CIMRM Supplement - Mithraeum of the Crypta Balbi, Rome.

In 2000 a Mithraeum was discovered in Rome at the site of the theatre and porticus of L. Cornelius Balbus. It seems to have been built ca. 200 AD and gone out of use in the 4th century AD. Fragments of a 3rd century tauroctony were found in the rubble with which it was filled after disuse. The Crypta Balbi is now part of the National Roman Museum.

From the EJMS:

The theatre and the vast porticus of L. Cornelius Balbus (proconsul of Africa 21/0 BC), at the extreme southern tip of the Campus Martius, were built in celebration of Balbus' victory over the Libyan Garamantes in 19 BC and completed in 13 BC. The theatre is completely concealed beneath the palazzi Caetani and Mattei which front onto the Via Michelangelo Caetani, but the porticus, on the site of the former convent of S. Caterina dei Funari, has been the focus of extensive archaeological investigation since 1981. The Northern boundary of the site is the Via delle Botteghe Oscure, to the East, Via Palacchi and the Piazza Margana, to the South Via dei Delfini (see the map in L. Richardson, New Topographical Dictionary, p.381 fig. 80). The walls of the porticus (as rebuilt after the fire of 80 AD) have been revealed to be still standing up to heights of more than 12m behind the facades of the buildings on Via delle Otteghe Oscure and dei Delfini. The whole area continued to be intensively settled in late antique Rome, and the upper levels have revealed extensive industrial activity, including glass-blowing, and bronze-founding. After ceasing for a while in the early 1990s, the excavations were continued recently under the direction of Prof. Daniele Manacorda, and in 2000 the remains of a large mithraeum were discovered on the ground floor of the porticus immediately to the South of the apsidal development in the centre of the Eastern perimeter wall, marked in Richardson's map as a series of large vaults. These have now been shown to have reached a height of four storeys, so that the mithraeum was in the middle of a densely populated insula. The overall dimensions of the temple were 31.5m long and ca. 12 m wide, and it could be entered from several points. It seems to have been founded in the late Antonine or early Severan period (ca. 200 AD), and to have ceased to be used as a mithraeum some time in the later fourth century AD, though these dates are still somewhat speculative. Some time after its closure as a mithraeum, it was completely filled with rubble, which, as in the case of S. Prisca on the Aventine, has made the task of determining what materials belong to the mithraeum and what is adventitious particularly difficult. But a large fragment of an early third-century bull-killing relief, altars and a number of multi-nozzled lamps certainly belong to the temple. Dssa Laura Vendittelli, the director of the small museum on the site of the porticus, has very kindly sent the EJMS both the pictures of the poster created for the exhibition held in the museum in April 2000, with texts in Italian and English, and some addiitonal visual material, including detailed plans, pictures of the excavation and the finds, and suggested elevations of the Porticus. We are most grateful to her and to Prof. Manacorda for their co-operation in bringing this important discovery to the notice of a wider international public. A presentation of the finds will be made by Dttori Marco Rici and Lucia Sagui at the conference on Mithraic small finds to be held at Tienen in Belgium this coming November. Further information may be obtained from Dssa Vendittelli, but no detailed account has yet ben published. General information on the site: Amanda Claridge, Oxford Archaeological Guide to Rome (1998), 220 with map on p.174f. M. Steinby, Lexicon Topographicum Urbis Romae (1993-) s.v. Crypta Balbi.

Note: this material has been copied in the interests of preservation from the EJMS site, which seems increasingly abandoned and whose original site has vanished.

Coordinates: 41° 54' 00" N, 12° 30' 00! / 41.900° N, 12.500° E.¹

Bibliography

• Ricci, Marco. "Il mitreo della Crypta Balbi Roma Note preliiminan," Roman Mithraism: the Evidence of the Small Finds. Brussels: Institute for the archaeological Heritage, 2004. pp. 157-165.
• Sagui, Lucia. "Il mitreo della Crypta Balbi e i suoi repert," Roman Mithraism: the Evidence of the Small Finds. Brussels: Institute for the Archaeological heritage, 2004. pp. 167-178.

Gallery

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  Bipedal pavimented room and layered works
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  Bust of Livia
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  Staircase of the building
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  Entrance to Mithraeum
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  Exedra
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  Marble fragments from Mithraeum
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  Reconstruction of the building
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  Reconstruction of Mithraic ceremony
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  Leaflet
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  Mithraeum seen from above

Number of entries: 10