Made from linen and wool, dated to be from around the 5th to the 7th century AD, and originating from the city of Antinopolis, the magnificent textile depicts 15 leafy tendrils (of which 12 have survived) containing the images of figures from ancient Hellenic mythology: satyrs, maenads and minor gods accompanying Dionysos during his thiasos. At the lower right, there is Silenos, the god of drunkenness and winemaking. At the upper left, the bearded god Herakles. The two figures with horns in the second row are likely Pan and one of his sons who assisted Dionysos in his conquest of India. The women are amongst the maenads who in ecstasy worship the god of ritual madness. Dionysos himself should appear in the center of the textile, but that part unfortunately does npt survive. The appearance of all these mythological figures shows the survival of classical Greco-Roman tradition into Late Antique Roman Egypt.
The artifact is currently housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
> The worship of Dionysus was particularly strong in Egypt, but the use of Dionysiac motifs during the late Antique and Early Byzantine periods is not unique to Egypt: images of the god appear on objects throughout the Empire. Floor mosaics, silver plate, furniture ornaments, and so forth are more often than not decorated with Dionysiac or other mythological imagery. Considering the use of textiles as hangings, covers, and curtains, it is therefore not surprising that they should be decorated with the same or related motifs. In Egypt as elsewhere in the Early Byzantine world, objects like these were made not so much for diehard traditionalist pagans as for the members of a well-to-do, educated class. For these patrons, visual representation of pagan myths, like the reading of classical literature or contemporary poetry on classical themes, such as the Dionysiaca of Nonnos of Panopolis (Akhmim), were acknowlegments of the culture of the past, rather than expressions of religious sentiment […]. In spite of its overtly pagan subject, the hanging dates from the early Byzantine period, specifically the late 5th and early 6th century. Its stylistic features—prominent outlines and reduced modeling of the busts combined with a more schematic arrangement of their costumes–are present in other late 5th and early 6th century monuments. (Cf. the figures of the original mosaic program in St. Apollinaire Nuovo and in the Archepiscopal chapel, both in Ravenna) […]. Dionysiac figures, in fact—full figures, busts, and head masks—are the largest single category of main and auxiliary motifs in Late Antique and Early Byzantine art. The interlace pattern, used in floor mosaics from the 2nd century onwards, became especially common in the 5th and 6th centuries. The compactness of this interlace pattern agrees with the 5th and 6th century development of this motif.
1 Comment
Made from linen and wool, dated to be from around the 5th to the 7th century AD, and originating from the city of Antinopolis, the magnificent textile depicts 15 leafy tendrils (of which 12 have survived) containing the images of figures from ancient Hellenic mythology: satyrs, maenads and minor gods accompanying Dionysos during his thiasos. At the lower right, there is Silenos, the god of drunkenness and winemaking. At the upper left, the bearded god Herakles. The two figures with horns in the second row are likely Pan and one of his sons who assisted Dionysos in his conquest of India. The women are amongst the maenads who in ecstasy worship the god of ritual madness. Dionysos himself should appear in the center of the textile, but that part unfortunately does npt survive. The appearance of all these mythological figures shows the survival of classical Greco-Roman tradition into Late Antique Roman Egypt.
The artifact is currently housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
> The worship of Dionysus was particularly strong in Egypt, but the use of Dionysiac motifs during the late Antique and Early Byzantine periods is not unique to Egypt: images of the god appear on objects throughout the Empire. Floor mosaics, silver plate, furniture ornaments, and so forth are more often than not decorated with Dionysiac or other mythological imagery. Considering the use of textiles as hangings, covers, and curtains, it is therefore not surprising that they should be decorated with the same or related motifs. In Egypt as elsewhere in the Early Byzantine world, objects like these were made not so much for diehard traditionalist pagans as for the members of a well-to-do, educated class. For these patrons, visual representation of pagan myths, like the reading of classical literature or contemporary poetry on classical themes, such as the Dionysiaca of Nonnos of Panopolis (Akhmim), were acknowlegments of the culture of the past, rather than expressions of religious sentiment […]. In spite of its overtly pagan subject, the hanging dates from the early Byzantine period, specifically the late 5th and early 6th century. Its stylistic features—prominent outlines and reduced modeling of the busts combined with a more schematic arrangement of their costumes–are present in other late 5th and early 6th century monuments. (Cf. the figures of the original mosaic program in St. Apollinaire Nuovo and in the Archepiscopal chapel, both in Ravenna) […]. Dionysiac figures, in fact—full figures, busts, and head masks—are the largest single category of main and auxiliary motifs in Late Antique and Early Byzantine art. The interlace pattern, used in floor mosaics from the 2nd century onwards, became especially common in the 5th and 6th centuries. The compactness of this interlace pattern agrees with the 5th and 6th century development of this motif.
– Friedman Florence Dunn, 1989. [Beyond the pharaohs: Egypt and the Copts in the 2nd to 7th centuries A.D.](https://archive.org/details/beyondpharaohseg0000frie/mode/1up
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