A mosaic montage part 2 - Bignor Roman villa

This is the second of three posts looking at the mosaics at some of the sites I visited on a recent trip to southern England.  The first was about Fishbourne Palace and can be seen here.  This time, its Bignor Roman villa in the spotlight.

Bignor is an independently managed site, fascinatingly still owned and operated by the descendants of the man who discovered the villa in 1811 - George Tupper, who began showing visitors around the site as early as 1814.  Bignor, then, is as old a heritage attraction as you'll find anywhere.

The development of the site is fairly typical for this type of rural complex.  There is some evidence of later 1st Century occupation, but the first substantial stone building on the site wasn't constructed until the 3rd Century.  This was rebuilt and expanded upon during the later 3rd and 4th Centuries until it reached its peak as a full courtyard villa -  a central garden enclosed by suites of rooms on all sides.

The first mosaic that George Tupper discovered was one of the finest in the entire complex, and one of two tessellated pavements that Bignor is now most famous for - the Ganymede pavement.  Believed to be the floor of a dining room, the pavement features a roundel with the boy Ganymede being abducted by Jupiter in the guise of an eagle (more of that story in a moment), with a hexagonal piscina to the side, itself surrounded by 6 maenads.

Ganymede was a Trojan shepherd who, because of his beauty, was abducted by Jupiter to become the cup bearer of the gods.  Jupiter did this in the form of an eagle (just one of Jupiter's many animal disguises), and the scene here shows Ganymede being lifted away, and he almost seems to be waving goodbye to his mortal life.  Ganymede has become a symbol for homosexual love, particularly that between an older man and a younger boy - something rather prevalent in the classical world.  The reference to drinking and merriment is continued with the inclusion of the dancing maenads around the piscina - they were the female followers of Bacchus, god of wine and revelry.  The subject of the mosaic would definitely suggest that the room was intended to be used for eating, drinking and the entertaining of guests.

Ganymede is a common and easily identifiable character in classical art.  Just for the sake of it, here he is in a photo I took at Naples Museum, sharing an intimate gaze with Jupiter.

Bignor's other superstar mosaic is the 'Venus and the Gladiators' pavement, probably the floor of a winter dining room, built as it was over a hypocaust.  

The collapse of the main section of the mosaic, which provides a wonderful view of the hypocaust structure, has sadly made it difficult to interpret the floor as a whole, as the crucial central image has been completely lost.

The mosaic contains a great variety of imagery, but it is the apse at one end that gives it its name, bearing as it does a portrait of a female in a roundel, with a long panel beneath featuring cupids acting as gladiators.  The female portrait is most commonly associated with Venus, but the identification is not entirely secure, and definite attributes of the goddess are lacking.  It remains a possibility that the figure is in fact mortal.

The panel with the cupids stands as one of the most recognisable and characterful elements of any surviving mosaic in Britain.  A series of scenes portray the story of a gladiatorial contest between a retiarius (a net man) and a heavily armoured secutor. The final scene shows that the secutor emerged the victor.

Aside from these two outstanding keynotes, the villa possesses a wonderful array of other pavements, including one that may possibly bear a maker's name (the letters 'TER' above a dolphin perhaps being short for Terentius) and an amazingly long corridor mosaic, currently the longest on display in Britain (though the now lost corridor from Greetwell villa, just east of Lincoln is just one that is believed from drawings to have been even longer).

Away from the main building, though originally part of another wing of the house, can be seen the slight remains of the bath house and yet another mosaic, this time a Medusa with wonderfully wavy snakes in her hair.  As this was situated in the changing rooms, I wonder if people avoided treading on her to avoid bad luck?

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A mosaic montage part 1 - Fishbourne Roman Palace

During a recent getaway to the south coast, I managed to visit three iconic Romano-British sites that have been on my list for a long time, and I'm actually a little ashamed to say I haven't ever been to before.  Still, I took the opportunity this time with both hands and, as always, a camera.

The stars of the show at any villa are of course the mosaics, and the three villas in question - Fishbourne, Lullingstone and Bignor - feature some of the best that Romano-British (or continental in the case of Fishbourne) mosaicists could offer.  In order to not make things unmanageable and to give them all their due, I'll cover them in three separate posts.  First up...

Fishbourne Roman Palace

I have of course been cruel to Fishbourne above by referring to it as a mere villa, when of course it feels itself entitled to use the epithet 'Palace'.  On scale and grandeur, it must certainly have been a contender in its heyday in the late 1st Century.  A graphic in the museum comparing the site with scale drawings of the Flavian palace on the Palatine and Nero's Domus Aurea demonstrate that Fishbourne was on a par with the grandest homes in the Empire.  The museum itself is in need of a little TLC in some areas, and I believe that money is currently being raised to improve it.  The displays are a good introduction to the development of the site, and include some iconic objects from the excavations, which are a pleasure to see.

The visible archaeology of the building is contained within a large open structure and accessed via raised walkways, which wind their way around and provide views from various angles of the most important mosaics.  It is mind boggling to think that the remains on view constitute only a single wing of the massive complex.

Of all the wonderful mosaics on show, two particularly piqued my interest.  The first is unsurprising as it is one of the finest mosaics anywhere - the 'cupid on a dolphin' mosaic, which features the chubby winged chap surrounded by sea creatures, elaborate cups and borders ofguilloche and floral designs, all contained within a chequerboard.

The second mosaic is one that demonstrates the development of the house, as it shows a 2nd Century Medusa laid directly over an earlier, late 1st Century, black and white geometric floor.  Sadly the Medusa roundel has half disappeared, but its a wonderful example of archaeological stratigraphy in action.

One of the highlights of the original palace would have been the formal gardens - perhaps the only place in Britain where such formal horticulture could have been seen in the late 1st Century.  Now sadly reduced in size to about half of the original scale, on a sunny day the gardens are still a pleasant place to wander.

I can't leave Fishbourne without giving mention to a building on the site that I fear most visitors won't venture into - the Collections Discovery Centre.  This is effectively a storage and conservation facility which has a public focus.  Although sadly there was nothing to be seen happening while I was there, it was still nice to peer through windows into their stone store and read some of the wall panels about their work and some of the individuals who have been at (and found love at!) Fishbourne over the years.  Overall, the ambition to have the importance of such unglamorous behind the scenes work highlighted to the public is laudable and I hope that there is a suitable programme of activities to make best use of it.  The corporate sponsorship was also an interesting angle, and one that, love it or hate it, seems to be something that we will need to see a lot more of in future if the current political attitude towards heritage funding continues.

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8 stunning mummies at the British Museum

Cutting edge technology and archaeology go together extremely well these days, but it's fair to say that when it comes to museums, displays tend to be a little behind the curve for a whole host of reasons. The British Museum's 'Ancient Lives New Discoveries' exhibition, more commonly being referred to as '8 mummies', raises the bar substantially on a number of levels. It's also fair to say that it marks a spectacular return to form for our national flagship institution after the lukewarm reception to the Vikings.

The concept of the exhibition is simple. 8 Egyptian mummies from the BM's collections which have never before been unwrapped have been intensively studied through the use of non-destructive CT scanning, and the results of this analysis presented. The experience is therefore twofold - one is the story of the people themselves, the other a demonstration of the power of modern scientific investigation.

The ethics surrounding the storage and display of human remains are dealt with succinctly at the start of the exhibition, and I've heard that images of the displays are available at the ticketing desk for those unsure if the content will be suitable for them or their little ones. I'm pleased but not at all surprised that I didn't hear a word of objection to the display of the remains while in the gallery.

The individuals being highlighted cover a long period of time, and a variety of mummification processes, from a body naturally preserved in the desert in c.3500BC through the heydays of 'proper' mummification, some unusual practices from Roman Egypt and ending with a Christian Sudanese mummy dating to c.AD700.

Each mummy is presented in a clean, simple and respectful manner, with labels about the individual placed near to, but outside of the display case. This approach of not directly labelling an individual (as one might a an object such as a pot) proves to be a subtle but effective technique in retaining the humanity of the person and not reducing them to the status of 'museum object'. It's a good method and one that should be considered by any museum displaying human remains.

Close to each body is a large scale animation of the full CT scan, displayed on high quality screens. In most cases, as the body is unwrapped, this is the time that the actual person is revealed, hidden and huddled within their bindings. The animations cycle through the layers of the body, showing how the body relates to the outer casing and clearly demonstrating surviving organic matter such as organs, and various amulets and the like. Even the way the animations work is super slick - the fluidity of the layers appearing and disappearing means that it's easy to get mesmerised and watch a few complete cycles before turning away.

Alongside this are interactive versions of the CT scans. Using a very neat touch-operated wheel visitors can rotate or zoom in on the scan as appropriate to discover a certain feature for themselves.  What's particularly good about this is that the CT scans aren't something produced for the sake of the exhibition - they're the real thing, as used by the specialists and scientists. Having visitors engage with real material this way is a masterstroke, and evidence of how science doesn't need to be dumbed down for public consumption.

Alongside the body and the scans were cases of material illustrative of the life or occupation of that individual, but these also used technology to great effect, for example through the CT scans of the contents of a canopic jar and through 3D prints of body parts and amulets taken directly from the CT scans. This latter approach feels revolutionary in a museum context - not only can the existence of an object be identified through non-invasive scanning, but an exact replica can be created in 3D and placed in a display case next to it. We're definitely through the looking glass now, people!

The fact that the bodies haven't been unwrapped is of course wonderful for their future preservation, but more than that, it actually adds to the experience. Being able to see the digital version of the body in some way actually enhances the experience as the relationship between the body and it's 'container' is preserved. By comparison, having a body lying flat next to that container somehow wouldn't have the same impact. Not being able to see the body for real actually makes it feel more special and more of a privilege.

The final body on display has an unusual twist. The c.AD700 body of a woman from Sudan has a tattoo showing a monogram of St Michael. This unexpected survival (though sadly I failed to see it on the actual body) is a great story, as it was the rise of Christianity that brought an end to the practice of mummification. A suitable way to round off the journey indeed.

If I have the tiniest grumble, it was that sometimes the layout meant that the dividing lines between one mummy's accompanying material and the next were blurred, and a feeling of a new chapter opening with each new individual was diminished. As I said, though, it's an incredibly minor point.

Overall, the exhibition breaks new ground in the presentation of cutting edge scientific research to the public, but also in displaying human remains in a way that is respectful, personal and touching. Absolutely superb.

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A new lease of life for Lincoln's Newport Arch

Lincoln's most famous Roman relic has just been reopened following months of repair and restoration.  Newport Arch, the 3rd Century northern gateway into Roman Lincoln, is renowned for being the only Roman archway in Britain still used by traffic - despite a few vehicles trying to end its long life over the years.  In fact, it hasn't just been clumsy driving that has threatened the arch's existence.  At certain points, certain people seem to have cared very little about it.  I'm reminded of a quote from 1774:

'Sir Cecil Wray, the Solomon of these parts, I much fear is doing all he can to pull down the finest Roman antiquity in the Island, a Roman arch belonging to the old Roman station Lindum, near Lincoln, and all this to break apieces to mend the turnpike roads.'

Despite some minor grumbles from local businesses over the time the work has taken and the complete closure of the arch being required, it can't be denied that the restoration was urgently needed.  The arch had already been placed on the English Heritage Buildings at Risk register in 2012 and the City Council deserve credit for making the long term stability of the arch a priority and getting the work done.  Despite generous grants from WREN, the project still cost a not inconsiderable £140,000.

So now that the arch is completely open again, let's hope its still standing and continuing to be one of Lincoln's treasures in another 1,700 years.

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