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The Magerius Mosaic

"What else would living be if lions and bears held sway, if serpents and all the creatures that are most destructive were given supremacy over us? These, devoid of reason and doomed to death by us on the plea of their ferocity."

Seneca, On Mercy (I.26)

Named after the aristocratic owner of the country villa where it was found, the Magerius mosaic presumably was intended for a public space of his house, such as the dining room, where the couches would be placed around the periphery of the room, recreating for the guests the original spectacle in miniature. This detail showing Crispinus ("Curly") being killed, or the dying leopards in the Borghese mosaic, depicts an event that is disturbing to modern sensibilities. That it was meaningful and attractive to the ancient Romans is one measure of the difficulty in presuming to understand different cultural norms. In the mosaic, the audience is not represented; rather, it is replaced by the viewer, who gazes upon the scene. Scenes such as this invariably show wounded animals, their blood spilling on the sand, at the moment they are dispatched. They indicate the interest of the spectator in exotic animals, their variety and number, and ultimately their death in an uncertain contest against a human opponent. The interest of Magerius, himself, as editor of the games is to remind the guests of his beneficence and the implicit honor due him. Presumably over dinner, he would be able to remark on the game, just as Trimalchio, in the Satyricon of Petronius (XXIX), had pictures of himself on the wall of the peristyle, including one of gladiators. In such mosaics, the ferocity of beasts (and the implicit threat of all nature) is subjugated and safely reduced to a dining room decoration.

Such domestic mosaics also prolonged otherwise ephemeral events and brought public spectacles within the confines of the private home. Venationes and gladiatorial combats were infrequent and short lived. Their representation in floor mosaics allowed them to be continually restaged for a new audience, entertaining the guests and enhancing the prestige of the host. And what more appropriate occasion than the banquet, another spectacle in itself.


In this mosaic, a venatio is being carried out under the aegis of Diana, goddess of the hunt, who is shown in a short tunic carrying a stalk of millet, and Dionysus, subduer of animals, who carries a staff with a crescent-shaped head (the symbol of the Telegenii, who fought that day). The leopards, themselves, are encircled with garlands. The two divinities indicate the religious character of these games, which had been sponsored by a local dignitary named Magerius, whose damaged image almost is lost. In the center of the mosaic, a herald bears a tray with four bags of money. It is indicated that the cost of the spectacle is five hundred denarii for each of the four leopards, but the crowd exhorts him to pay more, which he does, paying one thousand denarii apiece. The shouts of acclamation, "Magerius," are shown on either side of the panel. The venatores, themselves, are a professional troupe of beast hunters, the Telegenii, who had contracted to perform, one of whom is fighting on short stilts.


The mosaic dates from the middle of the third century AD and presumably graced the country villa of Magerius at Smirat, Tunisia. It likely commemorates a venatio at nearby Sousse and is in the museum there. Discovered in 1966, It now is in the Sousse Archaeological Museum (Tunisia) which, after the Bardo National Museum in nearby Tunis, houses the largest collection of mosaics in the world.


References: "Death as Decoration: Scenes from the Arena on Roman Domestic Mosaics" by Shelby Brown, in Pornography and Representation in Greece and Rome (1992) edited by Amy Richlin; The Art of Ancient Spectacle (1999) edited by Bettina Bergmann and Christine Kondoleon (Studies in the History of Art, LVI); Mosaïques de Tunisie (1976) by Georges Fradier and André Martin.

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