The Temple of Sulis Minerva at Bath
as a ‘Memory Theatre’
by Martin Henig
Figure 1. Pediment of the Temple of Sulis Minerva at Bath, 1st century (Photo: Robert Wilkins).
Major temples in the Roman world, especially in Rome itself, were major repositories of works of art, sculptures, paintings and jewellery. Apart from being centres of cult they doubled up as museums. The Elder Pliny tells us not only of famous Greek sculptures which embellished these buildings but of more portable items including collections of rings and gems, and it is apparent that, at least for the elite, these were available for inspection, very much as princely collections might be viewed by the privileged in early modern times.
In Roman Britain both the excavation on temple sites and the discoveries of caches of sacred metalwork have revealed plentiful offerings of objects dedicated to deities as well as cult items such as sceptres, ceremonial rattles and silver plate. Some of this material was probably already antique at the time of deposition, although whether in many instances what we have is a meaningful display with a considered intellectual programme is doubtful.
Figure 2. Gilt-bronze head of Sulis Minerva, probably 1st century (Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0).
However, in one instance, around the hot springs dedicated to the goddess Sulis, in south-west Britain, which had surely been a site of veneration long before Roman times, such a sanctuary was brought into existence in the first century CE (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985; Cunliffe 1988). The resources required to embellish the water source, and construct a fine classical-style temple and baths must have required patronage on a vast scale. I have suggested that the patron was none other than the client king, Tiberius Claudius Togidubnus, mentioned by Tacitus (Agricola 14), and styled as Rex Magnus Britanniae, on an inscription recording the construction of a temple dedicated to Neptune and Minerva in Chichester, evidently his capital (see Henig 1999). As a close friend and client king of Rome, Togidubnus would have been one of the only private individuals with the means and motivation to build such a monument. It is just possible that his name was inscribed on a very fragmentary marble inscription from the site (RIB III no.3050). The surviving pediment of the temple suggests its interpretation as a memory theatre, as understood in antiquity and especially in the Renaissance (Yates 1966), in which architecture, statues and other objects told a story of past achievements and future aspirations. Its central motif is a mask of Neptune conflated with Minerva’s emblem the Medusa. This combination, suggested also by the dedication of the Chichester inscription (RIB I, no.91), directly recalls the west pediment of the Parthenon, constructed in Athens 500 years earlier, where Poseidon and Athena (the ancient Greek counterparts to the Roman Neptune and Minerva) contend for the mastery of Attica (Henig 2000, 126). Britain, like ancient Attica, depended for its wealth on its agricultural and mineral resources, and especially on maritime trade. Sulis was, at least from this time, envisaged as the same deity as the Roman goddess Minerva, and the twice life size gilt bronze head of the cult statue of Minerva still survives (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 114, pls xxxii-xxxiv), having been buried under the temple in Christian times, perhaps as late as the fifth century. The statue would have taken the same form as the Athena Parthenos. Even if, unlike some of the well-endowed temples at Rome, there were no imported ancient Greek statues, the glorious past was always evident in the new building, especially in its pediment. As a client ruler Togidubnus would most probably have been educated in Rome with the sons of other dynasts, mainly from the East Mediterranean, and he might even have visited Athens. The rich triumphal imagery surrounding the central Neptune-Medusa emblem which includes the corona civica (oak wreath), clypeus virtutis (shield), victories and maritime tritons expresses his support and friendship for Rome and the ruling Flavian dynasty; the sun in the apex of the pediment expresses the benediction of the eternal heavens, while the star or comet in the temple architrave (in the form of the sidus Iulius) refers in this case to the deification of Vespasian in the recent past (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 115-7, pls xxv-ix and 131 no. MS3, pl. lxiii, re-interpreted by Henig 1999). Apart from the central Medusa mask, Minerva is also prominently referenced by her cult bird, the Little Owl figured to the bottom right of the clypeus. The temple is probably of Domitianic date: Minerva was, incidentally, Domitian’s patron goddess and is depicted on many of his coins, and Togidubnus, as the putative patron, thus shared his own enthusiasm with the Emperor.
Figure 3. Block from the side of the altar of Sulis Minerva, with figures of Neptune {?) and Apollo, second phase of altar. 2nd century (Photo: Penny Coombe)
In front of the temple to the east was a large altar whose corner blocks portray a pair of deities. Three of these blocks survive, one depicting Jupiter and Hercules Bibax; another Apollo and a bearded male deity (perhaps Neptune); and a third Bacchus and a female figure, holding an upturned urn, presumably a water nymph or goddess (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 117-8, pls xlviii-l). The style of these sculptures is very different from the pediment and is the work of another sculptor; the human physiognomy is rather lumpy, though the depiction of drapery is crisp and accomplished. In this form it is very probably later in date than the sculpture ornamenting the original altar . A hand, presumably of Jupiter, holding a thunderbolt was found beneath a corner of the altar and must be earlier (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 131 pl.lxiii, no. MS2). It goes, in all likelihood, with another larger fragment, a relief probably showing Diana with her hound, of which Diana’s bow and the hound survives (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 131 pl. lxii no. MS1), representing an earlier stage in the embellishment of the cult altar.
Figure 4. Bust of Luna from above the facade of the Four Seasons, 2nd century (Photo: Penny Coombe)
In the late second or early third century a four-way arch or quadrifons (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: pp.119- 21, and pl.li) was built, looking out onto the south side of the altar and providing through its main portal a view of the now totally enclosed sacred spring; at this time the spring basin may have been embellished with statues on three rectangular bases which stood up to the level of the water surface and would have appeared to hover upon it (Cunliffe and Davenport 1995: pp. 42-43). Such statues, if they existed, are now lost, but would presumably have depicted nymphs or water deities. The pediment of the quadrifons displayed a bust of the Sun god in a roundel and was appropriately supported by a pair of nereids. Across the square to the north was a long façade depicting reliefs of cupids and personifications of the four seasons, surmounted by a bust of Luna set in a roundel (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 123-9, pls liii-lviii). The Severan-period inscription mentions two individuals, Claudius Ligurius, evidently a member of a guild who had it repaired and repainted, and Gaius Protacius (RIB I, no. 141). The reference to the goddess Sulis Minerva certainly suggests this was part of the same complex. There were other statues dedicated by individuals, including a statue of Sulis Minerva, whose base survives, dedicated by Lucius Marcius Memor, a haruspex who interpreted the entrails of sacrificed animals (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 130, pl.lx no. 9A.1; RIB III, no. 3049). Another statue base found in the eighteenth century was dedicated to the Suleviae by a sculptor, Sulinus son of Brucetus, though it is not certain that this came from the temple precinct (RIB I no.151). However, the deities’ name is interesting; Sulinus may have conceived of the mother goddesses known as the Suleviae as connected with Sulis herself.
The visitor to the temple courtyard in this period would have been confronted by a bewildering variety of images: powerful visages of Neptune-Medusa, Sol and Luna in roundels above head height, as well as images of deities at or slightly above ground level, or floating on the waters. Immediately in front of him was the smoking altar (on which incidentally black stones – coal – were burnt, according to Solinus (Collectanea rerum memorabilium, 22,10)) and beyond that, beyond the four stately Corinthian columns and dimly visible through the open doors of the temple, was the awe-inspiring sight of Sulis Minerva herself standing at the back of the cella. He or she would have felt close to the heavens. A fragmentary inscription, probably another statue base, records that someone whose father was called Novantius made an offering ex visu, as the result of a vision the goddess had accorded him (RIB I, no.153).
Integral with the temple was the major suite of baths for which Bath is rightly famous. This would have been richly decorated, but surviving objects are few: they include a reclining river god on a bench serving as a fountain (Cunliffe and Fulford 1982: 13 no. 41) and, more importantly, the statue of a squatting boar, which is a version of a Late Hellenistic statue of the ‘Uffizi boar’ type (Henig 1995: 84 and 87, fig.55). The baths were not entirely secular; visiting them was part of the experience of purification, offering and healing. Moreover, as elsewhere in the ancient world, other structures, theatres, public squares and temples and, in the case of Bath, other hot springs and baths were built and exploited, allowing more opportunities to display works of art. Just one example of such a building may be mentioned, probably to the east of the precinct but in axial relation to it; this was a circular tholos, of which crisply carved blocks of its architrave remain, very probably of Hadrianic date (Cunliffe 1989). This may have been an open loggia. Might it have contained a statue of Sulis herself, of another deity, or perhaps of Hadrian’s deceased favourite, Antinous?
Figure 5. Finds of pewter and silver from the sacred spring at Bath, various dates (Photo: Crispin Paine)
Smaller items came to the sanctuary in two ways. Probably none of the small objects from Bath which grace the site museum today were meant to be seen following their dedication, because they were dredged from the sacred spring (Cunliffe 1988). The pewter and silver vessels include a number of handled pans which were probably presented to the shrine as dippers, so that water could be brought up for votaries to drink (N. Sunter and D. Brown in Cunliffe 1988: 9-21). Some items were perhaps displayed on ledges; the candlestick may have provided light but got knocked off by accident into the water. Of actual offerings, the most numerous were coins; amongst the most interesting other items are a bronze washer from a ballista (D. Baatz in Cunliffe 1988: 8-9 no.6.), and a large chunk of elephant ivory which was actually part of the pommel or the hilt-guard of a sword (though nothing else of the hilt remains). However, it is likely that it was actually dedicated because of the two breast-like protrusions on the side, suggesting that it may have been the offering of an officer’s wife expecting the birth of a child or as a thank offering for successful lactation after birth (Cunliffe 1988: 8 no.4, and see now Greep 1998: 267). It may be noted that legionaries were prominent amongst Sulis Minerva’s votaries recorded on altars and tombstones (RIB I, nos. 139, 143, 144, 146, 147, 152, 156, 157, 158, 160).
Figure 6. Gemstone intaglios found in the outlet drain leading from the sacred spring and the Baths. Roman Baths Museum, Bath & North East Somerset Council.
A collection of 34 gemstones which must be dated to the Neronian or early Flavian period, early in the site’s history, came from an outlet drain either from the spring or the baths (Henig 1988). Many of them show stylistic similarities which point to a single craftsman, though some are broken or show signs of wear. They were either lost from their rings by bathers in the baths or comprise a single offering tossed into the spring. It is just possible that they had been curated, and that provides a suitable introduction to the second part of this paper. As items of beauty which most certainly appealed to the Romans, gems and rings were collected in what were called dactyliothecae (‘ring cabinets’ – the word, from the Greek daktylos, ‘finger’, suggests that the gems were set in finger-rings). Pliny the Elder, our major source for Roman collecting, tells us of a number of collections of gems given to temples in Rome. Pompey dedicated a dactyliotheca which had belonged to king Mithridates in the Temple of Capitoline Jupiter; Marcellus, the son of Octavia gave a cabinet to the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine; while Julius Caesar presented no less than six dactyliotheca to the Temple of Venus Genetrix (Pliny, NH XXXVII, v,11). Gems in their natural form, if of sufficient size or rarity, were also deposited in temples, like a large slab of rock-crystal weighing 150 pounds, which Augustus’ wife Livia gave to the Capitoline temple (Pliny, NH XXXVII, x, 27).
In Rome the most notable benefactions to temples were Greek statues and paintings, the result of conquest, or at best of purchase. Amongst statues recorded by Pliny are representations of the Niobids at the Temple of Apollo Sosius (Pliny, NH XXXVI, iv, 28), a Latona attributed to Cephisodotos, son of Praxiteles and an Artemis by Timotheus, both in the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine (Pliny, NH. XXXVI, iv, 23 and 32), and an Aphrodite dedicated by Vespasian in the precincts of the Temple of Peace (Pliny, NH XXXVI, iv, 27). Amongst paintings, Apelles’ famous painting of Aphrodite rising from the sea (Aphrodite Anadyomene) was presented by Augustus to the Temple of Caesar (Pliny, NH XXXV, xxxvi, 91). Meanwhile, a painting of a hero by Timanthes and another of the mythical founder of Ialysus in Rhodes by Protogenes were consecrated in the Temple of Peace (Pliny, NH XXXV, xxxvi, 74 and 102).
There was of course much more in the way of statuary, painting and smaller precious objects in Rome, as befitted the capital of Empire, but there was still plenty remaining to be seen and admired by the pilgrim-tourist to the temples and sanctuaries of Greece in the Antonine period, as recounted by Pausanias. It would not have been surprising if the Temple of Sulis, with its connotations of the victory won by Rome with its allies, notably the Atrebatic state ruled by King Togidubnus, acquired suitable trophies and other items reflective of the programme of the pediment, albeit derived from more local sources. Moreover, the sanctuary, which consisted not just of the temple and baths of Sulis but other shrines, was by the second and third centuries little different from the sanctuaries of Greece and Italy, and like them attracted visitors at least from Gaul. The hot springs themselves and the burning of Forest of Dean coal on Sulis’ altar cannot have been the only wonders of this important site.
Figure 6. Gold jewellery from Ashwell. Image from Jackson, R. and Burleigh, G. (2018), Dea Senuna: Treasure, Cult and Ritual at Ashwell, Hertfordshire, British Museum Research Publication 194: London (p.21, fig. 40).
Figure 7. Gold plaques from Ashwell. Image from Jackson, R. and Burleigh, G. (2018), Dea Senuna: Treasure, Cult and Ritual at Ashwell, Hertfordshire, British Museum Research Publication 194: London (p22, fig. 42).
In any case, a number of temples in Britain, Gaul and beyond have yielded accumulations of objects of various periods ranging from temple plate to figurines, and from priestly regalia to jewellery. These, and other items which are unlikely to have survived like textiles, would by analogy have provided the sort of ‘clutter’ that is the hallmark of an old-style museum or cabinet of curiosities. One such temple assemblage originates from a temple at Ashwell, Hertfordshire, and consists of items dedicated to Dea Senuna (Jackson and Burleigh 2018: 31-62). The goddess is represented on a number of gold and silver leaf-like plaques which would have been displayed in her sanctuary depicting her in the form of Minerva, mainly of the Athena Parthenos type, in one case even accompanied by her owl. However, one plaque shows her very much in the guise of Roma, with one breast bare, and wearing a short tunic, seated on a pile of armour representing a trophy, with in front of her a supplicating barbarian; above her heard is a bust of the Sun god and above him a crescent moon. This imagery recalls the theme of the pediment of the Temple of Sulis. Another plaque depicts Victory and a crested serpent. Dea Senuna is figured in quite a different guise in a silver-gilt figurine presented by a woman called Flavia Cunoris where she is shown as the goddess Ceres. The assemblage also includes spectacular gold gem-set jewellery, a pair of disc brooches, a neck-ornament consisting of a pair of discs linked by a chain, and a splendid oval clasp-brooch set with a cornelian intaglio depicting a lion as its centrepiece.
Figure 8. The Backworth Treasure. Image from Jackson, R. and Burleigh, G. (2018), Dea Senuna: Treasure, Cult and Ritual at Ashwell, Hertfordshire, British Museum Research Publication 194: London (p.124 fig 174).
Other assemblages of this sort are known from Barkway, Hertfordshire, consisting of silver plaques depicting Mars and Vulcan, a bronze figurine of a youthful Mars and the handle of a priest’s rattle (Jackson and Burleigh 2018: 63-73). A larger cache from Stony Stratford, Buckinghamshire, also consists partly of plaques dedicated to Mars, but one carries a dedication also naming Vulcan, a priestly head-dress and other regalia including a rattle (Jackson and Burleigh 2018: 74-109). From a site in Northern Britain, the so-called Backworth Treasure consists of gold jewellery including a ring dedicated to the Matres, as well as a few items of silver plate including a pan whose handle is similarly inscribed (Jackson and Burleigh 2018: 124-5). This assemblage pales in size before the large collection of silver dedicated to Mercury from a temple at Berthouville (Brionne, Eure) in Northern Gaul, ranging from a jug and cups of early first century date to plates and pans dated to the second and early third century, as well as two large figurines of Mercury (Baratte and Painter 1989: 79-97). Many other shrines have produced material, some of it of purely personal significance, healing votives and the like, though these may have festooned the temple or shrine for a long time (see Kaufmann-Heinimann: 1998), but some of artistic value, the most valuable of which might have required a priest or sacristan to display to the curious.
Figure 9. Tombstone of the priest Gaius Calpurnius Receptus, priest of the goddess Sulis, who lived 75 years. Late 2nd century (Crispin Paine). Receptus must have been a part time guide to the treasures of a temple perhaps 150 years old, stacked with sculpture and other precious things.
There will always be a missing element in evaluating ancient temples, at least outside well-known Greek sites such as the Athenian Acropolis, Eleusis, Epidaurus, Olympia, Delphi and Delos. In Britain and the Roman West in general, we lack the stories, the foundation myths, told by those who lived nearby or worshipped there, like those recounted by Pausanias and others for Greek temples and those on the Italian peninsula. Aquae Sulis at least provides a ‘memory theatre’ as Giulio Camillo or, in Jacobean Britain, Robert Fludd might have understood it (Yates 1966: chapters 6 and 15). With its wealth of images, this is the only temple in Britain where there is sufficient surviving sculpture to allow us (in imagination at least) to stand in the shrine and not only catch references to ancient Athens as well as the Rome of the first century, but also to relate the cult of Sulis Minerva to the landscape and geology of the place, with its hot springs and proximity to the river Avon, and clear references to the seas surrounding the island of Britain, and thence beyond to the starry heavens and the realm of the gods. If the first impulse to build the spa was provided by a wealthy and highly cultivated British (or Gaulish) royal patron, his initial vision took many years to complete, extending far beyond his lifetime, and it was only in the later second and third century (when Solinus was writing), that Togidubnus’ vision (if it was his) was complete. In antiquity there would have been so much more to delight the eye and marvel at than now remains in its fragmentary state. From the twelfth century, Geoffrey of Monmouth’s fanciful history, Historia Regum Britanniae (c. 1136) provided a myth of an Athens-educated (!) King Bladud who founded Bath. Did he make the story up himself, or did he base it on existing oral folklore, and might there be some kernel of truth in the tale? In any case we can be sure that some such foundation tale would have been told by the ancient guides to the site, as the Bladud story has continued to be recounted in medieval and even more modern times to the curious, and is recounted in a late seventeenth-century inscription above the sacred spring (the Medieval and later King’s Bath) (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985: 84). This allows us, in imagination at least, join the haruspex Lucius Marcius Memor or the aged sacerdos (priest) Receptus (RIB I, no.155) as they explore the place with us and tell their own mythical story of the foundation of the temple and its spa, and show us the wonders and treasures of Sulis in the treasury of the temple, around her marvellous spring and in the baths by which the city continues to be known.
References
Baratte, F. and Painter, K. (1989), Tresors d’orfevrerie Gallo-Romains, Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux.
Cool, H. E. M. and Philo, C., eds. (1998) Roman Castleford. Excavations 1974-85. Volume I. The Small Finds, West Yorkshire Archaeology Service: Wakefield.
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Abbreviations
RIB I R.G.Collingwood and R. P.Wright, The Roman Inscriptions of Britain. I Inscriptions on Stone (Oxford 1965 with Addenda by R.S.O.Tomlin, Alan Sutton, Stroud 1995)
RIB III R.S.O. Tomlin, R. P.Wright and M.W.C. Hassall, The Roman Inscriptions of Britain. I Inscriptions on Stone found or notified between 1 January 1955 and 31 December 2006 (Oxbow Books,Oxford 2009)
Ancient Sources on Collecting
For Pausanias’ Guide to Greece see Peter Levi’s excellent translation (2 volumes,Penguin Classics, 1971)
For Pliny’s Natural History there is a full translation in Loeb Classical Library published by Harvard University Press
Martin Henig lectured on Roman Art in the University of Oxford for many years, where he was latterly a Supernumerary Fellow of Wolfson College. He is the author of many books and articles on Roman gems and the art and culture of Roman Britain including The Art of Roman Britain (1995), The Heirs of King Verica (2002), Roman Sculpture from London and the South East (with P. Coombe, F. Grew and K. Hayward, 2015), and The Complete Content Cameos (with H. Molesworth, 2018). From 1985 to 2006 he was Hon. Editor of the Journal of the British Archaeological Association. Martin is currently serving as an Anglican priest in the Diocese of Oxford.
