FRESCO OF S. ABBACIRO, 757-767 CE. ATRIUM OF S. MARIA ANTIQUA This open-air space was covered with frescoes by the C7, when a hall and rooms behind it, probably a guardhouse protecting the entrance to the Domitianic ramp that gave access to the imperial palace of the Domus Tiberiana, was converted into a church in the mid C6. This monastic saint, Abbot Cyrus or Abbaciro, under the rule of pope Paul I in the mid C8, was painted in the linear, hieratic style of Byzantine art. Paul I welcomed many refugees from the East who were fleeing the iconoclastic persecution then underway. We see the elderly, bearded saint, his brow furrowed, looking out at us frontally. In one of his hands he holds a small case with a surgeon's instruments in it. Inside the church was a chapel dedicated to the doctor saints, like Abbaciro, Cosmas, and Damian. The ill faithful could sleep overnight in the chapel, hoping to get a healing dream from these "anargyroi", "those who cure without payment".

A warm orange halo illuminates this #fresco from the atrium of #SantaMariaAntiqua in the #Forum in #Rome. The series of #Domitian's halls at the base of the #DomusTiberiana were converted into a church in the C6. For #FrescoFriday we're looking at this doctor saint from 757-767. #AncientBluesky 🏺

GEOMETRIC FLOOR MOSAIC, C. 125 CE. DOMUS TIBERIANA The history of this first imperial palace begins with Nero, though it is not impossible that its earliest nucleus was the domus of the Claudii Nerones where Tiberius grew up. This was the residence of Caligula and Claudius, so the house must have been palatial. When Nero came to the throne it would have been the obvious choice for development, and it was incorporated into his Domus Transitoria and then, after the fire of 64, rebuilt again as part of his project for the Domus Aurea. We begin to find it called the Domus Tiberiana only in the early C2, perhaps to avoid the mention of Nero and Domitian. The latter expanded the base of the palace all the way to the Clivus Victoriæ on the slope of the Palatine facing the Forum, with rooms facing the street and possibly serving as offices or places where citizens could go to interact with the imperial bureaucracy. This black and white mosaic pavement of Domitianic or Hadrianic date shows a sober knot of double meanders crossing to make swastikas, a symbol of good fortune referring to the sun.

#MosaicMonday finds us probing into the secret spots of the #domusTiberiana on the #Palatine in #Rome, where a possibly late C1 CE but probably early C2 CE #mosaic might be a luxurious floor for an office of the #imperial bureaucracy. #AncientBluesky 🏺

MOSAIC FLOOR, C. 125 CE. DOMUS TIBERIANA This is one of the rooms facing out of the original façade of Nero's Domus Tiberiana, before it was expanded across the via Nova by Trajan and Hadrian. At that point or later, the front opening (once closed by a now-lost curtain wall) was narrowed and whatever mosaic floor this room had was replaced by what we see here, an excellent example of black and white floor geometric mosaic probably contemporary with the more complex floor mosaics of the Hospitalia of Hadrian's Villa. Access to this room was from the still-extant balcony at front. A long irregular excavation in the left-hand wall suggests a medieval burial and the level of debris at the time, which ought to be sometime in the mid C8.

At night on the #Palatine in #Rome, suddenly a huge #mosaic is lit up and visible from the terrace atop #Hadrian's extension of the #domusTiberiana, a tantalising hint of the decoration of these rooms of the #imperial bureaucracy. #AncientBluesky 🏺

RELIEF HEAD OF A SATYR, EARLY C2. DOMUS TIBERIANA This white marble relief head of a satyr, missing the upper part above the eyes, was found in the excavations of the Domus Tiberiana, which, despite its name, is Neronian with Trajanic and Hadrianic expansions. The palace functioned principally as a centre for the imperial bureaucracy, but there are also religious traces, from Egyptian cult images (from under Nero, Domitian, Hadrian, and especially the Severan emperors) to Dionysiac elements like this satyr head, found in an area containing other pieces related to Dionysus, including a splendid tiger in fiorito alabaster inset with black marble stripes, possibly relating to the god's triumph over the Indians. The satyr head is magnificently carved, the satyr's beard a thicket of dense curls, his lips smiling mockingly to reveal his teeth, his eyes deep-set and goatish. It is interesting to imagine religious areas within this complex where imperial bureaucrats could worship privately.

#ReliefWednesday offers us a wonderful smirking satyr face from a #Dionysiac space in the bureaucratic #DomusTiberiana, from the early C2 CE. #Tiberius neither built nor lived in the palace bearing his name on the #Palatine in #Rome - in fact it was part of #Nero's #DomusAurea.