Visual Representations of Children and Ritual in the Early Roman Empire

Identification of Children in Roman Art and its Relationship to Actual Children and the Performance of Rites

The ability to identify children in Roman art, as in early Christian art, is a critical, interpretive issue – get the identification wrong and the entire significance of the scene suffers. As we will see in our discussion below, the topic of children and their function in art is a highly contested area among modern interpreters. Variation in genre styles, artistic conventions, cultural differences in dress, and regional variations in art across time, place and context all combine to complicate the identification process. As Roman art historian Janet Huskinson reports: “Art operates according to conventions that can produce some confusing effects (such as symbolic sizing, which represents low-status figures as child-size), while particular genres (such as ritual) determine that some aspects of the scene are appropriate to represent but not others” (Huskinson, 2007: 323). In Roman religions, processions, offerings/sacrifices and banquets are not really separate since the ritual function of each action is part of a continuous religious matrix (Prescendi, 2010: 75–76; Moede, 2011: 168–172; Scheid, 2011: 263–269). However, according to Katja Moede, “The peculiarities of visual art made it necessary to amalgamate non-synchronous moments of a coherent [ritual] sequence into one unified scene. ... Unlike modern viewers, [the ancient viewer] was not tempted to view these images as documentation of the actual event of the ritual, because he very well knew the sequences of the ritual” (Moede, 2011: 168). While realistic, Roman art is not necessarily documentary, since in order to fit a subject onto a small visual field, the narrative has been collapsed. Huskinson warns against viewing funerary reliefs of Roman families with children as documentary rather than as emblematic of a Roman family since not all family members may be present in the finished relief. Images, like texts, are edited documents (Huskinson, 2007: 328). By the late third century, compositions on sarcophagi were becoming formulaic, making it more difficult to attribute reality to imagery. Figures were generally becoming less important, thus reducing the capacity for individual identification within a decorative scene (Huskinson, 1996: 59; Rawson, 2003b: 290). While we cannot make direct correlations between images of children in ritual scenes and actual children performing rites, we can make the assumption, based on the amount and type of visual evidence, that children performing rituals in Roman religions were culturally significant enough for both patrons and viewers to include them in the most universal scenes of Roman ritual.

Notwithstanding the above methodological problems, the criteria for identifying children in Roman art can be seen to follow four basic guidelines. First, small children can be identified through their different anatomy from that of adults. Both young boys and girls have round faces, as can be seen in the terracotta pair of girl and boy musicians found in the Roman east (figure 1). Infants and toddlers can be identified through their chubby arms, thick thighs and ankles, and lack of muscle tone in their limbs, shown especially clearly on the back of figure 2, a terracotta figure of a toddler using a walking aid.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 1.

Baked clay group. Pair of musicians, girl and boy. Found in Babylon. Second century BCE–second century CE. ©The Trustees of the British Museum

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 2.

Terracotta figure of a child. Infant using a walking aid. Made in Egypt. The figure is shown wearing the lock of youth on the right side. First–second century CE. ©The Trustees of the British Museum

Three physical features also useful for identifying very young children include the shape and contour of a figure’s head (somewhat oval-shaped), nose size (small), and thickness of neck (short and stocky). ⁷ Our next criterion in identifying figures of children in Roman art relates to hairstyles, since boys’ and girls’ coiffures are an important marker of gender, ethnicity and status. ⁸ Roman girls (i.e. non-slaves) tend to be shown wearing their hair pulled back and braided at the crown or back of the head, sometimes with a parting in the middle. Busts of male infants from the third century CE show boys wearing the so-called Horus lock or a long “youth-lock” of hair on the right that identifies them as children (Backe-Dahmen, 2006: plates 90, 91a, 91b; 2008: fig. 64; and figure 2 in this article). Older Roman boys wear their hair combed forward in a Caesar-like style, cropped about an inch above the eyes. Non-Roman male children tend to be shown with longer, unkempt hair as on the Ara Pacis (figure 3) and in Scene XCI from Trajan’s column, 113 CE (Uzzi, 2007: fig. 3.7). Third, as with hairstyles, clothing or costume is an important identifier of Roman identity. As Jeannine Diddle Uzzi states, “costume is the key to determining ethnicity in art” (Uzzi, 2007: 70). Roman male children with high status or whose parents aspired to high status are frequently shown fully togated, as the imperial male and female children are on the Ara Pacis and on the funerary altar dedicated by Publicia Glypte to her infant son and a slave infant born and raised in her household (Rawson, 2003b: 286–287, fig. 2). This guideline on costume is especially helpful for identifying figures when Romans and non-Romans appear in the same image. In the procession Scene XCI on Trajan’s column, Roman males and children closest to the emperor are dressed similarly in tunic and pallium (a type of folded cloak) like the emperor, or in a toga like the senatorial class. At the back of the procession line, non-Roman men (the conquered barbarians) have long unkempt hair and beards, with tunics belted at the waist. The non-Roman boys have long unkempt hair like the adult males. The non-Roman women and their daughters wear costumes fastened with a twisted knot at a high waist and a stola (long robe) underneath with loose caps or kerchiefs over their hair (Uzzi, 2007: 70–71, fig. 3.7). Male slave children frequently appear only in a loincloth (Ryberg, 1955: figs 32, 51) whereas female slave children are difficult to identify in scenes by clothing. They may wear short or long tunics, and their hair can be loose or coiffed. Fourth, the placement of the figures in a scene can be an important factor in identifying children. In triumphal processions, barbarian children were shown at the back as discussed above. Though this is not a triumphal procession, the displacement of barbarian children, shown in front of the imperial children in the processions on the Ara Pacis (figures 4 and 5a), signals an important political narrative to the viewer (see discussion below). In Roman sacrifice scenes which depict the emperor as high priest, young children stand next to him as his assistant (camillus or camilla) holding an incense box. Wreathed youths who play the flute also stand close by (Fless and Moede, 2011: figs 18.1 and 18.2). Children as participants in banquet scenes are frequently placed at the end or edge of a couch. In Roman kline (single person couch) scenes as late as 300 CE, young children are relegated to the edge of a couch ⁹ (Dunbabin, 2003: fig. 57). In sigma meal scenes (those featuring a C-shaped couch), older children, especially beardless youths, can be shown reclining casually at either end of a long cushion (Amedick, 1991: plate 26.1, cat. 260, on viewer’s right; plate 31.3, cat. 279; plate 33.2, cat. 158; Dunbabin, 2003: plate VIII). On rare occasions, young children can be shown reclining among adults (Dunbabin, 2003: plate XII). After reviewing these guidelines we arrive at our first examples showing children participating in sacred processions.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 3.

South Frieze, Ara Pacis, Rome – detail. Photo © Janet Tulloch

Children and Sacred Processions 

A sacred procession (pompa) was typically the first stage of the larger ritual complex of Roman sacrifice with its six stages of rites (Beard, North and Price, 1998: 148). In the Roman world, the sacred procession had a different religious meaning depending on the event celebrated (e.g. military triumph, festival day of a god or goddess, marriage, funeral, imperial cult or games). For Romans in the early empire, a ritual procession was more than simply walking or marching; rather, it had sacred qualities which were believed to protect and sanctify an area as well as focus the attention of the participants (Davies, 1997: 54–56; Moede, 2011: 170–171). ¹⁰ In the procession’s representation in Roman art, it is not always possible to distinguish the various types although the triumph is usually recognizable through scenes depicting the carriage of the triumphator, subjugated enemies in chains, decorated sacrificial animals, soldiers in military formation, and musicians who separate the different sections of the procession (Fless and Moede, 2011: 260). Children and youths in sacred processions are depicted in a variety of types. They are shown in processions of public games (ludi), perhaps as young athletic participants or as part of a hymnal procession (Uzzi, 2005: 67–70, figs 22–23); as barbarians or subjected enemies in triumph scenes (Uzzi, 2005: fig. 42; 2007: 71, figs 3.7–3.8); as musicians in lustrations (purification rituals) (Stilp, 2001: fig. 68); as participants in the imperial cult (Ryberg, 1955: figs. 23b, 72a; Kleiner and Buxton, 2008: figs 4–7; and figures 3 and 4a in this article); and as participants in annual festival processions (Stern, 1981: plates 8–9; and figure 5 in this article). The lusus Troiae, a ritual parade in which boys from elite families participated on horseback in front of an adult audience, may be the visual source for young male children shown on horseback on funerary reliefs. ¹¹ Boys, who were not necessarily from elite families, led the pompa circensis (circus procession) on foot, horseback or chariot (Prescendi, 2010: 83).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 4.

South Frieze, Ara Pacis, Rome – detail. Photo © Janet Tulloch

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figures 5a and 5b.

North Frieze, Ara Pacis, Rome –details. Photo © Janet Tulloch

In this section, we discuss two examples of Roman processions involving child participants, those featured on the first-century BCE Ara Pacis, originally built on the Campus Martius in Rome, and a late second- or early third-century fresco from a house in Ostia. We then discuss the material evidence for early Christian processions. As the first monument under the new empire to unequivocally acknowledge the importance of children as key participants in religious ritual, the Ara Pacis serves as a prototype for comparing all later representations of children as participants in religious activities in the imperial period.

Vowed by the Senate in 13 BCE upon Augustus’ triumphant return from campaigns in Spain and Gallia (France), the Ara Pacis, or Augustan altar of Peace, was dedicated in 9 BCE. Magistrates, priests, and Vestal virgins were ordered by the Senate to offer a sacrifice once every year in honor of the end of Roman civil and military strife. As Jas Elsner has argued, the primary function of the religious art on the Ara Pacis was to map the sacred elements of the imperial cult at its beginnings in the 1st century BCE (Elsner, 1995: 192–196). However, as Paul Zanker and others have argued, its political function, especially with regard to children, cannot be separated from its religious function (Zanker, 1990: 121–123; Kleiner, 1993: 29, 44–46; Rose, 1993: 54; Kleiner and Buxton, 2008: 57). The monument shows two processions, which move in parallel lines depicted on the north and south friezes of the precinct walls which protect and demarcate the actual altar. Some scholars hold the view that the visual presentation of the procession on the Ara Pacis is not symbolic; rather, it represents an actual religious procession (Kleiner, 1993: 28; Elsner, 1995: 200 n21). On the south frieze, where Augustus leads the procession, there are three children, two boys and a girl, fully togated. They are dressed in the attire they will wear as adults. They have round faces and thick, stocky necks. The tallest figure wears her hair pulled back and rolled into a bun at the back of her head; a protective bulla is barely visible around her neck. The smaller figure beside her wears a laurel wreath on his head; a longer bulla is visible over his pallium. Judging by his oval-shaped head, the small figure to the viewer’s far left holding the hand of an adult female appears to be a toddler; he, too, wears a bulla. Based on their formal dress and the adult figures who accompany them, these children are clearly members of Rome’s Imperial family. ¹² Ahead of the togated children (figure 4), a child figure who is sometimes identified as Gaius Caesar, biological son of Agrippa and adopted son of Augustus, clings to the toga of Agrippa, Augustus' closest friend and trusted general. His placement beside Agrippa near the front of the procession suggests his high status, yet the boy appears in non-Roman dress. As scholars have argued, the short tunic, long curly hair, cap and torque (wreath) around his neck are reminiscent of children from the eastern part of the empire ¹³ rather than the Roman west (Rose, 1993: 55–56; Uzzi, 2007: 70–78; and Kleiner and Buxton, 2008: 59–60). On the north side of the Ara Pacis frieze, there are three figures which, using the criteria outlined above, can be identified as children, a togated girl and two small boys. While the girl is clearly a member of the imperial family, the identity of the boys is less certain (figure 5a). Like the boy on the south side, their hair and costume are non-Roman. The boy closest to the girl (taller boy–figure 5a; girl not shown) wears a short tunic and a mappa (or fringed cloth) over his left shoulder. The mappa could identify him as an apprentice camillus, a noble youth who assisted the Flamen Dialis with the sacrifice. An older camillus towards the front of the procession on the north frieze carries a mappa, and carries an accera (incense box), as well as an urceus (a small pitcher) used in sacrifices (figure 5b). In “Pledges of Empire,” Kleiner and Buxton focus on the disputed identity of the non-Roman-looking boys in both the north and south ritual processions. The authors’ identification of these boys as foreign princes who represent the sons of Augustus’ allies or conquered enemies is crucial to their interpretation of the Ara Pacis as “... a brave new Augustan world as it was envisioned in 13 BCE” (Kleiner and Buxton, 2008: 59). They maintain that the young boys represent highly prized pignora or “pledges of empire” in Augustus’ plan for a peaceful, harmonious and decidedly Roman global empire. This identification is backed by textual evidence which reveals that real foreign children of conquered elites could be found among the retinue of Augustus’ household and his circle of aristocratic friends (Kleiner and Buxton, 2008: 64–66). If the authors are correct in their interpretation, then the Ara Pacis frieze is a work of visual rhetoric which interweaves its religious function – the mapping of the imperial cult onto the bodies of known children and their parents – with a political function, the integration and social elevation of the youngest elite members of the empire, including those from conquered territories. At the very least, as John Clarke has suggested, the Ara Pacis provided a lasting visual example for all ancient viewers who lived or visited Rome, in how to raise their own children as future citizens of the empire (Clarke, 2003: 256).

Our next example in this category (see figure 6) is a fresco which shows children holding torches up high and gesturing towards the statue of Diana on the left. On the right, there is a procession of girls, some who hold baskets of grapes or other fruit in their hands, while two small figures hold poles with busts affixed at the top. Bunches of grapes hang from the ends of the pole. This fresco, from a house in Ostia, is dated from the late second to the early third century CE (Andreae, 1977; Stern, 1981). ¹⁴ It is likely part of a much larger representation depicting important festivals in the Roman year, of which only one other fresco now survives (see Stern, 1981: plate 8). There is some debate as to whether this fresco represents two different festival days in the Roman year as signalled by the two groups of children. The small figures on the left clearly honor the goddess Diana (Stern, 1981: 440; Scullard, 1981: fig. 32; Green, 2007: 140), whose festival was celebrated on 13 August in Rome, and most likely in Ostia since it was a nearby Roman colony. There is a tradition of argumentation that claims the figures on the right of the fresco are part of a procession in a separate Roman festival of wine that took place on 19 August (the second Vinalia in the Roman year) or, according to Stern, on 5 September. ¹⁵ Whether the fresco depicts one or two different festivals in the Roman year is less important to my argument than the point that the visual record shows children as participants in sacred processions in the larger context of the performance of Roman rites. Indeed, the surviving companion fresco to the one above also shows male and female children as part of a ritual procession. ¹⁶ I will discuss the left side of the fresco first – the association between the Italian goddess Diana and children, especially girls.

The cult of Diana, while popular with the inhabitants of the Latium region, was not part of civic religion. As the left portion of this domestic fresco shows, a small cult statue of Diana stands on a high pedestal flanked by two burning torches. Four small figures hold up burning torches at the side of the statue. ¹⁷ As discussed below, the torches may reference a night-time sacred procession carried out by women at Diana’s temple at Lake Nemi. The figures appear to be a mixture of girls and boys coiffed and dressed as adults. The remaining figures are young girls, coiffed as adult women. They wear mantles and shoes. ¹⁸ In her 2007 study of the Italic goddess, C.M.C. Green has suggested that as well as being the guardian of women in childbirth, “Diana was the tutela of the young” (Green, 2007: 140). One of Diana’s key roles included the teaching and training of the young, since they were “prone to error, to wandering off the path.” As Green states, Roman first-century BCE poets Horace and Catullus wrote hymns to be sung by girls and “chaste” boys together during worship of the goddess (Green, 2007: 138). Selected lines from Catullus’ poem XXXIV give us some indication of the role of children in the worship of the goddess:

We girls and chaste boys are lieges of Diana. Diana let us sing, chaste boys and girls. O child of Latona, great offspring of greatest Jove, whom thy mother bore by the Delian olive-tree, that thou mightest be the lady of mountains and green woods, and sequestered glens and sounding rivers. ... Thou, goddess, measurest out by monthly course the circuit of the year, thou fillest full with goodly fruits the rustic home of the husbandman. ¹⁹

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 6.

On the left: children dressed as adults honoring the Goddess Diana. Fresco. Photo: Photographic Archives of the Vatican Museums. ©Vatican Museums

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 7.

Remains of Iseum, Pompeii. First century CE. Photo © Janet Tulloch

The poet Statius (ca 45–ca 96 CE) tells us that in Aricia near Rome, Diana’s rites were performed at night by women carrying torches, who, after the rites, returned to the city in a torchlight procession (Silvae 3.1.55–60). Ovid and Propertius also mention these rites performed by women at Aricia in Roman antiquity (Fasti 3.269; Propertius 3.24.9f).

Archaeological evidence confirms worship of Diana at Lake Nemi near Aricia in the 3rd–2nd centuries BCE. Examples of two bronze statuettes from this period found at Diana’s temple at Lake Nemi show an adult female and a young girl in the identical pose of sacrifice, with a tilted patera (small offering dish) held in the outstretched right hand. An incense box is held in the left. ²⁰ These votive figurines suggest a strong association between female adults and their daughters at Diana’s temple at Lake Nemi. Whether or not the left section of the above fresco (figure 6) depicts a real or an imaginary rite of worship of Diana, possibly from Roman antiquity or even first-century Rome, cannot be known for certain. What we can say is that Diana’s festival, and children’s participation in it, were not incongruent events to viewers living in the early third century CE. The rites which marked this festival still recognizably stood for the representation of the 13th August, Diana’s festival day, as part of a larger wall painting that may have represented the Roman year. ²¹

On the right-hand portion of the fresco, five children are shown in what may be a different festival. Like the figures on the left they are well coiffed and wear mantles and shoes. As mentioned above, there is a tradition of argumentation that claims these figures are part of a procession called the Vinalia, a Roman festival of wine which occurred twice a year. Rather than a representation of a calendar of distinct months as Stern argues, I would suggest that this fresco (and its companion surviving representation) may have been part of a larger wall painting that marked the important festivals of the Roman sacred year, with the group of children on the right above, representing the festival for the second Vinalia, which took place on 19 August. ²² If the right-hand section of the fresco does indeed show the second Vinalia, then 19 August and not 5 September, as Stern argues, makes the most sense since the point of this sacred festival was to gain protection for the growing grapes (Scullard, 1981: 177). By depicting the anticipated positive result of a mature and healthy crop of grapes through the proper worship of the deity(ies) involved, Romans hoped to create favorable conditions for success. ²³ It must be acknowledged that the representation of children in the above fresco (and its surviving companion, not shown here) could be a visual convention of the calendar series. It could equally index sacred processions and rites in which children participated – for Diana on the left section of the above fresco in thanks for her protection over the lives of the young, and to Jupiter and Venus ²⁴ on the right portion of the fresco in thanks for their protection that will culminate in a mature harvest. For both groups of children, the theme of protection until maturity seems to be shared. Jupiter and Venus protect and guide the forthcoming harvest of grapes much in the same way, I suggest, that the invocation of Diana’s protection guides children to mature adulthood.

We are told by their detractors that early Christians did not participate in state processions (Benko, 1984: 55–57). When it came to weddings or funerals, however, it seems reasonable to assume that both early Christians and Jews would have included elements of procession in their rites similar to those of pagans, in which entire families participated, including children. ²⁵ Our earliest material evidence of Christians practicing a type of sacred procession in the form of circumambulation can be found in the architecture of round-shaped martyria, mausolea which at one time held the body or relics of a martyr or high-ranking Christian. The sarcophagus, placed at the center of the space, was encircled by an arched ambulatory around which pilgrims walked. A highly decorated example of such an ambulatory can be found inside the mid-fourth-century mausoleum, Santa Costanza in Rome, originally built for the daughters of Constantine I (Krautheimer, 1986: 67, fig. 28). It is likely that early Christian pilgrims also practiced a form of sacred procession in their pilgrimage from martyr’s shrine to martyr’s shrine in the catacombs outside the eternal city. ²⁶ Elsewhere, I have argued on the basis of the placement of frescoes in relation to a stone mensa (table) within an individual funerary chamber, that early Christians may have practiced a type of circumambulation within certain household funerary chambers in the catacomb of Saints Marcellino and Pietro, a large fourth-century cemetery known for its original burial sites of early Christian martyrs (Tulloch, 2011: 548–551). One particular funerary chamber in this catacomb is particularly suggestive. It contains two frescoes: a larger banquet scene consisting of seven figures painted in the lunette of an arcosolium (grave) across from the entrance, and a fresco of a seated figure who gestures towards a plate of food on top of a mensa or small table (Tulloch, 2011: fig. 32.5). This smaller fresco is square in shape and, according to one archaeological report, takes up the space of two children’s loculi as measured against the size of other children’s graves dug out above this fresco on the same wall (Deckers, Mietke and Weiland, 1987: 269, “Beschreibung” RCLau 45). ²⁷ This smaller fresco is located directly across from a real mensa made of masonry in the same chamber. In the banquet scene consisting of seven figures, two small figures can be clearly identified as children by their smaller size, placement among adults and, in the case of one figure, by the oval-shaped head (Tulloch, 2006: fig. 8.2; 2011: fig. 32.3). Above the fresco of the banquet scene is a loculus for an adult and above this one is a loculus for a child (Deckers, Mietke and Weiland, 1987: 267, “Beschreibung” RCLau 45). The smallest loculus on this wall is dug out of the lunette of the arcosolium which destroys the lower part of the banquet scene. ²⁸ Given it is smaller than the loculus for the child found on the same wall, it probably held an infant or toddler.

Although the age of the seated figure in the smaller fresco is difficult to assess, in the same 1987 archaeological report, Deckers, Mietke and Weiland describe the figure as a “young, beardless man with short, curly, brown hair” (Deckers, Mietke and Weiland, 1987: 269, “Beschreibung” RCLau 45). Of the three male figures in the banquet scene on the adjacent wall, one appears to be a beardless youth and may be the same figure depicted in the small fresco (Deckers, Mietke and Weiland, 1987: chamber 45, color-plate 21a). The figure’s identity as a male youth could have an important bearing on the role of youths and children in early Christian funerary rites and commemorative practices held on the feast days of saints at popular catacombs. Given that this fresco is located directly across from an actual mensa made of masonry, upon entering, a visitor to the funerary chamber, perhaps a family member or pilgrim, ²⁹ would have been visually directed by the two frescoes in the chamber to walk in a clockwise direction around the small room, ending with a plate of food (the host?) that was left on the real mensa, ³⁰ before leaving by the same door from which he or she had entered. Thanks to the fifth-century Spanish poet Prudentius, we know that young children accompanied families on their pilgrimages to the tombs of martyrs in early fifth-century Rome but did not, in his experience, assemble with the adults waiting their turn to “do reverence” at the shrine of a martyr (Prudentius II “Crowns of Martyrs”, XI, 319). If the seated figure in chamber 45 of Saints Marcellino and Pietro is indeed a youth, then within the context of the burial chamber which held the remains of a number of children and the catacomb of Saints Marcellino and Pietro as a popular destination for early Christian pilgrims, this image might have functioned symbolically in the role of “host,” in the absence of a real host, directing a family visitor or pilgrim toward the offered food on the real table.

In summary, while we do not have any visual evidence of early Christians and their children shown in sacred processions, we do have early to mid-fourth-century architectural, archaeological and documentary evidence that supports the view that Christians performed some type of circumambulation rite associated with death and the commemoration of martyrs and high-ranking Christians. ³¹ Based on the visual evidence in chamber 45, and the household tomb’s location in a catacomb well-known to fourth-century pilgrims for its famous martyrs’ shrines, we might speculate that on crowded feast days enterprising youths associated with families buried in the cemetery and who knew their way around the underground galleries may have assisted guests to the family funerary chamber or eager pilgrims anxious to find an alternative route to the tomb of their beloved saints to avoid the long wait in lines.

Children and Sacrifice/Offering

The ritual act of sacrifice had different meanings for believers who practiced diverse religions during the imperial period. In the following excerpt, Christian apologist Minucius Felix compares pagan sacrifice with early Christian belief. Except for the stage of procession, his anti-pagan rhetoric covers a number of the ritual elements of Roman sacrifice:

Shall I offer to god sacrifices and victims which he provided for my use, and so throw his generosity back at him? That is a mark of ingratitude, since the offering that is acceptable to god is a good heart, a pure mind and innocent thoughts. So, to cherish innocence is to pray to god: to cherish justice is to make a libation to god; to refrain from deceit is to propitiate god; to save another man from danger is to slay the best victim. These are our sacrifices, these our holy rites of the Lord. ³²

Like processions, there were different forms of Roman sacrifice and offerings. Their meaning and the types of gifts offered depended on many factors: the purpose of the sacrifice (e.g. vow or thanksgiving), the status of the divine power or ancestor being propitiated, the site of the sacrifice, and the public, professional or domestic nature of the event (Scheid, 2011: 269–270). There were also rules pertaining to which order of priests or priestesses performed the sacrifice. ³³ From the above excerpt, it is clear that Minucius Felix had no appreciation for the nuanced meaning of Roman sacrifice. In examples of Roman art showing children as participants in sacrifice rituals, the most common roles include: male or female assistants (camilli  or camillae) who refill the patera or hold the incense box for priests, or emperors acting as priests (Ryberg, 1955: figs. 17b, 54a, 67, 83, 93; Fless and Moede, 2011: figs. 18.1, 18.2); loin-clothed figures (victimarii) who lead the sacrificial animals to the altar (Ryberg, 1955: figs. 32, 51); and flute players (tibicines) who play the double flute in scenes of formal imperial sacrifice as well as in domestic scenes showing sacrifice to the household gods (Ryberg, 1955: fig. 38a; Clarke, 2003: fig. 40). We also find child musicians playing percussion instruments during an offering or sacrifice in scenes of foreign cults (see figure 8 in this article).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 8.

Isaic cult: showing young girl (in blue robes) playing a percussion instrument. First century CE. Photo ©Scala / Art Resource, NY

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 9.

Altar relief. “Sacrifice to the Genius Augusti, Altar of Vespasian.” Pompeii. Photo ©Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY

The following two representations show the tamer side of children’s roles in sacrifice in the early imperial period. Fless and Moede state that together, an “altar, sacrificing togatus capite velato [veiled and wearing the toga], and tibicen [flute player] are therefore the most basic, universally valid image of ritual action” in Roman art (italics in original text: Fless and Moede, 2011: 258). The first image we examine is a fresco from Herculaneum showing a young girl participating in the cult of Isis, a favorite of Roman sub-elites who lived in nearby Pompeii (figure 8). Our second example is a relief found on an altar from the temple of Vespasian in Pompeii showing camilli and a camilla assisting the emperor in a sacrifice scene. After discussing these two scenes we turn our attention to an early Christian fresco from the so-called crypt of sacraments from the catacomb of Callixtus in Rome (figure 10).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 10.

Scene from chamber A3, North Wall, Catacomb of Callixtus, Rome. Fresco. Photo ©International Catacomb Society, Boston

A fresco from Herculaneum now in the Museo Archeologico in Naples shows a sacrifice taking place in an Iseum, a temple dedicated to the Egyptian goddess Isis. Though the fresco was found in Herculaneum (Clarke, 2007: 39), a similar sacrificial performance may have taken place in Pompeii, about seven kilometres south-east of Herculaneum, where a nearly intact temple of Isis (figure 7) was one of the first sites to be excavated, in 1764 CE (Peterson, 2006: 22–23).

The focal point of the Isis cult scene (figure 8) seems to be the black male dancer, who is at the apex of a triangle of musicians and worshipping figures, many of whom shake a sistra. Of special interest to us is the young girl who plays the cymbals. She wears a full-length dark (blue?) robe and stands behind the dancer and the tall figure on the temple podium. Others on the podium appear to clap or play drums or tambourines while a fire burns on the altar below. In the fresco, both adults and children participate in the musical accompaniment to the sacrifice, a cacophony of percussion instruments celebrating the possible resurrection of Osiris (Clarke, 2007: fig. 24).As the Egyptian cult of Isis was one of the many oriental religions seeking to gain broader public legitimacy in the Roman empire, ³⁴ the positive presentation of sacrifice, in which children were welcome and could safely participate in a respectful ceremony, was not lost on the people of Pompeii, who, like many Roman sub-elites, were interested in finding ways to increase the status of their family through the promotion of the next generation. After the earthquake of 62 CE, the temple of Isis was one of the few temples to be rebuilt – all with private funds, as the temple’s dedicatory inscription attests. Further, all of this beneficence was thanks to Numerius Popidius Celsinus, a six-year-old boy, who reportedly used his own money (Peterson, 2006: 24–25).

Our second example (figure 9), known as “Sacrifice to the Genius Augusti, Altar of Vespasian,” is from Pompeii. According to Ryberg, it is an “Augustan type,” a Roman altar to the Lares and Genius Augusti, one of many similar examples that could be found in the courtyard of a temple in any number of Roman cities (Ryberg, 1955: 81, plate XXV, fig. 38a). Whether it was dedicated to the genius of a living emperor (Vespasian?) or to Augustus is a matter of some debate. ³⁵ Of interest to us are the figures of the youth in profile, who plays the double flute, and the young camilla (a female sacrificial assistant) on the far left, who carries an urceus (a small pitcher) and a simpuvium (a libation bowl shaped like a ladle). According to Fless and Moede, later records suggest that cult flute playing at sacrifices was originally introduced during the Roman royal period (753–509 BCE), so that by the first century CE, its function may have been no more significant than announcing the beginning of the ritual by drowning out all other noises (Fless and Moede, 2011: 258). Writing in the third century CE, Roman scholar Censorinus maintained that the purpose of flute players was to please the gods with their music (Parker, 2007: 24–25). ³⁶ With regard to the small figure on the left, it is the style of her hair – tied back in a bun like the figure of the young girl on the Ara Pacis frieze above (figure 3) – that suggests her identity as a female child. ³⁷ A mantele (cloth for the hand, considered as part of the instrumenta sacra or utensils of sacrifice) hangs around the figure’s neck. ³⁸ While Ryberg considers this figure to be a young male assistant and calls the coiffure “girlish,” the style does not conform to any statues or reliefs of boys discussed above in our identification criteria. While the pitcher and ladled libation bowl held by the figure may be used to refresh the wine used by the sacrificer, the presence of the mantele around the figure’s neck suggests that the contents of the pitcher could be water, used either as one of the libations or for the ritual washing of the priest’s hands.

In the final example for this category, we examine a small fresco that comes from the north wall in chamber A3, from the so-called “Crypt of the Sacraments” in the catacomb of Callixtus, the earliest Christian cemetery in Rome. Scholars generally agree that the date range of the earliest frescoes in this catacomb is around 200 CE, plus or minus 10–15 years (Finney, 1994: 146; Jensen, 2001:15). The fresco is part of a series of wall paintings which decorate a funerary chamber (walls and ceiling). Some scenes in the chamber are enclosed by painted frames, which may be intended to give the scene added significance. The scene shown in figure 10 occurs as one of three found on the middle register of images on the north wall of the chamber. Flanking the three scenes are figures of a standing fossor (grave digger), who faces front and holds a pick. The fossor on the viewer’s left gestures towards the three scenes with his left hand while the fossor on the right gestures towards the same three scenes with his right hand (Finney, 1994: figs 6.30, 6.43, 6.44). The three center scenes on the north wall (from the viewer’s left to right) are: the scene shown in figure 10; a scene of seven banqueters reclining on a sigma or stibadium couch; and a scene which is probably meant to represent the sacrifice of Isaac. In this representation, Isaac is shown as a small child standing beside his much taller father (Finney, 1994: fig. 6.48). Both figures have their arms raised in the same gesture as the female figure below (see figure 10). Figures of a fisherman, a child baptizand, and his baptizer occur within a painted frame on the middle register of the adjacent west wall in the same funerary chamber (Finney, 1994: fig. 6.50). To the immediate right of the baptism scene is a single standing figure carrying a four-legged pallet (bed).

The scene in figure 10 is the only fresco of its type to survive in early Christian art. As such, its interpretation has puzzled scholars since the catacomb of Callixtus was rediscovered in the nineteenth century by Giovanni Battista de Rossi. Most scholars agree that a male and female figure flank a tripod table with food on its surface (bread and fish?). Finney is unsure of the identity of the figures but states that the scene represents the cultic display of bread and fish (Finney, 1994: 216). Jensen reads the figures from left to right as “... Jesus performing the miracle of loaves and fishes, a veiled orante” (Jensen, 2011: 15). Given the representations of Isaac and a baptizand as small children in this particular funerary chamber, as well as the presence of smaller loculi (graves cut from tufa), I suggest that the two figures in this scene (figure 10) are both children. Their round faces and lack of muscle tone suggest their young age. Even Finney refers to the female figure’s arms in the fresco as “stubby” (Finney, 1994: 214). Further, a comparison of the girl figure in the fresco with the girl figure from the baked clay group depicting the girl–boy pair of musicians (see figure 1 above) shows some iconographical similarities. The round face, collar, the A-line fold in the tunic, and foot stance are all suggestively similar. Like the girl in the clay group, the female figure in the fresco stands in a contrapposto position and wears a short-sleeved tunic with vertical folds on the front and a round, bordered neckline. The girl in the clay group plays a lyre while the female figure in the fresco raises her arms in a possible prayer or song position. The male figure, on the other hand (in figure 10), is almost the same height as the female figure, suggesting that he too is a child, given that the girl–boy pair in the clay group are approximately the same height. Perhaps, given that his right hand is held over the food in a blessing gesture, the male figure is a representation of a child lector whose sacred duties, later sacramentaries inform us, were “to bless the bread and new fruits brought by the congregation as offerings” (Wiedemann, 1989: 186–187). If these two figures are indeed children, then the absence of a priest is telling. It announces to the viewer that the scene is not a Roman sacrifice. Even though there is the presence of a tripod table with an offering, there is no togatus capite velato and tibicen – “... the most basic, universally valid image of ritual action” in Roman art (Fless and Moede, 2011: 258). When read together, the three scenes on the middle register of the wall in the catacomb of Callixtus (figure 10, the banquet scene with seven figures, and the Abraham–Isaac scene showing Isaac as a young child safe from sacrifice) could represent an anti-pagan polemic through the demonstration of the positive participation of children in early Christian rites, especially those related to offerings, funerary banquets and sacrifice. Such scenes may have served to mitigate charges, made by second-century Christian detractors, of infant cannibalism and the corruption of child novices (Benko, 1984: 55–56; Macdonald, 1996: 59–67, 110–111, 119–120) especially since, according to John Scheid, “... Roman sacrifice was, to ancient eyes, first and foremost, a banquet” (Scheid, 2011: 270).

Banquets

Ritual banquets were a common practice in the Roman empire and took place during religious festivals, imperial feriae, family birthdays, weddings, funerals and anniversaries. Even the domestic daily meal included a ritual performed by a child, which took place at the beginning or just after the first course of the meal. A propitiation to Vesta and other gods (Lares and Penates) consisting of incense and wine along with a part of the banquet was offered at the family hearth. The remaining banqueters had to wait for the pronouncement of the gods’ satisfaction with the sacrifice before continuing (Prescendi, 2010: 85; Scheid, 2011: 268). Proclamations of the host’s hospitality through offering a share of the banquet to non-family members, especially the god they wished to thank, was a key element of Roman sacrificial banquets (Scheid, 2011: 268). According to Scheid, “a sacrifice was a banquet, which offered men the opportunity to become familiar with their divine counterparts, to define their respective qualities and status, and, together, to address the matters in hand” (Scheid, 2011: 270). As such, Roman formal dinners had very special seating arrangements according to one’s rank or social status (Dunbabin, 2003: fig. 21). As mentioned above, the placement of children as participants in Roman banquet scenes is typically at the end of a couch or cushion. However, it is just as likely that the viewer will find children represented in front of the banqueting couch as slaves cleaning up after an overzealous banquet participant (Clarke, 2003: plate 21) or as participants invited to share in the sacrificial meal (see Clarke – same image).

Like their Roman counterparts, hospitality and the sharing of food were of equal importance to early Christians (Smith, 2003: 244–245; Osiek and MacDonald, 2006: 31–32; Tulloch, 2006: 191–192). It was certainly part of Mediterranean table hospitality to fête strangers. As well, the care of widows and orphans was part of a Christian’s duty towards believers in accordance with the ethical duties outlined in some early Christian texts (James 1:27; Herm. Man. 8.10; Barn. 20.2; Ign. Smyrn. 6.2; Herm. Vis. 2.4.3), ³⁹ and so it was an ethical priority in early Christian communities (Osiek and MacDonald, 2006: 75). How this priority might have been rendered in early Christian art is the subject of some debate. Some scholars have suggested that the baskets of bread visible in the earliest banquet scenes from the Roman catacombs of Callixtus and Priscilla refer to the charitable donations that typically accompanied Roman funerary banquets, a practice that was continued by early Christians (Dunbabin, 2003: 177 n8 and n9). There are few Roman pagan funerary scenes, however, that depict this donation in art, with which we can compare. ⁴⁰ If early Christian banqueters did continue this tradition, and there is no reason to think that they didn’t, they may have chosen to represent the charitable distribution of food as part of a funerary banquet scene. In this way the household who owned the funerary chamber were able to communicate to others that they had fulfilled their ethical duties as laid down in early Christian texts. Earlier commentators have interpreted these earliest banquet scenes in various ways, including as an illustration of the Multiplication of Loaves and Fishes story from the New Testament or as an illustration of the Eucharist or Christian agape. Finney views these scenes, first and foremost, as funerary banquets, given their funereal context (Finney, 1994: 203). With regard to these early Christian scenes in Callixtus and Priscilla, Dunbabin notes the absence of slaves bearing food and drink as well as “a greater sense of decorum and sobriety ... than in many comparable scenes. The baskets full of loaves are also an exceptional feature, whose prominence suggests they were intended to bear particular significance” (Dunbabin, 2003: figs. 102–103, 176–177). In the catacomb of Priscilla, a famous banquet scene known as “Fractio Panis” (the breaking of the bread) shows seven figures flanked by seven baskets of bread (figure 12a). Two pieces of evidence suggest that the figure on the viewer’s far left (figure 12b), whose legs drape over the cushion, is a youth and not a priest who presides at the banquet. The first is the number of similar extant banquet scenes which show youthful figures casually reclining on the ends of cushions, as discussed in the section above on identification of children. As we have seen, in informal banquets, children may have perched on the edges of couches, or reclined at the ends of sigma cushions if they were youths. When one examines the figure known as “the presider” on the viewer’s far left, the diminutive size of the figure along with its posture, balanced on the edge of a cushion, suggests a youth of about ten years of age. The figure extends a plate to the banqueters, the contents of which are now unclear but were read by earlier interpreters as bread. In the context of the Roman visual genre of banquets, the identity of the figure at the end of a cushion as a youth is not uncommon. The second piece of evidence which suggests the figure may be a youth is the New Testament instruction to early Christians to care for widows and orphans. Perhaps in this banquet scene, the deceased, who was once buried near the fresco, is visually attesting her care of this group by showing women and a youth as the participants who enjoy a banquet as part of her patronage. ⁴¹ The deceased or her heirs may be further illustrating her support of the early Christian community who congregated around the catacomb of Priscilla, through the visual reference to the baskets of bread that are to be distributed, flanking the banqueters.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 11.

Photo illustration by author using   details of figures 1 and 10 for comparison.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 12a.

Banquet scene. Catacomb of Priscilla, Rome. Fresco. Photo ©International Catacomb Society, Boston

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 12b.

Detail of end figure. Photo by Janet Tulloch, after J. Wilpert

Early Christian Art and the Role of Children in Early Christian Ritual Practice

The question of correlation between the visual representation of a subject, in this case the role of children in ancient religious ritual, and actual religious practice is admittedly a problematic one. In the case of Roman religions, there are at least a number of contemporary texts with which to test and compare scholars’ hypotheses about children in ritual art. It must be kept in mind, however, that both images and texts are “edited documents” of a historical reality that, at best, can only be partially recovered. In the above discussion, all three questionable figures in scenes of early Christian art share the visual genre of “offering,” closely associated with a representation of a funerary “banquet” scene, in common. Unfortunately, we have no early Christian texts that can help clarify the identity of the figures in question as children. Even if we could confirm this identity, we are confronted with interpreting the function of these figures within the unstable visual conventions of a nascent religion struggling to express its identity.

Perhaps what we can say is that if these figures are indeed children or even youths, we have found a visual pattern of religious practice involving children and offerings not visible in early Christian texts. Without the availability of the dominant Roman culture’s representations of children in processions, offerings/sacrifices, and banquets, with which to compare our images, this pattern would not have been visible.

Conclusion

The above analysis of representations of children participating in three categories of Roman ritual has sensitized us to the difficulties of identifying children in ritual scenes, whether Roman pagan or early Christian. Beyond identification, there is the question of how much historical authenticity can be read into a work of ancient art, even those works which appear to be “documentary.” Through a comparison with images in each of the three categories of Roman art: processions, offerings/sacrifices, and banquets, it might be possible to identify child figures in similar early Christian scenes. If the interpretation of questionable figures as children in the above discussion of early Christian examples is correct, then some important differences between Roman and early Christian scenes can be determined among the categories. Within the category of offerings/sacrifices, we find the absence of a priest and musician in the early Christian scene interpreted here as two children presiding over or blessing an offering. It is interesting to speculate that the continuation of this scene without the priest (or musician) was a visual strategy used by early Christians for identifying offering scenes as Christian gifts or donations and not as a pagan sacrifice. The use of a youth in presenting a plate of bread to banqueters (as in the scene from the catacomb of Priscilla) or to visitors to household tombs (as in the fresco from the catacomb of Saints Marcellino and Pietro) may be an early Christian visual expression of the practice of hospitality; within the category of banquets, the absence of slaves and the addition of baskets in the earliest Christian banquet scenes may show a household’s commitment to the care of community and children in accordance with the ethical duties outlined in some early Christian texts. ⁴² Finally, within Roman art the child assistant (camillus and camilla) to the veiled priest was a familiar figure in sacrifice scenes from the imperial period. That our questionable figures in scenes of early Christian art related to the visual genres of offerings and banquets might be children does not appear to be a coincidence.