarily a work as much of synthesis as of original research, Cumont provides a valuable commen- tary on the iconography of the decoration and the liturgical implications of the graffiti. Besides his strictly descriptive aim, Cumont emphasises the importance of the Dura Mithraeum as proof of the catholicisation of Mithraic liturgy during the early third century a.c. Towards the end of his career, particularly under the influence of discoveries at Ostia and on the Aventine, he formed the opinion that the impulse for During these six weeks of excavation, many scholars visited the site and, among vhost ‘eationed in the notes to Cumont'’s essay, the day book records the presence of F. Dussait ®. Perdrzet, D. Schlumberger, H. Seyrig and H. Ingholt, who had arrived at Durs : prior to the initial recovery of the Mithracum. . © On the back of one of the file cards which he used to record the graf ome with Mithracum, Rostovizeff has inscribed the following dedication to his friends ara Skill of @ practised epigrapher: paanciseo CvMONT! Amico RT MACIATRS a wy 9B PP. 90f reports a vm, pp. 62-134. tn etl ‘bution to vPreramne that Gumont is referring to the draft of his earlier contr! ° it since he makes was clearly working on the final version until the end of Apel sin eign, his last communication to the Académie des Inscriptions, “0. section on Ne de Baris, (CRAZ, 1947, pp. 303 f), presented on 25th APrib 1947 in yoga) af “actuate (A. 169), he refers to his Lux perpetua (published Poot Os ertissement Ted MEDE sous presse’ (ef. B. Faral, CRAd, 1947, PP» 532 £) and Sur's Laue perpetua vy),154 Franz Cumont is growing sense of orthodoxy derived directly from Rome.15 Aj a“ growing tf drew a sharp distinction between the local Palmyrene Cuaron of the Early Mithracum and the Roman legionary presence in the Severan at” The evidence for this development, at least to the extent to which it is shrine.te ‘va_—vitl, is, however, far from decisive.17 In a Durene context thaw! in lying ethnic distinction between a garrison of Palmyrene auxiliaries and Re soldiers is at best blurred, since most of the legionaries in question seem to ha ‘oman’ recruited in Syria. ve been In this paper, however, Cumont extends the scope of the debate in an interesti way by attempting to distinguish two separate iconographic stages covondiale win the proposed. sociological division. The first stage he describes as characteristic Syro-Mesopotamian ‘and lacking specific ‘European’ features, while the seoond, beginning with the Middle Mithraeum and the legionary presence at Dura, attests that influence. This argument, however, requires some caution, not least because Dura itself represents the major evidence for Syrian Mithraism. On the other hand, Cumont’s suggestion permits us to see his prosopographical distinction between the Early and the later Mithraea in a new perspective. Although the membership of the Mithraeum, throughout the ninety years of its existence, doubtless remained funda- mentally local and military, the Severan reorganisation of frontier defence from. Hadrian’s Wall to the Euphrates occasioned increasingly extensive military reas- signments among the Syrian conscripts in the Roman army. In other words, itis seceivable that a latger proportion of Syrian soldiers at Dura in the third century had seen service elsewhere on the frontier than in the second century. ‘The painted shield, recovered by Cumont in his campaign of 1922® and dated to the early part of the third century,}? may reflect such a career, for its owner has carefully ma his journey home from the Danubian limes to Syria. If a sense of uniformity is pe” ceptible in the decoration of the Middle, and especially the Late, Mithraeum ised European types,2° then it may have resulted from precisely such a pattern ol Te transfer. Even so, the evidence is relatively restricted and ‘excludes some of the m? prominent decoration.2t The alteration of the iconography of the early Lani might therefore provide more reliable support than the paintings fo wad” regarding conscious orthodoxy, but not even that evidence is stra 15 Cf. CRAI, 1945, pp. 420, and 169, n. 100, below. se, Graft’ 18 GE, for exansple, Reports vit-vis, p. 863 TCS V, 1935, P. 279, and Franc : eat 7 posrapbictl A Ibid., pp. 4g1 £. In summary, the graffiti containing the crucial Proery snitiat a gence all date from the Middle Mithraeum and explicitly assig> Soovtzelt Od ke garrisoned at Dura, There are more Semitic names than RONG" oy Gi imply; many ofthe Graeco-Roman names are transribed variously 19, Mee fot Bes Roman script, Roman orthography obviously cannot be adduced 5 CT silat Tee go Latin-speaking soldiers, Its use may represent 20 more than P: < Roman military system in either an auniliary oF legionary content. Ibid, tree plates 109-10. pont °° Ibid. pp. 931-4. py CBee Rook pp. a f., 185 f,, and 168, n. 99, below: the arguments advanced efit ont Sowa Reports vi-viny,p, x01) and L.. A. Campbell MU, p- 182 ens wae ae they eee on Zenobins! bas-relief and the snake oF E wit om a Bee incanonical’ may be seen in this light. it 8 ably Ay SamBle, the Magi and the hunting frescoes. On the O et of Mi more conga that the bascelifs and painted scenes from the ‘epee om Chip. 108 ie Mithiais liturgical practice than their artisticallyThe Dura Mithraeum 155 ite of Mareus’ Semitic name, we have no proof that he came directly from Jo rn population.*® It he were, on the other hand, a Syrian soldier in the service ot Rome, he might equally well have once belonged to a Mithraic community on the Rhine or Danube, or at least have been instructed by one who had. In any case, with the posible but indefinite exception of the hunting fresco, there is no indication that ‘Roman legionaries’ rather than cult members drawn from the colors XX Palenys renorum inspired these changes, It thus seems impossible to be certain whether Dura wides evidence for the liturgical unification of Mithraism throughout the Roman empire or merely for the chance personal experience of a single artist. Indeed, apart from the fact that iconography should be used with great caution asa guide to dogma and belief the available data do not—at least in my judgement—clearly support the reconstruction of any far-reaching ideological changes of the type Cumont seems to have envisioned, ‘The task of preparing a posthumous edition of a great scholar’s unpublished work can never be easy. The decision to translate Cumont’s original French was made with the recognition that English was the language of the Final Reports as well as of the Congress proceedings, Cumont’s exuberance and enthusiasm for his subject is ex- pressed in a highly decorated style, and much of this feeling is lost in translation. For Cumont the bull is ‘le quadruped redoutable’, and the signs of the zodiac are ‘ces douze constellations de I’écliptique’. Many of his sentences are complex rhetorical tours de force, ten to fifteen lines long. The translation records the substance, though it may lack some of the fervour, of Cumont’s impassioned narrative. In this edition of Cumont’s manuscript straightforward errors of fact have generally been corrected without comment. His footnotes were somewhat impressionistically Prepared; Cumont clearly expected his editor to complete the precise references. In ‘many places he specifically requested cross-reference to pertinent discussion in Reports vi-vut, and I have attempted to follow his intentions in this regard. The question of setting Cumont’s interpretations in the light of subsequent debate has proved, at times, a difficult one, since he might not have chosen to incorporate some of the conclusions drawn by his successors. Moreover, a thorough bibliographical account ofsuch discussion would have placed an intolerable burden on an already substantial baratus. I have therefore cross-referenced Vermaseren’s Corpus wherever appro- Priate and included a few bibliographical references to works published after 1947 ‘When it seemed informative to do so. Other editorial additions have been enclosed M square brackets, E. D. Francis 1. Mithra in Syria oan the Achaemenid period a powerful Mazdean priesthood already Kings 25 an Official cult at Babylon, the winter residence of the Great doetmen re? dissemination of groups of Magi throughout Asia Minor is etsian n° €Xtensively and in detail.28 We know of temples dedicated to the ela in oes which date from considerable antiquity—for example, those at tug, ® Pontus and at Hierocaesarea and Hypaepa in Lydia, On the Cp, nop, 169, n, 1 nceP. aro, thie sa Mage ai? PP- 281 £3 Cummont, Religions orientale, pp. 198 £3 Bidez and Cumont, PP. G0 £5 CRAL, 1947, pp. 903 f.scriptions, Tran. Furthermore, Plato’s bi i . > 'o’s biographies recount th: . the Egyptian pries ts, the philosopher wanted to, a long sojourn among s r Converse with the Magi A war, however, was then raging—it was the period of. Artaxerse? wo reign “and prevented him from visiting Persia. He went instead to Phoenicia and learned about Zoroastrian doctrine from the Magi who lived there.28 Even though we may doubt that Plato would have stopped, like a modern tourist, on the shores of Lebanon in returning from Egypt to Europe,?? this story at least proves his biographers believed that communities of Magi lived in the Phoenician cities. A tradition which may derive from Aristotle himsel? 27 Clem. Alex., Protr. 1v.65.3; cf. Paul Schnabel, Barr und die bape Literatur, Leipzig and Berlin, 1923, fr. 275, and Cumont, Mysteris, pp. 9! . 28 Cf Vitae Platonis (Prolegomena to Platonis Opera v1, ed. Hemanns p90) (Me os in Egypt, [scil. 6 HAdtw}) ElBaw els Dowlury negeroyer nei gen > atraéy tiv Zogodotgov natdelav; cf. Olympiodorus (Vi Oe gah Fovadue i Tp, duc 18 wav’ éxeivan Thr xa! “i Bovdspevos 48 wal rois dross Orrenet T. aapain dglacto ema ovveotdva mdhepov pip dvvnfeis mag’ 4 Oe Le 87: 84 6 I . . ius, ious éxet évcvzan reagéhaBe Ty MANMED Te , and Apuleis Hie, ae ee sig 68 tods THs "Avlas nohke " iit Mayo ovppis i ang LP a, tonis, 1-3- . . ‘ in cchichtlichen Entwick Pot cer (Die Philosophie der Griecen in re" Tg, J, Biden (BO ype Pp. 405) entirely rejects this adi a ‘o think it authentic. Lom of Pein e 9) in te 98) in st ; Paris, 1945; PP. 23 fa oF or Diogenes Lacrtius (37 pat nye ently cites the Pa senicia, the biographer in fact Teast unreliable that Platower TP aertius is generally regarded 99 (even fuiker Since Diog« astrian jonable. AS ies wet 35 limited point seems somewhat oe . ): i Cumont’s om oad his Werk New ya Pe zacedote before 101 Tong been recognised A ting both Sock misreP "nical decoration tideat' biographical tis as anti in the Critias of Adanns hoff], troduction [trans: Fiirala Kerschensteiner 1 toxenus has isrepresemThe Dura Mithraeum cA put which perhaps goes back no further than. thes pseudo-Aristotelian Magicus records that magus came from Syria (Cumont’s italics] to Athens and pro- raesied t© Socrates that he would die a violent death,30 Finally, according to the account of a medieval Syriac scholiast derived from @ relatively ancient source,8! Zoroaster and his disciples practised their cult in an isolated part of the forest of Maboug’. This statement evidently refers to. tradition that the reformer made his legendary retreat in the heart of a deserted area®? which a certain Syrian commentator located in the neighbourhood of Hierapolis. To the best of my knowledge these are the only traces, albeit indefinite and scattered, of the propaganda of the Magi west of the Euphrates before the snot Alexander's conquest. In the Hellenistic period a son, ot perhaps a nephew, of. ‘Antiochus the Great (Antiochus III) was called Mithridates, and a Syrian finance minister of Lysimachus and friend of Epicurus bore the name of Mithres.93 It would, however, be improper to conclude from this evidence that these men were necessarily devotees of the god whose name they bore, and we must accordingly wait until the end of the period for more definite information. Lying between the Taurus and the Euphrates, Commagene was governed bya dynasty which claimed descent from Darius, son of Hystaspes, and which was allied to the Seleucids. A hellenised form of Mazdeism was practised in Commagene, and we know 2 few essential details of this cult from the im- posing bas-reliefs and the long dedicatory inscription of the colossal tomb erected by Antiochus of Commagene (69-34 p.c.) on the summit of Nimrud- Dagh.*4 Along with other Persian deities, this ruler worshipped Mithra, simultaneously identified with Apollo, Helios and Hermes;* a remarkable "Of DL, 2.(5)45: gyal & “Apworording (= Aristot. Jf. 9% 8 Rose) pdyor td aihirea be Soplas che Abfpas ve dda dis Tpdavan too anxodrovs wat Of wal lawn Locoda vip velevedy adr. om "Thoodorbar- Kenai in HL, Pognon, Inscriptions Mandaites des coupes de Khouabir, Pats, 1898-95, p. 11, On the source of this account, see E. Benveniste, 14 monde oriental xXV1, Bane 378 on ite Ingen concerning Hierapolis, see Bidez and ‘Cumont, Mages lat, po. 96 fs , pps 94 fy PP. 103 f. [The wooded setting became one of the mast fue repeated clichés concerning Persian, Tefjious practices thus Lord Allibone writs Buck's Beast London, 1823, p. 64)* eee g < «esteemed woods and forests most proper for religious sacrifices’.} _ oo feast Pliny, HAN 11.42.2042: (sc. dicitur] Zoroastrem in deser is caseo uixisse annis xe it tame Frog gf aiales mon sere (cE. TMMM ny, p. 61, 0. 33 A. V. We ‘Jackson, Zoroase te lof Ancient Tron, London, 1899 {repr. New York, 1928], P- 34)- Compare the wading rmatting to which Zoroaster was the fist to consecrate to Mitra agro in the PO Porphynys poendorgon abropués azilavoy comer dnalon Ggeae vie Heeatbos 7! 2 TMA nympharum, V1). . . ae 11, pp. 79-80: Midouddeng (No. 63, Commagencs cf. Nos, 64-5» Si range Syria). TMMM 1, pp. 75-85 in fact contains ® lst of some he i 1, pp- 89 f oe were, hpp. 53, Nos, 28-32 (with extensive bibliography: cf, TMMM 1 PP: © Michel, Rei : mann and O- ag hel Reewil inscriptions grecques, Brussels, 1900, P- 7353 K. Hu158 Franz Cumont piece of sculpture portrays this syneretistic god in Commagenian costume crowned and radiate, clasping the hand of the king in token of the pact he ig bestowing upon. him.36 This is the first definite evidence for the worship of Mithra south of the Taurus. On the other hand, as the religious legislation promulgated by the king clearly attests, the cult at Nimrud-Dagh had not yet developed the character of mystery worship later found throughout the Roman empire.3? A crucial reference in Plutarch records that the Cilician pirates conquered by Pompey practised these mysteries.38 These pirates were the first to make the mysteries known to the Romans. Finally, in the reign of Gordian III, the great metropolis of Tarsus still placed on its coinage the image of the bull-slaying god.8° It is hardly surprising that these mysteries had penetrated between the Amanus and the Euphrates in a region adjacent to Commagene and Cilicia. Evidence of their dissemination in Cyrrhestice is provided by the discovery of a bas-relief of Mithra tauroctonos accompanied by his two characteristic torchbearers at Arsha-wa-Qibar on the left bank of the Afrin, near a bridge beyond which the Roman road from Antioch divided. One branch led north- east to Cyrrhus and Commagene, the other went east to Zeugma and Mesopotamia.49 We need not be surprised that the alien religion became established near such an important junction of major communication routes, but the absence of any inscription prevents our knowing at what date the reli- gion was introduced and whether it was practised by slaves imported from the East, by merchants trading in the area, or by the soldiers who occupied this strategic position. The crudeness which characterises the workmanship of this votive monument, however, implies that it was dedicated by humble Puchstein, Reisen in Kleinasien und Nordyrien, Berlin, 1890, pp. 262 f,, 921 f, plate 26, 25 L, Jalabert and R. Mouterde, Inscriptions grecques et latines de la Syrie x: Commagéne ef SY 7 tigue, Paris, 1929, p.12, No.1:°Az6i| Aavos MiBgov ‘HAlov Eguot (II A line553cl-Cl4 1, pp. 54 £ No. 32). Paris 36 [Cf, CIMRM 1, fig. 5. On the concept of pact, cf. also Cumont, Lux Lasgo 1949, p. xix, n. 2, and P. Thieme, ‘The concept of Mitra in Aryan belief” pp. 21 ff above ® The Mazdeism practised by the king of Commagene is not ‘Zervanist’, at least 12/7 characteristic form of that doctrine; note the judicious remarks by A. D. Nock in i Theol. Rev, xVM, 1934, pp. 79 f. On the other hand, the Xedvos éeigos mentioned in “Te” hus’ inscription (sua, lines 115-14) certainly seems to refer to the concept of Infinite that is, Zurodn akarana (cf. Schaeder, SBAW, 1935, P. 140, cited by Bidez Mages heliénists 1, 67, n. 3). 38 Plutarch, Vit. Pomp. xxrv (cf. TMMM 1, pp. 240, n. 5, 244) 0. 3)» [Om see appendix 13.1, below.] ilicia, Londom 3° G. Hill, Catalgue of Greek Coins inthe British Museum : Lycaonia, Isauria, and Ciliciy 10, 1900, p. 213 (No. 258, plate 38, 45 TMMM u, 189, mon. 3, fig. 123 [(CIMRM ® PT, au 37, fig. 4)5 of, E. Will, Le Relief cultualgréco-romain, Paris, 1955) P» 165: ‘Thommage re, revel lew perse adopté par Rome, au moment de la campagne contre sa patrie Prem! une valeur: politique Particuliére’,] in the as-relief was discovered in 1932 by Captain Larrieste and is NOW PET yy, 1933) Damascus Museum (cf. F. Cumont, ‘Deux Tnonuments des eultes solaires; x An and a ah Plate 40, 2, republished in Berytus x1, 1954, plate 3, 1; CIMRM 1, P- this referenceThe Dura Mithracun 159 Je. In a passage which demands consi . peo iochus I ordered his army in Tonto caution, Polyaenus records lation of the surrounding area to celebrate a Persian fonrane entire popu- lato graphic text which is probably also spurious provides wantin 2 juvocal indication of the introduction of the Persian cule ie an eaually oarital of Antioch. ‘The confession of St Cyprian, who tai Diocletian’s persecution, relates that the future martyr had been i victim of the mysteries of Mithra in his seventh year.42 Malalas, in a my nated in trustworthy passage, puts forward the opinion that Perseus, the copy sed ancestor of the Persians, had founded a temple to the ‘immortal ae? area Silpion, near Antoch.*® Moreover, an inscription from Roman times which was discovered at Athens mentions one Miers Xcoov *Avriozets** ho in all probability originally came from the large Syrian city; compare Mithres, Lysimachus’ minister, mentioned above (p. 157). It is somewhat more certain that Mithra was worshipped in Phoenicia, where, as we have noted, Plato may have already journeyed to converse with the Magi. At Sahin, not far from Tortosa and the Aradus, Renan copied an inscription probably dating from 203 a.c. which, if his restoration is correct, was dedicated to the dc“ Yyeotoc and Mithra.*® Sidon, a great commercial centre under the empire, in all likelihood received the mysteries from foreign traders. The beautiful marbles dating from 188 a.c. and now in the Clercq collection#® come from a magnificently decorated spelaeum, at least if we judge from the quality of the sculptures which adorned it? 4 Polyaenus 4.153 é sq ndon Heqoee Baasdtews wire sense cad ed Se 3. Olz [22 Bayern, Akad. 34.1 ADb.], Munich 1928, p. 13) 0. 1)- . ® hpi S Cran Ghee Abhi], Mutih September, p. 205): éca obs jum. ert Fre xai roig rod Mlbgov mpoo7ov poatnglors (cf. TMMM 1, p. 54. No. 6b; A.J Festugitse La rlélation d’Hermis Trismégiste 1, Paris 1950 P- 38. On the initiation of children, see F. Cumont, Symboliome funtraire, pp. 282 fi, Lux perpetua, PP. 3°% 0 | . @ Malas (ed, eee TB): 6 86. abrdc Legoets Exrice tole Tanta tobe, 5 énuvdpace moods dBardzov (of. E. Bikermann, Institutions Te Sdeucides, Paris 1938 P- 251)- Se eee ip dtt x3) 2936 (TMMM us, p- 89, No. 67), xo 3) SE, Renan, Mission de Phinice, Paris, 1864, p- 103 (cf TMMM 0 poe) 3) (006 Splor odparle Sindro . ..| MObeg 6 Bouse EertoO(n - «(ce OTN »P 72s No. 72). The inscription is dated 208 a.c- [But note CIMEM HP. NOT) Oo oat “8A. de Ridder, Catalogue de la collection de Clercq TV: ls marbres, Pati, 1906, PPS se (CIMRM 1, pp. 73 f., Nos. 74-87.) [The collection wae subsequently deposits wie rhe Louis de Boisgelin, 5 Rue Marseran, Paris (cf CIMRM 1, ps 73» No. 74)- O07 ne Oe Sidon Mithracum’ see E. Will, Syria xxvus, 1950+ PP. 261 & on whi, Roweves Campbell, Barytus a, 1954, P- 26, 2. 1). Marble sculpran® of high ava a 1283s found in the Walbrook oo Emerita Mithraca (cf. CIMRM » PP 28 f, Now Oe ™On the Sic. ibid, pp. 272 £, Nos. 773, 775-80, 782-9 with extensive 6 ography) about MeL implications of such dedications See . M. C. Toyabesr veinch , The Hibbert Journal u1v, 1956, P- 109) by $.Reinach, © Durghell'seertion in Bape Eopren(agth August 1887, rep Ae Chroniqus d’Orient 1, Paris, 1891, pp: 4341) ‘eworthy of A Thousand ot Of aia a, ps 19% cma ie fantastic product of an excessively oriental jmagination (ch160 Franz Cumont In the ports of Phoenicia merchants were apparently the Principal devotees of the exotic cult. The Syrian army also served to Proselytise this Teligion as it spread throughout the West. Until 1916, however, this point of view was open to question. In its support one could invoke only a Bedouin Story about the founding of the fort of Qasr-ibn-Wardan, north-east of Hama.48 According to this account, Ibn Wardan had been a sheik and the master of many herds, One day, while he was passing his hand along the back of one of his cows, a scorpion leapt out and struck him, and, as a result, he died. Néldeke49 — jectured that this strange story had been inspired by a Mithraic monument found among the ruins of a Roman castellum, characteristically representing the bull with a scorpion grasping at its testicles, Thi interpretation, however, remains most doubtful. At last, in 1916, Butler published a bas-relief of Mithra tauroctonos which he had excavated in the ruins of a temple of Dushara (Dusares) at Si* (Seeia, modern Djebel Druze) in the Haurdn, near Kenawéat, the ancient Kanatha.51 It thus became clear that the god whose worship had been propagated by soldiers far and wide along the Danube and the Rhine had also been brought by them to the eastern frontier of the em- pire, where he was identified with Dusares, the Arab Dionysus.52 The excavations at Dura offer particularly striking evidence of Mithra’s popular- ity among the troops which guarded that frontier. 2. Mithraism at Dura I intend to show that the discoveries at Dura provide new information regarding Mithraic religion.58 It is essential in such a study to recall at the “8 Cf, Syria x1v, 1933, p. 382, n. 2. I shall demonstrate below (p. 191) that a bas-relief dis- covered at Hama similarly represents Mithras ephippos. Qasr-ibn Wardan is possibly the ancient Seriane (cf. R. Dussaud, Topographie historique de la Sprie antique et médidvale, Paris, 1927, 211; E. Honigmann, RE, s.v. ‘Syria’, col. 1579, 1560; A. Poidebard, La Trace de Rome dans te désert de Syrie; te limes de Trajan é a conguéte Arabe, Paris, 1934, p. 42; CIMRM 1, pp- 72 £, No. 73). 49, Littmann, Riinenstitten und Schriftdenkmiller Syriens, Leipzig, 1916, p. 16. 59F. Cumont, Syria xrv, loc. cit. (n. 48); Honigmann, loc. cit. . & G, Butler, Expedition to Syria: Section A (Southern Syria, Part 6), Leiden 1916, p. 38, This bas-relief is now preserved in the Museum at Damascus and has been published bya Frothingham (‘A new Mithraic relief from Syria’, AJA xx, 1918, pp. 54 f Pl 3; cf. C Watzinger and K, Wulzinger, Damaskus, Berlin 1921, p. 109, No. 7. fig- 753 E. wil Syria 7M, 1952, pp. 67 f., Berytus x1, 1954, plate 2, 13 CIMRM 1, p. 76, No. 88, fig. 33)- 42, Cumont, ‘Mithra et Dusarée? RHR Loowvmt, 1918, pp. 207 f. The bas-relief conform to the type which is customary in the west and throughout the army, with the exceptio one detail: the snake is about to drink, not the blood of the wounded bull, but the sperm Which flows from his testicles as they are pinched by the scorpion. The scene sym the fertilization of the earth by the death of the bull. to fit 2 have omitted Cumont’s opening sentence in this section and revised the a, the new context. Cumont began by referring to those accounts of the excavations of aan Tcrehitecture, paintings and inscriptions, which were to have been more exe The fliscussed in other chapters of Rostovizefl’s projected volume on the Dura Mithract Siti ‘ture of this volume (Final Reports vit, pt. 3) remains uncertain. Apart from the &\ | The Dura Mithraeum 161 it d facts which are indi: outset certain dates an ‘€ Indispensable to o of the Durene practice of the cult. The dedication set erie peereeiation shrine states that it was restored during the reign of Septimice the Caracalla and Geta (¢. 209-11 a.c.) by legionaries of ee, " . XVI Flavia Firma.*4 Thus the sanctuary, tor crs and as the excavato: i dates the beginning of the third century. Certain discoy omens ah i veries mad st digging also lead to the conclusion that the decoration covering the walle i the vaulted sanctuary postdates these years and that ane : t, like the painti ie a cighbouring synagogue, belongs to a period not long before the: Pesan capture of Dura in 256 a.c.5° The building was certainly erected by soldien of the regular army, thereby explaining the fact discussed on pp. 169 f. that the paintings which they made represented episodes of the sacred legend almost identical to those illustrated by the sculptures discovered on the frontiers of the Danube and the Rhine. When the Mithraeum was restored, however, two bas-relief dating from a considerably earlier period were re-used and set in the wall at the far end of the sanctuary (plate 22). According to its Greek inscription, one had been dedicated by Zenobius, also called Eiaeibas, son of Iariboles—both are Palmyrene names—‘stragegos of the archers’ (atgarnydc toforé5#) in 482 of the which are now being prepared for publication, there is relatively litte archival material on file in the Dura-Europos Collection at Yale which was not published in the Preliminary Report of the Seventh and Eighth Seasons, A manuscript by Henry Pearson on the architecture of the site—his initial report of the excavation (henceforward referred to as ‘Pearson, “Architecture” ?)—is basically similar to the one later published in Reports v-vmu, pp. 62 £.3 there is, however, an accompanying file containing Rostovtzefl’s lengthy criticisms of several of Pearson’s conclusions (cf., for example, n. 59 below, and Francis, ‘Graffiti’, p., 427 n. 14). An esay by Grace Crawford on ‘Comparative Mithraic Architecture’ (117 pp.; cf. Reports ‘vu-vut, p. 80) is now somewhat obsolete. The remaining files will be edited during the next ‘two years but it is unlikely that their publication will be on the same scale as that of Krae- ling’s volumes on the Synagogue (now reprinted) and the Christian Building. Forthcoming studies of the Dura sculpture (by Susan Downey) and painting will include detailed sections on the Mithraeum]. acceen “e ‘(For a somewhat more detailed history of the site see Francis, ‘Graffiti, pp. 425 f. In this and several subsequent notes, Cumont requests a cross-reference to the coumeratias of the graliti in the Final Report. For all published inscriptions, T have referred to efaris “i-vm and CIMRM 1; all unpublished graffiti and dipinti (JMDur.) are cites ae contest Rostovize’s inventory number (cf. Francis, ‘Graffiti, p. 425, 0. 3- ane at, p. 6 {etication was published in Reports viv, pp. 85 f., No. 847, plate 49, « (CIMRM bp. 0, No. 53). Pace Vermaseren (loc. cit.), Antonius Valentinus did sot dedicate an al neighbouring Dolicheneum (cf, Francis, ‘Graffit’, p. 435) 0- 59]- ease fereites thal _ © [Cumont cucastently col this vaulted sanctuary an ‘apse’ and sometimes impies shits domed. Although the sanctuary is characteristically built on the central Sir 1 there is no evidence to suggest a rounded or multiangular termintlot Tt weevidence Points against such a reconstruction (cf. Reports an Po Ta tke ‘crm ‘apse’ to trond eM, figs 7, 8) and I have therefore abandoned Cumont’s use of Me ot tion a 72Y Possible misunderstanding. The vaulted sanctuary mee ‘arched (cf. Reports, loc. cu, Late Mithraeum; in the Middle Mithraeum, only the niche ws f Sorry. erate ibliography, see ‘crt ae has been disputed, perhaps injudiciouslys for bibliograP +P. 426, n. 12.] rrancis,i Imyrene dedicati . 8? The other relief bears a Palmys x ion dat. Seleucid era (170 4.©.)- a records the fact that Ethpeni, son of Zabde’a, : -s earlier an - ing. prea d of the archers garrisoned at Dura, had made this and sire oe the year 480 (168 A.c.).58 When we recal! offering in the month of Adar of pea n ing his campaign of 165 nev " oe ey tbat Palmyrene archers, horsemen and dromedarii in the ser. vice of Rome brought the cult of Mithra to the recently occupied city and that the cult was therefore introduced from Palmyra, which had probably main- tained a Roman garrison since the time of Hadrian.% This conclusion is cor- roborated by several facts which together illustrate the importance which Palmyrenes always enjoyed within the Mithraic community at Dura. In the first place, the Mithraeum was established in a location very close to the temple of Bel, Iarhibol and Aglibol, which dates from the first century a.c, Furthermore, among the portraits of the benefactors of the Mithraeum which have been recovered, one is accompanied by a Palmyrene inscription. Finally, in the third century, as the graffiti demonstrate, soldiers of the cohors XX Palmyrenorum were numbered among the faithful.60 The mysteries celebrated in the massive Euphrates fortress were therefore not inherited from an archaic, autochthonous tradition but had first been spread across the Syrian desert by indigenous troops, the auxiliaries of the Roman army. This religion was first known in the form in which it had been practised at Palmyra under the Antonines prior to its renewal in the third century by the legionaries. These facts are supported by inscriptional evidence and will assist in the interpretation of the iconography. 8 Reports vu-vun, P. 84, No, 846 (CIMRM 1, p. 65, No. 41; Francis, ‘Graffiti’, p. 427). é Reports vu-viny, p. 83, No. 845 (CIMRM 1, p. 63, No. 39; Francis, ‘Graffit?, p. 425). AS ont notes, “Torrey recognised that the name of this strategos was reproduced in Greek Jeers on the left-hand edge of the bas-relief: E@ITANEI ISTATPHTA (CIMRM 1, p. 63, of Mithra is purely conjectural. However plausible such an tion might appear, one {ust remember that, although Palmyra is an unuswally well excavated site, no sure trace of been found there (cf. my remarks, ‘Graffit?, pp. 40 £). Harald toe ae ay felt me hat an unpublished lamp from the Tomb of Malku is inscribed with Phoric esseras) on whe, Dut this is too fragile evidence (even when coupled with dada- X4 1954 pp. 3 fr based mtu an active military cult. Campbell’s assumption (Bers si the tie asd On Pearson, ‘Architecture’, cf. n. x above) of a Mithraic cult at ura from the ti ir TM eh pl oer yon 6B alo ere "re P. 64)) f Dura-Europos’, in Festschrift Franz Altheim 1, Bet «) [Cumont's text some js i {usqu’au IIle sidcle’ bay, °¢ Somewhat misleading on this point: in the first place, he write 'Y lisrestin fk t, since the earliest clear evid resence of the cohors ses fam 28 A. (Far Sra a te resco Of the Mithraie commer inely. Furthermore, the regimental afflictions of the mesThe Dura Mithracum 163 3. The interior arrangement of the Mithraeum ‘The construction of the shrine and its subs lished by the excavations prompt only a few ‘The general plan of the building conforme Western Mithraea, that is, it consisted of officiants, with two lateral podia where the initiates pa, banquets. These benches were lengthened and raised at thetmeonne ates remodelling, from which we may conclude that the number of partici niet these mystic feasts had apparently increased. During the reconstruction in the period of Septimius Severus the western end of the shrine had been altered to form a raised vault® ascended by a staircase of seven small steps. These steps are, however, so short (15 cm each) and narrow that their number was clearly selected on account of its inherent symbolic value and regardless of convenience. We are reminded of the mystical Mithraic ladder described by Celsus, the xAipak éxtdscvdoc, where seven superimposed ‘gates’, each made of a different metal, represented the planctary spheres through which the souls passed as they ascended to the empyreum.82 An important characteristic which distinguishes the Dura Mithraeum from most others is that its floor was not constructed below ground level. Apart perhaps from the arched niche, there were no other reminiscences of the worship of Mithra in the underground spelaea imitating the original cave in the mountains of Persia dedicated to the god by Zoroaster.®3 The cult niche, however, was definitely covered by a cradle vault, of which traces have been found, and perhaps, as is the case elsewhere, the cella was also enclosed by a concave ceiling ingeniously made of mud bricks with plaster equent modifications as estab- observations of religious interest. d to the conventions adopted in a central aisle reserved for the 61 [At the beginning of this section, Cumont requested that his remarks be corrected in the light of Pearson’s account of the architecture, Although I have made a number of minor corrections in Cumont’s text, at other points I have decided to let his text stand and to cross- reference Pearson's remarks: since Cumont attended the excavation (cf. my introductory notes, p. 152 above) and presumably drew his own conclusions regarding the stratiiation of the three shrines, I have thought it inappropriate to suppress his interpretation a maely because it may differ from Pearson’s (cf. Francis, ‘Graffiti’, p. 427, 0. 14). Thus, according to Pearson (Reports vv, pp. 72, 75 and fig. 34), the arched cult niche behind the sar dates from the Middle Mithraeum, While Pearson’s remarks (sbid, 76) might be inte the 10 mean that the reconstruction of a vaulted sanctuary took place during the peri ae Middle Mithraeum, the raised platform and the staircase of seven steps leading yp © re Sanctuary, seem certainly to have belonged to the Late Mithraeum (Repors viv P- 795 saat id, p82). i ee F, Cumont, Lux TMMM 1, pp. 1 17 £.3 on the primitive significance of this ladder, 5 taux’ RHR cmt, {ebeta, pp. 866, pp. 282 f.; id, ‘La fin du monde selon les Mages occderis opie Mea, PP: 29 fy especially 46 f.3 Rostovtzefl, Reports viI-vi, P- 8a, TR. enary of te suppacchen Mysterienreligionn®, Leipzig, 1927, pp» 244 £), offers # Tr a cites Scho ed (Pict Journey through the seven regions of the astrological PSA Aj jégoat odfonetd Ae. tare; cig 2e Milog olnetaw vay Excd dowiudy, by Ouaee a 7 TMM 1, p. 54; cf. Francis, ‘Graffiti’, pp- 428, a MMs, pp. 55 £3 La frpeua, pgs De etre rompharan G (cf. p. 1575 P- 3% abv}164 Franz Cumont mortar and connected to the framework of the roof.64 This false, was regarded by Mithraists as an image of the firmaments5 cave symbolised our darkened world into which the heave, descended. This concave surface, however, would have been of the shrine still reminiscent of a rock-bound cavern. ks On the dry plateau where Dura ‘was built it would have been impossible to ave a spring of running water in the shrine or even to supply a fountai whose presence would remind the faithful of ‘the natural cave ‘washed by spring water’66 pledged to the cult by Zoroaster and indispensable for ie ritual ablutions. At the entrance of the shrine, however, a lined plaster basin with a broad neck was sunk in the ground. In all probability it served, like the bowls of holy water in our own churches, to hold the water for the lustrations performed on entering the shrine.6? This water would have been supplied by carriers who drew it from the Euphrates.®8 Another comparable storage jar lined with plaster was sunk into the middle of the cella floor and, immediately above the staircase, a pot-bellied jar like the first was embedded in the masonry of the sanctuary, its large mouth level with the floor. These vessels would likewise have contained the sacred water necessary for the cele- brants officiating either in the central aisle or in front of the cult images. Behind this last container the upper part of an altar with plaster horns at its four corners rose out of the floor which engaged its circular shaft. The excava- tions have shown that prior to the construction of the raised cult niche this shaft, which was decorated with wreaths and ribbons, reached down to the level of the cella.?0 The altar, evidently intended for performing sacrifices, stood in its usual position in front of the image of Mithra tauroctonos, which characteristically occupied the far end of the spelaeum. Two small alu covered in plaster and with square bases and tops were engaged in the Vault, real op ‘and the whole nly souls have the only aspect 64 TMMM 1, p. 59 f. [Due to the destruction of the shrine, this reconstruction is largely conjectural.] . inted on ®° TMMM 1, pp. 98 f. The vault appears to have been decorated with stars painted blue ground. . 1 p88 0 Porphyry, loc cit. (abropues amfdaioy « . . dvOngdv xal aoryds Exon); TMMM ty PP ; f,, 106, Cf. Pearson, Reports ViI-viti, P. 72. . turn at 67 Similar bowls have been found at the entrance of the Mithraea at Cater Tain Friedberg (Taunum). Note the running spring at the entrance of the Roma" as8 fs S. Clemente (cf. Cumont, CRA 1915, pp. 203 f., 597; CIMRM 1, Pe 350 4 Leipais, 199% especially No. 346; also H. Lietamann, Geschichte der alten Kirche 11, Berlin P. 128). commodities (8° 8 Several graffiti mention the purchase of water in addition to other Reports vu-vut, p. 125, No. 862; CIMRM 1, p. 71, No. 65)» atform bad thraeum after the Pl © [Cf Reports va-vint, p. 79, plate 3, 2 (from the Late Mi F been raised)]. P. 79, plate 8,2 ( on writes Bat % (Cf. Reports vir-vm, pp. 67, 75 and fig. 313 in ‘Architecture’ (7), Peareet jeaves ioe first coat of plaster (there were seven) was decorated with bands of flowers ‘ategral ¥ and green. Because this decoration is on the first coat of plaster whic that of rest of the furniture, the painting and altar can also be considered Mithraeum.’] garyThe Dura Mithraeum 1 65 pench to the left of the large altar.71 ‘They seem t which perfumes, especially incense, were b 'o have been thymiateria on urned,,72 . these two altars opened out to form a horseshoe and wang an of ts left of with twelve evenly spaced holes about 4 mm in diameter, small altars, like that of the large one, provides aeemed surface of the were burned on them [but cf. n. 72]. evidence that fires To the left of the main altar, in the original bri small rectangular ditch had been dug and a clin eee wall, a covered inside it,?8 perhaps representing a foundation deposit ik un oo the sanctuary when its level was raised. In the middle of the cella, ho under bones certainly seem to have come from sacrifices which, according toa ritual custom among the Magi, had been offered in a ditch.?4 In a Mithraeum at Ostia we find a cemented pit with a knife drawn in the floor mosaic beside it. The function of the pit, namely, to collect the blood of victims sacrificed above it, is thus clearly illustrated.75 4. The bas-reliefs There was an arcosolium at the end of the niche which functioned as the adytum of the shrine. The two bas-reliefs (plate 23) in gypsum whose dedica- tions we have already mentioned occupied the middle of this arcosolium. They were somewhat clumsily set in the wall, with the smaller one placed below the larger.78 The first is rectangular and simply reproduces the traditional scene of Mithra tauroctonos.?? The bull’s forelegs are flexed and its chest is poised to strike the ground. On the other hand, the bull’s hind legs are fully (CE. Reports vuvin, p. 66 (CIMRM 1, pp. 61 £4, No. 95): ‘their bases and tops were square, changing in an unbroken surface toa rounded central shaft. The corners of each top were brought to a point.” . 72 [Note, Nomen eiate vu-vin, loc. cit.: ‘both altars contained marks of fire i cinders, although their material and position would not have allowed a hot or continuous fre to a i ich and altar bases. 78 (CE, Reports v-vin, p. 64: ‘the floor was of plaster coming to the Li eee Itis 0-27 m above the original floor of the preceding private house and Ti eo, ay in front of the altar table, a brick-lined cavity o-a1 m x 0-26 mand O28 WTS cg, a to contain deposits of small bones;’ (further deposits are discuss rancis, ‘Graffit?’, p. 440, n. 83)]- ‘ . , and fish "4 ICE Reports adie a where, however, the finds of ‘small bird, sheep, bones are not specifically attributed to the cavity in question). 34 Ob this point, see Cumont, TMMM 1, p. 63, 2. 3- lets [Reports vivir, pp. 68 f.: ‘the west wall above the altar table 8 Cer bas-relief «+ tea + «razed for the Middle Mithraeum. In it were undoubtedly set "1 1 erat flakes of conaet,the level of the altar table of the Middle Mithracti® were rey were present inte pared gesso similar to the covering of the bas-relief, showing *02 sat ly Mithraeum and were slightly damaged at that time. 1 ate 2) 1 (Cli [MRM 1, pp: 62 fo ” No. Gor a fuller description, see Reports va—vut, pp. 91 fs completely gone, having and Downey, Dura Sculpture, forthcoming)]-166 Franz Cumont setae 3 in the air, The animal’s curling tail q, thus raising its rump in t B ling loes not extents of grain’ but in a tuft of hair. In front of the sacrificial victim, the cn les ps towards the wound whose blood it is about to drink and, up above, 03 2 the raven flies towards the head of the god, whose youthful countenance is represented frontally, thus facing the spectator. The crescent moon is por- trayed to the left and, on the right, the radiate sun, but the representations of both these heavenly bodies are badly damaged. The sculpture was accentu- ated by a bright polychrome, of which a few traces remain visible.79 The cap and costume of Mithra were painted pink with yellow trimmings. Four discs of coloured glass were set in the upper border but they appear to be merely ornamental.80 Above the stone, two holes drilled into the plaster held the metal staples from which a veil was probably suspended.81 On the second bas-relief, the scene of the sacrifice takes place in a vaulted room supported by columns, an architectural transformation of the mythical grotto.82 Mithra dauroctonos is portrayed as he was on the other relief and the victim assumes exactly the same attitude. The god is apparently accompanied by the dog and the raven, but the bird, instead of flying towards the god, perches, as often happens, on his cloak.83 The lower edge of the arch which represents the firmament is, as in many cases elsewhere, decorated by the signs of the zodiac, crudely incised and each set in a moulded frame. As usual, they begin with the Ram on the left and end with the Fish on the right.®4 In the upper sector of the sky, that is, in the middle of the arch, the sequence is interrupted by the bust of a bearded personage wearing a calathos on his head. He is certainly to be recognised as Baal Shamin,®5 who was %8 As, for example, at Heddernheim (cf. TMMM t, pp. 964, 509, mon. 2513 CIMRM 1, pp. 64 f., No. 1083, with bibliography) ; cf. TMMM 1, p. 186 and Reports vu—vim, p. 101. jy LFor the use of bright polychrome, see F. Cumont, Mysteries, p. 2193 on the specific colouring, see Réporis va-vur, p, 94 (CIMRM 1, p. 63, No. 37); the gypsum surface ‘was let Tough to give a grip to a coat of fine gesso or plaster with which the smoothing and finer modelling was done. This was colored brilliantly in pink, yellow, red, and black . . . the very dark patina on both reliefs is not intentional, but probably comes from the altar smoke’ (Pearson, ‘Architecture’, 95 note the different interpretation in Reports vit-Vil, PD. 99 f)}- SIGE Reports vu-van, pp. 93 f. and n. 7: ‘in the first [scil, hole], there is a white inset stone. The second once carried a bit of green glaze pottery, but the other two insets are lost. «+ ‘These inset stones and pieces of faience probably had a lose relationship to the three jewels and mare represent stan, ‘Thus on a relief found near the Circus Maximus in Rome a a wet relief] Pp ithras and four stars are arranged in a row near the upper 8 (CE Reports va—vin, p. gt (ef. i relief] was Te MCV P. 91 (ef. 94 and p. 168 below): ‘the smaller [scil. bas- ; soufred with a kind of curtain and was palated only once, while the larger had no curtain in the cult eect Several times. This may mean that the smaller bas-relief played no Patt the cult ceremoni i . ce, the larger alone being ated kept in the sanctuary exclusively for the sake of revere’ °° Cf the bas-relief at Konii No. 1896: fig. 490). F sption G2 (TMMM 1, p. 175, fig. 10 [CIMRM mn, p. 265, No- 109” PB. 63, No. go) P08 Of the larger bas-reliel se Reports vn-vin, pp 95 & (CIMRE a TEMA b. 189, n, 8, PP. 110, 111, 1, 6 (cf. also ‘ . n. 8). 85 aie E also Cum VIII, P- 95» cf. H. Seyrig, Syria 0Y, 1939, ope ee 's remarks in Reports vul-vull, P- 9!The Dura Mithracum 167 d in great veneration by the Palmyrenes and identi i fra Mazda, lord of the sky, the Iuppiter Case nr ey at even in the West.8 Outside the zodiacal arch the upper coven ee with plaster during the restoration of the shrine in order to my oduce a rounded effect on the top of the relief. The two busts which di cotated tae corners were thus hidden from view. ‘They thes an appear to represent thi the moon but are too crudely executed to permit any certain identifention The donor and his family stand in front of the sacrificial bul in the sit hand sector of the field. Zenobius, the father, is pouring a libation on the altar.88 His two sons are standing on a ledge to his ight and, according to the rule of isocephaly, they are represented as smaller than he.89 One of them, named Barnaadath, wears a simple tunic and raises his right hand [with his palm turned forwards, his thumb extended, and his fingers doubled into his palm].° The other seems to be making the same familiar gesture of adora- tion.®! He is dressed in a military costume and wears the paludamentum; his left hand rests on his sword, which hangs from a belt at his waist. Like his grandfather’s, his name is Iariboles. Beneath Barnaadath and Iariboles we see two small kneeling figures. At first sight they might be taken to represent Atlantes supporting the ledge, but it is more likely that they are the grand- children of Zenobius, placed below their parents.92 Like the smaller bas-relief, this one was also brilliantly coloured. On Mithra’s cap, upper garment and mantle, even on his left hand, we can still distinguish several traces of gilt;93 his breeches were coloured pink. The bull ‘8 TMMM 1, p. 87 and n. 9. ; . 87 (Cf, Reports viva, pp. 96, 101, where the busts are identified as those of Sol and Luna, their unusual placement noted, and their removal attributed to this very Jack of orthavieny} #8 [Campbell and Gute (ibid., p. 97), however, interpret Zenobius’ gesture as one of ae ing incense on a thymiaterion. For the accompanying group of dedicants foimpare ie Pal say rene relief published by H. Ingholt (Berytus ut, 1936, plate 9, 1s cited by Ya-vit, p, 100, n. 16). . Similar cae Te representational misproportion due to the ru of ocepaly are frequent and early. Thus on the stucco representations of Jason and Medes it Te Ct ty the Porta Maggiore, Jason sits on a table and his body is correspondingly reiers (¢f.J. Carcopino, La basilique pythagoricienne de la Porte Majeure, Paris, 1920s Pe 324 8° (CE Reports va-vn, p. 98.] ; *! On this Semitic ritual gesture, cf. F. Cumont, Fouiles, pp» 7% f pp. 100 f, qv ef * [This interpretation was disputed by Rostovtzefl, Repo Te ime Mitt. 49 (1934)> the kneeling figures adorning the dado at Miran discussed Bare Mereooes of the Pp. 180 £, and YCS'v, 1935, p. 300.] Compare the similar arrangoTirn Td beneath theit smple of the Palmyrene Gods where the children are likewise fice Patents at the level of the stylobate (Cumont, Fouilles, pp. 52 ee along with his family as he liza north of Aleppo, Gaios, priest of Bel, is not represen i anying dedication offers his sacrifice, at least his family is fully enumerated in the 900 0% peat in %8 at Dura, the name of the dedicant, mentioned in the G0 auction to J. 1 tis portrait (ef.'F, Cumont, Etudes syriennes, Paris 3917 P- 2874 2 hs and Mouterdes Tagtts Oriental forerunners of By zantne painting, Chicago 10% Pe”! wih ribtions grecques et latines de la Syrit, No. 1743 GRAIL 1934 P» 9" statue of Bacchus Wi ‘uy, C% the Temple of the Syrian Gods in the Janiculum, Where © i syrien du Janiaus ide face and hands has been discovered (ch: P. Gauckler, 1 #168 Franz Cumont the dog had a reddish-brown tint. Other traces of paint remain on and the clothing, with its red clavus and edging. Mithra’s cap and the bust the sun god were inset with jewels.® This use of bright polychrome has also been observed on several Mithraic monuments elsewhere.95 Without it the sculpture would have seemed indistinct amid the gloom of the underground crypts, and gold lent the éclat of precious metal to what was otherwise mediocre craftsmanship. In discussing the first bas-relief we mentioned a series of holes along the top of the rough splay where staples had been fixed in order to support a fabric concealing the sacred image. The great bas-relief at Carnuntum in Pannonia offers a comparable case.°6 There can be no doubt that, in the course of the liturgy, the figure of the bull-slaying god, until that moment hidden under veils, was suddenly revealed.9? After describing the details of these representations of the bull-slaying god we may now consider their composition in general terms with the Purpose of identifying those shared features which distinguish them from the character- istic Western type. The bull has not yet been thrust to the ground and it still raises its hind quarters in the air by stretching out its back legs. In this respect the relief is similar to those from Seeia in the Hauran and from Arsha-wa- Qibar in Cyrrhestice.®® At Dura we find the dog and the raven near the dying animal but the snake and the scorpion are absent.9 On the smaller of the two reliefs the positions usually occupied by the busts of Sol and Luna Paris 1912, p. 184, plate 253 J. Nicole-Darier, Le sanctuaire des diewx orientaux du Janicule, Paris 1909, plate 3). *4 [But see Reports vr—vin, 98: ‘it is open to doubt at best whether the cap carried a jewel] *5 Of TMMM 1, p. 217. °* MAM th pp. 492 £, mon, 228 bis (CIMRM u, p. 215, No. 1683, with bibliography; cf. n. 6, above). Cf. CHL v1, 746 (183 a.c.) where an offering is made to Mithra of bela [i.e., ula, cf inbicto, supr.] domini insicnia habentes [sic] /n(umero) IIH (TMMM ny, p. 102, No. 51, id. 1, 325+ 2. 95 CIMRM 1, p. 218, No. 563). Materials are also mentioned in a Mithraie inscription from Ostia, published by Calza, Notizie degli Savi, xx1, 1924, p. 73: deum uetustate religione/ in uelo formatun et umore obmubi/latum etc. (CIL x1v, 4314; CIMRM 1, p. 120, No. 239)3 the cult of Jupiter Heliopolitanus (ILS 4290: torguem et uelum sac.). & CE pp. 158 above and Reports vit-vut, p. 101. the __'» {Cumont’s statement regarding the absence of the snake is incorrect and repeats the similar error in CRAI 1934, p. 96. Cf. Reports vua—van, p. 92 (the smaller relief): ‘just b i the dog appears the outline ofa snake which also leaps against the wound in a manner sim to that of the dog. Originally the snake was in high relief but at some time in the eee the stone it was sliced off level with the adjacent field with a sharp tool having & ane “the dag aug The Femaining outline is the mark of the original modeling.” Cf. ibid, P- °° ‘the dog and snake, much too small in proportion, leap against the neck of the bal ee Small relief”. Although the position of the snake in these reliefs is highly unusual (should mee P. 92, n. 45 cf. L. A. Campbell, MUL, pp. t6, 86), itis strange that the sn /= 7" 55) have been removed in one relief but left in the sche Campbell's suggestion (0P- bs Pr vas that the snake in the smaller bas-relief was deleted becaue ofits unorthodox PO! yyzzling discerned on the later one on account of its diminutive size does not account for on of Sl NEw in a fully convincing way. Compare, however, the removal of the bus and Luna, discussed in note 87 above, and Campbell, loc. cit.].The Dura Mittraeum 169 ¢ been reversed; the latter is on the left-hand si eh and the same situation perhaps obtains on the patter puss are almost unrecognisable [cf.n. 87]. These distinguishing fenreeee” ail the more significant since they apparently do not occur on the third century paintings which portray the same scene (cf. P- 185 below), Thi differences, although of no special artistic interest, have “ligious importance since they prove that the works of art consecrated in the Dura Mithraeum under the Antonines, unlike those executed during the Severan period after the legionaries had restored the shrine, do not conform to the iconography of the Western sanctuaries. The form of Mithraism practised at Dura, like that of the Latin-speaking provinces, derived from an Anatolian prototype, but it would have arrived in Syria directly from its point of origin in Asia Minor and, for a time, would have developed independently in a Semitic milieu, In this early form we do not find the rigorous uniformity attested in a later period between the Syrian type and the religion which spread so widely through the military camps of Europe.101 a certain religious 5. The paintings The principal artistic interest of the Dura Mithraeum lies not in its poorly executed sculptures but in its remarkably preserved paintings, though their artistic quality is similarly undistinguished. They are often crude and care- lessly done and their artist’s palette was poorly supplied with colours. Many figures are simply executed in just two tones, black and red, and resemble outline sketches rather than paintings. Occasionally a neutral tint is added to the bare outline to give more prominence to the portrait. The artist signed his work above the arcosolium vdpa Magéw Cwygdpep? and his Semitic name, like the use of the ritual term vdpa,03 suggests that this decoration was executed by the unskilled brush of a local artisan who had been initiated into the mysteries.204 On the other hand, because of the variety of their subjects, 100 [At this point Cumont has pencilled in the following note: ‘this observation should be tnodified since I now believe that Mithraism of the third century conforms to the tyPe Gstablished at Rome under the surveillance of imperial authority (cf Rapport oe sion 4 Rome,” CRAI 1945, pp. 386 £., especially 420, and my note on the bas-rel “ri 1947, Pp. 303 £.)"]. - optaque d'Amsha-wae Qiag uments Deux monuments des cules solaires I, Bas-relief mithitaue , Syria x1v, 1993, pp. 381 £, especially 384 [but see the previous note]. _ ‘oe 102 Reports vu-vul, p, Top, No. Gog (CIMRM. p. 67, No. 46). [Fora Geena * nna eports vivir, pp. 89 f, pp. 101 f (CIMRM 1, pp. 65 £ Nos- rs vi-vm, pp. 121~2 and p. 195 below]. - israel aa The indifferent aesthetic and technical quality of the paintings of the aie Maipey are prime dently been emphasised (cf. Reports vivint, p. 04). Like so much af Ate re, AlheTY interesting as examples of a syncretistic offshoot of Roman prove he pueh th i ithraic graffiti at Dura, 28 trade name of Mareus is not recorded elsewhere among the Mithraic graffiti at Indeed, ted by a vda-inscription. i i It } We may well regret our general lack of information regarding the cu tionally been regarded as an initiate since he is celebrat affiliations of170 Franz Cumont i the walls of the Dura sanctuary are unlike those in an os en ee ra the West the only one which is at all comparable is ad Mithraeum at S. Maria Capua Vetere, first published in 1924105 and even that lacks the same iconographic richness and detail. These facts are by themselves enough to affirm the religious importance of the sacred art at Dura. (a) Mithraic cosmogony and the mission of Mithra.106 Around the outer edge of the larger bas-relief in the arcosolium of the cult niche the excavators found a series of thirteen little pictures [painted on a layer of plaster . . . each one of them in a trapezoidal frame, ibid.]. (The two lower pictures on the left-hand side are missing.) The pictures and their frames resemble the arch-stones ofa cylindrical vault. Like the accessory scenes which, in the great sculptural compositions of the West,20? enclose the portrait of the bull-slaying god, the Dura paintings represent both the cosmogony of the mysteries and the legend of Mithra. They enable us to comprehend more fully the internal structure and meaning of these religious symbols and thus to account more exactly for some of their specific details. 1. The sequence of scenes begins with the keystone of this celestial vault (cf. p. 164 and plate 264), where we see a portrait in full face whose head is surrounded by a nimbus. As three vertical strokes indicate, the body was covered by a mantle. In his right hand, now obliterated, the figure holds a curved object which might represent either a shepherd’s crook or an augural those artisans who decorated the Mithraea of the Roman Empire. Nevertheless, owing to the avowedly secret nature of Mithraic ritual and, presumably, its accompanying iconography, the burden of proof seems to lie with anyone who wishes to claim that a Mithraic artist was not also an initiate. More important, however, in the present discussion is the implication that Mareus was a ‘local artist’. While his Semitic name may imply a Syrian provenance, there is no reason to suppose that he was a native of Dura. Not only may he have been ‘one of the soldiers of the garrison initiated into the mysteries’ (ibid.), but he may also have served along the Rhine or Danube frontier (cf. my remarks in the preface, p. 155 above). It is perhaps worth considering the comparisons which Cumont draws between western and later Durene Mithraic art in the light of this possibility]. 105A. Minto, Notizie degli Scavi, xx1, 1924, pp. 361 £, and now M. J. Vermaseren, Mithriaca 1: The Mithraeum at S. Maria Capua Velere, Leiden, 1971. In the Mithraeum at Spoleto, the vertical walls of the podia were decorated with frescoes depicting the planetary deities, two of which have survived (cf. TMMM n, pp. 255 f., mon. 973 CIMRM 1, pp. 247 f Nos. 673-82, especially 677). Otherwise the paintings which seem once to have existed have almost completely disappeared. [Cumont’s long note continues with a list of Mithraic paintings discovered prior to 1947, including the finds at Ostia, the Palazzo Barberini and Santa Prisca, For a list of Mithraic paintings, see CIMRM 1, p. 3405 m, 44 (tv. ‘painting’)5 Cimaseren-van Essen, EMSP, pp. 148-78; Vermaseren, Mithriaca 1, Leiden, 197!" Gencerning the Barberini paintings, Cumont added the following note: ‘the paintings from Of Mates it Gardens have a particular interest for our study for, on each side of the sco ithra tauroctonas, five small tableaus represent, as at Dura, episodes from the cosmoge"Y of the Magi or the legend of Mithra,’] , , 1072 ieee Pp. 105 f. (plate 18, 1); CIMRM 1, p. 65, No. 42)- E, Will, Legg agement ofthe sculptured scenes, see F. Saxl, MTU, Berlin, 193% Srtco-romain, Paris, 1955, Pp. 423-55+ and n0WsThe Dura Mithraeum 171 type already carried by the Hittite gods, but is more likely to be stall of the harpé. Like the rest of the figure, it is poorly drawn. This portrait eset ut of Kronos, the god of Time,108 He is represented as beardless js indee for Mithraists, as for the Orphics, the first principle was that of pecause Ot gane, ‘Time which never grows old,!0? replacing the Persian Xpsvoe oa On two bas-reliefs, one of them formerly in Rome,!! the ein Pettau (Poetovio, in Pannonia),1!2 and on a painting in the Mith- on of the Barberini Gardens,18 in exactly the position occupied by rae in the Dura painting we find the leontocephalic god encircled by a serpent, the lion-headed monster by means of which Mithraic art often rendered its conception of a supreme divinity of Time (Aion). Finally, the coins of Valerian and Gallienus struck at Antioch show Saturn on the reverse, standing with his head veiled and holding the harpé; they carry the legend Ademitati Aug(usiorum).144 In my opinion these parallels guarantee the correctness of our interpretation of the first picture. em (plates 26c, 27a). A scene widely attested in other Mithraea, that of Kronos handing over the thunderbolt to Zeus as the symbol of his power and thus transmitting to him the sovereignty of the world,!15 does not occur at Dura. On the other hand, the next two scenes, which should be considered as one subject, represent a frequent episode from Mithraic theogony. Zeus is standing with his head surrounded by a nimbus. He is dressed in a simple chlamys encircling his hips, passing over his shoulder and held in his left hand. 108 TMMM 1, p. 77. 1s RHR, crx 4994. 6.655 cf, Mythographus Vaticanus (ap. TMMM n, 53): Salurnus secundum fabulam cum sit senex, posse fieri puer fingitur. Cf. Minokhired, 8 (trans. H. S. Nyberg, JA ccxtv, 1929, p. 199 (cf. ibid., coxrx, 1931, p. 52): ‘Zurvan the Infinite is exempt from old age and death (azarmén, amarg), [Minokhired Ménég i Xrad) ene suggested elsewhere that this god of Time was also represented on the great bas- ‘Rif of Osterburken at the beginning of the sequence of accessory scenes as a simple head frcaed within a kind of circular fillet (TMM xt, pp. 348 f, 509, mon. 246 cs CIMRM n, Tee aetgNo, 1292). Saxl (0p. ct. p. 69, late28, Nos. 150-52), however, has plausibly argued span, hould identify this figure as that of the abyss or primeval chaos (an interpretation Ta gal acoepted by Vermaseren, loc. cit.) De Mike (MM n, pp. 231 £., mon, 70 (CIMRM 1, iia getettt Rome, Nijmegen 195t, pp. 56 £). fac Pato eet 24 Umetrastno Zendovino (1993)> P- 75» fig. 93 cf. M. Abramit, Fihrer 80. og aboagy 192 BP. TAL. (CIMRM n, pp. 182 £, No. 1510), Cumont, RHR, loc. 8g eee), inten BCR, 1938, pp. 251 £. and fig. 3 (CIMRM r, pp. 168 f., No. 390, fig. 112: Pent which lays mee zodiacal arch a naked figure stands on a globe ‘entwined by a ser- MH. Cohen, Desmiptin the god’s lion’s head (Aion)’.] » Pp. 153 f., No. 3353 cf. M. J. Vermaseren, (Valerian, cription historique de ie Pempis in?, Pari Valerian, No. 8. Gow 1s monnaies frappées sous Pempire romain®, Paris, 1880-92 Piece of evidene’® cZllienus, No. 53). A. Alf6ldi kindly drew my attention to this interesting nee. On the example we 19 ascertai which I have examined in the Cabinet de Médailles, 1 was in if Saturn was bearded [cf. H. i oman Coir : . H. Mattingly, Roman Coins?, London 1960, pp. Pe the worhip rae definite welerenee to Mi ism f fore 36) und eaiP of 5: ol hae es ithraism [scil., in early Imperial coinage], oubte tus Comes under the later Emperors (cf, plate xu1 8 [and pp. 230, ST ya used Mithraic worship. -?}. (PI a cf, the bas-reliefs at Neuenheim and Osterburken.172 Franz Cumont « ing to the left but his full face is portrayed according to the rule of Pentality. He is raising his right arm and brandishes the thunderbolt in ie hand. In the next frame two anguipede giants, their beardless faces outlined in black strokes and coloured in a purplish hue, take part in a scene char. acteristically represented in the manner ofa Greek gigantomachia. One of them stands erect; stretching out his left arm, he raises in his right hand a huge stone which he is about to hurl against the lord of Olympus. The other giant has fallen to the ground, his head down, and he is desperately lifting his two arms. Through remarkably crude workmanship on the part of the artist, the giant’s face is drawn the wrong way up, thus giving the impression that the forehead is directly attached to the neck.116 In this episode Ahura Mazda repulses the assault of the forces of Evil, creatures of Ahriman, who are attempting to invade Heaven.117 1v (plate 275). A figure is lying full length on a rocky mountain, which is painted grey. Apart from his left arm, which is bare, he is entirely covered by a full, pleated mantle, part of which shrouds his head. He rests his bearded head in his hand as he supports his weight on his left elbow. Above the recumbent body the leafy branch of a tree has been painted. The god lying on the rocks appears on a number of Mithraic bas-reliefs.118 He is sometimes depicted holding the sickle!® and ought therefore to repre- sent Kronos, who, according to one legend, after being dethroned by Zeus was confined to a cave, where he continued to utter oracles in his sleep. On the other hand, the head sometimes wears horns or lobster claws which identify him as a water divinity. According to Berosus’ famous version of the story of the Babylonian flood, Kronos had revealed the imminence of the flood to the hero, Xisuthros, and ordered him to construct a huge boat in which to escape. This myth was probably conflated with Mazdean traditions, which record that after the failure of the demons’ assault on Heaven a new invasion of Ahriman was averted by the rain which Ti8tar caused to fall, thus inundating the whole earth.120 At Dura the only addition to the usual type is 48 [The giant is evidently falling head first and the fact that his head is drawn as if he wore Sanding erect doubtless results from an exaggerated application of the principle of tality. 17 TMMM 1, p. 157. 18 TMMM 1, pp. 99 £., 155 (cf. the paintings in the Palazzo Barberini, note 113 above). 4° Cf, the marble relief found by the English painter, Fagan, at Quadraro (near Ostia) at the end of the eighteenth century and now housed in the Cortile of the Belvidere in the Vatican City (cf. W. Amelung, Die Skulpturen des Vatikanischen Museums, Berlin, 1903, P- 692 Ko. 8695 CIMRAM 1, pp. 146, No. 321) and on a bas-relief from Nersae in Aequiculs in the Abruzzi, now at the Museo delle Terme in Rome (cf. G. Mancini, ‘Il culto mitriaco 0° [amtorio Abruzzese’, AGSA 1931 [repr., Casalbordino 1932], pp. 1 f.3 CIMRM 1, p. 249 f No. 650.) On the harpé as a Chaldean weapon, adopted at an early period by the S ea which later became an attribute of Kronos, see H. Seyrig, Syria xvut, 1987) P- ey rhs account of the scene summarises an interpretation proposed in RHR om, 193% P. 38 f. On the sleep of Kronos, accompanied by prophetic vaiovs, see Poblene, RE (pent Kronos, and its meaning ch placed ae a ee foolhardy to compare the verdant ay Os (ie would obvi » Noah. ) aa the dove brought am, wel attend the birth of Mithra. As wou aye). Follwe nexooyerte already wearing his Phrygian cap, al te youn acky mass. As yet only his bare torso 18 visible. In each issu . i . a lighted torch!22 and, as an unusual detail, red flames ee nd him from the petra genetrix.128 At the moment Mithra xan a orld light immediately appeared, as at the birth of Orphic ai in terms of this motif he was closely assimilated.124 Part we plastered wall had become detached, and two _yn. Alarge portion of the “ ee Ieft-hand side are therefore lost. If the sequence was the a as that in the West, we would expect to find the puzzling scenes of Mithra harvesting fruit or ears of corn and hiding in the branches ofa tree,125 putit is idle to quibble about these lost pictures. vm (plate 282). The illustration of the sacred legend is continued on the righthand side, First of all we find the well known figure of Mithra shooting at the rock to make a spring of water gush forth.126 His face is, as elsewhere, frontally portrayed and he is therefore drawing his bow without looking at his target, It has been suggested that the rock was actually a cloud from which the divine archer caused the rain to fall.127 At Dura, however, as in pay other representations of this scene, Mithra shoots his arrow in a aon Plane and not into the air; this fact obviously excludes such an ite cont ae rock most commonly rises directly from the ground,128 but vail of a ave Th i overhanging, thus apparently representing the Beighein We nee th ips ' an clearly observed on the bas-relief of intins was watered b a e mythical grotto of which the spelaea were ‘ead chao Cp y natural springs.180 The sacred legend recounted om 5 iA'D. Nock and A. J. Festugiére, Hermes Trismegistos 1, Paris 1945, X.5 nF, 1, pp. 159 f. ‘ng buta dagger Tepresentations of his birth, in the other (cf. TMMM 1. pees customarily carries a torch in one (atiaggneY Perhaps cory : 1, p, pare a bas-relief oe sp tin be te Coat Mowtanenan a Upper Mona SL at ot genta ee Sigerus. CE St Teron 348, No. 2237) at least in that a burn- ei le Nin Fruits Ado. Tovinian. 1.7 (ap. TMMM n, p. comes 1984 p. 65 in lapide uel in terra de solo aestu ©. 4, 5: crt PP 163 £5 of a B85 CIMRAg y 13 £5 cf, P. Behn, Mi ops MMi, Pp. 103 f,, Nos, vee tiga zu Dieburg, :, ‘inti *. ie he n, in fe Palazzo Barbet lcuenhei, following D: Bob Ne CEMRAL m, pos ag » No, 123 4{, No, 1288) and Mainz (Mogon ei Berlin 1928, pp. 8 f. with bibliography). ini; CIMRM 1,p. 169, No. 390). No. 1301).17g eR ee the way in which Mithra had made running water spring up in thi cavern by striking the stone with his arrows. Since, however, the vaul S vast cave was regarded as a symbol of the firmament (cf. p. 164 above) a of the can be allegorically interpreted as applying to the sun piercing the , ee cath ite raye and thus causing the rain to fall. (Note the remarkable precig, with which the artist has reproduced the appearance of an Iranian toe ae of wood reinforced with horn and famed for its marvellous power).31 1x (plate 280). Starting with the next scene, the artist has represented th epic struggle of Mithra and the primeval bull created at the beginning of i world. This subject appears elsewhere in more highly developed forms, and only two episodes have been retained at Dura. Mithra, clothed in a tuni white trousers and red mantle, rides on the back of the fiery bull, portrayed e a flying gallop.182 Red waving lines represent either a mountain top or perhaps a river across which the bull is leaping at a single bound. The god’s right hand is raised and he seems to be extending his first and little r. This is the gesture which is still made today to avert the evil eye.15 His out- stretched left arm carries a red globe the significance of which remains unclear.184 x (plate 28¢). Mithra hasnow tamed his formidable foe. He is portrayed ina standing position, holding the hind legs of the bull, which is flung over his shoulder. On his back he carries the carcass of the beast whose head and forelegs droop down to the ground and possibly even touchit. The application of the principle of frontality has made this scene particularly clumsy (cf. 2. 116 above), for the progress of the god should have been represented in profile. Nevertheless, the significance of this portrait of Mithra taurophores, the rival of Cacus, is well established, and we possess numerous examples of it.135 The BovxAdmoc Beds transports the bull he has just overpowered into his 381 Cf, Medinger, RA, 1933, P- 227, and the bow found at Irzi by Cte. du Mesnil. A Syst bow belonging to a cohort of Hamii has been found in Britain (ch. G, MacDonalt, aw Wal in Scolland®, Oxford 1934, P- 284). A. Alfoldi (Funde aus der Hlunnenctt Oe cis 1932, pp. 18 f.) believes that the Huns introduced this type of bow into Europe origin is considerably more ancient. | 1, Row ge MMM 1, p- 470 (ct. Bd 15:27, 17:4, 19313). On the flying gallop, see eel od tovtzeff, ‘Parthian Art and the motive of the flying gallop,” in Independence with 2 Borrowing in Institutions, Thought and Art, Harvard University Press 1936) PP- #8 for further bibliography). . + ef, Cumonh 333 Cf, S. oO hase Blick und verwandtes 1, Berlin, 1940, P- 1875 coe Fouilles, pp. 137, and Francis, ‘Graff’, p. 436, ». 63). rat Newent 138 Nothra cocigenus carries a globe in a similar fashion on the great bate the (cf. n, 128 above) and also as a mounted god on another relief appa (CIMEM Te Mithraeum (CIMRM 4, p. 117, No. 1289); cf. the relief in the Villa Ne nf 152 f, No. 94) and at Kénigshofen (R. Forrer, Das Mithra Helicon 7 eal 38 Sirassburg, Stuttgart 1915, p. 43) CIMRM m, pp. 129 f+ Nos. 19g 75> Xan actsibe Perhaps this object represents a celestial globe, like the one whic be 58 68 Teo the sun, for example, on a Mithraic relief in Rome (CIMRM » P. Tc ryggea 5 P- 38 TMMM1, pp. 170 f (ef. the paintings in the Palazzo Barberi aeThe Dura Mithraeum 175, cave and, on the left of the scene, a high-arched doorway, > represents the opening of the gloomy cay aint ern. This represen cd black, entrance of the cave is unique (cf. n, 135), ntation of the xs (plate 292). The next scene, the pact of Sol and Mithra. i the Mithraic monuments with a frequency which vine troduced on of the religious importance attributed to it. In oft ae ication either so small or executed in so sketchy a fashion that its inte relat a fay long been subject to doubt.136 The Dura painting now pein us to ond _ stand its full significance more precisely. acer | Its general meaning has alread; been ascertained through a comparison with the ceremony, described by Suetonius and Dio Cassius, of the crowning of Tiridates of Armenia by Nero.18? The Mazdean prince gave homage to the emperor as he did to Mithra,188 and as he knelt before him Nero took off the Persian tiara he was wearing and crowned his head with a diadem. Mithra’s coronation of the Sun is also a scene which was particularly favoured in Mithraic painting and sculpture. At Dura Sol kneels before Mithra and lifts both his arms in a sign of adoration.189 With his right hand Mithra has taken off his cap, which he raises in a triumphant gesture,140 and lays his left hand on the head of Sol. Above the figure of Sol we see the radiate crown or nimbus!41 which the Sun wore in the banquet scene. In the Iranian cult this halo could only be the Hoaren6, an original Mazdean conception which played so great a role in the political and religious beliefs of earlier Asian peoples.14? It is a kind of super- natural fire, a brilliant aura pertaining to certain divinities but which also illuminates legitimate princes and, by sanctifying their power, assures their victory. The laying on of hands is a familiar liturgical gesture in Judaism and the earliest Christian ritual, especially at the ceremonies of baptism, con- firmation and ordination. Texts clearly refer to the prilliance of the Holy 188 TMMM 1, p. 172. 387 F, Cumont, Riv. di Filol. uxt, 1933, PP. 145 f io Cassi i ay Dedv, mpoaxvniaw? 124 Cf, Dio Cassius 63.10: xai #A0dy te mpdc a8 [scil. Négaoval tov éudr Dedv, : 02 dc al rdv MiBpay; Ps-Callisth, 2.14.5 ede Kroll): ag’ dMlyov azar ngnoexcirncer ds mem Reports vu-vin, p. 107 and n. 28. « . Reports, loc. cit, . the head Mo Ta bi raised hand, Mithra holds the red cap which he bas removed fom the bead Sol. Elsewhere, this cap is often drawn somewhat indistinctly, but .) No. t4go) and found at Virunum (TMMM 1, pp. 335 £ mon. 2353 CIMRM m, PP. 18? W142), Ona Oserburken (TMMM u, pp. 348, 509, mon. 2643 CIMRM m PPT v.90), Mithra Roman relief (TMMM ut, pp. 200 fy mon. 16, fig. 263 CIMRM © P. pein the head of Sol aps the Phrygian bonnet in his left hand and once again P { Sexi, MTU, plate 17, fig. 90)- . (ex 10n: Sometimes this object has the form of a radiate crown (©8111 pura painting) its 32, fi. 40; CIMRM 1, pp. 146 £., No. 321, with bibliography, but repcbtedly a nimbus; cf, the bas-relief at Virunu ne ed ‘sented more clearly than it is anywhere else (an : 6, Rv*R¢ of the Heddernheim relief (TMMM 11, pp. 362 fs aon pesentiD8 Sol’s two piece? of he3)s the nimbus is placed around the Phrygian cap, thus nitdgear successively bestowed upon him. Cl TMMM y, pp. 284 f.176 Franz Cumont Ghost,148 and we may safely suppose that Mithraists attribute g_; power to the nimbus.¥44 In laying his hands on the head of the Sun Mae causes the brilliant nimbus of Hvaren6 to descend upon him; he cinse lithra, him as the legitimate ruler of the world. He will henceforward inal *Hiws Baotdedc, often invoked in the empire and particularly in Syriatts® the invincible protector of armies. We can scarcely doubt that the impositi as of hands which we have observed in the sacred myth also became part ree ritual and was particularly prominent in the ceremony of Mithraic initiatio ‘ xu (plate 296). The effect of the investiture conferred on Helios by Mithrg is to make them mutual allies.146 Under the inspiration of his new partner Mithra finally slew the mighty bull. The next scene shows us the carcass of the heavy beast being carried by two beardless men in oriental costume and crowned, like Mithra, with tiaras. They have hung the dead bull from a pole slung over the right shoulder and which they hold with both hands. This aspect of the legend is represented uniquely at Dura. In all probability these young men are the two acolytes of Mithra, Cautes and Cautopates, who customarily act as torchbearers but who may also assume other functions in the myth of the bull.14? They are evidently carrying the bull to the place where the feast of Mithra and Sol, the subject of the final scene, will be celebrated. xm (plate 29c). Two persons, facing to the right, sit or recline on the hide of the dead bull.148 Sol is on the left; his head is encircled by the nimbus, from which seven rays are flashing, and in his left hand he clasps a drinking horn. On the right, Mithra, wearing his red Phrygian cap, holds a similar rhyton, 148 Cf Dict, d’archéol, chrét. vil, 1926, pp. 391 £. (s.v. ‘imposition des mains’) which draws together diverse evidence concerning this topic. The Cathars, who probably follow old Manichaean traditions, also confer a similar consolamentum. For them, the only true baptism js that ‘of the Holy Spirit and Fire’ as opposed to baptism by water (cf. in the W.T., Mt. u-1i3 ‘Acts, 1) and they administer it by the laying on of hands (cf. Schmidt, Histoire dela sect de Cathares 11, Paris 1849, pp. 119 £3 for the ‘imposition of hands’ in Manichacism, st Schmidt, Manichdische Handschriften 1, Stuttgart, 1935, CaP. 95 PP- 37 f).In this note, 1 eT i cite all relevant analogies; for further information, therefore, see Hastings eas (64 Religion and Ethies, s.v. ‘hand’, pp. 493-5); Handwérterbuch des deutschen Aberglan os ‘Hand’) ; Dict. de théol. cathol. vt, 1922, pp. 1307-253 L. de Bruyne (‘L'imposition i ensive dans Part chrétien ancien’, Riv. di archeol. crist. xx, 1943, PP. 1 £) gives @ comPr account of the evidence. sigan ital 144 Against this comparison one might object that, in Jewish and Christian ™ ae i Jays on not both hands but only one, it is always the right. At Dura, however, rn art obSe! Mithra is placing his left hand on the head of the kneeling Sun. In fact, Mie — no consistency with regard to this detail: at Heddernheim, for example, Helios with his right hand. « ef, the inscription 145 R, Dussaud, Notes de mythologie syrienne 1v, Paris, 19055 pp 110 £5 © "go, No- x017) deo/inuict(o) regi (Bandorf, TMMM un, p. 159, No. 466; CIMRM 1, Prnéologie lai? On the astrological speculations associated with this title, see F. ‘Cumont, 53+ Meénoires prisentés par divers savants (hereafter MPSAL) x11, 2, Paris, 1919 Pr 4 of 48 TMMM 1, p. 173. ove) on which 147 Note, in particular, the reverse of the Heddernheim relief (cf. n. 143 i 178 plow): ost carry a basket full of fruits or loaves beside the body of the slain bull (of Pe ‘Soh and Mi 148 Cf, the white marble relief discovered at Fiano Romano in 1926 whe Dura Mithraeun 7 now damaged, in his left hand. A peculiar detail desery, ; the left-hand corner stands a figure with the head of a Special comment: in chest of a bird. He is, however, dressed in a tunic with’ and the plump human legs are covered with trousers, and on his feet hy long sleeves, his poots. His beak is open as if he were speaking to his din: © 18 Wearing laced with his right hand, he offers them a spit on which viene, companions and, threaded, like the kebab of Eastern cook-shops, €s of meat seem to be ‘Another representation of the same scene but the Mithraeum before its final restoration. In caval dele ftcorated the cena Pearson discovered remains of this scene and, by joinin 0 cand stucco fragments, he has been able in part to reconstruct it,49 ne acther the ents worn by Sol and Mithra can now be more clearly discusted, ue tsual, Mithra holds the rhyton in his left hand, and the head of the Sun though otherwise bare, is encircled by a nimbus as he gazes up at his com- panion.150 The execution of this earlier painting is superior to that of the later one, which, however, owing to its better preservation, has greater religious interest. ‘The banquet scene which concludes the series of Mithra’s terrestrial exploits preceding his ascension on the chariot of the Sun was the prototype of the liturgical feast of the mysteries and is represented with great frequency in Mithraic religious art.151 In most cases, however, Mithra and the Sun are reclining together behind a table full of food. Only the bas-relief of Dieburg shows us at close quarters, as in Dura, the bull stretched out on the ground, turned towards the right, its legs tucked in as if it were undergoing its death throes, Behind the bull and on the left we see Mithra in his Phrygian cap beside the Sun, with his radiate crown on the right. Both hold a rhyton in their hands as if about to drink each other’s health.15? ist i 4 relief mith- ae distinctly shown stretched out on the hide of the bull (F. Gamont, (U0 bas-relief riaque du Louvre, RA, 1946 pp. 183-94; CIMRM 1, p. 238, No. 641). (The Bae ih Dura is probably similar.) I discuss the significance of this rite in RA (eet SD eed have consumed the bull’s flesh and drunk his blood. Thus, in the ritua, ore on to represented the bull’s flesh and wine his blood. At a later period, 1 8 17 tee himself Christian practice, we may imagine that it was the flesh and bl Zoroas! which the initiate claimed to consume in order to assure his salvation. fa a Reports vu—vin, plate 13, 3+ i Bs 59)-According to Mazdean cosmogony, the primeval bull, by means fi death, gave birth to vegetation.15> Various kinds of plants germinated j a different parts of the body. Thus his marrow produced the corn from whint we make bread, and from his blood came the vine. From clusters of ‘rapes ich this vine flowed the wine which Mithra and Sol drank at their feast ..4 which the initiates likewise drank as a draught of immortality at fas mystical banquets. For this reason the Mithraists’ most profound religi Ne beliefs were associated with the miraculous creation of beneficent plants a by representing the death of the bull in their shrines with a cluster of ears of corn sprouting from its erect tail, they frequently intended to recall the other marvellous consequences of this immolation. The moment immediately following the sacrifice was chosen by the artist of the Altieri bas-relief to symbolise the triumph of Mithra: the young god stands upon his out- stretched victim,154 knife in hand and encircled by mythical animals and plants. The reverse of the great bas-relief of Heddernheim has an even more specific significance.155 Mithra and Sol are standing behind the massive bull as it lies on its stomach. The Sun’s head is bare, but his Phrygian cap and the radiate nimbus by which it had been superseded (p. 175 above) are set beside him on a support. He offers Mithra a beautiful cluster of grapes. Mithra lifts one hand in a token of respect and in the other holds his drinking goblet. To the right and the left Mithra’s two habitual acolytes are carrying, not torches, but baskets full of fruit. This is the harvest gathered from the trees which have just been miraculously created. Comparison of these various pieces of sculpture serves to clarify the sense of the composition at Dura. In this painting the raven assists at the feast of the two divine dinner companions, as is also the case in certain other representa- tions of which we shall speak in a moment. Since this winged messenger of the Sun had brought to Mithra the charge of killing the bull,156 it is only natural that, once the sacrifice had been accomplished, the legend should reserve a place for the fateful bird in the banquet scene occasioned by this sacrifice. At Dura, however, as we have mentioned, the raven has a peculiar form, half-bird, half-human, Until now a similar figure has been ob: a only one composition, namely the bas-relief at Konjica in Bosnia (cf. p- a and n. 152 above). In this relief we should nolongersee, as was once believ merely a simple liturgical scene, a representation of the love feasts at celebrated in the mysteries. The group forms a close pair with that of Mu tauroctonos sculptured on the other side of the same relief, turning © 4 and representing an episode directly connected with the sacre out any doubt this episode is the customary banquet of Mithra an 188 TMMM 1, p. 197. 154 Id. 1, p. 221, mon. 54, fig. 51. 185 Jbid., pp. 362 f., mon. 251, plate 8 (cf. id. 1, p. 1975 CIMRM 1, 158 TMMM 1, p. 192. p. 66, No. 1085)The Dura Mithraeum "9 ut the divine dinner companions are suri we the masks of a Raven, a Lion anda Penns Py Mandiog figures carry- a ¢ Dura, as a Konjica, the myth has been id result those servants (Sanoévar)15? attend the fe cants in the ceremonies of Mithraic initiation, snimal masks. Itis entirely likely that the feode which the lion and the raven came to serve wi feasts and that, in order to represent the bird and. mood at the divine love office, the artist has given them a semi-human aspect vesembiin this domestic once of the Coraces and Leones in Mithraic ceremonies t98 ene Pea The raven of she Dura Mithraeum opens his beak as if he were addressin; the two diners,15° and at the same time he seems to be presenting them wi . slices of meat threaded on a long spit. We previously knew of. only one mons ment on which a similar oblation may be attested. In the Mithraeum at Poetovio the scene of the pact of Mithra and the Sun is represented with the participants standing on each side of an altar.!6° A morsel from the victim is skewered on a sacrificial knife which Mithra is holding vertically. The raven stoops to peck at this meat, and it is unclear whether he is about to take his share of it or, on the other hand, whether he himself carried it there with the purpose of sticking it on the sharp blade of the knife. At Dura, however, the raven is unquestionably offering the flesh of the sacrificial bull to the guests. According to a belief often associated with the celebration of a sacrifice, the pact between the two gods is consummated by their common participation in the bloody feast. In the course of this century two new representations of the banquet scene have been discovered which are of particular importance to our discussion, 151 Ch RHRox, 1994p. 65 (chp. 199 m. 269, below). [Cumont might aso have compared 4 i a (Rome) now in the ‘mancraven’ On the fragmentary bas-relief from the Castra Practoria ( 2 the Schloss Museum at Mannheim, cf. RA, Ser. 4, 2x1 (1902), P- 125 Reports VBl-Vil, P. X085 CIMRM 1, No. 397]. . : 188 Cf, at Quaest. wet. eb now. testy 113-11 (308, 20 ed. Caen 1, p.8) alii autem sicut aues alas percutiunt uocem coracis imitantes; alii wero vate Saying Mithra in which ior This detail can be seen in several other representations of PAINT, 1a"), As an the bird transmits the Sun’s message to the celebrant (cf. TM. MM ‘RH, ee cote initiatory grade, the Raven is termed fegdc xdga$ o many InsP i gonarica (CUL Vs 157 above), and the ceremony of initiation to this grade wom TOE" nyo, 4og). A come 751 b, dated 976 a.c.; cf. TMMM 1, p. 93) No. 105 CIMRM b P- yonk which Mithraists Fatison can probably be drawa between this tie and that of oo dhe cult herald. The borrowed from the Greek mysteries where the Raven we eee hat the Ravens actually Pasage from Ps-Augustine cited in note 158 Support me veoh spoke during the celebration of the Mysteries. ‘The ratification of pact is O° "100 Abratnié, Pofovin (ch: £12 above), Px £79) £8. 125, TM Fone’ victim (ck Die implied by the participation in a feast consisting of the ence his fellow-conspirat 37.30.3, a passage which describes Catiline’s alleged attempt 10 Comm). Such practice are 0 cat the entrails of a recently sacrificed child, cf. Flor. 4 “Seythians, ch ne at mentioned, for example, by Herodotus (Hitt 4-70 te an aa Armenia). Tbe Christ 1.19] id. 1.74 [Lydia]; id. 3.8 [Egyptl) and TA Cr yginacius, Ota” 30) apologists pointed with triumph at this revolting rite (CU lentified with the rite As ‘ast who assist the commun’. their faces concealed behind 46y0¢ itself related the way in180 Franz Gumont since they introduce certain elements which add further dimension conception of this, the supreme event of Mithra’s terrestrial mission.» our scenes are closely related, although they derive from regions widely oe from each other. Indeed, this fact itself offers confirmation of the fa * . 5 i - : funda. mental unity of Mithraic doctrine. The first is a decoration on the bottom of, cup discovered in 1905 in the Roman cemetery of St Matthew near Trier. 1 Mithra and the Sun are seated together on a divan in front of the food which they are about to eat, two small loaves of bread16 and, in a plate, perhaps a piece of meat.163 Sol prepares to drain his rhyton, which he holds in his right hand, while Mithra accepts his own rhyton from one of his two acolytes, now transformed into a cup-bearer and standing at his right. The second acolyte, on the left of the Sun, holds a scarcely distinguishable object in his left hand, possibly a napkin, and with his right offers a loaf of bread similar to those on the table. A huge lion is lying in front of this table, in the centre of the com- position.164 Above we see a large krater, encircled with a snake which is plunging its head inside the vessel as if about to drink its contents. The raven perches on the right and, on the left, a cock is moving towards the vase. If this assembly of gods and beasts appeared only on a small clay cup we might decide to attribute it to the potter’s imagination, but a recent dis- covery in Portugal brings us clear proof that the scene expresses a well established tradition in the mysteries. In the ruins of a Mithraeum at Troia (the ancient Caetobriga, situated opposite Setubal) five fragments of a sculptured relief have come to light.165 On the left of the original relief we see the remains of a representation of a bull-slaying god. A foreleg of the bull is still visible, Cautopates is lowering his torch, and, above, we see the portent of Luna. At the right and in the same proportions the banquet scene 1s repre- sented. We may therefore conclude that, as at Konjica, the two represent tions form a pair. Mithra is wearing his characteristic oriental costume, an¢ Sol’s nimbus is radiate. Both hold a rhyton in their left hands, and the sun god is moving to the right as if he intended to pick up an object (possibly oe drinking vessel?) which Cautes is carrying in both hands. Cautes’ to! ch fallen to the ground at his feet. Above the flame of this lighted torch we , 161 : 189 f, fig. 35 Saxl, MTU, p. 20, plate 1 eee tee oes Macnee exelent comment T° Heimathuch. Festschrift zur rheinischen Jahrtausendfeier, Trier, 19255 PP» 322-6. 20 f. i¢2 For a comparable offering in the liturgy of the Parsis, see TMMM » PP. 8 163 Cf, the role of the Raven discussed above (p. 178). - arth, Crab: WH 184 These animals represent the four elements (Lion: Fire, Snake: Earthy 0 i age wi Bird: Air), The cave in which the mystical banquet took place was conside 5 the world whose vault is the sky. For this reason, the symbols of those elements HO" eld the world is formed are represented there (cf. Porphyry, De antro aymphre™ 5) ayrig nave gégor05 [adr] too onndalov roi xdopov, bv 6 Midgas ednprobernTer ey i ydrami ovpperqor; dnoordoers ovupoka pegarrar rv xoopindy aro1zelar «6.88 1946, p. 191). 5 fy BB: 188 Co ice da Costa, Archeol. Port, xxix, 1930-31, appeared 1934 FX é fig. * CIMRM 1, p. 277, No. 798. Cf. Cumont, CRAT 1934, P. 2623 RA 1946, PP»The Dura Mithracum 181 rater encircled, as at Trier, by a snake, ‘i eyered torch in his left hand, and with Ae a heen Ca the krater as though he were going to pour some wee’ We have previously argued!66 that the group of the ki snake, frequently attested on the bas-relie fe of the Dy ens the krater and the symbolised three distinct elements—fire, water and ‘avit, Th and the Rhine, ations which we have just discussed confirm this interpretation eee case at Troia, the burning torch has been intentionally set n, for, in the one place of the fiery lion and, in the other at Trier, we near the krater in ary group, two birds which are clearly emb! ‘Utopates holds his AN cenochoe close to haa find, next to the custom- they fiy28? ‘ematic of the air through which In the Mithraic mysteries, however, explanations are always secondary. T! exegesis of the old tales and legends by which the artists who created these sculptures were inspired. It is not improbable that the sacred legend also reserved a role in the episode of the divine feast for the faithful companions of Mithra, the snake and the lion, who accompanied the Bedg &pumoc, and for the cock, sacred to Cautes,168 the dgvic [Tepauds whose voice, in announcing the appearance of the light, routed the demons.169 At Trier, as at Troia, we see that they also participated in the divine feast and probably drank of the wine which conferred immortality. We are, however, too ignorant of the Mithraic iegég Adyog to go into further details. Were the animals trans- formed into heroes with human form by virtue of this draught? It would be altogether hazardous to make such a suggestion in view of the poor state of our knowledge.1?0 The essential meaning of the act to which Mithraism attached so high a religious value is, however, confirmed by the monuments which we have just considered: reunited at the final meal before t ir ascension into Heaven, the two gods consume the bread made from d " grain produced by the body of the bull at its death and they oi : mn drawn from the vine which issued from its blood. Thus we yaeenen he glimpse of the parallels to which Justin Martyr alluded wi en to parody the vicious forces of evil of having created the Mithraic communio} institution of the Eucharist.17 18° TMMM 1, pp. 100 £,, 80. 1° Cf. Léschcke, op. cit. (cf. n. 161 above), P- 323+ 188 TMMM 1, p. 210. Jactos tenebris noctium / gallo oat 4% Prudentius, Cath, 1.973 ferunt uagantes daemanes, | ios RARA Vy 1927, P- 783 CRAD exterritos / sparsim timere et cedere (cf. TMMM 1, pp. 122) 210% ; Mid a reference (0 pitt, PP. 288 £25 Lux perpetua, pp. 230, 409 & [Cumont himself request ‘petua, cf preface, n. 14 above). . ‘om / "0 Léscheke ‘or. ai ) ‘has or sed a different interpretaior of the Eucharist, ¢ 2 "7 Justin, Apel, 1.65 (ch. TMMM 1, p- 230). OM this PATO © eq in which oo Attcle in RA 1946, pp. 183 £, expecially ros, where T discust & YEE, ‘or ahe bul in er Magi have apparently substituted the body of Zoroaitt 0 ens orgie ote Wa Ssctlfcial feast: The toxt in queation is entitled The Book of ti Bim ors Note that precisely these elements are represented in the Mitra such cosmological and astronomical hey belong to a system of recondite(b) The signs of the zodiac. The soffit of the vaulted niche was decorateg wi pictures of the twelve signs of the zodiac, each set in a rectangular frame ae plate 30). They were drawn in red-brown strokes and coloured with a neue shade of brown, red or yellow. Like the mythological Tepresentations whine we have just discussed, this series started at the top of the vault, above portrait of Kronos. The first picture, that of Aries, has disappeared like Taurus to its left. Lower down, the Gemini, often identified with Hercules and Apollo,1?2 are pictured as two young men standing side by side, The shoulders of Castor—Hercules are covered with the lion-skin hanging down his back. He supports himself by resting his right hand on his club, His left hand is at waist height and probably held the apples of the Hesperides, Apollo is represented as an ephebe dressed in a simple chlamys. His torso and legs are bare and he lacks any distinguishing attribute. Cancer is pictured as a large, reddish-brown crab, claws at the ready. Leo is painted yellow. He has a mane and is leaping to the right. Virgo is a woman, her head encircled by a nimbus, her body modestly veiled by Jong, pleated garments. Her lowered left hand may have held an ear of corn. The series continues on the right, progressing, like the legend of Mithra, from the bottom to the top. First we see Libra depicted as a rosy youth who stands naked, facing us as he holds aloft the scales, Next come Scorpio and Sagittarius. Scorpio’s coiled tail curves up to the left, and Sagittarius is pictured as a centaur galloping to the right and drawing his bow. His equine hind quarters are somewhat damaged. Finally Capricorn has a goat’s head and body, which, however, ends in the writhing tail of a sea monster. The plaster has come away from the upper curve of the vault and carried Aquarius and Pisces with it. . These figures are no different from many other familiar representations of the zodiac, but they acquire a certain iconographic importance from the fact that they can be precisely dated. We have already noted that these twelve celestial asterisms were reproduced on the larger of the two ise reliefs in the Dura Mithraeum (p. 166). According to astrological baie, these constellations were, together with the planets, the mighty artisans 0 human and material destiny. Like the Chaldeans, the votaries of Mithre accordingly considered them to be divine and rendered them passionate worship in all their shrines,173 7 A the (c) The two Magi. These two beautiful figures, painted on either side oe Piers of the cult niche, are of considerable value, for until now nothing 5 The 17? (CE. H. Seyrig, ‘Héraclés-Nergal’, Syria xxrv, 1944, pp. 76 £.; Susan B. pow. . Heracles Sculpture (= Dura-Europos Final Report m, pt. 1, fsc. 1, New Haven 1969, Pd ‘Thiele ie MMM x, p. 110 (on the ritual significance of the signs of the Zodiac); G- Thier Antike Himmelsbilder mit Forschungen 2u Kunstgeschichte des Sternhinmels, Berlin 1898s Bet antil- . Bouché-Leclerca, Astrologie greeque, Paris 1899, pp. 130 £3 Daremberg Saalcn (s.v. ‘Zodiacus’, pp. 1061 £)5 [K. Latte, Romische Religionsgeschichte, Munich 196°The Dura Mitiracum 183 i her Mithras has been found in any ot A cum (see plate 25), in Persian costume?”# and majestically enthroned car vay are both dressed Owing to the carelessness of the painter, who ignor with raised backs, d their four carved feet are all on the same level, The ma of perspective, wned with a tall, curved tiara and each i teach figure is with a wide, embroidered belt around the eee na long tunic sae ey both wear billowit breeches knotted at the ankle above their high boots. A yell ing been thrown around their shoulders and hangs dowa, Thee ee fastened at the chest with a round brooch. The tunic and the b ackss it is decorated in front with vertical stripes, and between double orders stom of buttons has been sewn. The neck of the tunic is embroidered like the welt The sleeves are circled with bands, like a claus, one at the wrists, the other round the upper arms. The figures wear a short beard and a drooping moustache. Their black eyes are wide open under arched eyebrows and their whole face is distinctively Iranian in type. The artist has executed these features with particular skill. He has endeavoured to reproduce the lines of the cheeks and the throat with especially distinct colours and has enhanced this effect with fine hatching which causes the white plaster to show beneath the colour. He apparently aspired to paint actual portraits, but whom did he intend to depict? The oriental sages each clasp a white volumen in their left hand and, in their right, a black cane with a flat pommel and tapered to a point which one holds erect and the other on a slant. The presence of the rolls defines them as teachers, and the black cane can only represent a magical ebony staff,1?5 the characteristic attribute of a thauma- 174 Cf. M, Rostovizelf (YCS v, 1935, pp- 279 £.): “The two figures are Palmyrene in all their characteristic traits. Their dress, while exactly the same as that of many of the heroiaed dead on the Palmyrene funerary bas-reliefs, is quite different from the dress of the ACO menid or Parthian Magi described above (viz. in “Dura and the problem of Parthian Ar, and hardly can be taken to be the dress of Palmyrene priests. It is the Borage dct of Palmyrene aristocracy. The style of the two figures is also Palmyrene ae with the style of the painted portraits of the deceased in late Palmyren® ETS Ts Note is not the slightest trace of Romanization or Hellenization in the Seuree F ieutal alto in the Mithraeum at Capua, the priests (or at least scien Nariace 3, PP» costumes (ef, Minto, Notizie degli Scavi xx1, 1924, PP- 961 £ eer reer a ria 8 16£. Cumont, Religions orientales’, plate 13. Compare the paterint! me it aed to ace ermaseren and van Essen, EMSP, p. 169). We might therefot™ On who had that the Dura portraits represent those members of the communi’) 0)", eatoned contributed to the construction of the shrine. Two patres palru SF" i+ is doubtful if ©n one of the inscriptions (Reports vn—vul, No. 855; CIMRM 1, No. ea "RAI 1945) P» 417 maything definite can be inferred on the basis of such evidence (<* 2. 3). sens in ane tg [eb}- “9 Ps..Callisth, 1.1 éBervlony édBdov; trans. Jul. Valer. 1 ce 279 (= Sole 15 P> ao At per magicas artes, uocabat daemones K- Picea pov Gy oj hau 2001 xth. ‘xal otodlcas ceautov 1 ine oynpart EXE & sow 23 : g (6, ps 18); ude Gan (Cooks & Bs 40): 015d 000 X01 TH TE coop armgoerea ai m7... nad nddapos % Boxctngla, ,xeveoOres ; Roscher, Lexicon (s.v. ‘Zauberstab,’ P- 555)184 Franz Cumont turge or Magus.176 In the Acta Archelai Hegemonius described th ance of Mani in precisely these terms—in manu ualidissimum baculy @Ppear. ex ligno ebenino, Babylonium uero librum portabat sub ala sinistegtrnn denebat may assume that in second- and third-century Syria the founder ofann i was so represented. Beside the episodes from the legend of Mithra the et has illustrated the famous teachers of the sect, just as the painter raat neighbouring synagogue set images of prophets in the middle of on ihe scenes. If we seek to identify these two seated Magi in more detain names which first come to mind are those of Zoroaster, who instituted th, mysteries,179 and Osthanes, most famous among his disciples and character, istically associated with him in the West.180 This Painting, certainly prior to 256 a.c., would then represent the earliest known Portrait of Zoroaster, 181 although this fact obviously cannot guarantee the validity of the likeness The reformer of Mazdeism is here shown holding a book, for he is the mythical legislator of Iran and the supposed author of its sacred literature, The distinctively oriental appearance of these two Fathers of Mithraism helps us understand the point of Firmicus Maternus’ reproach against Zoroaster’s votaries, that they have enslaved the Romans to a Persian cult and to Persian laws.182 Indeed, it is a curious religious phenomenon that at the period in which the empire was desperately defending the Euphrates frontier against the Sasanids, the Roman legionaries stationed there were worshipping their enemy’s god and recognising the spiritual authority of the Iranian Masters of the Magi. 176 From Homer’s Circe to the enchantresses of the Middle Ages, the staff had always been the special property of thaumaturges; note also that the Jews attributed it to Moses and the Greeks to the Brahmans (Philostr., Vit. Apoll., 3.15). It is even more appropriately the in- signia of a magus in his role as magician. In Mandacan baptism, the celebrant likewise holds a staff (cf. M. Lidzbarski, Mandéische Liturgien, Berlin 1920, p. 2t). 377 Hegemonius, 27 (p. 22, Beeson). 178 On the vate Daremberg and Saglio, Dict. antig. (s.v. ‘cathedra’). 119 Porphyry, De antro nympharum, 6 (cf. TMMM 3 P. 314) 0. 5). 180 Bidez and Cumont, Mages hellénisés 1, pp. 39, 98. . 381 A. V. W. Jackson (Zoroaster, App. vil, pp. 288-94) has listed the sculptures ne “ thought to represent Zoroaster. The Syriac Apology of Meliton already mentions an ee Zaradust, the Persian Magus (W. Cureton, Spicilegium Syriacum, London 1B PP e Mages 9%, 2. 365 E. Benveniste, Le monde oriental xaxv1, 1992, p. 1715 Bidex and Cumonl £3, hullénsés u, pp. 94 £. cf. p. 157, n. 32 above). In all probability, however, the Bet p, Tak-i-Bostan is the earliest sculptural representation of Zoroaster (cf. rd ¢ Herzfeld, Iranische Felsreliefs, Berlin 1910, pp. 199 f.). In this relief, cmd ve led bY # crown to Ardatir as an emblem of rule; in the rear stands a figure whose head is 67° radiate nimbus and who holds in his hand a large staff (a oxijrtgov?), oF 2 iy identified (baresman?) (cf. Vermaseren, Mithriaca t, P18, 7). This personage is us im Zoroaster in his role as founder of the true faith. - i> magonsn 182 Firm. Mat., de err. prof. rel., 4: wos itaque qui dicitis in templis rite < so ‘oor, persica, cur hase Persarum sola laudatis? si hoc Romano nomine dignum pulalis ©" C-a, censure Persarum legibus seruiat .. .(TMMM ny, p. 143 cf. Origen, contr. Cels. 6.2 (Call. Mas a Rom is addressed against Manichacism in a repressive law of 297 oF 302 ks Sea aduersria nobis leg., 15.3.4): Manichaei ueluti noua et inopinata prodigia in hun munduam de pers gente progressa uel orta,The Dura Mithraeun 185 ‘Mithra tauroctonos with cypress trees and altars. Above the t @ entire upper part of the outer surface of the arch of the oie hats wwas covered by a unique composition (see plate 22). The centre of this ‘eure was occupied by a third representation of bull-slaying Mithra, It is badly damaged, since large sections of plaster were detached from the wall and not all of them have been recovered among the heaps of debris. The surviving pieces suggest that, by contrast with the bas-reliefs (pp. 165 ff.), this painting conformed in all respects to the characteristic Western type. A large snake, coloured green, black, brown and red, slithers beneath the bull’s belly and a scorpion pinches the testicles of the stricken beast. On both sides, the torchbearers stand with their legs crossed. In the damaged figure on the right we see only the lower part of the legs and some of his body, including the left arm, his head has been lost. The figure is dressed in Persian costume resembling that of the two Magi we have just described. Set on both sides of this central group, seven cypress trees alternate with seven flaming altars. In fact the artist had painted eight altars, but one of them was obliterated in antiquity so as not to exceed the sacred number of seven.183 ‘The trees have reddish-brown trunks and a yellowish foliage ending in a black tip at the end of each branch. In the midst of the foliage of the one near the dadaphore on the right we can clearly distinguish the small pink figure of a naked child whose torso appears to issue from a formless mass, perhaps representing rocks, like the petra genetrix of Mithra at his birth. The seven cypresses and the seven altars occur fre- quently on the bas-reliefs of Germany and Italy,18¢ and we are familiar with several representations of a figure wearing a Phrygian bonnet emerging from the branch of one of these conifers.185 Even if the sevenfold representa tion obliges us to conclude that these altars and cypresses are connected with the cult rendered to the planets,18° the significance of the child, an additional feature, remains very puzzling. Since, however, the Mithraic cult at Dura was established by Palmyrenes, it would be difficult not to compare this representation with the celebrated altar of the Capitol, dedi- cated to Malakhbel, where the child, emerging from a large cypress and carying a kid over his shoulders, probably depicts the birth of the solar 800.187 Tt is for this reason that the figure in the spelaewm has been given the san the Mareus dip No. 859, plate 18, 25 cf. p. 169, 8. TO4 i ipinto (Reports vut-vut, p. 104, No, 853, plate 1° Os atove) is beneath the Haat ater onthe let, For the alternating cypress tres and altars, jambare the Barberini frescoes (CLMIM 1, p. 168; No. 390); note abo TMMA 1p. 16h Bors va-vin,p. 113. [One might speculate that the eight eypresses wore Sone ly drawn, pot merely in error or for the sake of decorative symmetry, but to conform toa cures Fredilection for symbolical octets (cf. the proverbial ndvra dvr) which, however were et rian aly part of Mithraic liturgy; on this point, cf R, Reitzenstemy » PP. 224 £.], TMM We ltid, p.i6g On wy ids pe 15, ‘is ic . 178. CLF. Cumont, Syria 1x, 1928, pp. tor £3 H. Seyrign Syria xv) 1935» P 1186 Franz Cumont appearance of Mithra saxigenus. The interpretation of this episode of the legend is further complicated by the fact that in the Poetovio Mithraeum, three heads with Phrygian caps emerge from the tops of three cypress trees,188 and that in Dieburg three branches are growing from the knotted trunk of a single cypress. Each of these branches ends in a precisely similar miniature head.189 Behn has reasonably compared this peculiar scene with the reference in Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite!® to a teuAdovoc Midgac, commemorated by the Magi. This ‘threefold Mithra’ apparently designates the god and his two inseparable acolytes, Cautes and Cautopates, who with him formed a trinity.191 Did the Mithraic tradition recount how Mithra, after being born from the rock, for some reason took refuge in a tree and how, by some miraculous prodigy, this tree then produced three identical divinities? I fear that we must await the discovery of a Mithraist’s library, like that of the books of the Manichaeans, before we shall, with any certainty, be able to explain this rebirth and threefold nature of the deus Saxigenus. (e) The hunt of Mithra.192 The most remarkable of all the compositions ex- ecuted by the artist (or the artists) of the Dura Mithraeum are those which decorate the side walls of the adytum, reproducing, on either side, the hunt of Mithra (see plate 24). On the left wall, drawn in large red strokes, a horseman clothed in characteristic Persian costume gallops towards the right. His large mantle floats behind him in the wind, indicating the speed of his course. A quiver full of arrows hangs from the saddle, which is not pictured but which is supported by a crupper. The god lets the reins fly over the neck of his mount, whose shoulders are decorated by round phalerae, and he is preparing 188 Abramié, Poetovio (cf. n. 112 above), p. 75, fig. 163 Saria (op. cit. cf. m. 112 above) com pares this scene with other accounts of men or gods being born from plants or trees (cf. E Rohde, Die griechische Roman und seine Vorliufer8, Leipzig, 1914, p. 208, n. 43 Cumont, Syria ®% 1928, pp. 105-8). The account given by the Bundakiin according to which the first human couple drew their power from the earth like a plant proves that analogous beliefs were 1° foreign to Mazdeism. 188 Behn, Mithrasheiligtum, p. 15. i 190 Epist. 7: wdyot td pvnudcvva t08 toinaatov Midoov relotot (cf. TMMM n, P. bv CRAL 1947, pp. 303 £, fig. 1, on the bas-relief from Baris in Pisidia; CIMRM 1, p. 5% No. 25, ¢ At Baris, Mithra has been identified with Niké and is being accosted by two palm-bear Victories. [On the interpretation of this relief as a Niké-taurokione, see M. P. Nilsson, schichte der grichischen Religion uw, Munich, 1961, p. 643, plate 16, 13 CRAL, 1948, P- 40% (Cie by Vermaseren, loc. cit., on the general question of bull-slaying Niké, see E. Will, cultuel gréco-romain, Paris, 1955, pp. 169 f. 191 Cf. TMMM 1, p. 208. 1 Roe 198 (CE. Reports vut-vut, pp. 112 f, plate 14, 153 CIMRM 1, pp. 68 f., No. 525M. Fs ™ay tovtzeff, YCS v, 1935, pp. 280 f.: ‘Mithras is dressed . . . in a Palmyrene parade res °° ory told, this figure looks exactly like the figures of Palmyrene nobles, and rather differet! ye the horsemen scratched and drawn on the walls of Dura buildings.’ For an accoun animals in the scene, see appendix 13,2, by G. Evelyn Hutchinson. ].The Dura Mithraeum 187 rrow from his bow. Instead of directly facing his target, however, to shoot an 2 ds the spectator.193 Once again the princi f his face towar 0 85 ¢ principle of he turns has been rigorously observed. A purplish-blue snake, flecked with . dss along beneath the feet of the horse, accompanying him in his white, In front leaps 2 lion, Mithra’s familiar animal, serving him here as ep. eat The painter has indeed depicted the lion with its mouth open : we red tongue hanging out like that of an over-exerted dog. Higher up, iw deer with large antlers bearing well developed tines!95 and, in front two fm, two gazelles with curved hors flee before the hunter, like the Jarge brown wild boar in the foreground.196 All these animals, except, of course, the lion and the snake, have been pierced by the arrows of the god, two of which have broken at the violence of the shock. Red blood flows from their wounds, which, however, do not cause them to break their stride. ‘Trees and stylised plants which dot the field provide a brief indication of the terrain in which the tireless hunter pursues his game. ‘The scene on the right is similar but less well preserved. There does not appear to be any snake and instead we see a lion beneath the belly of the charger, which is portrayed in a flying gallop. In the countryside, amid green vegetation, three gazelles and a second lion, this one wild, seek in vain to escape the shafts of the divine archer.197 This hunt of Mithra is not unknown in the West. In Germany one of the accessory scenes of the great bas-relief of Osterburken!9 depicts the mounted god drawing his bow and followed by a servant carrying a bundle of arrows. 193 Cf, the similar posture of Mithra in the scene discussed on p. 173; M. I. Rostovtzeff, lee, city and ‘Une tablette votive thraco-mithriaque du Louvre,’ MPSAI xm, 2, 1923, ‘especially plate 4. 44ND, Aclian, de nat. anim., 17.26: [In India, the lions] kai #yeepotvral te xai yiyrovrat Gora whad0l, cig yew ye dd Guriigas ez) Ojoay xeudduw nal éidpaw xat afew xal tatoo ‘al dyolan Exon. elou pag nal Gemfarijaar ds dxovw dewol (ed. Hercher), 0. Keller (Die a Tierwelt1, Leipzig, 1909, p. 80) believes that Aelian is actually referring to the cheetahs pith were used by the pharoabs in their antelope-hunts since the period of the Eighteenth (rag! and stl remained popular in the East in his own times. ‘According to Martial inthe and 104), however, Domitian had lions trained to catch hares and carry them alive reich, Se He also undoubtedly used them at the wenationes in the Circus (cf. O. Wein- in dunt nat Mortal, Stuttgart, 1928, pp. go f. [G. Jennison, Animals for Show and Pleasure WS Accorht, Manchester University Press, 1937, p- 75 ¢t passim]). been fale in’ 10 H. Seyrig’s view (Syria x1v, 1933, p- 369, n. 1), these animals would have ac eae which are still found in Syria, The tines, however, seem to be different from P2106, below), on the hunting mosaic at Apamea. [On this question, see appendix 13.2, TI m ia HM n, p. 348, p. 509, mon. 246 (CIMRM n, pp. 117 f No. 1293). at on te ene Reports viv: ‘the picture on the right wall... s almost identical with very small ge 7all The only difference is that the snake is omitted and its place is taken by ‘helion of the enh tule the place of the boar is taken by a large fierce lion, almost a copy of, Ome ofthe viewer Picture. Note that this lion has no arrow in his back and probably is not he ms but a helper of Mithras;’ cf. p. 214, below]. ; {rote Texas of be 24 Mon. 310. Since Mithra ephippos was virtually unknown at the tie "wibution of tig cunts (TMMM), 1 originally entertained some doubts regarding the Monument to the cult of the Persian god. Subsequent discoveries have,188 Franz Cumont Under the belly of his galloping horse a lion moves forward, bas-relief from Neuenheim,1°9 in front of a Broup of rocks why growing, Mithra, as in the Dura fresco, is mounted on a galloping ha” and accompanied in his journey by a lion and a snake. He does nee ce ever, draw his bow but is holding a globe in his left hand 200"pi importan, of this episode in the legend and the cult of the mysteries was, howen revealed only in 1926 by the discovery of the bas-relief at Dieburg, where er, the centre of the carved relief, it occupies the place ordinarily reserved { e the group of Mithra éauroctonos.20l The horseman is galloping in front of a cypress tree, which provides the sole indication of rural landscape, He energetically draws his bow as he is about to release an arrow, but he is accompanied not by the lion and the snake but by a pack of three Molossian to the Rhine frontier, and he suggested that the special character which the Persian god had assumed was due to a syncretism with the Germanic Wotan, This suggestion might otherwise have been accepted with reservation but is now precluded by the discovery at Dura, which places the Problem on a larger canvas.©2 We must now inquire when and how the conception arose of a solar god who hunted on horseback. Mithra is already described as an archer in the Avesta. The Mihr-Yait mentions arrows among the weapons with which he fights and strikes down his enemies.203 When Mithra subsequently became a solar god the character of this Mazdean Apollo as an archer could only be enhanced. The rays which the flaming sun shoots forth have been generally compared with the shafts which the bow shoots across the void.204 Moreover, this bow, together with the knife, is the weapon which the iconography characteristically attributes to Mithra,205 and we have seen that one of the most frequently reproduced episodes of his legend was that occasion on which he caused however, shown that these doubts were unjustified. The Dura fresco has put the matter finally beyond doubt [cf. E. Will, Le relief cultuel, p. 119 et passim). 389 TMMM, loc cit. (CIMRM u, p. 117, No. 1289). 300 On this globe, see p. 174 above and n. 34. %01 Behn, Mithrasheiligtum, pp. 8-10, plate 1. oui ie 202 Note the earlier robjectinas of Saxl, MTU, p. 77; cf. F. Cumont, althra om a Mineure’, in Anatolian Studies presented to W. H. Buckler (ed. W. M. Calder and J n Manchester University Press, 1939, p. 73, n. 53 cf. A. D. Nock, Gnomon 1930) e Seals X, Latte, id., p. 55530n the Parthian Heracles (= Verethragna?) as 8 mounted i SEG vn.36 (Reporis va—vm, p. 115, n. 63; cf. Cumont, op. cit, p. 74 and . 2. ee Provenance of the representation of the hunting scene, compare the Luristan oe 96 fi century B.c.) discussed by R. Dussaud (Syria xv, 1934, p. 1885 ibid. xxv1, 1949) M. I. Rostovtzeff, C5 v, 1935, pp. 279 f.). 8 Trio. ror f, 119 f,, 128 fete. 2 TMMM 1, p. 165, 0. 4. sa back, see THMM th *°8 For the bull-slaying Mithra with his bow and quiver slung over his pat 34h P.a11, mon. ag, fig. 38 (Rome; CIMRM 1, pp. 213 £, No. 5463 cf. TMM: ting on the 241, fig. 215); for Mithra’s bow, quiver and arrows beside his dagger, resThe Dura Mithraeum 189 ogo forth from the rock by striking it with his arrows (p. 173 er ne) ya, however, this archer is not a horseman. Mithra, like an In the Aves vides on a magnificent war chariot drawn by four white oriental ae the quadriga of Roman generals at their triumphs. Certain porses™° ae ever suggest that the horse was not merely the proper indication tim of Hwvaré, ‘the sun god,20? but also his mount.208 We might ifcial te that, through an internal development within Mazdeism, ula . : ea a solar god in the mysteries and exchanged his chariot for f Hvaré. ta ee gestions, however, require further examination. We have already mentioned (pp. 155 ff) that these mysteries had been celebrated in Asia Minor during the Hellenistic period. All the eastern part of the Anatolian plateau had been colonised by Persians. In addition to the Magi who celebrated the Mazdean cult there dwelt the satraps, masters of vast domains.209 Horse breeding was always widely practised in Cappadocia.?1° The Hittites already wrote treatises on the subject#!1 and imperial stud farms were still maintained in the Byzantine period.212 The principal strength of the armies of Mithridates was the excellence of their cavalry.218 In all likelihood, therefore, the Persian god first became a horseman in Asia Minor. Apart from the bas-reliefs of Baris, the only images of him which we possess from this region are those stamped on the coins of Trapezus. On one coin of Alexander Severus and Gordian III?14 we see Mithra in fomwhich he was bora, see TMMM tt, p. 231, No. 69, fig. 62 (Rome; CIMRM 1, p. 224, No 5005 cf. p. 195, n. 245, below). Mig (5h 204 124 f. [on Mithra’s chariot, see Iya Gershevitch, The Avestan Hymn to ar emirides 1959, PP. 35-40 et passim]. phon, Anab. 4.5.35; Ovid, Fast. 1.385 f.: placat equo Persis radiis Hyperiona cinctum, eel alti tarda de (cf. TMMM 1, p. 126, n. 4). / tins Curt, 3.3.11: currum deinde Ioui sacratum albentes uehebant equi: hos eximiae magni~ swift —— Solis appellabant, sequebatur. The Avestan epithet of Hvaré is ‘he who has 2,404.01) o swift horse)’ (cf. J. Darmesteter, Le Zend-Avesta 11, Paris, 1892, P. 314 para. a CG - [On this matter, see Gershevitch, loc, cit., n. 206 above.] 20 Strabo i Religions orientales,¢ 1333 CAH x1, pp. 606 f., 919. Sie of ancient Res fa, ©: Johnson, Roman Egypt (= Tenney Frank, ed., An Economic ag Hreeng, ibe Baltimore 1936), p. 233, No. 125. a Misoncatcnssement des Shomer chez le anciens Indo-Européens, d’aprés “Reinach, Mina OF 8 (1931), PP. 431-63. "Daremberg aida Eupator, roi de Pont, Paris 1890, pp. 269 f. rae di lars, Peee ot antia. (s.v. ‘equitium’, col. 793); of. H. Grégoire, Saints TMMM 4, p. 190. Who Pp. 67 f.; F. Cumont, Byzantion v1, 1931, pp. 525 f. Dae it these coins bore an jy Published Texts et Monuments (TMMM), I incorrectly This PN. 541) who ig renee image of Mithra assimilated to the god Mén (cf. CIMRM 1, Mithee eS became gererentcd a8 an equestrian deity on other coinage in Asia Minor. Tra Pea tollight cont ‘Perfluous as soon as several other equestrian representations of 6p Reports virevor nine & type comparable with the numismatic evidence from wag ly 78, ch noe ama and Cumont’s article, ‘Mithra en Asie Mineure’, Vi-vin, p. 114,1QO LTA, MO oriental costume, mounted on a charger, moving to the right, In front him the sacred fire burns on an altar; on either side stand his custome torchbearers. On the left a tree rises up and spreads its branches above th, god, in whose direction a raven is flying. Beneath the feet of the horse : snake is moving to the right, as in the Dura fresco. a The hunt was the favourite sport of the Persian aristocracy.215 This nobl pastime would have taken place under the lofty patronage of Mithra, horseman and archer. His faithful worshippers, as often happens, conceived him as an idealised personification of the qualities which they particularl esteemed among their peers. We cannot doubt that beside portraits of Mithe, straddling a peaceful mount, as at Trapezus, examples already existed in Asia Minor of the type which portrayed him galloping after game that fled before his charge216 and which thus provided a divine model of the prowess the nobility eagerly sought to achieve. This transformation of Mithra was favoured in Asia Minor by the existence of indigenous gods with an analogous character. The Thraco-Phrygian populations which settled the western part of the peninsula and the Balkan territories worshipped hunting and equestrian divinities. Perdrizet’s observa- tions on this point have considerable merit :#1? ‘in Thrace and in Asia Minor, countries with broad plains and rich in horses, the nobility rode on horse- back, so it is natural that they conceived of mounted gods. In Greece, on the other hand, a mountainous and insular country, where, except in a few districts, the horse was not much used or easily bred, the gods, for the most part, were not horsemen.’ Especially in Anatolia the astral deities, regardless of whether they were solar or lunar, are characteristically depicted on horseback,218 and in the Balkans not only ‘the Thracian horseman’ but other gods, including Dionysus, also hunt.219 Mithra could thus easily 215 Cf. TMMM 1, p. 174, n. 6; Fouilles, p. 233. 216 G, Rodenwaldt has clearly demonstrated the Iranian origin of thesculptural type repre sented by the mounted Persian hunters on the Monument of the Nereids (‘Griechische: Reliefs in Lykien’, SBAW 1993, pp. 1028 f,, especially 1040 cf. FHS tut, 1993, pp. 1954.5 Restovizel YGS v, 1935, pp. 266 f and n, 14x [on the Nereid sculpture, see now P. Coupel and P. Demargne, Fouilles de Xanthos m1, Paris, 1969, plates 6, 23, 29]). The two types also cocxisted with respect to the indigenous deities (cf. R. Mouterde, ‘Dieux cavaliers de la région ¢’Alep* Milanges de l'Université de Beyrouth x1, 1926, pp. 309-322, especially p. 319). In the Christ es st George, mounted ‘on a white horse, succeeded Mithra in Coppasiocin (cf. F. Cumont ‘St. ithra ef” . 63-71) Sud toy, p20 (on a bavaciet hom Meindl) Conon, Mua en Asie Mine 4. 2. ‘ne, Gagé (‘Dieux cavaliers ’Asie Mineure’, Mélanges de 'Bcale de Rome x1, 990,70 104 f.) plausibly emphasises the fact that these gods are neither Greek nor Semite ian but autochthonous, Sama8 already appears on horseback on the bas-relief from eB (cf. F. X. Kugler, m Bannkreis Babels, Minster 1910, p. 152; Saxl, MUT, P- 17) ctor Cook, Zeus, Cambridge 1914-40, 1, p. 333) U P. 474» fig. 366 (on the transiton T ontent wheel to solar chariot) : ‘when the growth of anthropomorphism made men no 10P8°* 15 40 {0 regard the sun either as a wheel or as a horse it needed no great effort i TCE Deedes and henceforward to believe in the driver ofa celestial ¢The Dura Mithraeum 191 be compared with these Anatolian deific: The genesis of this conception in the Ba explained in terms of Thraco-Mithraic evidence whose symbolic meaning, it,2% still remains pit avin in so What happened when Mithraism penetrated ; i conceived as a horseman,##2 existed here toe Mn ‘ wy Bods alo in the northern region, which, like Cappadocia, had ‘bee al eneny Hittites, but as far south as Arabia, where the “sun and subect to the known as the Geol xaBaAAdguo.223 The two types abich mas sans jn Asia Minor are likewise found here.224 Sometimes Helios i tiene galloping horse, but more frequently he rides at a walking pace oe fhe the right, and his youthful face, frontally portrayed, is encircled bya low iM ant head of hair. On several bas-reliefs found on the edge of the de ert he . fe desert he wears the typical costume and armour of the Palmyrene cavalry, that is to say, his accoutrement is of Persian origin,225 Assimilation could have easily occurred between Mithra and such a divinity and, unless I am mistaken, it is exemplified by a piece of sculpture whose true significance is now evident.226 A bas-relief from Hama to which the crude workmanship assigns a comparatively late date (probably the third century A.c.) depicts a horseman in oriental costume with full breeches knotted at the ankle above the boot. He is wearing a cuirass decorated with a Gorgon’s head, and a paludamentum streams behind his shoulders. He carries a whip knotted to his right wrist and, beneath his hand, a bow and quiver full of arrows are attached to the saddle. This is the mounted solar god of Syria, and Dussaud at once compared it with the bas-relief of the Palmyrene divinity, Genneas, now in the Louvre.227 The monument at Hama is, however, distinguished by certain additional atu ed — corners, as in representations of Mithra tauroctonos, are occupied by the of Sol on the left and Luna on the right. In front of the horse, as on the i i i snally we observe a particularly an eat ee elke te pentane = ath the feet of the horse, telling detail, for a snake is portrayed bene: 20 TMMM n, pp. 526 £., mon. 328 bis. 221 Rostovtzeff, MPSAI xm, 1923, PP- 1046. {,, and especially Mouterde 222, Dussaud, Notes de mythologie syrienne 1, Paris 1903) PP- 5? oq f. (on mounted Syrian (oe dit, n, 216 above); also, Rostovtzell, Aegyptus XIm, 1933» PP: imported into Egypt). caton & 228 In accordance om ‘he formula of renunciation imposed RBR Lax, 1906, 1523 Cumont, RHR Lx, 1gt1, P. 149) fom Bass . Mouterde, op. cit, pp. 313 f 1s PP: 477)» 25.Cf the ee eli from Ebversol (R. P. Ronzevalle, RAI, eae from Damascus (eticated to the god Genneas; ef. L. Heuzey, CRAI, 199% Ps | onzevalle, CRAI, , pp. 8f.). jques en Sytie gt Dasa, ate Uinallcaud, “Les travaux achtoloe a a56. 74, 1924, pp, 120 f,, plate 31, 43 cf. H. Seyrig, Syria xv Sri, loc. cit, (cf. YOS V, 1935s fig. 42)+ ations of t sa: Ikan and ie ding inthe sky, SyNncretism220 despite ingenious many Tespects, on Moslems (cf. Montet, en 1922-78"192 Franz Cumont accompanying him on his journey, as at Trapezus, Ni A 187 and n. 24 above). All these features tet to cotabligh sua (bp. adopted a type popular in Syria before his time and modified Sculptor hag Mithra as the protector of the Roman cavalry. ito Tepresent Mithra at full gallop and hunting his prey has been given Dura, and the composition which the painter has created is has demonstrated,?28 directly comparable with the Iranian re 5 of royal hunts, of which a bas-relief from Tak-i-Bostan presents et highly developed type. The hunt was also a favourite subject ot Ss matt decorative jewellery. We may assume that this aspect of Mithra’s cieplc personality has been given special prominence by the Palmyrene complex who, at Dura, were his first and most faithful votaries. These marisines ver as skilled as the Parthians in shooting their arrows while at full galloy _ particularly worshipped the character of their tutelary god as 2 fale, horseman, racing after gazelles at full speed, the unerring archer whose arrows never missed their mark. Without doubt these exploits of the chase were celebrated by a hymn in which the miraculous hunter, taming the wild beasts like Orpheus, was accompanied not by a pack of dogs but by a snake and a lion.229 Apart, however, from a few scant verses, nothing of the litur- gical poetry of Mithraism has survived. Precedence at » 88 Rostovtzerr (f) The earliest decoration of the shrine.28° Besides the scenes which are still visible on the walls of the adytum, many fragments of painted plaster were collected during the excavations. Some of them offer nothing of interest from a religious standpoint, There are, for example, fragments from paintings of tree trunks and foliage, coloured red and green, which seem. to have been purely decorative, like the wreaths encircling the altar and the columns in the sanctuary. We also found heads belonging to the portraits of benefactors of the shrine whose names were inscribed at their side in Greek (e8: Arkhelaos).231 Other pieces, however, belonged to religious compositor and, despite their damaged condition, they furnish us with proof thats general character of these sacred pictures was the same as that of the which have been preserved. Sometimes the technique is similar to that of the fre: discussed in that the figures are drawn in red or black strokes aly fe highlights or sometimes a neutral tone to separate them ae ware 228 M. I. Rostovtzeff, GS v, 1935, pp- 230 £,, 266 £3 Sarre and Heras 138 reliefs, plate 35. On the origin of this motif, see ‘Rodenwaldt (op. cits PP: “an [ct cere eMithra in Asie Mineure’, p. 73: ‘un. hymne sac Sr spirait ces compositions, et racontait les exploits cynégétiques av flection Ics traits ne manquaient jamais leur but et av"invoquvient avec Pp! Soe pera na pg by rags onthe baal, see pp 165 £ abO¥ 231 Jhid.. p. ao, No. 840, plate 13, I. ie ul doutes ans Ode, dont lier intrepid “nott«san The Dura Mittracum oq he background. Shading is rarely e1 ailin of relief. The similarity of method en there is virtually no indi not far distant in time from, if not actually seat these works are at lean previously discussed, More frequently, however, teeoraneous with, those an earlier decoration prior to the final restoratio ese fragments belong to immediately distinguishable from those which still cies (oP: They are to which they are considerably superior in style 7 the sanctuary and was richer in colours: he used not only black and red hen ot he Painter of grey, blue, lilac, yellow, green and pink. His ton Mt also vatious hades trasting. The hand of the artist is also surer, Ho dey oe at less con committed those clumsy faults of execution with ‘which Oot naan fo have his successor, Mareus. eh one can reproach According to Pearson,?8? the far end of tl ‘ ‘ ceding the final restoration was decorated jae Period re- tauroctonos with his torchbearers of which a few remains have been Ss coe beneath the uppermost coat of plaster. On either side of the bull eside each torchbearer there was at least one tree.283 The feet and the lower part of Cautopates? torch were visible. Cautopates stood on the left, a position as appropriate to him as the right.?84 The head of the snake, along with the rump and testicles of the bull, was also still attached to the wall. The follow- ing fragments recovered from the plaster debris belonged, in all likelihood, to this group: 1 Five connected fragments (height, 0-13 m; length, 0:16 m) contain a large brown border, beneath which we can distinguish the point of a Phrygian cap, coloured a purple-brown, with a blue-grey nimbus. The radiate nimbus is generally reserved for the Sun (p. 175 above) and infrequently attributed to Mithra,235 2 Two adjacent fragments (height, 0-13 m5 length, 0-18 m) depict the upper part of the bull’s head, painted purple-brown, along with the horns and the tip of the right ear. 3 Three large connected fragme: fallen to the ground with its legs outstretched. tinguishable, and a snake lies nearby. 4 Twenty-three connected fragments form a slal by 0-45 m,286 and depict the body and arms ofa torchbea his customary oriental costume with the embroidered tunic an fastened by a fibula. His lowered left han nts show the leg of the pull after it has Its hoof is clearly dis- b of plaster measuring 0°39 rer, dressed in d the mantle id probably held a torch which me P. 90, 101. ay, a0n; 0290 00-7 61, eoartal i (MM 1, pp» 184, 2115 mon, to) European bas-reliefs (7M! PI TMMM1, p. a 204, M, 12. = TMMM n, p. 188, fig. 10 (CIMRM 1, fig- 8) 2a ts vil-vint, p. 104, plate 135 4+has today been broken off. His right hand and index fin, as though he were pointing at something; the other fin, Ber arg extendeg his palm. The meaning of this gesture remains obscure. Ser are Closed in 5 Six connected fragments (height, 0-27 m; length, 1 6 beautiful head ofa figure similar to the preceding one, weat 7 de cap.28? The face is pinkish-brown and the cap grey. Below we @ Phrygian remains of the embroidered neck of the tunic and one end WE CaN see the painted yellow and red. of the mantle, Pict the Pearson (loc. cit.) has also recognised, around the ni sanctuary, traces of thirteen small scenes which, like thee vie Stith placed them, may have depicted the cosmogony of the mysteries, bara = paintings were too poorly preserved for their subject to be determinal certainty, We have already mentioned (p. 177 above) the remains of a a fully executed representation of the banquet of Mithra and Sol which wo rescued from the debris. In the arcosolium, in addition to the bas-relig, Pearson saw traces of the signs of the zodiac, but they too were so defaced that only Pisces remained clearly visible. Finally, on either side of the niche, we observe two large heads wearing Phrygian caps, the upper part of their bodies covered with a mantle fastened with a large brooch. These heads are slightly larger than those of the seated Magi described in section (¢) above and, in all probability, belonged to similar personages. Above them, the blue field was decorated with rows of stars each with eight white rays, evidently a representation of the heavens from which the learned guardians of the mysteries had received their inspiration. We may conclude from this dis- cussion that, apart from the hunt of Mithra, the paintings destroyed in order to bring about the final restoration of the shrine had the same, or nearly the same, subjects as those which have actually been preserved. 6. The graffiti and dipinti We have already mentioned that, apart from a few examples in Italy, be Dura Mithraeum is the only shrine in which important frescoes oe served. Moreover, it is set apart from all other Mithraea by the 2a is of the epigraphic texts assembled there, for besides the stone ae ‘i engraved in Latin, Greek and Palmyrene, the Dura Mithracom ely extraordinary wealth of graffiti and dipinti.28° 1 shall now Osh aby on the new facts regarding Mithraic beliefs which have been these texts. 28? Reports, vii-VImI, p. 102, Plate 13, 2- | 296 [This claim might perhaps Have’ been qualified by reference © 1 t39 (08 Maa Prisca’ already discussed at some length by Cumont, CRAl, 194%; Pi iow), OF Nt pt eee we Vertaaseren and van Essen, EMSP, 179-2403 of ®- 4° ¢ os, 53-704 graffiti, see Reports vu-vin, pp. 116 f., plates 49-505 CIMRM 1, pp- Nos. 63, 68; Francis, ‘Graffiti’, pp. 424 f. below).] « overies at St to the discover ichOOS LUE Mithraeum 195 The wall inscriptions were only accompanied jnstance> beneath the dipinto on the first column of the Mi B in a single celebrating Marinus zet(rwg?®9 thename of MIOPASi: ‘ Middle Mithraeum tied with fillets and with a palm branch beside it (eee dan gd ube wreath a ese two emblems apparently allude to the perpetual victory of the - may compare an interesting detail in the Mithracum oF deus inuictus. We Rome, where a radiate crown and a palm branch are d S. Clemente at side of the dedication of a large sculptured altar.240 wie ~ a Christian era, these symbols are found again in metrical ‘nsec in the at the end of verses. No satisfactory explanation has yet bot ean placed the presence of these and certain other symbols on the epi Proposed for ments of the new religion.241 pagPaphic imaonm= The majority of the inscriptions published by Rostovtzeff are acclamations or greetings beginning with the word nama and followed by the name of the god or a cult member in the dative case.242 This liturgical formula was already familiar from a carved inscription (Nama Sebesio)®43 on the great Borghese bas-relief, now in the Louvre, which has been treated to a host of fanciful explanations. We may compare two other monuments, also origin- ally from Italy. One is an inscription from Tibur (Nama cunctis),?44 the other js a scene of Mithra at his rock-birth, now in the library of Trinity College, Dublin. On this inscription only nama, carved inside a wreath, remains legible.245 It has long been recognised that nama is an Iranian word, by a drawin 289 Reports vin, p. 87, No. 848 (plate 49, 2), CIMRM t, p. 69. No. 54- %40 Gamont, CRAT, 1915, pp. 7, 203 &. (CIMRM 1, pp. 156 f, Now 398-48, especially No. 439; C. Cecchelli, San Clemente, Rome (n.d.), p- 160, 8g. 324 L. Nolan, The Basiliza of St. Clemente in Rome, Rome 1925, Pp. 223-5 ¢t ‘passim. I once thought that the radiate circle represented the solar disc, but comparison with other scenes provides sure proof that we are dealing merely with a crown or, strictly speaking, @ rnimbus, similar to the one depicted in the coronation of Sol (cf. p. 176 above). Man Cf. F. Délger, Antike und Christentum 1, 1929, pp- 303 f. ithraeum on the Esquiline (TMMM 1, pp. 199 f, mon. 7 : an inscription is also ed ‘with a crown and a palm (Crispiane wiuae oe ee crown of victory and eternal life; cf. E. Le Blant, CRAL, 1885, pp. 143 £3 F- um the bolisme fundraire [index, s.v. ‘couronne’, ‘palme’]). Note also the Proficentius him” iy Mithraeum from the Palazzo della Cancellaria (B. Nogara and Fs Mg ve ie not area del Palazvo della Cancellaria Apostolica’, in Hommage? a Joseph 0 2 og, No. 423) Coll. Latomus ni}, Brussels, pp. 229-44, especially, PP. 23) £5 CIMRIEY Ps or, pp. 119 & 2%42 Cf Reports viva, p. 87 (No. 848), P. 104 (No. 859), P- 118 ¢ S. TNoxe so the (CIMRM 1, pp. 69-70, Nos. 54, 56-623 Francis, ‘Graffiti’, PP+ 438 £)- Grats ve, construction of nana with the nominative case: [¥Jama/ Maximus mas (unicae) (Reports No. 8595 CIMRM 1, No. 61), Nam[a]/ Maximus ‘scen{ico/ leg(ionis) oes, ‘No. 860; CIMRM 1, No. 62)]- a *The Dura Mithraeum 197 right was regarded in the East as the positi was understood to refer either to the Chief post honour. The use of nary archy or, ina mystical sense, to Mithra himself: 250 Thee the sacred hee however, appears to be absolutely untenable, for we have wt Pretation othe effect that, in the Persian mysteries, the pate vane eret® estimony tions which were performed per patrem.251 Theme minted at the initia- oun derived from a liturgical act. Perha: Eto is there ° af a PS we could visual fore which the ordinand took his place on a throne bese te pony in ling Father, Dwéews would then be a synonym ‘seated at the right’, Two pi tems See ea eh bbs, and mean strictly speaking, ovvdéEvor [Cumont’s emphasis), de, however, are not, on the left of the other. Moreover, the intersietatioi under din a not take sufficient account of the sense of ovy- in parallel com, vomnal dots aboropos ‘mouth to mouth’?5? or avymoug ‘with the feet joined OE ether as In the same way, ovvdéévoc, derived from the feminine defi, ike of cae from gov}, can apparently refer only to the iunctio dextrarum. a ‘Vigne (fidei2®4 in its Latin definition, this act was thought by the Greeks and ‘Romans,255 as also by the Germanic peoples,256 to invest a pledge with appropriate sanctity and authority. Of particular interest in this context, however, is the fact that, among the Persians, it often accompanied the conclusion of a pact and the taking of an oath.?87 By means of this mutual embrace one makes a profession of reciprocal trust. In this regard the written word is supported by iconographic evidence. On the bas-reliefs of Nimrud-Dagh, the Mazdean gods (in particular, Mithra) and King Antiochus clasp each other’s right hands in exactly this manner, thus se _— - seus Dim, abmvaog wohl exklitbar sein’ (cf. T. Friedrich, In Feet “Matern libellum quaestone, Bonn 1905, pp. 19 £, following Ziegler). For the sense of Boowtant, see P- X74 ABOVE 280 Ziegler, lo. cit; this proposal appears to have been inspired by a re ect Paul’s phrase: év SefsG T00 Beod (Rom. vm1.345 Col. 11.13 Heb. *.12 etc. / “GIL vt, aoae ™, 41093 Eph. Ep. 15 "762; ILS 4190 4208. Cf. oe Apa. 8.7: uolentibus initiari moris est, opinor, iprius patrem illum sarin et poe Pre und describere (cf. TMMM uy, p. 4593 of id., Ad nat. 1-7-23; and Délger's oortjae in the initia Cr er oo 488), There is also papyrological vider for eof form tion of a pdorifg by a mari (cf. Haro. Theol Fea. xxv, 1935» BP. TEA DNs ic. uaropdouaty fe cote gee (Teleco Fras ear a ee points of junction of the lips? tr. 7.4.1); ovyyerddar (Aristot., Phgrs 11818) rel and ofropoug means ‘with meeting eyebrows’ (ibid., ratas te) 1 dey i Hen 258 Str.15.1.42: [the hunter] dnoddvert® dyolp éhépare a ya evar 2 Min. 3.96, where Headlam notes that ovp7004 equivale ery suet iras TOUS pa Exovta (Luc. 5 yet of Schol. Plat., Men. g7D: mhartévro” wa bpa siger, Antike und nbbag add sovésca ovu7080).)- cf. TLL (owe ente’s DOMES wit Curt, 8.12.105 Plin. HN, 11.103-13 f tum Vv, » P» 552 P+ . ‘i ipzi » PP: #35 2 Kar Sar ni lae bs 287) pen und Ri, LEDEBIBOHPP Ss siou apa Die Gene apne (oo. HandscOk)” ag Qereallant Oasg, p48) 2 Died. Sic. 16432 [Ageagéons] tiv dete? swe 7B Rin di Fel 2% 198 vy : btn BeBasordrn naga tots Légaats (ch TMMM1 P- 175igo 0 pace agreement concluded between them according to whic} sen ceive the latter into their allegiance and the worship honey by the king is set beside the protection reciprocally promised by the gods,268 On the monuments of the West we frequently see Mithra and Sol performing the same act, thereby drawing attention to the solemn alliance which have contracted.25° Sometimes the two gods perform the iunctio dextrarum above an altar. Moreover, their agreement seems to have received its final sanction through the exchange of blood, the tasting of which, according to a belief widespread in the East, and particularly among Iranian peoples,260 solemnly unites those who drink it. Probably the myth, as is often the case, represents only a symbolic prototype of the rite and, by attributing it to the gods, our monuments accordingly reproduce a ceremony which used to occur in the Mithraea when a new initiate was first inducted. The deflwoug was the first act through which a postulant was admitted into the community of the faithful and thereby became equivalent to a pdborns or ovppdorys. Although our well-nigh total ignorance of the mysteries prevents us from invoking direct evidence of this liturgical practice, at least we know that it occurred in a Babylonian religion related to Mazdeism. Among the Man- daeans the word kusta (properly signifying ‘truth’) applies by extension both to the bonds of trust which unite true believers and to the éunctio dextrarum which represents their pledge of good faith.261 In the Mandaean baptismal ceremonies the priest, before placing a wreath of myrtle on the head of the neophyte and before the neophyte leaves the baptismal water, bestows the kugta upon him. In the sequel of this ceremony he twice renews the ritual iunctio dextrarum.282 The nomenclature of the seven stages of initiation has been preserved in a letter of St Jerome, and the most recent editor of his correspondence prints the pertinent text as follows: [Praefectus] omnia portentosa simulacra guibus corax, cryphius, miles, leo, Perses, heliodromus, pater initiantur subuertit, fregit, excussit.263 Such, therefore, appear to be the sacred designations of 258 TMMM ny p. 188, mon. 2 (CIMRM 1, pp. 53 f., Nos. 29-31). 28 TMMM tb, 173i concerning the pact celebrated between Sol and Mithra on ie altar at Poetovio, see Abramit, Poetovio, p. 179, and p. 179 above). MM 260 On thisritval exchange of blood among the Parthians, see Tac Ans. 12.47 (cf: THN 1, loc cit. n, 8; Dilger, Antike und Christentum 1v, 1934, pp. 207 f.3 a similar practice hes observed among the Scythians: ne foedera quidem incruenta sunt; sauciat se) qui PANT eae ‘en ubi permiscuere, degustant, Pomp. Mela 2.1.12, cf. Hat 4-703 ™ inns, Scythians and Greeks, Cambridge, 1913, p. 87, and p. 179, 0. 160 abOve.). gia 41 M. Lidzbarski, Das Johanesbuch der rr Dein rots, p, xvi; id, Mandastt LIE Berlin, 1920, p. 3, n. 1: ‘NDwIa, “truth”, is the central concept of ‘Mandaean of han ‘The term also designated the bond which uni i th > 7 ites the faithful. Kusta refers to xis f brotherhood.’ Christians in India also practise ovpdefeoug rather than the 1 peace. mandtisme . ut Lidabarski, Litwgien, pp. 28, 40, 50, n. 13 cf. A. F. Loisy, Le a Atrbtienes, Pasis'1934, Pp. 106, 109. 2 xo Hicronymi Epistula vm (ad Laetam; ed, Hilberg)3 of. Acta Archelai 10-31* ™2°The Dura Mithrocum 09 Mithraists in Rome at the end of the fourth centur . entire Roman est, since the inscriptions mention no oe indeed of the theless, in an obscure and broken passage from his trent Never. Porphyry evidently refers to wsotar who bore the ate De abstinentia Falcon.25 The fact that the philosopher asserts in the son of Eagle and women receives the designation of Hyena (Gawvaz) casts doubt chapter that discussion, for it is certain that members of the femal on the whole admitted into the service of the soldiers’ god. In no Mithracun a find any mention of a woman servi i sate eur do we donor.26 ng aS Priestess, initiate or even as a This conclusion is fully supported by the Dura i. ., rich prosopography of the Dura shrine is cxclusivel wate amazingly appears to have been made part of this Mithraic community, Nowhere eke among the titles associated with the names of the initiates do we find Por. phyry’s Eagles or Falcons, any more than his Hyenas. On the other hand, of the seven grades mentioned by St Jerome,28? the Dura graffiti provide direct evidence for five, namely the Raven (xdga£), the Soldier (oreatudtys). . A . » the Lion (Aéwv), the Persian (J7égon¢) and the Father (mato). As in the West, where the Fathers recognise a pater patrum at their head, the Dura graffiti mention two matégec maréga.268 Of these grades, that of the Lion is by far the most important, since it is the one which appears to have bestowed the right of full participation in the cult.26° Moreover, admittance into this grade was preceded by a time of trial during which the initiate was called a peddodéwv. After attaining the Leontic rank, the initiate at once became dfods Aga; the meaning of dBode is, however, not clearly under- stood. The names of the Raven and the Lion derive from the fact that, in [ro Caw avedpa] dédancy adrg TH nodry dvOodne SeSuiv al dorpeyxen bx too oxdtovs «atl ce nrcenaatios tiv ovverehow0%? didlos: defiis Bddaa savrols onuloy fot, dic dxd oxdtove awbéevres. oo om in TMMM Pe 535, 1 ‘prought together all the literary and epigraphical erkienee concerning those Mithrate grades which were known prior to the end of te lett Carn Since then, however, new texts have come to light and our understanding a she Se re initatory grades has become much more exact owing to the discovery a: Pens frescoes and the Ostian mosaics. This evidence proves that each of te se i of grades was placed under the patronage of a planet, as Ferrua has shown ot dacus Sta. Prisea (cf. CIMRM 1, p. 14, for bibliography). In CRAI, 1945: FP $07 ne ls. the precise significance of these grades and stress the particulas INPATA TT rages and {Ge Nermaseren and van Essen, EMSP, pp. 148 fe and the lists * functions in CIM. |. 352-543 PP- 427-30 sp vai tgaxes obtOt "Porphyry, de Sete iG tnt 88 raw marge » « - det0} da x00 He *podayogevovtar; cf. TMMM 1, Pp. 314 2 8. * TMMM t, pp. 329 £.5 f. A. F- Loisy, RHR, 1913) P- 500. 2 Cf. Epistula od Luctam, et. supr., and Francis, “Graffiti PP. 4# = ‘Vu-vun, p. 119, No. 855 (CIMRM 1, P. 70s No- 57). git), the Lions were Be "© TMMM 1, pp. 317, 320 £; according to Porphyry lo. Gin mR, 10m P- 953 RAs lertzorres, the Ravens, snpecotvres. On this point, however Sh joins Mithra 1” 194®: Pp. 184 £5 Lace perpetua, p. 272- The dfgds Aéow the ‘unt on the fresco (pp. 186 f., above)-200 Franz Cumont d, these two creatures were the original attendants of Mig tee ee Perhaps dod, in the sense of ‘gentle’, might recall tha wa wild beast had been tamed by the god.270 On the other hand, the adjective could also mean ‘splendid, robust’ and the only claim which can be made with any probability is that dBgdc was borrowed as a poetic term from some ritual hymn.2?72 In the graffiti, however, we also find a number of prayers addressed up or dyabG vdupe.2”? At first this title seemed to be a new one, Previously unknown. On closer inspection, however, it became apparent that in the passage from St Jerome (cit. supra) the manuscripts read nymphus (var, nimphus, nimplus, nimfus) rather than cryphius. Cryphius represents an emenda- tion introduced as a result of comparing certain Latin inscriptions from Rome?’3 which speak of cryfios ostendere, chryfios tradere. The word nymphus, moreover, occurs in a mutilated passage of Firmicus’ short treatise De errore to which I have already referred.?74 After a long lacuna, the Christian writer cites a liturgical formula which has been incorrectly attributed to the cult of Bacchus and which has been restored as follows: "Tide vepple, yaige vyuple, xaige véov pas. Here again the correct reading is »Supe, and voyée is an arbitrary emenda- tion: on each occasion the manuscript reads yjypye and the verse should therefore probably be read as follows: Alle vbupe, xalge wings, xatoe vor pec, ‘Sing, Nymph; rejoice, Nymph, rejoice at the new light’.2?5 This form is 20 [On the possibility that @fgce (not dBedc or, as Cumont sometimes writes it, dod), means ‘companion’, see Francis, ‘Graffit?, pp. 443 £]. #1 [Despite the discovery of ‘Mithraic’ verse, for example, at Sta. Prisca, Cumont’s insistence on the poetic provenance of this term seems to me unjustified (cf. p. 192, 0. 22% above). Indeed, it is by no means certain that these discrete ‘verses are quoted from the sup- Posed ‘sacred book’ of Mithraic belief, (on which, see p. 206, n. 312, below). Since there i Ro positive evidence for a leeds Adyos, it might be no less prudent to regard them as the inspiration of an influential cult member with a taste for poetry.] ted 273 [I have been able to count only twelve occurrences of dugog (not sixteen, as sugees™ by CIMRM 1, p. 71, No. 63); cf. IMDur. 33, 63, 67, 89, 108, 169, 189, 203, 210, 211 and Eve unnumbered Graffiti transcribed by Cte. du Mesnil]. CL Cf GIL vs, 7510 (358 4.6. TMMM 1, p. 93, No. 9} CEMRM t, p. 172, No. 408); Gt we c5B (962 A.C» TMMM u, p. 94, No. 12; CIMRM 1, pp. 173 £4 No. 405). Copliat “ dy proposed as an emendation of St Jerome's text by Zoega (cf. F. Welcle ai's Soeee s Abhandlungen, Gottingen 1817, p. 140). In CRAL, 1945 (p. 403, n. 3) I discuss Pr he vhs to explain cryphios ostenderunt by association with the dvaxakumrgta ae, De ev. prof. relig., 19.1 i 275, Fe eee ae ression sion vio ie thas P. 214 (cf. pp. 122, 11). For the use of the 935 etc Pa dated Cito, 198, 3 eehe Dura Mithracum 201 in any other respect remarkable, si i x ered oh » Since it occurs in several come a result of this restoration we might inte i i iss ydpog of the kind celebrated in cettain amici fx as referring to in Eleusis and Samothrace.277 On the other hand, it is not cary ance those even a mystical union could have been celebrated bya cult i to see how men participated. Although Firmicus translated weypog a ‘ which only artempting to provide a synonym for roupos, his treatise betraynso meat an ignorance of actual Mithraic beliefs that such evidence carries Tittle weight, In Greek »upy properly denotes a young, nubile girl, and I arn the . fore inclined to believe that, in the sacred language, réypog refers to an ‘adolescent’.27° Initiation to this grade would therefore represent a memory of those rites de passage which are recognised among so many cultures at tbe onset of puberty when the child is admitted to the society of men.28 The fact that this grade immediately precedes that of miles, marking the time at which the young man, newly recruited, enters the holy militia of the invin- cible god, appears to favour such an interpretation (cf. n. 279 above). It follows from these considerations that, of the seven grades mentioned by St Jerome, six are attested at Dura. We may therefore conclude that, in the third century, the cult organisation and initiatory sequence were in most respects identical in both East and West. Not only the doctrine but also the liturgy of the mysteries was unified from one end of the empire to the other. Only one grade term listed in the Epistula ad Laetam is not found among the PHEg, naganiupos, xaxdroupoc, Svoniupos etc. [Note, however, that the possessive adjectives seaxdroupos ‘and dvovtuos most plausibly mean ‘he who had a bad rvypn’ and therefore do not provide particularly strong evidence for an underlying masculine form pines. On the other hand, one can readily understand bow ie ninges ¢ could at east be secondarily derived from nagarsupog, regardless of that form's derivational source. ad the relation of wjupos to rdyupy in Mithraic terminology, compare that of Bg0¢ to oa, ancis, ‘Graffiti’, and n, 100]. ‘ “The ade eos of Zeus and Demeter is represented at Elewsis by the hieropbant and hisspouse (cf. L. A. Deubner, Attische Feste, Berlin, 1932, pp. 84 f.). Compare the marr Kadmos and Harmonia in Samothrace (Kern, RE, s.v. ‘Kabeiros’, col. 1426i 0 Tos ‘Ieeés yéiuoc, Diss. Halle, 1933, pp. 112 £). By attributing the formula cit by Firmicus to the cult of Bacchus, Dieterich evidently supposes @ connection with ni pe fa Dionyaus celebrated at the Anthesteria (cf. Deubner,op.cit, 100). On the use of We APO initiatory ceremonies, ef. Patriarca, Bull. Comm. Lxt, 1933, P- 21% cing bra to a Temple Witte xatacxeudtover xa porayanlay tédovat etc. Pausanias also refers 1ysus, Demeter and Persephone as a vuppesy, 211-3) mereatur audire? we, Fim. Mat, loc. city: “pul apud te lumen est, nec aliguis qu se sponses a Lete est, uns est sponsus, nominum horum gratiam Christus accept 7s. aacsny yévetO, tei ay pmedally the Orphic verse (Kern, Frag. Oph 218, 16D: to A Cotes Exheto wiupn). . , Totemism and expat Ya" Gennep, Les ies de passage, Patis 1909) pp. 107 £3 J. Fae pp. 363 # Belge? 8 teatise on certain early forms of superstition and society LONG CO. Nymphs are the beaut > "1 re children, the aiautiud n, London, 1923, pp. 225 f.5 ‘the Ravens Wr ane Fathers are elderly (AF a While the Soldiers, Lions, and Persians are grown men and Les mystires paiens et le mystire chrétien, Paris, 1930 P- ¥727*202 Franz Cumont inscriptions of our Mithracum, namely that of the Heliodrome.281 On 4, her hand, another term (oregso{c) is frequently mentioned and has pes haps been substituted for the ‘Courier of the Sun’. This word is used Ree rarely in the secular literature. Our dictionaries cite only one other exam 7 TT avegeatig. It occurs in the scholia of Oppian,2® meaning ‘he wis strengthens or reinforces’. When we recall the religious sense which om firmare acquired among Christians and, on the other hand, the Mithraie practice of making a sign on the Soldier’s forehead, we might conclude that the title of otegewr7}¢ referred to an analogous ceremony of anointment or sacred marking. This interpretation is, however, highly problematic,283 Two other designations occur in the graffiti, copiotxjg and magus/ydyoc, but they do not appear to belong to the system of initiatory grades. The title of coguotijc,284 like that of studiosus astrologiae on the epitaph of a priest at Milan,285 evidently refers to one who has thoroughly studied the arcana of the holy writings. They are teachers of theology, but of a theology which comprehends all the natural sciences. In Greek writers the word gogioriig is sometimes used to refer specifically to the Hindu Brahmins.?86 Similarly, the yuzvocoplara: are the fakhirs who are famed equally for their endurance as for their knowledge.®8? It is significant that historians often compare the ministry of this Indian priesthood with that of the Persian Magi, to whom the same intellectual and moral qualities were attributed.288 These Magi are pre-eminently coguotat.2®® In addition to these more general references 281 Cf, TMMM 1, p. 317, n. 3 (ef. Vermaseren and van Essen, EMSP, p. 156, 168). 282 Schol, Opp., Hal, 4.421: spoguiotijoa’ ovegewtiy, xdrender donaevor, acnpizarra ods apaxthous. 283 Note, however, Erik Peterson's observations in Pistis Sophia (trans. C. Schmidt, ‘Copen- hagen, 1925, p- 2353 cf. Iren. 1.21.3, on the initiation of Valentinian: 5 reveleoyéos dnoxglverar éovigvyuar [Cumont’s emphasis] xai Aeldrompar tip poxiy dé rob aliiwos cobrov. 284 [CE IMDur. 99 (fragment of a pilaster or door-post, height 0-29 m, width 0117 My 0-13 m. thick, On the front, a abella in a red frame, the upper left comer only being ext Scratched letters are drawn in double lines. The tabella is painted on an upper layer of plasters the lower layer is red. Average letter height, 0-017 m): vdula*Ade Edvdgla xab Legoveluo copuoth éx{epla?] (unpublished) |. 285 CIL v, 5893 (cf. TMMM 1, p. 1263 1, 126, No. 1925 CIMRM » P- stu[di(esus)) astrologiafe) »« .) . oe: 286 Cf. Arrian, Anab, 6.16.5: Boaypdvow of 6) copiotal tole "Ivdots clot; where cogustifc is frequently used as a synonym of ‘Brahman’. ih 1. 287 D. L., Proem. 1.6 ete. Philo, de somn, 1.7.563 de Abr., 33,1825 quad om™ n® 14.94 £3 Heliod. 9.25, 10.2-6; Porph., de abst. 4.17- 288 Diogenes Laertius (citing Ps. Aristotle, Mag., fr. 32): of P- 157+ 26, No. 708% id, Indic" 1. go abores SH 5 1080 1.1.68; 16.2.393 Phil., loce. citt. . i wal 108"? 269 Porphyry, de abst 4.16: mgd ye pip rote ITégaarg of reel 73 Oelor TPN a giext ‘a * 4 nor Osgdsxorres pudyor nv ngoaayopesoveai” robro yap Onfol xara Tip LA, goglt Edyos (TMMM ny, p. 42} cf. Bidez and Cumont, Mages hellénisés 1,The Dura Mithraeum 203 ere is also a text which contains a direct A noche ‘A Christian polemicist from the at Sin to the Mithaic tide of he has ridiculed certain rites practised in the Shelaea, century, after This is how those qui se sapientes appellant are mocked? 290 a as follows: to the learned men of Mithraism is an appropriate one The name applied that they had directly inherited the ancient wisdom ames they believed their teaching claimed to reveal all scientific inowledge the East. Indeed, ot and thei ‘ often actually represent a religious expression of the physics and ss doctrines y of their period. The title of Magus was apparently applied at Dura, out Persia, to members of the Mithraic clergy. Tae Y throug: categories of initiates there was certainly also a priestly caste instructed in the rites supposedly initiated by Zoroaster and which officiated at the celebration of the mysteries.291 In the West these priests bore the names of sacerdos and. antistes.2°2 The term feged¢ does not occur among the graffiti; that of Magus probably took its place.293 Certain other terms used in the inscriptions scratched on the walls of the Dura shrine clarify particular aspects of Mithraic doctrine or the Mithraists’ moral conceptions. The epithet dxégatog ‘unmixed, innocent, pure, whole’, the wisdom attributed to Zoroaster). Cf. Dio Chrys., Or. 36.40: Zogodorens Zour soplas. ‘A aimilar conception existed among the Manichaeans (cf. H, J. Polotsky, ‘Manichiische Homi- li, Stuttgart 1994, p- 12, line 20 (cf. Polotsky’s index, s.v. ‘copla’). (On the multiple senses of cofuerifc, see Plato, Scholia (ed. Hermann, pp. 249-50). ‘Mani used to proclaim that he was the possesor and the prophet of gop/a which thus assured the supedonty of his religion over all others (cf, Schmidt and Polotsky, SBAW, 1933, PP. 43 f» 56 £). On the Syrie equivalent of copustic, see Payne Smith, Thes. 2580 (with Pierences); H. Pirenne, Ree bénddit 1934, p. 163. ‘ it i ProAugust, Qu. uct. et now, testa, 114.12 (ed, Souter pp. gog): ace quantis modis turpiter inluduntur qui se sapientes appellant (TMMM u, p.8). eof = TMMM 1 me 31 ooo ‘Note that in the Mithraic frescoes at Cope the costume the celebrants closely resembles that of the Magi (cf. p- 183; 2. 174 2 : 6 Hye istes, id. 1, P» 3455 22 For sacerdos, see GIMRM 1, p. 3493 th P- 424 (-V- ‘gacerdos’) for antistes, id. y Pe S495 1, p. 420 (a.v. ‘antistes?). ei ai ish plaster, 3 [Tegevs, teens may occur on IMDur. 17 (two joined pices of greyish height o-26 m, width 0-17 m. Letter height, o-or to 00% m): sn payvel > Avcwvivos legless *Avelnatoas TETaOTLOS , 3 Béyaog Briguios *y Bayle». « J4Qv0e + > Anodadwlo)s Magm- + Te earlols payor eee Joyty 6 below). . , 152% 2: 29) jtled the (eebublisheds but see Reports vu-vin, P. 124 and Ch IMDat 18 goat as Ph fn of the file card containing Rostovizefl's transcription» Ider eee “revue, n’ai pas pu lire plus’. The tenn don! 8b: loved’ Aveloyo[y] (cf. Reports, lae- cit.)-]204 Franz Cumont a uently applied to the initiates,24 recalls that extreme con, vic hich Characterised Mazdeism. This adjective belonged to the current religious usage of the day. It is even preserved in Coptic, in the recently discovered Manichaean hymns, where the faithful dxéoaio, are united with the sages.2% In one graffito the déxaor are opposed to the duo and we are reminded of the fact that Mithra is the Oed¢ disavog par excellence, protector of justice and truth.?97 Otherwise both Manichaeism and Christianity fre. quently refer to the faithful by the name of dixator.298 One curious text whose conclusion is not clearly intelligible mentions the “fiery breath’ (svpamdy Ga8ua)?9 of which the Magi spoke. The same word, Goya, is applied to the fiery blast which descends from the sky to ignite the surface of the earth in the cosmogonical hymn of the Magi of Asia Minor preserved by Dio Chrysostom.39 On the other hand, certain representations of the leontocephalic god of Time portray him reviving the flame of an altar with his powerful breath®01 and, in certain secret ceremonies, the ikon is apparently made to spew forth flames from his pierced mouth in what is aptly termed a ‘fiery breath’.302 If my restoration of the end of the graffito is correct (xvgwndy dofua / t6 [for 6] xai wdyous 7 »[f]ateov do

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