Londinium, Architecture and the Crafts

“Fantastic and even grotesque, it possesses a wholly unclassical fierceness and vigour, and not a few observers have remarked that it recalls not the Roman world, but the Middle Ages.”

Imperial Statues

A FEW broken fragments only remain to us, but they are sufficient to suggest to our imaginations the sculptures of Londinium. The finest work of sculpture found in London is the magnificent head from a bronze statue of the Emperor Hadrian, which was taken from the river near London Bridge in 1834. The head, with the neck, is 16½ in. high. It is really a masterly work of art, of Hellenistic character, and may, I think, be Alexandrian. The treatment of the head and beard is surprisingly like that of the marble Hadrian from Cyrene in the British Museum. Here we have the close-clipped beard and moustache; also the double row of curly locks of hair over the forehead from ear to ear, and the hair close cut behind, an arrangement suitable for the support of a wreath. The beard is again similar on a bronze head of a man found at Cyrene, in the British Museum. The projecting ears of the head of Hadrian are like the ears of the bronze head of Augustus in the British Museum, found in Egypt. That the bronze head of Hadrian represents a statue and an erect figure is shown by the facts that one shoulder is higher than the other and the axis of the head and neck is bent. The figure must, I think, have had the left arm uplifted. The statue must have been a splendid object in some public place—possibly the square of the Forum, or on the bridge. In a cast, when seen close by, it looks lumpy and even dull, but the original bronze as set up in the Museum is not only powerful but vivid; notice the sharp eyebrows, the way the nose is set into the brow, the line on the forehead, and the strong expressive mouth (Fig. 72, from Roach Smith). There is also in the British Museum a bronze hand, found in Thames Street, which seems similar to the head in scale and excellence of workmanship; moreover, faults in the casting have been repaired in a similar way on the neck and the wrist. Roach Smith seems to have thought that the head and the hand did not belong to the same statue. Speaking of the head he said: “It belonged to a colossal statue, two of which we may probably reckon among the public embellishments of London, for excavations in Thames Street, near the Tower, brought to light a colossal bronze hand 13 in. in length, which has been broken from a statue of about the same magnitude, and, apparently, judging from the attitude, from a statue of Hadrian also. The posture is similar to that of the marble statue in the British Museum.” Dr. Haverfield says of the head: “It appears to have belonged to a colossal statue of the emperor; the forehead is too short; the ears set out too obliquely; and the back of the head projects too strongly; the beard, too, is more closely cut than Hadrian usually wore it.” In another place he speaks of it as “a life-size head of the emperor Hadrian; whether it belonged to a colossal statue of the emperor I do not know, nor does it much matter”(!). In one aspect, Dr. Haverfield was a champion of things Roman in Britain; in another, he, as will be seen in regard to the mosaics, generally spoke slightingly of their quality.

I may now sum up my conclusions. The head belonged to a standing statue. The hand, found separately, may have belonged to the same statue; it probably drooped and held a roll. The head has the characteristics of Hellenistic art. The expression is alert and eagle-like; the close-cropped beard already appears on the head of Mausolus in the British Museum, and seems to have been maintained as an Alexandrian tradition. The statue was doubtless imported and may well have been brought from Alexandria, a chief centre of bronze casting. Notice that repairs are executed in an exactly similar way on the head of “Aphrodite,” brought from Armenia and probably an Alexandrian work, c. 200 B.C. A little silver image of Harpocrates, also found in the Thames, is, I think, certainly an Alexandrian work. The bronze statue would have been set up as a memorial of the Emperor’s visit to Britain in 121. A “big brass” was struck in honour of the same event, inscribed Adventus Augusti Britanniæ, and the profile portrait on the coin is very like our head. It has the clipped beard and bears a laurel wreath. Hadrian was the first of the emperors to wear a beard, and we may take our bronze as evidence that he began with the clipped fashion. Not much attention has been given to this head as an early portrait of the emperor, but it is important from that point of view. Compare it with a small bronze bust of a later time found at Winchester and also in the British Museum.

Other remnants of large bronze statues have been found in London. Two fragments at the Guildhall are thus described: “(19) Arm of a bronze statue broken off below the elbow, 19 in. long; (21) Left hand of a statue, bronze, of heroic size, with traces of gilding, 9½ in. long. Found in a well to the east of Seething Lane.” From a notice in The Builder (May 3, 1884), it appears that the latter was found with coins of Nero and Vespasian during the construction of the Metropolitan Railway. An article in the Journal of the Archæological Association (vol. xxiv.) discusses other fragments of bronze statues. There must be evidence for the existence of four or five large bronze statues in Londinium. A bronze leg of a horse at the Society of Antiquaries, found in Lincoln, shows that equestrian figures—probably of emperors—were also known in Britain (cf. the Marcus Aurelius in Rome).

Other Portraits.—In the Guildhall is a tomb with a relief of a soldier, larger and in higher relief than usual, which was found in the Camomile Street bastion, and probably occupied a place in the cemetery by Bishopsgate. This figure of a signifer is a little battered, and this accentuates a certain grimness of expression, but it is really a masterly work of unflattered portraiture. There cannot be many existing presentments of a Roman man more real; this has the face of a functionary, and the details of the costume are made out with careful accuracy. The mantle, or cape, partly stitched together in front, was like a chasuble. It was the pænula on which there is an excursus at the end of Becker’s Gallus. The sword had one of the ivory or bone hilts of which there is an example in the British Museum—every detail was evidently carefully studied from fact. Soldiers on the Trajan Column bear similar swords. It is probably an early second-century work. (The Colchester centurion (c. 100) has a similar sword-hilt.^[1]) When we learn to value and make due use of our antiquities a copy of this relief should be set up to stand for the fact of Roman rule in Londinium. I gave a restoration of the whole slab in the Architectural Review, 1913; it has been wrongly restored in Price’s volume on the Camomile Street bastion.

The relief of the Colchester centurion, Favonius Facilis, is really a fine work, one of the most perfect representations of a centurion which exist (cf. Daremberg and Saglio). The niche in which the figure stood had a shell represented on its rounded top; only the hinge-end of the bivalve appears at the apex, and the rest may have been indicated by painting.

At Oxford there is a soldier’s memorial stone with a sculptured relief of a similar kind to the centurion of Colchester and the signifer just described. It was found at Ludgate Hill when Wren rebuilt St. Martin’s Church (Fig. 73). According to V.C.H. the soldier carries a dagger in his right hand. This object is so long that Pennant called it “a sword of vast length like the claymore.” In fact, it is a rod held exactly as the Colchester centurion holds his stick, and I suppose it was a rod of office of some kind. The scroll the man carries in his left hand also suggests that he was more than a “private”; so also does the monument itself, which must have been costly. Roach Smith properly speaks of “stick and roll.” There is a good drawing of this monument in the Archer collection at the British Museum. I give here a sketch made from the original at Oxford. The figure is injured, but it was skilfully cut and gracefully posed. I should date it in the first half of the second century. At the Guildhall is a head larger than life-size found in the Camomile Street bastion, which, although battered, shows character (Fig. 74). The discovery of a marble bust of a girl, near Walbrook, was recorded in The Builder of March 12, 1887.

Roman Gods and Impersonations.—It is hardly brought out in the history books that the inhabitants of Britain possessed a great classical inheritance. I would say possess, but we do not seem to have determined whether we are British or only English. For a thousand years before the Teutonic invasions of the fifth century A.D. Britain had been in touch with Greek and Roman cultures, and for centuries before that again some overflow from Mediterranean lands had reached this island, and the Celts themselves were a great European race. During five centuries from 100 B.C. to A.D. 400 Britain became fully Romanised. After that time it was probably only some small balance of forces which gave us a Teutonic language, while France under somewhat similar circumstances retained a Latin tongue. Greek gods and, doubtless, Greek stories were known here long before the Roman occupation, as the British coins (the most beautiful money ever coined in these islands) show. Already when Ptolemy wrote his geography, Hartland Point, in Devonshire, was the promontory of Herakles, and this is evidence which, together with figures of Hercules on the British coins, strongly suggests that some Hercules story became localised in Britain. Possibly, as the seas beyond the Gibraltar Straits became better known, the “Pillars of Hercules” were shifted to the headland facing the Atlantic. Hercules rescuing Hesione appears as a subject on Castor pottery. “This, and the corresponding scene of Perseus and Andromeda, were popular in Britain and Gaul,” says Dr. Haverfield, and adds: “Whether the scenes conveyed any symbolic meaning in these lands I should greatly doubt.” I incline the other way. It is to be remarked that several altars dedicated to Hercules have been found in Britain: one at Corbridge is inscribed in Greek to the Syrian Hercules—that is, the same who had the famous temple at Gades.

During the Roman rule, the Olympian gods and minor classical genii were, of course, fully adopted, and the monuments show interesting transitions of thought. Jove became a single supreme deity, while the most of the other chief gods were associated with the planets and the days of the week—1 Sol, 2 Luna, 3 Mars, 4 Mercury, 5 Jupiter, 6 Venus, 7 Saturn. This stage of thought is represented by the Jove and Giant Pillars before described.

On the fragment from Chesterford at the British Museum we have Mercury with his wand, Jupiter with bearded face, and Venus with a mirror. These figures can be completed by comparison with others. There is a relief of Mercury at Gloucester. Another, illustrated by Espèrandieu, is of the same sort; he seems always to have carried a pouch in his right hand (Fig. 75). At the Goldsmiths’ Hall is a little altar having a relief of Diana on the front, a group of sacrificial utensils on the back, and simple reliefs of two trees on the returns. The figure is charming, graceful and well proportioned. The pose and setting in the panel are very similar to the soldier relief at Colchester, and I should date it about the same time, A.D. 100-150. The figure is very like a small bronze found near St. Paul’s, of which Allen gave an illustration; that also held a bow, and with the lifted right hand took an arrow from the quiver behind her shoulder. The objects carved on the back of the altar are a table of offerings (compare the leg of a piece of furniture in Leicester Museum), a jug and probably a dipper (Fig. 76). Archer, who published etchings of the reliefs, thought he saw a hare here, but this was a misreading of the obscure forms. This altar must have belonged to some temple or shrine. As Dr. Haverfield says of a somewhat similar relief of Diana found near Bath: “We need not doubt that passers-by worshipped Diana of the Romans.”

At the Guildhall is the upper part of a terra-cotta image of Ceres, and fragments of a Hercules, perhaps from a tomb, were found at Ludgate in 1806. There are many small bronze figures in our museums—altogether quite a Pantheon could be made up of images found in Britain, and these, I feel, belong to us in a special way.

In the form of impersonations of the days, the seven gods might still be available in a modern art language if we had sufficient sense to construct such an Esperanto.^[2]

The Roman impersonations of places and ideas are nearer to us than the gods, and they indeed belong to universal poetry. Chief of these is Britannia, the “Sacred Britain” of the inscriptions. This impersonation was “revived” (we may truly say so in this case, for it had life and reality in it) for our coins in the seventeenth century. It is astonishing evidence of the paralysis of modern architectural thought how little use has been made of this noble imagination which ultimately derives from the gold and ivory Athene of Phidias, and yet is our very own. A seated variant of the standing Athene was made to represent the goddess Rome, and this in turn was the source of our Britannia. Next in importance were the impersonations of cities, and every city and station had a representative figure which stood for its spirit, its genius, itself. Our French friends, in their images of the City of Paris or of Strasbourg, still make use of the idea, but we have ceased to know that a city is more than a congested area where landlords hire out what they call houses. I wonder if London were given an image whether it might not acquire a new sense of soul.

In the London Museum is a pretty and well-sculptured figure which is, I think, a city impersonation and may be Londinium. It is one of two sculptures in marble which seem to have been found about 1887, together with a Mithraic relief, on the bank of the Walbrook. It was at first identified as Fortune, but Dr. Haverfield objected that Fortune would have been a female figure, and he suggested “Bonus Eventus, or a genius”; at the London Museum it is entitled Bonus Eventus. It would be hardly possible to bring forward any nearly similar figure with such a designation; on the other hand, a genius of Rome having a striking resemblance to our figure is one of the commonest types of the later coinage. Our figure, a graceful youth, holds a great cornucopia against his left shoulder and pours with his right hand a libation on an altar from a patera; a serpent rising from the altar winds around his wrist; by his left leg is the prow of a ship. He has two wreaths or collars around his neck and is partially draped; his mantle seems to have fallen from his head like a veil, and this suggests that he wore a mural crown or a modius. Now the genius of the Roman people on the coins was represented with a modius on his head, a horn of abundance in his left hand, and a patera from which he pours, in his right. Such a figure occurs on several coins which bear the Mint mark of London and the legend Genio Populi Romani. It is quite possible that our statue may be the genius of Londinium itself. It is known that our British Roman towns had impersonations wearing mural crowns—a fragment of such a figure has been found at Silchester. Our figure is clearly of the nature of Fortune, and the impersonations of towns were their Fortunes. The ship and the horn of plenty, piled up with fruits, corn and articles of commerce, are especially appropriate for a busy port. I suggest that this figure might, and should be, adopted as the impersonation and image of the City of London.

I had already written this when I found a figure illustrated in Bruce’s book on the Roman Wall, which is a close parallel to our figure. It was found at Netherby, and is described thus: “The best piece of sculpture belonging to this station represents the Genius of the Castrum wearing the mural crown and engaged in the grateful task of pouring an offering to the superior powers” (Fig. 77). The resemblance of this figure to that in the London Museum proves, I think, that that is the genius of a place, as does also the serpent which rises from the altar. An altar “To the Genius Loci,” found at Chester, represented the genius holding a cornucopia. Compare two altars figured by Lysons (Reliq., pl. lviii.) of similar figures apparently male, each with patera, altar, snake and cornucopia. Fig. 78 is one of those in the British Museum.)

Wren, in an early design for the Monument, proposed that it should be surmounted by a civic impersonation.

In Roman days every place and almost every field had its genius loci—an idea which we still timidly preserve as a “figure of speech.” Many British inscriptions and sculptures relate to Silvanus, Rivers and Fountains; to the Deities of the Fields of Britain (think of that now!), to Nymphs of the Springs (think again of ours choked with tins and old shoes), and to the God of Ways and Paths (perhaps such an image would do some good at Liverpool Street and King’s Cross).

The other marble sculpture found with the Genius is the torso of a river god of a well-known type—and very well carved. The figure reclined supported by his left arm; the right hand carried a long water reed which rested against his right shoulder (Fig. 79). The head, with long curling hair and beard, is in a tradition which derives from the Zeus of Phidias, and the body had its prototype in the reclining figures of the Parthenon pediments. Some reliefs of similar river gods occupy the spandrels of the Arch of Constantine. Bruce illustrated a very similar figure which represented the North Tyne (Fig. 80). We have every right to assume that the torso in the London Museum may be called the Thames. There is some reason, from the conditions of discovery, to think that this figure and the Genius before described occupied places in a Mithraic cell by the Walbrook. That a river impersonation and a genius of locality should be so found together strengthens the evidence that they represented London and Father Thames. Modern figures of the Thames and other rivers existed in seventeenth-century London.

Mithras, etc.—At the London Museum is a Mithraic relief, rough and small, but a valuable document. In the centre is Mithras and the bull, surrounded by the circle of the Zodiac. “Outside in one upper corner the Sun drives up his four-horse chariot, and in the other the Moon is driving her car downwards. Beneath are two winged heads, probably symbolising the Winds” (Haverfield). These heads are very well carved and quite pretty; so are the Zodiac signs. This is one of many cases of the similarity of monuments in London and at Trèves. On the celebrated Igel monument is found another Zodiac, the signs of which (so far as they exist) are practically identical with those on our stone. In the spandrels are “heads of wind-gods, emblematic of the four cardinal points.” These heads are winged like those on the London stone, and the comparison allows us to be sure of the interpretation of the latter: the rising Sun is East, the setting Moon is West, the bearded head is North, and the youthful one South.

A small figure found in Bevis Marks, and now in the British Museum, is usually identified as Atys. I have some doubt whether it was not rather Silvanus; but it may be a grave monument, and for such a purpose a figure of Atys would be appropriate. A small figure of Hercules at the Guildhall was also probably, as before said, a tomb sculpture.

In the London Museum is another small sculpture, this time in relief, of a figure seemingly in countryman’s costume, standing in a roughly-formed niche or rock recess. By his side is some implement like a yoke, but I cannot suggest any explanation. It has “character,” and I should like to know what it means. It was found in Drury Lane.

Bagford, in his letter to Hearne (1714), mentions a Janus head dug up at St. Thomas Watering on the Dover Road by Bermondsey, also a glass urn at Peckham, and several other Roman things at Blackheath. The Janus head was about a foot and a half high, and seemed to have been fixed to a square column or terminus. It was illustrated by Horsley. One of the two faces was Jupiter Ammon with ram’s horns, the other was female.

I cannot here do more than mention the dozens of small bronzes, some of high excellence, which have been found in London; doubtless most or all of these were imported. Mr. Chaffers saw a beautiful bronze of an archer with inlaid eyes of silver taken out of the mud in Queen Street, Cheapside, in 1842. A pretty bronze relief of Hope was found in Thames Street in 1840 (V.C.H.). I must just refer to a delightful little bronze Genius, found at Brandon, and now in the British Museum, which holds a double horn of plenty. This, again, is probably a locality genius. Many of the small clay lamps found in London have pretty reliefs on them, such as a figure of Victory, a head of Luna (Fig. 81), a bird, or an animal. Altogether we have quite a large gallery of classical imagery of our own.

Ornament.—Carved decorations were for the most part rude and rapidly cut, but they show some fresh thought and are very different from the defunct details which now pass for “classic.” At the Guildhall is part of a frieze of small scale (Fig. 62) which has running animals alternating with trees. This suggestion of the forest was a popular motive of the time, and is found frequently on our native-made Castor pottery. Haverfield suggested that it might be a Celtic motive, but it is found on Samian pottery, and Espèrandieu illustrates a similar frieze of higher quality found at Mainz. All the Roman architectural carvings found in Britain, it may again be said, very closely resemble works found in Gaul, and especially at Trèves.

The wide pilaster at the Guildhall (Fig. 70), also mentioned before, has a boldly designed relief of foliage arranged in a series of oval forms, one over the other. The interior of each unit is filled by the leafage being bent downwards. The same scheme occurs on a mosaic floor found in Dorsetshire, now in the British Museum (Fig. 82). Fine Corinthian capitals have been found at Cirencester and Bath; even in these we find the spirit of experiment constantly at work. An example sketched at Angers in France is given in Fig. 83. The most elegant piece of architectural decoration executed in Britain, which is known to me, is a frieze found at Bath, which is somewhat singular in bold freshness of treatment (Fig. 84). Again, this can be explained by comparison with a mosaic pattern. At first sight it seems an ordinary piece of scroll work, but examination reveals that the alternate elements were complete circles. This frieze is broken at a point which might seem to leave room for a little doubt as to this, and my figure is slightly restored; but the border of a mosaic floor found at Frampton furnishes us with a complete example of the same treatment, and this excludes any doubt (Fig. 85). Fig. 86 represents a more ordinary scroll frieze from Chester, but even this is brightened by the little birds set in the corner spaces. Fig. 87 is the soffit of a corona member from Bath, also alive and inventive.

All this is very different from the “Roman style” of books and the commentaries on Vitruvius. We may see in such provincial Roman works an early stage of Romanesque art and even the beginnings of Gothic. Again, the fragment of a column at the British Museum, carved over with a lattice pattern having foliage in the interspaces, is particularly interesting as an example of an “all-over” diaper pattern, and a prototype of Romanesque carved shafts. At Trèves there are many examples of much more elaborate diaper patterns of the same type. Such continuous surface decorations speak rather of what was to be in the romance ages than of the past of classical art. Even the series of acanthus leaves arranged like tiles on the “roof” of the sarcophagus found at Haydon Square shows adaptive invention and pleasure (that is what it comes to) in the doing (Fig. 50).

If ever we awake to make use of our inheritance and set about civilising London, we might yet gain something of value from the Roman sculptures which have been discussed. A replica of the splendid head of Hadrian might be joined on to a bronze cast from one of the figures of the emperor in the British Museum and re-erected, resurrected, as a visible symbol of the Roman age in Britain and London. Set on a tall pedestal, it would make a noble monument. Copies of the Ludgate Hill Soldier and of the “Signifer” at the Guildhall, we might place against each side, and the reclining River God—the Thames—in front, with an enlargement of the Genius Loci at the London Museum above it. Such a monument would be something to tell the children about, and it might even move the business men to occasional thoughts outside the fluctuations of stock.

Symbolism.—Romano-British sculpture was certainly not over-refined; indeed, much of it was just the opposite. But ideas were embodied, and many of the things had simple and poetic meanings. The power of making impersonations is specially to be noted, whereby an image stood for a thing as definitely as its name—Sun, Moon and Planets, Seasons, Winds and Waters, Countries, Cities and localities, events and wishes. Fragments of a set of reliefs of seasons found at Bath, represented by nude boys carrying flowers, a reaping-hook, etc.; the winged heads of Winds; and the rising and setting Sun of the Mithraic panel at the London Museum talk a universal language.

Some study of the sepulchral monuments of Roman Britain gives many indications of the thought of the time. The coming in of the coffin, and then of the double coffin of lead and stone, suggests some concern as to an awaking after the sleep of death. The lack of late funeral inscriptions is another indication of transition. The old mythology was softened and the characters were allegorised and reinterpreted in harmony with the mystery cults. We have seen that the Jove and Giant columns suggested triumph over evil. Mrs. Strong has dealt with this subject in regard to continental monuments (J.R.S., 1911): “There is frequent preoccupation as to survival on these tombstones.” The cult of Atys was revived under Mithraism, as appears from “countless gravestones ... an expression of hope, of resurrection; so, too, his pine-cone must be symbolical of the belief; there are numerous examples in Britannia.” In the Roman corridor at the British Museum is a fragment from the North of England, described as the upper part of a niche, which can hardly be other than the top of a grave slab; on it are two peacocks between three pine-cones. Peacocks were symbols of immortality. The baskets of fruit carved on the Haydon Square tomb could only have one meaning. Compare a Gaulish tomb illustrated by Espèrandieu (iii., No. 1789), on which is carved a peacock pecking at the fruit from such a basket, which is upset towards it. The sepulchral banquet symbolises some sort of paradise. In examples of these at Chester, we find birds perched on festoons above the main subject, and we have found an example of birds and festoons in London.

The group before mentioned of a lion seizing another animal was in some way “apotropaic”—that is, it warded off evil influences like a horseshoe on a door. At Colchester is a group of a sphinx having a skull between its paws, which is much finer in style (compare Espèrandieu, No. 4675). Probably there were similar tombs in London; in the British Museum is a pretty little bone carving of such a sphinx.

A grave slab at Cirencester has a sphinx and two lions carved on it as acroteria. A somewhat similar slab, found in the north by the Roman wall, has two lions with skulls. A lead coffin of specially fine workmanship, found at Sittingbourne, but doubtless made in London, now shown at the British Museum, has pairs of lions guarding a vase (compare Espèrandieu, 4715), and little medallions of the Gorgon’s head on it (Fig. 152). The most important example of apotropaic sculpture in Britain is the great Gorgon’s head in the pediment of the small Corinthian temple found at Bath.

The apotropaic nature of this sculpture has not, I think, been brought out. It has been explained as a symbol of Minerva, and the building has been called the Temple of Minerva; but for this there is no evidence. (I may say here that Lysons assigned to this building a fragment of an inscription which mentions repairs, but I do not think that this fragment should be separated from another which clearly belonged to a second building. Since writing this, I find that Mr. Irvine had already made a similar observation. Wonder has been expressed that this head should be bearded, but this appears to be the Italian tradition.)

In any story of life in Roman London, some of the atmosphere of mixed faiths and symbols suggested in Kingsley’s Hypatia should appear.