The tragic boy emperor, Philip II

Philip II (Latin: Marcus Julius Severus Philippus; 237 – 249CE), also known as Philip the Younger, was the son and heir of the Roman Emperor Philip the Arab by his wife Marcia Otacilia Severa. When his father became emperor in 244, young Philip was appointed caesar at the age of only seven-years-old. In 247, he became consul, and was later elevated by his father to the rank of augustus and co-ruler.  Although ancient historians claim both Philip the Arab and his son were killed in battle by Decius.  

Decius was a distinguished senator who had served as suffect consul in 232, had been governor of Moesia and Germania Inferior soon afterwards, served as governor of Hispania Tarraconensis between 235 and 238, and was urban prefect of Rome during the early reign of Emperor Philip the Arab. In 248 or 249 Decius was sent to quell the revolt of Pacatianus and his troops in Moesia and Pannonia, a rebellion seen by some modern historians as emerging Balkan separatism.  After the collapse of the revolt, Decius let the troops proclaim him emperor. Philip advanced against him and was killed at Verona, Italy, in September 249. The Senate then recognized Decius as emperor, giving him the attribute Traianus in reference to Emperor Trajan, an emperor considered the ultimate example of a ruler at the time. According to the Byzantine historian Zosimus, Decius was clothed in purple and forced to undertake the [burdens of] government, despite his reluctance and unwillingness.  

Modern scholars do not think Philip II was with his father in Verona and suggest that when news of his father's death and the proclamation of Decius as the new emperor reached Rome, the Praetorian Guard murdered the 12-years-old. 

Bust of Philip II at the archaeological museum in Venice, Italy, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Architas.

Previously crushed portrait of Philip the Younger from Asia Minor, 235 CE, bronze, at the J. Paul Getty Museum (Villa)

Portrait of Philip II, 247-249 CE, from the Chiragan Roman Villa, now in the Musée Saint-Raymond, image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Daniel Martin.

 

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Realism in Roman miniatures

The Romans favored bronze and marble above all else for their finest work and loved miniatures.  By the mid-1st century CE, Roman sculptors began to move away from emulating their Etruscan and Greek predecessors and sought to capture and create optical effects of light and shade for greater realism.  This trend may well have developed from the tradition of keeping realistic wax funeral masks of deceased family members in the ancestral home.  Although few bronze examples have survived due to a high demand for reuse of the alloy, those that did, like this poignant figurine, portrayed a people who were realistically scarred, wrinkled, or plump, like this healthy-appearing little girl.

Sadly (from my viewpoint anyway), towards the end of the Empire, the influence of art from the eastern Mediterranean resulted in figural sculpture with enlarged heads, vacantly staring eyes, and out-of-proportion torsos and limbs such as those seen in works portraying the emperor Constantine.

In his excellent article on Roman art in the Ancient History Encyclopedia, Mark Cartwright points out, "Perhaps, though, their greatest contribution to world art was the fostering of the idea that the appreciation of art for its own sake was a fine thing and that to possess art objects or even a collection was a real badge of one’s cultural sophistication. In addition, even for those who could not afford their own art, there was the provision of public art galleries. Art was no longer the exclusive domain of the rich, art was for anyone and everyone. The Romans, like no other culture before them, were champions of art as a popular, affordable, and accessible means of expressing and communicating the human spirit."

Read his full article at: https://www.ancient.eu/Roman_Art/

Image: Bronze statuette of a girl holding a puppy, Greek or Roman, 1st century BCE – 2nd century CE courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

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Girl playing astragaloi (knucklebones), from Caelian Hill in Rome, 150 CE, at the Altes Museum in Berlin

This Hellenistic sculpture is one of six Roman copies with a similar theme.  All versions depict a female sitting  on the floor with her legs drawn up, supporting herself with her left hand and just throwing two knuckles ( astragales ) with her right hand.   The subject is dressed in a thin chiton , which has slipped from the left shoulder to the elbow and exposes the left breast. This nudity is thought to have been incorporated by the sculptor to elevate the subject to an ideal, divine level.

A version of the sculpture in The Louvre depicts the subject as an adult.  But 17th century restorers substituted a shell for the astragaloi and dubbed the sculpture "Venus with the Shell."  This piece was originally in the collections of the Duke Camillo Borghese and held in the Villa Borghese but when the Duke married Pauline Bonaparte, his new brother-in-law, Napoleon, forced the Duke to sell the work to him. 

The more elegant and endearing sculpture of the young girl playing knuckebones, now in the Altes Museum, was found on the Caelian Hill in 1730. It passed from Cardinal Melchior de Polignac to Friedrich II then to the museum in Berlin.  This Antonine-era sculpture  appears to realistically depict a young girl with a distinctive face, suggesting it may have been created as a funerary statue of a deceased child. Another feature that supports this interpretation is the gaze of the child who is not looking at the game but with her gentle facial expression portrays a melancholic absence. The melon hairstyle she wears was particularly popular at the time the statue was created.

Other sculptures with this theme can be seen in the British Museum, the University of Göttingen (a cast), and the Albertinum in Dresden.

Image: Girl playing astragaloi (knucklebones), from Caelian Hill in Rome, 150 CE, at the Altes Museum in Berlin courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Sailko.

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