1
RCS Lecture 7 - Death
AEC 11.12
Lecture 7 - Death and Burial
Location of Roman tombs
 All outside sacred boundary (pomerium)
 Twelve Tables: ‘a dead man shall not be burned or buried within the city’ (Cicero, on
the law 2.58)
 Most along roadsides
 Honorific tombs in Campus Martius, Rome:
 Scipio brothers; Sulla; Julia; A. Hirtius & C. Vibius Pansa
 Exceptional burials at Rome:
 Caius Publicius Bibulus
For Gaius Poplicius Bibulus, aedile of the people, in recognition of his worth and valour, by decree of
the Senate and People, the site for a tomb for him and his descendants has been given at public
expense.

Trajan’s column: CILVI 960 = Dudley (1967) p.133-4:
The Senate and people of Rome, to the emperor Caesar Nerva Trajan Augustus Germanicus Dacicus,
son of the deified Nerva, chief priest, in the 17th year of his tribunician power, six times hailed as
victorious general, consul six times, father of the fatherland, to show how high a hill – and the site for
such great works – had been cleared away.
Types of tomb
 Chronology of cremation/inhumation
 Sarcophagus
 Marble sarcophagus with the Triumph of Dionysos and the Seasons
 Grande Ludovisi sarcophagus
 C. Iunius Euhodus + Metilia Acte - CIL XIV 371:
To the Departed Spirits. Gaius Iunius Euhodus, of the tribe Palatina, quinquennalis of the guild of the
Ostian builders, of the twenty-first lustrum, ordered (this monument) for himself and for Metilia Acte,
priestess of the Great Mother of the gods of the colony of Ostia, his most holy wife.


Ash chest/urn – Gaius Perperna Geminus
Funerary altars:
To the spirits of the dead. To the most upright Cominia Tyche, his most chaste and loving wife, Lucius
Annius Festus. Died at the age of twenty-seven years, eleven months, twenty-eight days. Also for
himself and for his descendants.



‘House tombs’
Rotunda: Caecilia Metella; Pompeii banker Serapio
Columbarium
 Description/ chronology
 Why did columbaria start to be built?
Three kinds of columbaria:
 1. built by one man or one family
 Isola Sacra no.87
Publius Varius Ampelus and Varia Ennuchis built (this) for themselves and for Varia Servanda,
daughter of Publius, their patron, and for their freedmen and freedwomen and for their descendants in
such a way that no sarcophagus be placed within this monument. This monument is not to follow an
heir from outside the familia. 10½ feet wide, 33 feet deep.
But poss. that chron. might distort social hierarchy: unlikely to disturb remains of
someone already buried in order to be able to express some else’s higher status.
 2. built by one or more individuals for speculation
 Via Latina
2
RCS Lecture 7 - Death
AEC 11.12
"Of Caius Rabirius Aeschinus, fourth tier, twenty-eighth locus;" "Of Lucius Scribonius Sosus, fourth
tier, twenty-third locus:"
 3. built by a company - ‘Burial club’
 Lanuvium collegium: of Diana & Antinous - AD 136; ILS 7212.
 Schola of Sodales Serrenses: Via Nomentana
 19th c burial clubs
 Non-monumental burials at Isola Sacra
 Poorest at Rome
 Horace Satires 1.8.2-4:
Before this the fellow-slave bore dead corpses thrown out of their narrow cells to this place, in order to
be deposited in paltry coffins. This place stood a common sepulchre for the miserable mob, for the
buffoon Pantolabus, and Nomentanus the rake. Here a column assigned a thousand feet [of ground] in
front, and three hundred toward the fields: that the burial-place should not descend to the heirs of the
estate. Now one may live in the Esquiliae, [since it is made] a healthy place; and walk upon an open
terrace, where lately the melancholy passengers beheld the ground frightful with white bones

Suetonius Vespasian 5:
Once when he was taking breakfast, a stray dog brought in a human hand from the crossroads and
dropped it under the table.

Children
Social hierarchy
 Augustus’ mausoleum
Strabo 5.3.8:
The most noteworthy tomb is the so-called Mausoleum, a great mound upon a high foundation of white
stone near the river, thickly covered with evergreen trees right up to the top. On the summit is a bronze
statue of Augustus Caesar, and below the mound are the tombs of Augustus himself, his relatives &
household, & behind is a large grove with amazing walkways; in the middle of the Campus is the
enclosure of his cremation-site (this too is of white stone), with a circular iron railing, & planted inside
with cypresses.



M. Lucilius Paetus, Via Salaria, CIL VI 32932
Munatius Plancus, Gaeta.
Cycle of boom & bust
What types of information appears on tombs?
 Age-rounding in inscriptions:
 Dedicator/ deceased
 Social rank:
 slave/freed
 freeborn
 slaves

True reflections of status or aspirational?
 Munatius Faustus, Pompeii
Cooley Sourcebook G38:
Gaius Munatius Faustus, Augustalis and Country-District Dweller by decree of the councillors, to
himself and to his wife, Naevoleia Tyche.
Cooley Sourcebook G47 = CIL X 1030 = ILS 6373:
Naevoleia Tyche, freedwoman of Lucius, for herself and for Gaius Munatius Faustus, Augustalis and
Country-District Dweller, to whom the town councillors with the consent of the people decreed an
honorific chair for his merits. Naevoleia Tyche had this monument made in her lifetime for her own
freedmen and freedwomen and those of Gaius Munatius Faustus.
3
RCS Lecture 7 - Death



AEC 11.12
Comparative studies
Professional occupation:
 Marcus Vergilius Eurysaces: This is the tomb of Marcus Vergilius Eurysaces, a
baker, contractor, he serves (as some minor official)
Role of inscriptions
How are religious practices shown?
 Parentalia, Lemuria
 Ovid, Fasti 2.533:
Honour is paid, also, to the grave. Appease the souls of your fathers and bring small gifts to the tombs
erected to them. Ghosts ask but little: they value piety more than a costly gift: no greedy gods are they
who in the world below do haunt the banks of Styx. A tile wreathed with votive garlands, a sprinkling
of corn, a few grains of salt, bread soaked in wine, and some loose violets, these are offerings enough:
set these on a potsherd and leave it in the middle of the road.


 Parentalia
 CIL XI 5047: C. Attius Ianuarius
 CIL XI 1436 – soldier at Pisa
Archaeological evidence for ritual
 Libations, columbarium Delle Vigne
 Arria gens herms: Pompeii
 Isola Sacra Tomb 87 biclinia
Burial ritual
Do burials preserve wishes of remaining living family rather than of deceased
person?

Ante-mortem commemoration
 Pyramid of Cestius - CIL VI 1374:
Gaius Cestius Epulo, son of Lucius, of the Poblilian tribe, praetor, tribune of the people, one of the
seven epulones. The work was completed under the terms of his will in 330 days by decision of the heir
Pontus Mela, son of Publius, of the Claudian tribe, and of (C. Cestius) Pothus, freedman.
Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus, Publius Rutilius Lupus, Lucius Iunius Silanus, Lucius Pontius
Mela, and Decimus Marius Niger, the heirs of Caius Cestius, and Lucius Cestius, on whose part the
inheritance of hits brother came to him as gift from Marcus Agrippa, from the money which they
received for their own part from the sale of the Attalics, which by edict of the aedile they were
forbidden to put into the tomb of Caius Cestius as requested in his will .

Tomb 1, Isola Sacra - Gaius Annaeus Atticus
Conclusions
4
RCS Lecture 7 - Death
AEC 11.12
Roman Culture and Society, Lecture 7
Death and Burial: Bibliography
Key readings
@Hope, V.M. (2009) Roman Death: dying and the dead in ancient Rome [DG 103.H68]
ch 6 'Commemorating and remembering the dead'
@Patterson, J. (2000) ‘On the margins of the city of Rome’, in Hope, V.M. and Marshall,
E. (eds) Death and disease in the ancient city (London: Routledge) [DE 61.D3 + e-book]
General reading
Bodel, J. (1999) "Death on Display: Looking at Roman Funerals," in B. Bergmann and C.
Kondoleon, eds., The Art of Ancient Spectacle (Studies in the History of Art 56)
(Washington, D.C., 1999) 258–81 [GT 4851.A7 oversize]
Carroll, M. (2006) Spirits of the Dead: Roman funerary commemoration in Western
Europe (OUP) [DG 103.C2]
Claridge, A. (1993) ‘Hadrian’s Column of Trajan’, Journal of Roman Archaeology 6: 1-22
[Arts periodical]
Colvin, H. M. (1991) Architecture and the after-life (New Haven, London: Yale University
Press) [NA 6162.C6]
@Davies, P.J.E. (2000) Death and the emperor (Cambridge) [NB 1875.D2] pp.27-34,
127-135
Elsner, J. and Huskinson, J. (2011) Life, death, and representation: some new work on
Roman sarcophagi [NB 1810.L47]
Hope, V.M. (1997) ‘A roof over the dead: communal tombs & family structure’, in
Domestic Space in the Roman World, eds R. Laurence & A. Wallace-Hadrill (JRA Suppl. 22:
Portsmouth, RI) 69-88 [DG 97.D6]
Hope, V.M. (1997) 'Constructing Roman Identity: Funerary Monuments and Social
Structure in the Roman World' Mortality 2: 103-121 [Social science periodical]
@Hope, V.M. (1997) 'Words and Pictures: the Interpretation of Romano-British
Tombstones' Britannia 28: 245-258 [Arts periodical]
@Hope, V.M. (1998) 'Negotiating Identity and Status: the Gladiators of Roman Nimes' in
J. Berry and R. Laurence (eds.), Cultural Identity in the Roman Empire (Routledge) 179195. [DG 78.C8 + e-book]
Hope, V.M. (2000) ‘Fighting for identity: the funerary commemoration of Italian
gladiators’ in The epigraphic landscape of Roman Italy, ed. A.E. Cooley (London: Institute
of Classical Studies) [CN 530.E7]
Hope, V.M. (2009) Roman Death: dying and the dead in ancient Rome [DG 103.H68]
@Hope, V.M. and Marshall, E. (eds) (2000) Death and disease in the ancient city
(London: Routledge) [DE 61.D3 + e-book] Chapters by Hope, ‘Contempt and respect. The
treatment of the corpse in ancient Rome’, 104-27; Patterson, ‘On the margins of the city of
Rome’, 85-103
@Hopkins, K. (1966) ‘On the probable age structure of the Roman population’,
Population Studies 20: 245-64 [Social science periodical]
5
RCS Lecture 7 - Death
AEC 11.12
Hopkins, K. (1983) Death and renewal (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Sociological studies in Roman history 2) [DG 103.H6]
Huskinson, J. (1996) Roman Children’s Sarcophagi: their Decoration and its Social
Significance [NB 1810.H8]
Koortbojian, M. (1996) ‘In commemorationem mortuorum: text and image along the
“Streets of tombs”’ in J. Elsner, ed. Art and Text in Roman Culture pp.210-34 [N 5760.A7]
Kyle, D. G. (1998) Spectacles of death in ancient Rome (London: Routledge) [DG 95.K9]
Morris, I. (1992) Death-ritual and social structure in classical antiquity (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, Key themes in ancient history) [DE 61.D3]
@Mouritsen, H. (1997) ‘Mobility and social change in Italian towns during the
principate’, in Roman urbanism: beyond the consumer city, ed. H. M. Parkins (London:
Routledge) [DG 78.R6 + e-book]
@Mouritsen, H. (2005) ‘Freedmen and decurions: epitaphs and social history in Imperial
Italy’, JRS 95: 38-63
Oliver, G.J. (2000) The Epigraphy of Death - chapters by King, Vestergaard and Hope
Patterson, J. (1992) ‘Patronage, collegia and burial in Imperial Rome’, in S. Bassett,
(ed.) Death in towns: urban responses to the dying and the dead, 100-1600 (Leicester:
Leicester University Press) 15-27 [GT 3243.D3]
Patterson, J. (2000) 'Living and dying in the city of Rome: houses and tombs' in J.
Coulston & H. Dodge, eds Ancient Rome: the archaeology of the eternal city (Oxford) 25989 [DG 65.A6]
Pearce, J. et al, eds (2000) Burial, society and context in the Roman world (Oxford:
Oxbow) [DG 103.B8]
Price, S. (1987) ‘From noble funerals to divine cult: the consecration of the Roman
emperors’ in S. Price & D. Cannadine, (eds) Rituals of royalty: power and ceremonial in
traditional societies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [GT 5010.R4]
Toynbee, J. M. C. (1971) Death and burial in the Roman world (London: Thames &
Hudson) [DG 103.T6]
Walker, S. (1985) Memorials to the Roman dead (London: British Museum) [DG 103.W2]
Sourcebook
@Hope, V.M. (2007) Death in Ancient Rome: A Sourcebook [DG 103.H6 + e-book]
Comparative studies
Jupp, P.C. & Gittings, C., eds (1999) Death in England: an illustrated history
(Manchester: Manchester University Press) [HF 2011.D3]