CIMRM 603-604 - Tauroctony of Fortunatus and Alexander. Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg.

CIMRM entry

603. A relief, formerly "in domo Andreae Cinquinae". Now Leningrad( ?). Gruterus, Inscr., XXXIV, 4; Ms. Lupus, Vaticanus, 7143 f. 841; Zoega, Abh., 150 No. 29; Guedionov, Ermitage Impérial, Musée de sculpture, 1865", 21 No. 94; MMM II 228f No. 65bis. Our description from CIL VI 735. "Mithra est fusa chlamyde, succinctus veste breviori, braccatus et manicatus, curva tiara, respiciens corvum. Taurum figit cultro parazonio extremum pedem ei suo premens; altera nares tenet; adsilit ad vulnus canis et serpens toto bovis spatio porrectus. Testes bovis chelis suis apprehendit scorpius, cauda bovis in quatuor aristas desinens subrecta est. Subest inscriptio." No. 604. 604. CIL VI 735; MMM II No. 33. D(onum) deo invicto d(ederunt) / Marci Matti / Fortuna/tus / et Alexander / et Pardus / et Eficax / per Fl(avio) Alexandro patre. As Lupus' manuscript states, that in the beginning of the 18th century it was kept "Romae in Musea Rolando", Cumont presumed (MMM II 483 No. 65bis), that this relief is the same as a work, which has got lost hitherto and of which we reproduce a drawing according to Causius, who adds "apud P. A. Rolandum" (cf. M.A. Causeus, Romanum Museum, II,1 Pl. 23; Montfaucon, Ant. Expl., I (2), 579 and Pl. 216, 1, who states wrongly, that he has copied his reproduction from del Torre; J. G. Graevius, Thesaurus Antiquitatum Romanarum, V, 1696, 777, Tab. XVI; Eichhorn. de deo Sole, Tab. I; Creuzer. Symb., Pl. 3; Welcker in Zoega, Abh., 396; Müller, Mithras, fig. 8; MMM II 233 No. 71 with fig. 63). If indeed we compare the description of the Corpus with the Causeus reproduction, the similarity is striking. The bull's tail however, ends in three ears, but a drawing may easily lead to a mistake. For one of the ears is bigger and fuller then the other two. As to the inscription, Causeus may simply have omitted it.