As with virtually every aspect of life in the late Roman Republic, Cicero encapsulates for us the tensions, controversies, attitudes, and contradictory realities of Greek art among the Romans.  You have two different readings from Cicero in your humanities reader for this unit.  Each one reveals a very different side of Cicero with respect to his knowledge of and attitude toward art.  The first excerpt is from a court case.  Remember that Cicero was first and foremost an orator and lawyer.  The reading is a few snippets from a very early and very important case in Cicero's career.  He is prosecuting a man named Verres, who had been serving as the Roman governor of the island of Sicily. Cicero is prosecuting him on charges of having abused his office of governor.  According to Cicero, Verres headed up a brutal reign of terror on the island during his years as governor, filled with merciless abuse, assassinations, and corruption.

 Among the many, many crimes Cicero documents in his prosecution is the enormous amount of looting of art objects that Verres committed all over the island. Cicero needs to be very careful when it comes to describing these crimes to the Senate, however.  Since Cicero is addressing a very conservative group of Romans, he has to compensate for their attitudes toward art.  Every good lawyer has to present his case as effectively as possible, after all.  He was speaking before a very wealthy class of Romans, so some of them probably had examples or copies of Greek art in their own homes.  But others would still be holding on to the idea that Greek art was decadent and beneath the dignity of a good Roman. Cicero's difficulty is made still more complicated by the fact that Verres was governing Sicily in particular, because the capital of Sicily was Syracuse, the very city Marcellus sacked 140 years earlier and brought much of Rome's most splendid art to the city.  So to a degree, Cicero has to fight the attitude that what Verres did in stealing art was not so wrong.  After all, the Romans had been taking art from conquered peoples for centuries, and they had long ago captured Sicily and made it a province.  And since art was a decadent, subversive thing, so what if Verres messed up some of it.

But Cicero is a sneaky guy.  He takes great care in the way he depicts Verres' actions.  For example, he describes the thefts Verres made at the house of Gaius Heius.  He picks Heius, because he is in fact a Roman citizen living on the island.  This way Cicero can emphasize that Verres is stealing from a fellow Roman rather than focus on WHAT Verres is stealing.  In fact, a couple of times, Cicero even pretends he is not sure what the artworks are that were stolen.  He acts like he has to ask someone who carved a particular statue and what the name of another one is.  He even says at one point that he only learned about this sort of art so he could present the case-- just so he does not come across as some sort of dilittante who would waste his day babbling about art and sculpture or the like.  He's just an ordinary guy trying to bring down a big, bad crook.  In another instance, Cicero describes some of Verres' henchmen trying to steal a cult statue of Hercules from a temple.  This allows Cicero to describe the art theft as the desecration of a temple.  The use of statues in temples, remember, was one of the time-honored places for works of art in Roman society, so this way Cicero can still emphasize the wickedness of Verres' crimes. Cicero also throws in comments about giving the Greeks a break.  Y'know, the Greeks are a little weird.  They take all this art really seriously.  And it may seem really silly to us Romans, but we've conquered the Greeks now and we really should allow them their little trinkets so they can live happily as they serve us.

A very different Cicero appears in your other selection.  These are snippets from some of his personal letters.  Most if not all of them come from 3 or 4 years after the Verres case.  All but one are just private, quick notes to his lifelong friend Atticus.  Cicero is setting up a country home and his friend Atticus is helping Cicero purchase statues and the like to decorate it.  Most important to Cicero is acquiring appropriate art for his gymnasiade, which is a Greek type of lecture hall and study.  Cicero nicknames it the Academy after Plato's famous philosophical school.  In contrast to his prosecution of Verres, Cicero here reveals a real knowledge and love of Greek art.  He knows the names of artists and types of work available.  There is one letter, not addressed to Atticus, which really shows Cicero's knowledge and priorities.  It is a letter to one of his friends, Marcus Fadius Gallus.  Apparently, Cicero gave Gallus some money to put deposits on purchases for his "Academy."  Gallus has found several pieces but there are other buyers interested in some of them.  Cicero is writing in response to Gallus' report and he is not happy.  In somewhat polite tones, Cicero says that Gallus spent too much money and got the wrong stuff anyway.

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He is especially upset that Gallus bought some statues of Maenads rather than some Muses.  Maenads are women who have been possessed by the god Dionysus and are in a frenzy.  This painting  depicts a Maenad from a fourth style wall ensemble.

Here you can see a fragmentary remain of what Cicero was probably complaining about.  Maenads are pretty freaky.  Cicero does not want to be studying or lecturing and have to face a statue of a crazy woman!  What Cicero wanted were Muses, the dignified goddess of artistic and literary inspiration.  Where would I put statues of Maenads? yells Cicero.

Gallus apparently thought Maenads were a reasonable substitute for Muses.  Here you see examples of statuettes of Muses, the goddesses of inspiration, which is what Cicero has originally ordered.  They are much more mild-mannered than Maenads.  Another complaint of Cicero's is that Gallus has apparently also ordered a statue of Mars, the god of war, to which Cicero wonders why he would want a statue of the god of war when he is desperately trying to bring peace to Rome after decades of intermittent civil strife.

These sorts of criticisms and other details in the letter tell us that Cicero was probably not an expert when it came to knowledge and criticism of Greek art, but he took it very seriously.  He was very much aware that the art he chose displayed his character and status and wanted art that he felt would be appropriate.  Cato was surely spinning in his grave.  This was a Roman obsessing about the very things Cato had chastized Romans for doing.  But in this Cicero was only a stage in what was to come.

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In Roman house decoration, we see Romans continue to declare their identity and allegiances by choosing and displaying particular works of art.  Cicero probably would have approved of this mosaic, showing a group of Greek philosophers at Athens, most likely Plato lecturing at his famous Academy.

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If one subscribed to Epicurean philosophy, this mosaic might be appropriate, since Epicureans considered death not an evil but a democratic reality for all human beings.  This particular piece actually made up the top of table, as a reminder to diners and partiers to eat, drink and be merry lest they die tomorrow.

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Similarly, a Jewish family in Pompeii apparently celebrated their heritage with this painting of the Judgment of Solomon.

Or, someone might pick something simply because they like it...

Another resident of Pompeii commissioned this massive mosaic, measuring more than 16 feet across, of Alexander the Great.  Interestingly enough, the depicts Alexander's enemy, Darius, the King of Persia, shown in detail on the right, favorably and Alexander himself rather coldly.

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One of the most popular motifs is one you have studied this semester: Homer's Iliad in particular and the Trojan War in general.   The painting in the center shows Achilles surrendering his prize Briseis to Agamamnon.  The painting belongs to a series similar to the one outlined here.  The chart on the right and the drawing on the left both outline a massive series of panel paintings.  The shorter series running along the bottom tells the full cycle of the Trojan War.  The taller series across the top recounts the twelve labors of Hercules.  Artistic representations of both the Trojan War and of Hercules figure into your readings for seminar, so I want to close with some observations about each.

The excerpts from Petronius' Satyricon include mention that the character Trimalchio has just such a series of paintings of the Iliad and Odyssey in his atrium.  Petronius worked in the court of the infamous emperor Nero.  He served as an administrator and general manager of high decadence until Nero asked him to commit suicide in 66AD.  By this time the Romans were trying to come to grips with what they had done in forsaking freedom in the Republic for the new rule under the emperor.  Some Romans were very much of the opinion that the change coincided with a brutal decline in morality and decency.  One of the theories of this decline was linked to the presence and prevalence of decadent art.  This is the theory of luxuria.  Luxuria, which translates from Latin roughly as "pernicious luxury," refers to the idea that when the Romans conquered the Mediterranean area and Asia Minor, it brought them into direct contact with the enervating, subversive influence of Eastern decadence.  This theory was well-known enough that by Nero's time, the encyclopedist and antiquarian Pliny the Elder (not to be confused with Pliny the Younger, some of whose letters are also in your reader, who is Pliny the Elder's nephew) could write about the history of bronze-making, and, after commenting that in the old days, although the Romans knew about bronze statues, they preferred to have their religious temple statues made of simpler wood or clay, that is, until they conquered Asia Minor, unde luxuria (34.34), "when the luxuria came," and that was all he needed to say, since everyone knew from that one word that he meant from there the Romans started to become weak and soft.

 Petronius' novel the Satyricon explores the theme of luxuria.  In particular there is a character named Trimalchio.  Trimalchio is a former slave who bought his freedom and has become a filthy rich businessman, but with absolutely no taste or restraint.  He is an absolute personification of luxuria.  Not coincidentally, Trimalchio throws absolutely the wildest, over-the-top dinnder party ever.  One aspect of his luxuria is the artwork Trimalchio has in his house, which you will read about.  For example, he has a series of wall paintings depicting his life story.  Remember how some Romans would use art to show off their status-- well, Trimalchio takes it a step further.  He also has wall paintings from the Iliad and the Odyssey of Homer.  Problem is, Trimalchio has them mixed in with some paintings of gladiatorial games.  That would be the equivalent now of a film like Glory or Saving Private Ryan having bouts of professional wrestling spliced into it.
 

The last reading in your selection is a little poem by the poet Statius, who wrote 30-40 years later, under the Emperor Domitian.  It's about a little Hercules statue.  This is a famous statue by the Greek sculptor Lysippus.  This statue shows Hercules a little tired from having completed his twelve labors.  The copy on the left belongs to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, by the way, so if you happen to be there, keep an eye out for it.  The copy on the right is a slightly different version.  Aside from the rather modest editing here, it is also a mirror reversal of the original.  This seems to be a case where a reverse copy was made to suit the new architectural environment it would have.

But the one Statius describes is more like this.  You can't tell from the slides, but the one on the left is life-size, but this version on the right is less than two feet tall.  Statius applies a rather hyperbolic description to the statue, but keep in mind it really is just a cheap, table-top model.  As important as Statius' praise of the statue is his praise of its owner, a man named Novius Vindex remains a focus of the poem.  Novius Vindex seems to be a serious art collector.  At least Statius says so.  Once again, the importance of dining emerges, as Novius has invited Statius to dinner at the beginning of the poem.  If Statius exaggerates here as much as he does elsewhere, who knows how much of an expert Novius truly was, but the list of art objects that Novius has and seems capable of discussing is impressive.  So have a look at how Statius portrays Novius' expertise and enthusiasm for art, especially in contrast to the very guarded knowledge Cicero had and displayed.

 So as you go into your final seminars, reflect on the different attitudes and uses of art.  Consider your own views and the ways you use art, or don't, in your dorm rooms and your homes.  Think about what your friends and family do, what they convey to you with the art they choose to display, and what you think about them as a result.  Ask yourself whether the idea of artistic luxuria as a sign of decay and immorality exists today.  And since we are considering Civic Patrons in particular, think about how such choices reflect your community and society at large, how the leaders of your home or town or church or country express their civic ideals in the art and artists they patronize.

Thank you.