ground beneath his feet. The Crucifixion is at the right. The Virgin
Mary and Joseph of Arimathea are to the left of the cross. On the
other side Longinus thrusts his spear into the side of the “King of the
Jews” (REX IVD is inscribed above Jesus’ head). The two remaining
panels show two Marys and two soldiers at the open doors of a tomb
with an empty coffin within and the doubting Thomas touching the
wound of the risen Christ.
The series is one of the oldest cycles of Passion scenes preserved
today. The artist who fashioned the ivory box helped establish the
iconographical types for medieval narratives of Christ’s life. On
these plaques, Jesus always appears as a beardless youth. In the Cru-
cifixion (FIG. 11-22), the earliest known rendition of the subject in
the history of art, he exhibits a superhuman imperviousness to pain.
The Savior is a muscular, nearly nude, heroic figure who appears
virtually weightless. He does not hang from the cross; he is displayed
on it, a divine being with open eyes who has conquered death. The
striking contrast between the powerful frontal, serenely calm Jesus
on the cross and the limp hanging body of his betrayer with his
snapped neck is highly effective, both visually and symbolically.
DIPTYCH OF THE SYMMACHI Although after Constan-
tine all the most important architectural projects in Italy were Chris-
tian in character, not everyone converted to the new religion, even
after Theodosius closed all temples and banned all pagan cults
in 391.
An ivory plaque (FIG. 11-23), probably produced in Rome
around 400, strikingly exhibits the endurance of pagan themes and
patrons and of the classical style. The ivory, one of a pair of leaves of
a diptych, may commemorate either the marriage of members of
two powerful Roman families of the senatorial class, the Nicomachi
and the Symmachi, or the passing within a decade of two prominent
male members of the two families. Whether or not the diptych re-
lates to any specific event(s), the Nicomachi and the Symmachi here
ostentatiously reaffirmed their faith in the old pagan gods. Certainly,
the families favored the aesthetic ideals of the classical past, as exem-
plified by such works as the stately processional friezes of the Greek
Parthenon (FIG. 5-50) and the Roman Ara Pacis (FIG. 10-31).
The leaf inscribed “of the Symmachi” (FIG. 11-23) represents a
woman sacrificing at an altar in front of a tree. She wears ivy in her
hair and seems to be celebrating the rites of Bacchus, although
scholars dispute the identity of the divinity honored. The other dip-
tych panel, inscribed “of the Nicomachi,” also shows a woman at an
open-air altar. On both panels, the precise yet fluent and graceful
lines, the relaxed poses, and the mood of spiritual serenity reveal an
artist who practiced within a still-vital classical tradition that ideal-
ized human beauty as its central focus. The great senatorial mag-
nates of Rome, who resisted the empire-wide imposition of the
Christian faith at the end of the fourth century, probably deliber-
ately sustained the classical tradition.
Despite the widespread adoption during the third and fourth
centuries of the new non-naturalistic Late Antique aesthetic featur-
308 Chapter 11 LATE ANTIQUITY11-23Woman sacrificing at an altar, right leaf of the diptych of the
Nicomachi and the Symmachi, ca. 400. Ivory, 11 43 – 51 – 2 . Victoria &
Albert Museum, London.
Even after Theodosius banned all pagan cults in 391, some Roman
families still practiced the ancient rites. The sculptor who carved this
ivory plaque also carried on the classical artistic style.
1 in.ing wafer-thin frontal figures, the classical tradition in art lived on
and was never fully extinguished in the Middle Ages. Classical art
survived in intermittent revivals, renovations, and restorations side
by side and in contrast with the opposing nonclassical medieval
styles until it rose to dominance once again in the Renaissance.