STATUE OF A PRIESTESS OF ISIS, C. 200 CE. PALAZZO CIAMPOLI, TAORMINA Ancient Tauromenium was the centre of a major cult centre of the Roman Egyptian gods Isis and Serapis, one of the most important centres in the Mediterranean. None of the Serapeum survives today, but this statue and various other pieces of decoration have been found in excavations near the church of S. Pancrazio. This statue has a particular delicacy and grace in its carving. The priestess of Isis is identifiable by the famous Isaic knot in her dress, between her breasts. Her broken right arm would have held a sistrum or ceremonial rattle, and her left hand holds a rounded cista which contained items and substances used in the initiation of new members into the mystery cult of Isis.

A magnificent #statue of a #priestess of #Isis, from the #Serapeum of #Tauromenium, today's #Taormina, from around 200 CE. The knot in her dress identifies her. She's holding a cista or container indicating that she is about to initiate a believer into the Isaic mystery cult. #AncientBluesky 🏺

BASIN WITH EROTES AND ACANTHUS, C2 CE. TAORMINA Ancient Tauromenium was a city clinging to the side of Monte Tauro, and its public buildings and spaces needed to adapt. The main public baths, not huge, were beautifully decorated with local marbles and mosaic pavements. This somewhat damaged basin probably came from the baths. A lip decorated with an egg and dart pattern curves over a band of low relief with acanthus scrolls and tiny amorini. The use of the short drill to punctuate a deep shadow helps us to date this to the early C2. Below this band is a strip of garland with bucrania, and the lower part of the basin has fluting that fans out from the centre. It's been reused as a wall fountain, now used as a plant pot.

A #spolia basin from an ancient #Roman #fountain from #Tauromenium, today's #Taormina, juts unevenly from a garden wall. #SpoliaSunday here finds humble reuse of splendid materials in walls, in terraces, in churches. #AncientBluesky 🏺

FRESCO FRAGMENTS WITH BIRDS, C1-C2 CE. PALAZZO CIAMPOLI, TAORMINA In excavations in 1990 beside the church of S. Pancrazio in Taormina, archaeologists digging in the ruins of the so-called "Byzantine Baths" (actually late antique) removed the floors of two cisterns and found layers of broken-up infill including stucco and painted decorations from about the reign of Trajan. These decorations come from a villa that was destroyed and built over to make the flat surface on which the bath structures were built. Not much of the fresco work of ancient Roman Tauromenium has survived so the fragments in the S. Pancrazio excavations are an important discovery. Here we see two ducks swimming in green-brown-blue marsh with a beautiful water lily about to bloom. This is not provincial or second-rate work, but lies in the same category as a painted garden like the ones from the Vesuvian area or the famous fresco from the villa of Livia. It probably decorated a peristyle.

#FrescoFriday takes us under the ruins of some late-antique #baths in #Tauromenium, #Roman #Taormina, to discover some rather fine #swamp #ducks. #AncientBluesky 🏺