Clarke 1993 Warren Cup PDF

The Warren Cup and the Contexts for Representations of Male-to-Male Lovemaking in
Augustan and Early Julio-Claudian Art

Author(s): John R. Clarke
Source: The Art Bulletin, Vol. 75, No. 2 (Jun., 1993), pp. 275-294
Published by: College Art Association
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The Warren Cup and the Contexts for
Representations
of Male-to-Male Lovemaking in Augustan and Early
Art
Julio-Claudian
John R. Clarke
Despite growing scholarly interest in texts that shed light on piled-up clothing rests on a box-like piece of furniture in
the cultural construction of male-to-male sexual activity in front of the drapery (Fig. 2). Beneath both pairs of lovers the
ancient Rome, there is very little written about the visual artist has depicted heavily cushioned and draped beds,
representations of males making love to each other. Al- without including their wooden framework (a feature present
though it is true that the evidence in art is scarce and difficult in the Arretine vessels and wall paintings discussed below).
to study for lack of adequate reproductions, art historians The side framed by the lyre on the left and the doorway to
and classicists have shied away from serious, methodologi- the right (which I will call "side A") pictures two males on a
cally sophisticated analysis. For the most part, they have bed (Fig. 3). The young man on top is easing himself onto his
limited their comments to brief, businesslike descriptions of partner's penis while holding onto a strap. He is clean-
the objects and their sexual imagery. Because images like shaven (Fig. 4). Flowing drapery conceals the arm that holds
this have, until recently, belonged to the dark underside of the strap, parting in a gentle curve to reveal his right hip and
ancient art history, research into the proper contexts for buttocks but concealing his legs and feet, which disappear at
visual images of lovemaking from the ancient world is still at an oblique angle into the picture plane (Fig. 7). The man
its beginning stages. Although philologists have made impor- beneath him has a close-cropped, curly beard and wears a
tant advances in their research on sexual constructs in laurel wreath tied with a fillet at the back of his head (Fig. 6).
literature, law, and society, historians of Roman art have The drapery that coyly conceals and reveals areas of his
neglected the images of sexual activity that form such a large lover's body covers almost none of his; it falls in a scallop
part of the visual record. Nowhere does one find satisfactory above his right knee, partially masks the awkward juncture
discussion of the broad contexts surrounding images of where his left knee crosses over his right, and flows over his
male-to-male lovemaking that would connect them with their right foot. The couple is not alone. To the right a boy opens
social and cultural setting, the circumstances of their produc- one of the battens of the door-either to peer in or to glance
tion, and the persons who would have paid for them and back while quietly exiting (Fig. 5). He has tightly curled
enjoyed looking at them. ringlets and wears a simple tunic. Both the boy and the door
The Warren Cup provides a unique opportunity to ex- are quite small in relation to the couple on the bed, whether
plore such questions of context because of its high quality because of the limited space available or because the artist
and relatively secure date. It is of ovoid shape, made of silver, wished to suggest their distance from the couple or their
and measures about fifteen centimeters in height, including secondary roles in the scene.
the foot.1 Two scenes of two male couples making love On side B, in contrast to the couple on side A, the two
constitute its principal relief decoration. The viewer can best males are clearly of unequal age (Fig. 8). The long locks of
understand the setting where the lovemaking takes place by hair of the male in front-as well as his smaller size-
examining the areas of the relief between the two scenes; indicate that he is a boy (Fig. 9). His beardless lover, who
here the artist has suggested interiors by constructing a wears a laurel filet in his short hair, supports himself on his
background of cloth, furniture, and a door. On one side, two right knee while parting the boy's thighs with his right hand.
panels of drapery hang over their ties and fall in symmetrical His left leg extends beyond the edge of the mattress, his toes
folds (Fig. 1). A double flute hangs from a strap over the touching the bottom of the framing drapery (Fig. 2). The
drapery on the left, while a lyre rests on top of a tall box or artist has represented one of the man's testicles directly
shelf on the right. On the other side, the artist has con- behind the boy's, indicating that he is entering him. Rather
structed a more complex background: on the left is a than gazing at his partner, the man looks to the viewer's left,
double-batten door with a wide frame, whereas on the right, his head slightly lowered. Two details of the drapery in this
I dedicate this article to the memory of Charles M. Edwards. l For the shapes of silver drinking cups of the period, see D.E. Strong,
I wish to thank Ann Kuttner, Amy Richlin, and Brian Rose for their Greekand Roman Gold and SzlverPlate, London, 1966, 134, fig. 27. The
excellent criticisms and suggestions; the anonymous reader's advice was Warren Cup corresponds most closely to the "deep ovoid" type "b."The
also extremely helpful. The owner of the Warren Cup was also most foot and liner of the Warren Cup are ancient. The cup does not stand
cooperative in furthering my research. I am grateful to Professor fully perpendicular on its foot because one of the foot's sides has
Baldassare Conticello, Soprintendente Archeologico di Pompei, for telescoped into the metal of the cup. A small wedge used in the current
granting permission to study and photograph paintings zn sztu, and to display corrects the problem. I wish to thank Richard Stone of the
Dr. Stefano De Caro, Soprintendente alle Antichita di Napoli e Caserta, Department of Conservation, Metropolitan Museum of Art, for allowing
for granting permission to study and photograph the silver vessels from me to consult him and examine the Warren Cup in April of 1992.
the House of the Menander. Finally I wish to thank Michael Larvey for
his encouragement and his fine photographic work.

276 THE ART BULLETIN JUNE 1993 VOLUME LXXV NUMBER 2
1 Warren Cup. New York, Metropolitan Mu-

seum of Art, Anonymous Loan (photo: Mu-
seum)
scene take notably phallic forms: the folds ending in a albeit in its uncleaned state.4 Warren lent the cup to the
drapery weight hanging from the mattress beneath the boy's Martin von Wagner-Museum in Wurzburg sometime in the
left side and the similarly weighted drapery end curving over twenties.5 After Warren's death, the cup seems to have
the furniture at upper left. passed to Asa Thomas through inheritance, and thence to a
The first modern owner of the cup was the American dealer. In the late fifties; the Warren Cup was searching for a
collector Edward Perry Warren (1860-1928),2 who acquired home. No museum bought it, presumably because its subject
it sometime in the early twentieth century.3 In 1921, Vorberg matter was considered too obscene for public display. Never-
privately published a volume of 113 plates of erotic images in theless, C. Vermeule, Curator of Ancient Art at the Boston
the minor arts, giving pride of place to the Warren Cup, Museum of Fine Arts, included it in a brief article.6 The
collector who eventually purchased the Warren Cup lent it
for some time to the Basel Art Museum. In 1992, the cup
went on display as an anonymous loan to the Metropolitan
2 0. Burdett and E.H. Goddard, Edward
PerryWarren:The Biographyof a
Museum of Art in New York.7
Connoisseur,London, 1941; K. Herbert, AncientArt in Bowdoin College:A
Descriptive Catalogue of the Warren and Other Collections, Cambridge,
Mass., 1964, 4-8; A.L. Rowse, Homosexuals in History: A Study of 4 G. Vorberg, Die Erotikeder Antike in Kleinkunstund Keramik,Munich,
Ambivalencein Society,Literatureand the Arts, New York, 1977, 309-313, 1921, pls. 1-3.
where Rowse gives the wrong death date (1936); D. Sox, BachelorsofArt: 5 Both
EdwardPerryWarrenand the LewesHouse Brotherhood,London, 1992. photographs in the archives of the Deutsches Archaologisches
Institut in Rome locate the cup in the Martin von Wagner-Museum in
3
Opinion is divided on the findspot of the Warren Cup. Although Wurzburg. One shows the cup without cleaning, as it appears in Vorberg
Warren kept meticulous records regarding all ancient objects that he (as in n. 4), and is dated 1929 (Deutsches Archaologisches Institut,
either owned or sold, so far the records regarding the cup have not Rome, 3145, 1929, Index fiche 1990); the other, dated 1931 and also
surfaced. There are two published opinions. Vorberg, 457, gives Syria as labeled "Martin von Wagner-Museum," pictures the cup after cleaning
the findspot (without further explanation) in the caption beneath an (Deutsches Archaologisches Institut, Rome, 247, 1931, Index fiche
image of the Warren Cup. Strong (as in n. 1), 137: "A cup with scenes of 1990). In the following year, Vorberg republished the three plates of the
homosexual love recently on the London Market is said to have been
cup used in his 1921 book, stating (erroneously) that it was presently
found in Palestine together with coins of Claudius"; and 137, n. 6: located in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts; Vorberg, pls. on 355, 456,
"R.V.Nicholls informed me about its provenance." One expert who and 457.
prefers to remain anonymous has good grounds for a provenance from 6 Vermeule, 39,
Pompeii. If and when Warren's own notes on the cup are found, more pl. 14, 2 and 4.
precise information about its place of origin may be available. 7 Metropolitan Museum of Art, L.1991.95.

MALE-TO-MALE LOVEMAKING IN AUGUSTAN AND EARLY JULIO-CLAUDIAN ART 277
2 Warren Cup (photo: Mu-

seum)
Warren was a friend of Sir John Beazley, who so admired Roman Italy that represent lovemaking: since many are still
the cup that Warren had a replica made for him. In 1966, in their original architectural settings, they already have a
this facsimile came to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford as context that we can interpret by looking at the kinds of
part of the Beazley Gift. C. Johns's book of 1982, Sex or spaces they decorate, spaces where the ancient Romans used
Symbol?, reproduced a large color plate of side A of the vessels like the Warren Cup. The third kind of information
Ashmolean facsimile,8 and it figured prominently in an providing context is that of ancient texts and their modern
exhibition at the museum in 1985.9 Although photographs interpretations, together elucidating sexual practices in Au-
of the Warren Cup (either of the original or the facsimile) gustan Rome. From these three kinds of information, I hope
have appeared several times since Vorberg's publication, no to put this somewhat unusual object into focus, in an attempt
scholar has given it the attention it merits. Above all because to see it with Roman, rather than with modern, eyes.
it is a precious object that is unique in its class, the Warren Publication of ancient erotic images has been problematic.
Cup challenges the modern viewer to consider a broad range Although the general trend, especially since the late sixties,
of artistic, cultural, and social issues. has favored increasing use of Roman erotic material in widely
To build a proper context for the Warren Cup, one must diffused publications, the modern texts by and large ignore
explore three types of evidence. The first is that provided by both the context and content of the individual objects.'1 For
objects similar to it in form and date. These objects allow us popular books, authors have exploited two sources, the
to see the range of subject matter, style, and quality in so-called pornographic objects in the Secret Cabinet of the
ancient Roman figured vessels of the period. The second National Archaeological Museum in Naples, and erotic
type of evidence is that of wall painting and mosaics in paintings still on site-but rarely seen by visitors-at Pompeii.ll
8 C. 10The best modern treatment is Brendel, 3-107.

Johns, Sex or Symbol?,Austin, 1982, color pl. 25 (side A) and fig. 84 I
(side B). A far from complete sample would include G. Marini, II gabinetto
9 M. Vickers, O.
Impey, and J. Allen, From Silver to Ceramic.The Potter's segreto del Museo Nazionale di Napoli, Turin, 1971; M. Grant, Eros in
Debt to Metalwork in the Graeco-Roman, Oriental and Islamic Worlds, Pompeii, New York, 1975; D. Mountfield, Greekand Roman Erotica,New
Oxford, 1986, unpag. Vickers compares the replica of the Warren Cup York, 1982.
to an Arretine ware bowl decorated with groups of lovers, formerly in the
collection ofJ.D. Beazley.

3 Warren Cup, Side A (pho-

to: Museum)
With few exceptions these picture books, aimed at a broad closest in style to the Warren Cup date to the reign of
audience, contain little new information. The texts invariably Augustus (27 B.C.-A.D. 14). In particular, two of the cups
follow a by now predictable pattern: authors stitch together found at Pompeii in the silver hoard of the House of the
ancient texts referring to sexual activity without commenting Menander reveal that some Romans used vessels with scenes
directly on any of the images. In this way, even "modern" of lovemaking in their homes. Maiuri has identified both as
and "liberated" books end up doing no more than Vorberg12 picturing the loves of Venus and Mars.15 Their elongated
had done in the twenties or Marcade in the early sixties.13 ovoid forms closely parallel that of the Warren Cup. Al-
A survey of Roman silver vessels reveals a broad range of though the backgrounds, consisting of carefully wrought
subject matter that sometimes includes the erotic.14 Those grapevines, set the scenes in garden bowers rather than in
bedroom interiors, each cup presents a pair of male-female
lovers on each of its sides. In both cases, side A pictures a
12 semi-nude male on a couch entreating a modestly dressed
Vorberg continued to republish the plates appearing in Die Erotikeder
Antike in Kleinkunst und Keramik throughout the twenties: Uber das female with a diadem who sits near him, fully clothed; she
Geschlechtslebenim Altertum, Stuttgart, 1925; Ars erotica veterum. Ein
seems to resist. The other sides of both cups are much more
Beitrag zum Geschlechtslebender Altertums, Stuttgart, 1926; Glossarium
eroticum, Stuttgart, 1932; many of these images (although not the erotic, picturing close physical contact. In particular, side B
Warren Cup) also appear in H. Licht (pseud. of P. Brandt), Sittenge- of Cup 6 clearly pictures a very intimate moment, when the
schichteGriechenlands,3 vols., Dresden and Zurich, 1925-27; the English
translation of Licht, Sexual Life in Ancient Greece,London, 1932, did not nude female seems to be either rising from or sitting back in
retain the volume of five hundred plates. the nude male's lap (Fig. 10). His gesture, with left arm
13J. Marcade, Roma amor: Essai sur les repr6sentationserotiquesdans l'art crooked over his head, conventionally denotes tiredness or
etrusqueet romain, Geneva, 1961; Eros Kalos: Essay on Erotic Elementsin even sleep, suggesting that the scene may represent the
GreekArt, Geneva, 1962.
14 For a recent review of the literature, see C.
Johns, "Research on
Roman Silver Plate,"Journal of RomanArchaeology,III, 1990, 28-43; see
also F. Baratte, ed., Argenterieromaineet byzantine(Actesde la TableRonde,
Paris, Oct. 11-13, 1983), Paris, 1988; F. Baratte and K. Painter, eds., (May 16-Aug. 27, 1989), Paris, 1989; E. Simon, Augustus.Kunstund
Lebenin Romum die Zeitenwende,Munich, 1986, bibl.
Trdsorsd'orfevreriegallo-romains,exh. cat., Musee du Luxembourg, Paris,
(Feb. 8-Apr. 23, 1989); Musee de la Civilisation Gallo-romaine, Lyons '1 Maiuri, i, 321-330, figs. 125 and 126; II, pls. 31-36.

4 Warren Cup, Side A, detail (photo: Museum) 5 Warren Cup, Side A, detail (photo: Museum)
6 Warren Cup, Side A, detail (photo: Museum) 7 Warren Cup, Side A, detail (photo: Museum)
denouement to actual lovemaking.16 Although the ancient the cupids playing with weapons in the scenes under the
Roman would have understood the allusions to the erotic cups' handles, the more intimate scenes seem far removed
encounters of Mars and Venus in the female's diadem and in from mythology: they picture, like the erotic paintings found
in bedrooms discussed below, real human beings like them-
selves enjoying lovemaking.
16This
gesture seems first to appear in the Hellenistic images of the Although the Warren Cup depicts actual sexual contact, it
Barberini Faun: J. Pollitt, Art in the Hellenistic Age, Cambridge, 1986, is not far in spirit from the House of the Menander cups. In
134, fig. 146 (3rd century B.C.); and in the Sleeping Ariadne type: M.
Bieber, Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age, New York, 1961, fig. 624. It is both cases, they are silver drinking vessels for the use of
taken over for representations of the sleeping Endymion on Roman guests of both sexes, and in both cases they are meant to
sarcophagi beginning in the early 2nd century of our era: see A. entertain the guests with their engaging imagery and fine
McCann, Roman Sarcophagiin the MetropolitanMuseumofArt, New York,
1978, 39-41. craftsmanship. In particular, the secure archaeological con-

8 Warren Cup, Side B (pho-

to: Museum)
text of the cups from the House of the Menander-found beards, and drapery; on the Menander cups, particulars in
intact as they had been left in the house of their owner, the embroidery of the coverlets and in the petals and leaves
together with 116 other silver articlesl7-implies that such of the vegetal ornament. There are differences as well:
erotic silver vessels could belong quite usually with the figures on the Warren Cup are larger in relation to the whole
serving ware of a wealthy household.18 pictorial field, which is crowded by the tendrils and leaves of
Since the Warren Cup, unlike the many silver vessels found the bower on the Menander cups. Furthermore, the artist of
buried by Vesuvius, lacks an archaeological context, analysis the two Menander cups employed higher relief for all the
of its style must provide its approximate date.19 In addition figures, so that in side view, a full three-fourths of the arms
to the analogies in subject matter, the two erotic cups from and limbs are visible. The proportions of the figures them-
the House of the Menander share certain stylistic traits with selves also differ: whereas the artist of the Menander cups
the Warren Cup: the Augustan hairstyles and body types, the favors the elongated bodies with thin limbs and relatively
clear separation of figures from ground, and the taste for fine small heads common in the late Hellenistic repertory, the
details and textures-most of them added by the artist after artist of the Warren Cup constructs more solid, compact
he formed the whole composition in the repousse technique. figures with Polycleitan proportions and high relief. The
The viewer can see such details, added by chasing, upon head of the reclining male figure on side B of Cup 6 (Fig. 10)
close examination: on the Warren Cup, details of hair, is considerably smaller in relation to his torso and arms than
that of the male on top on side A of the Warren Cup (Fig. 4).
Whereas the same male on the Menander cup has relatively
17Maiuri, 245-251. soft facial features and unarticulated hair, the precisely
18 On the class and social status of the last owners of the House of the
combed short locks of the men on the Warren Cup, coupled
Menander, see Clarke, 170-193.
with profiles emphasizing the heavy jaw, straight nose, and
19See Maiuri, 241-245, for a union of nose and brow line, announce a typically Augustan,
rapid overview of silver finds in the area of
Vesuvius. neo-Attic style. In fact, the Warren Cup heads all compare

Roma.23 A similar layering occurs by necessity in the image of

lovemaking on side A, with the added problem of suggesting
an architectural interior, with a strap, an opening door, and
a lyre on a ledge.
The facial types and hairstyles of the males on the Warren
Cup conform to the fashion established by Augustus at the
beginning of his reign; he based his image on models from
fifth-century Greece, for he wished to evoke the golden age
of Classical art. His own portrait establishes the iconography
of the entire Julio-Claudian dynasty that he founded.24 Gone
is the exaggerated realism of so-called "veristic" portraiture
of the Republican period in favor of a youthful idealism.
Although Augustus was a toothless old man in his seventies
when he died, throughout his reign he appears as a youthful,
Apollo-like deity with Polycleitan features and smooth skin.
He has a strong jaw, a small mouth, deep-set eyes, and short
ringlets combed forward over his unwrinkled brow; these
features characterize the male heads on the Warren Cup,
making it one of many examples of the success of Augustus's
visual propaganda.
Both the precious metal of the Warren Cup and the care
taken in its figural modeling indicate that it was a luxury item
intended for the upper class.25 Fortunately, the Arretine
wares greatly enlarge the context for the Warren Cup's style
and subject matter, providing abundant evidence that per-
sons of slenderer means also enjoyed drinking from vessels
adorned with erotic scenes. These glazed terracotta cups,
9 Warren Cup, Side B, detail (photo: Museum)
bowls, and vases come from the Roman city of Aretinum-
modern-day Arezzo. Because they imitate the forms and
closely with the male heads from the south frieze of the decoration of expensive vessels in silver and gold, appear in
Parthenon. Although it is true that the modeling is deeper modest archaeological contexts, and were mass-produced,
and simpler in the Panathenaic frieze, there is a surprising scholars see them as products meant for relatively poor
correspondence of all the facial features, even down to the consumers.26 Potters used fired clay molds for the exteriors
so-called Parthenon pout, the men's fleshy yet downturned of the vessels. After turning the molds on the wheel, they
little mouths.20 used stamps or punches in relief to create the negatives of
Closer to the Warren Cup's Polycleitan proportions are the the figural and ornamental designs. The potter would then
figures on the Augustus Cup, one of 108 pieces found in press wet clay into the mold to make the vessel itself,
1895 in a villa near Pompeii at Boscoreale.21 The common producing its smooth interior by turning the whole object on
inspiration of both the Warren Cup and the Boscoreale Cup
in Greek art of the fifth century B.C. is especially clear in the
lictor in the foreground between Augustus and the suppliant
barbarian on side B. Furthermore, the overlap of individual 23W.-R. Megow, Kameen von Augustus bis Alexander Severus. Antiken
Miinzen und geschnitteneSteine, II, Berlin, 1987, 9-11, pls. 3, 4.
figures, rendered in differing degrees of relief, allows a 24A. Massner,
BildnifJangleichung:Untersuchungenzur Entstehungs-und
sophisticated rendering of space on both cups-a character- der Augustusportrdts(43 v. Chr.-68 n. Chr.), Berlin,
Wirkungsgeschichte
istic largely absent from the Menander cups as well as from 1982; K. Fittschen, "Die BildniBe des Augustus," SaeculumAureum, IIn,
the two roughly contemporary cups found in a hoard at 1991, 149-186.
25 It is difficult to determine how
Hoby, in Denmark.22 The Warren Cup's complex overlap is expensive silver vessels were in terms of
also similar to that of the upper register of the cameo known ancient Roman wealth. F. Baratte, "Arts precieux et propaganda
imp6riale au debut de l'empire romain. L'Example des deux coupes de
as the Gemma Augustea, particularly in the complexities of Boscoreale," La Revue du Louvreet desMuseesde France, XLI, 1, 1991, 37,
placement and drapery in the figures of Augustus and sees silver vessels as belonging to the minor arts, not really rising to the
level of originality that one finds in imperial art. But the evidence for the
mass production of silver vessels, such as exact repetition of motifs from
20 E. Richardson, TheEtruscans:TheirArtand Civilization,Chicago, 1964,
molds, is lacking.
26 Brown, xix: "It has
134. long been recognized that a close relationship
exists between Italian terra-sigillata and contemporary silverware, so
21 H. de Villefosse, "Le Tresor de Boscoreale," MonumentsPiot, v, 1899,
much so that the potters' work is often described as 'poor man's
1-290; Soprintendenza Archeologica di Pompei, II tesorodi Boscoreale, silver.' . . . This correspondence is reflected not only in a community of
exh. cat., Pompeii, Casino dell'Aquila, Aug. 20-Sept. 30, 1988, Milan, vase shapes but also in the subject-matter of vase decoration." See also E.
1988; F. Baratte, Le Tresord'orfevrerieromainde Boscoreale,Paris, 1986; A. Ettlinger, "How was Arretine Ware Sold?" Rei cretariaeRomanaefautorum
Kuttner, Dynastyand Empire in the Age of Augustus. The Evidence of the acta, xxv-xxvI, 1987, 5-19; G. Pucci, "La ceramica aretina: 'Imagerie' e
BoscorealeCups, University of California Press, forthcoming. correnti artistiche," in X. Lafon and G. Sauron, eds., L'Art decoratifa
22 K.F.
Johansen, "New Evidence about the Hoby Cups," Actaarchaeolog- Rome d la fin de la republique et au debut du principat, Rome, 1981,
ica, xxxI, 1960, 185-190; Vermeule, 33-46, pls. 12, 1-4; 13, 1-2. 101-121.

the wheel. When the molded clay bowl shrank in drying, the
potter removed it and fired it.
The earliest description of Arretine wares comes from a
thirteenth-century Tuscan chronicler, who marveled at the
perfection of the human figures.27 Figurative designs on
Arretine pottery must have inspired generations of artists
during the Renaissance, but it is not until the late nineteenth
century that scholars or collectors took much notice of them.
Although erotic types with male-male lovemaking had long
been known, the first photographs of them appeared in the
1948 Corpus vasorum antiquorum of the Metropolitan Mu-
seum in New York,28 followed by the publication in 1968 of
the holdings of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.29 When the
catalogue of the Arretine ware in the Boston Museum of Fine
Arts was reprinted in 1975,30 the editors illustrated the
pieces with erotic scenes from the collection of E.P. Warren
that had only been described-but not illustrated-in the
earlier work. Although Porten Palange has recently ques-
tioned the authenticity of the molds with male-male lovemak-
ing in New York and Oxford,31 there is no doubt, on the basis
of indisputably authentic fragments of actual vases and
molds in Boston, Oxford, and Arezzo, that there were at least
two such compositions available to the Roman buyer.
Both compositions alternate images of male-female love-
making with male-male copulation. In the first composition,
a statue of Eros standing on a fluted column separates the
four scenes of lovemaking (Fig. 11).32 The second composi-
tion is similar, but more complex and detailed: here herms
sporting huge phalli hold garlands that festoon behind the
couples (Fig. 12).33 The artist who created this composition
exerted great care in details of modeling, and has fashioned
beds with fulcra, or bedsteads, ending in satyrs' heads. He
10 Silver cup from the House of the Menander, Pompeii. Na-
enlivened the herms by representing them in contrapposto Museum (photo: Michael Larvey)
ples, National Archaeological
and by having them actively gaze at the couples making love
while grasping their own buttocks with their right hands.
for the fulcra, for both sets of couples retain essentially the
They become active rather than passive spectators, ready, it
seems, to leap out of their decorative roles and join the same poses as in the first composition.
lovers. It is clear that this artist's originality rests in his The scene of male-female lovemaking in both composi-
tions is the most graphic of such erotic types on Arretine
depiction of the herms and the creative use of satyr protomes
ware, picturing the female about to squat on the male's erect
penis. She wears a breast band, a feature of many scenes of
male-female lovemaking. Although the positions of the
27 Chase, 4-5. male-male lovers are approximately the same in both compo-
28 C.
Alexander, ArretineRelief Ware(Corpusvasorumantiquorum),Metro- sitions, two variants can be distinguished. In the first variant
politan MuseumofArt, New York,I, U.S.A., 9, Cambridge, Mass., 1943. the two males, one an adult, the other a boy, gaze at each
29 Brown.
other on a bed (Fig. 13). The man prepares to enter the boy
30 Chase.
while supporting himself on his flexed right knee, which
31 F. Porten
Palange, "Falschungen in der arretinischen Reliefkeramik,"
ArchaeologischesKorrespondenzblatt,xix, 1989, 197-216. The author
appears below and behind the boy's right knee. The boy's left
points out that the combination of maker stamp and workshop stamp arm rests on the edge of the bed, while his right hand touches
("EPOC + C.ANNI") on molds with scenes of alternating male-female the man's right arm near the elbow. In a modified version of
and male-male lovemaking is highly unlikely, a fact noted earlier by H. this pose, the man seems more relaxed; rather than kneeling
Dragendorff and C. Watzinger, ArretinischeReliefkeramikmit Beschreibung
der Sammlungin Tubingen, Reutlingen, 1948, 89. On this basis, Porten bolt upright, he inclines toward the boy, who reclines as if
Palange rejects the following molds depicting male-male lovemaking: floating or swimming, all the while locked in his lover's gaze,
Alexander (as in n. 28), inv. no. 21.88.165 (pls. 34, 1 a-b; 38, 20), and
and in one variant, kissing him (Fig. 14). These two variants
Brown, inv. no. 1966.251, cat. no. 62 (pls. 15, 16, and 19; figs. 1 and 3).
32 Brown, 28, of the male lovers can appear in either of the two composi-
pl. 18, has published two fragments of the mold for this
composition, the one in the Ashmolean, Oxford, cat. no. 77, joining with tions. A fragment of a vase in the Ashmolean Museum,
another in the Archaeological Museum, Arezzo, no. 10734. discussed below, may represent yet another variant.
composition, known, however, only through a dubious mold in This whole class of erotic cups and bowls produced in
33 A third
the Ashmolean (Brown, 23, cat. no. 62, pls. 16 and 17), differs from this
Arezzo during the Augustan age establishes an artistic
second composition only by virtue of the substitution of candelabra
holding the garlands. context for the Warren Cup, on a sort of "trickle-down"

11 Arretine bowl fragment. Boston,

Museum of Fine Arts (photo: Museum)
12 Arretine mold fragment. Boston,


model. Because Arretine ware was an affordable-and widely head sharply away from the boy's. The viewer who sees the
exported-substitute for silver and gold vessels, examples man's elegant profile on the left and the boy's on the right
have been found as far away as London and northern India. could read detachment, disengagement, and distraction in
Although erotic scenes form only a small part of the imagery, these poses. Reinforcing this sense of isolation is the arrange-
their sources must have been in the decoration of the ment of the figures' arms. Whereas the boy turns to touch the
expensive objects. After all, it was Arretine ware's ability to man's arm as it crosses over his right leg-presumably to
mimic the style and subject matter of aristocratic silver that begin entry-on the Arretine vessels, on the Warren Cup the
made it so attractive to consumers. On the evidence of the man's forearm passes under the boy's right thigh so that his
style and erotic subject matter of both the Warren Cup and hand is outlined against it. The boy, in turn, uses his right
the cups from the House of the Menander, it must be arm to prop up his torso on the cushions. The Warren Cup's
assumed that wealthy Romans of the Augustan period had artist has added a note of psychological estrangement and
cultivated a taste for silver with erotic scenes. These vessels the strain of bodily torsion to the simple and easily legible
picturing explicit sexual activity were part of the artistic versions of the pose on the Arretine cups.
fashions of the time, along with the more usual scenes from Despite the differences in artistic quality and originality
classical mythology and the theater. And if the Warren Cup is evident between the Warren Cup and the Arretine vessels, it
a reminder of an aspect of upper-class taste, the erotic is important to note that all of the artists present the act of
compositions on Arretine pottery show how the lower classes lovemaking between males in a romantic, elevated manner.
embraced that taste throughout the Empire. Dover's examination of Archaic and Classical vase painting-
The combination of male-male with male-female imagery has demonstrated that depictions of rear-entry intercourse
in the two extant compositions seems to be a simplification of between two males are quite rare in Greece. The Greek
upper-class conceptions meant for the consumption of the artists focus their romantic notions in scenes of courting;
less wealthy-who were nonetheless eager to keep abreast of when they depict intercourse, it is almost invariably the act of
current artistic and cultural fashions. For one thing, the artist the older male rubbing his penis between the boy's thighs,
has created a situation of absolute visual equivalence be- so-called intercrural coitus.35 Not only are there no known
tween the scenes of lovemaking that involve males and examples of intercrural copulation in these Roman represen-
females and those showing male-male intercourse. He has tations of male-to-male intercourse, the Roman artists have
used familiar and popular icons of sexual love, the winged infused images of anal intercourse between males with the
Eros and the ithyphallic herm, both to separate and to frame same tender intimacy that pervades the images of male-
the four scenes. Furthermore, the representations of lovemak- female lovemaking on the Arretine ware and the House of
ing themselves are quite conventional and therefore easy for the Menander cups. The artists go to great pains to make the
the neophyte to understand. By placing the female in a male who is in the receptive position as dignified and
squatting position over the male's erect penis, the artist has attractive as the insertive partner. Whereas representations
left no doubt about the act. And for the representation of of rear-entry penetration of boys and women by males on
male-male intercourse, he has modified a type from the Greek vases emphasize the male's domination and power
male-female repertoire that displays the greatest portion of over his (unwilling) and often unattractive partner,36 these
the front of the female's body. By removing the female Roman depictions make both males as attractive as possible
breasts, breast band, and by adding a penis, the artist and show them mutually attracted to each other, even
telegraphs the boy's sex to the viewer in the most direct though in most cases one is a man and the other a boy.
If Romans of all classes used vessels with erotic imagery,
possible pose.34 It seems that clear display is uppermost in
the artist's mind. With the Warren Cup, meant for a more how pervasive was such imagery in the houses and buildings
sophisticated audience, the artist could afford to be more they lived in? Erotic wall paintings and mosaics still in their
inventive in his depiction of male-male sexual acts. original settings at Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Rome pro-
Although the scene on side A of the Warren Cup has no vide a second, valuable context for the Warren Cup. Particu-
equivalents on the Arretine vessels, that of side B closely larly interesting is the wide variety of settings in which they
parallels the Arretine both in pose and in the pairing of an occur, indicating that, as with the erotic vessels, interest in
adult male with a boy (Fig. 8). The boy's position on the sexual imagery cut across class boundaries.
Warren Cup is closest to the fragment in Boston (Fig. 14), but Both the quality of the erotic image and its location help
here, as with the other Arretine vessels, the man and boy are guide us in interpreting its use and meaning in antiquity. For
locked in each other's gaze. The artist of the Warren Cup has example, three images of male-female lovemaking decorate
created a much less intimate mood by turning the man's a room from the House of the Vettii at Pompeii (Fig. 15).
Room x1 is tucked away behind the kitchen, off a secondary
34
Dragendorff and Watzinger (as in n. 31), 89: erotic types of the
Perennius workshop: "Typus XIV 8. Das Madchen, das eine Binde unter
der Brust tragt, hat sich von dem Jingling weg auf die linke Seite 35
K.J. Dover, GreekHomosexuality,Cambridge, Mass., 1978, 91-100; see
geworfen, so dalbes dem Beschauer seine Vorderseite zukehrt. Es stutzt also H. Shapiro, "Eros in Love: Pederasty and Pornography in Greece,"
sich dabei auf den linken Arm und faBt mit dem angestreckten rechten in Richlin, ed., 55-58; R. Sutton, Jr., "Pornography and Persuasion on
den Unterarm des Junglings, der sich uber es wirft und es herumzudre- Attic Pottery," in zdem,14.
hen sucht, indern er es am Oberschenkel faft. XIV 8a. Dieser Typus
kommt dahin variiert vor, daB bei sonstiger genauer Ubereinstimmung 36Sutton (as in n. 35), 11-12, figs. 1.2 and 1.3. I wish to thank Amy
aus dem Madchen ein Knabe gemacht ist. Die Brustbinde wird in diesem Richlin for pointing out this difference between the Greek and Roman
Falle natiirlich fortgelassen." representations.

13 Arretine bowl fragment. Boston,

peristyle that housed the servants' quarters.37 Whereas the

reception spaces of the house boast some of the finest
frescoes in Pompeii in both their workmanship and their
iconographic sophistication, this little room is painted in a
slapdash fashion, employing only red paint on white walls. In
addition to the three male-female lovemaking scenes in the
center of each wall, each illustrating a different position, over
the doorway appears an owl-probably to augur the occu-
pant good luck in lovemaking. We know that the owners of
the house were freedmen, former slaves who had made good.
Could this room be for a favored slave, perhaps the cook, as a
reward for his services? In style, its painting differs dramati-
cally from the refined, intricate frescoes in the rest of the
house, calculated to dazzle the visitor with their visual and
iconographic intricacy. Yet the style of painting in Room x1 is
the same one used in the nearby lupanar, or whorehouse. 14 Arretine bowl fragment. Boston, Museum of Fine Arts
Obviously, this room was never meant for the masters of the (photo: Museum)
house or their guests. They would never frequent a bordello,
since they could simply purchase slaves for their sexual entertainment. Bordellos, painted with images just like
these, were for slaves and citizens too poor to afford a love
slave.
37Clarke, 220-221; Myerowitz, 131-132.
A very recent discovery at Pompeii provides a further
38 L.
Jacobelli, "Lo scavo delle Terme Suburbane. Notizie preliminari," context for scenes of lovemaking. Excavators of Suburban
Rivista di studi Pompeiani, I , 1987, 151-154; idem, "Terme Suburbane:
Stato attuale di conoscenze," Rivista di studi Pompeiani, II, 1988, 202- Baths, located just outside Pompeii's Marine Gate, found a
208; plan, 203, fig. 51; idem, "Le pitture e gli stucchi delle terme dressing room, or apodyterium,its south wall decorated with a
suburbane di Pompei," KolnerJahrbuchfur Vor-und Friihgeschichte,xxiv
wide variety of scenes of lovemaking.38 On the upper part of
(4. InternationalesKolloquiumzur romischenWandmalerei),1991, 147-149,
fig. 2. the wall appear cubicles in perspective, each of them num-

bered (Fig. 16). Above the cubicles appear figures on beds,

although the viewer is to imagine them as though the scenes
were taking place within the privacy of the rooms pictured
below. There is a great variety of sexual activity. Two scenes
deviate significantly from the surviving wall paintings from
Pompeii, which all depict only male-female lovemaking.
Scene v pictures two males and a female. The female, to the
right, rests her upper body on the bed while raising her rear
to receive one of the two kneeling males; this man, in turn, is
locked in anal intercourse with the male kneeling behind
him. In Scene vi two males and two females are engaged in a
lively foursome: a kneeling woman, right, fellates a reclining
male who practices cunnilingus on a kneeling female while a
kneeling male enters her from the rear. The artist seems to
have wished to present a broad range of sexual possibilities;
in another scene he represents cunnilingus, with the woman
reclining on the bed while her male lover, clothed in a tunic, 15 Pompeii, House of the Vettii, Room x', north wall (photo:
crouches at the foot of her bed with his head at her genitals. Michael Larvey)
In particular, his inclusion of the two scenes that make
male-male intercourse an integral part of the pleasure
depicted breaks the stereotype of one-on-one, male-female to have been ubiquitous in the ordinary Roman household
intercourse that emerges from all the other published wall and shop, appearing on bronze and terracotta lamps, and
painting. One wonders if the excavators who uncovered the so-called spintria, which may have been brothel tokens.42
erotic wall paintings in the past might have destroyed- What kind of paintings of lovemaking did the patrician
through prudery-other evidence of male-male lovemaking. class enjoy? Literary sources shed some light on aristocratic
Also of particular interest is the fact that the artist of the attitudes to erotic stimuli in their homes. Ovid (Tr. 2.521-
Suburban Baths coupled his representations with numerals, 528) claims that Augustus himself had a small painted
suggesting a visual and/or literary source that numbered acts picture that illustrated the various sexual positions:
of lovemaking in a Kama Sutra-like series.39 Recently H.
Parker has discussed the ancient literary genre of sex In your homes bodies glimmer, it's known:
manuals. Scattered sources, including a recently published artists have painted great men of old
papyrus fragment, give the names of nine female writers and and somewhere a small picture
suggest that in addition to detailing positions (like the portrays the diversity of sex
paintings of the Suburban Baths), the sex manuals covered a the calculus of Venus
full range of sexual activities, including seduction and kiss- Telamonian Ajax sulks glowering ire
ing.40
barbarian Medea glares infanticide
The rough-and-ready style of the paintings in the Subur- and nearby a damp Venus
ban Baths and in Room xl of the House of the Vettii is that of wrings her dripping hair dry
so-called "popular" painting, found throughout Pompeii. barely covered by the waters that bore her.43
This genre, recently studied in depth by Frohling, usually
appears on the street fasades of houses and shops and in Even accepting the possibility that Ovid is saying "our"
public buildings.41 Rather than being executed in true fresco (nostris) rather than "your" houses (vostris, i.e., those of
technique, like the majority of decoration in people's houses, Augustus), he reveals that for the upper class it is the norm,
the artist applied his pigments over partially dried plaster, a rather than the exception, to possess and display little
secco, so that the colors did not incorporate or carbonate into paintings that showed couples illustrating a variety of sexual
the plaster. This rapid, cheap technique causes the paint to positions (figurae veneris). This is good evidence for the
fall off very easily. The style, poor quality, and location of the "domestication of desire" that Myerowitz argues had oc-
images of lovemaking in both the cook's room and in the
dressing room of the bath indicate that the artist created
them for people with little money, probably slaves and 42
Vorberg, 386-387.
freeborn tradespeople. Similar images of lovemaking seem
43 ... Scilicet in domibus vostris [nostris] ut prisca virorum
artificis fulgent corpora picta manu
sic quae concubitus varios venerisque figuras
exprimat, et aliquo parva tabella loco.
39 Brendel, 60-68. utque sedet vultu fassus Telamonius iram,
40 H. Parker, "Love's Body Anatomized: The Ancient Erotic Handbooks inque oculis facinus barbara mater habet
sic madidos siccat digitis Venus uda capillos
and the Rhetoric of Sexuality," in Richlin, ed., 90-107. et modo maternis tecta videtur aquis.
41T. Frohling, Lararien- und Fassadenbilderin den Vesuvstidten:Untersu-
chungen zur "volkstiimlichen"pompejanischenMalerei (RomischeMitteilun- Ovid, Tristia,Ex Ponto, trans. A. Wheeler (LoebClassicalLibrary),rev. ed.,
gen, Ergdnzungsheft,xxxii), Mainz, 1991. Cambridge, Mass., 1975; trans. Myerowitz, 132.

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rr ????*? 'u ?4. u. :-l.:?;:tp,. '?jk'.;
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southwall (photo MichaelLarvey)

16 Pompeii,SuburbanBaths,apodyterum,
16 Pompeii, Suburban Baths, apodyterium, south wall (photo: Michael Larvey)
curred by the time of Augustus.44 In the two places in his Ars Meleager performing cunnilingus on Atalanta),47 Tiberius
amatoria where Ovid describes the figurae, he does so not had pictures illustrating sexual positions placed throughout
without irony, emphasizing that women were quite adroit in rooms used for copulation: "He decorated rooms (cubicula)
inventing positions that both went far beyond the paintings located in different places with images and statuettes repro-
(ArsAm. 2.679-680) and also showed off their best physical ducing the most lascivious paintings and sculpture, which he
features while engaged in lovemaking (ArsAm. 3.771-788).45 amplified according to the books of Elephantis, so that no
Suetonius, in his Lives of the Poets (Poet. Vita Horati 10) gives position he might order would fail to be represented."48 In
an account of Horace's mirrored bedroom that suggests that addition to mentioning one of the famous sex manuals, this
some wealthy Romans enjoyed seeing their own or others' passage adds to the evidence that artists often illustrated the
sexual acts reflected in mirrors: "They say that he [Horace] sexual positions detailed in them. Although none of these
was immoderately lustful, for it is recounted that in a room erotic paintings on wood panels has survived, many images
lined with mirrors he had whores so arranged that whichever painted directly on the walls of buildings excavated at
Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Rome-in contrast to the
way he looked, he saw a reflection of copulation."46 A
considered-fit the profile of
passage from Suetonius's Lives of the Caesars (Tib., 42-43) "popular" paintings already
describes Tiberius's use of erotica. (It is still not available in the erotica meant for the upper classes. Just as we might
English translation; the Loeb Classical Series leaves the offend- expect from the literary sources, two dominant types emerge:
ing text in Latin.) In addition to having his bedroom on one pictures mythologized lovemaking, the other realistic
Capri decorated with two expensive paintings by Parrhasios lovemaking, following, it seems, the models of the sex
with obscene subject matter (one showing the Archigallus or manuals.
eunuch high priest of Cybele in an indecent act, the other The first kind of representation mythologizes sexual activ-
44 Myerowitz, 151-155. 47 Myerowitz, 137, with further references in n. 6.

48 "Cubicula
45 Parker (as in n. 40), 95-97; Myerowitz, 135-136. plurifariam disposita tabellis ac sigillis lascivissimarum
46 "Ad res Venerias
intemperantior traditur; nam speculato cubiculo picturarum et figurarum adornavit librisque Elephantidis instruxit, ne
cui in opera edenda exemplar imperatae schemae deesset," Suetonius,I,
scorta dicitur habuisse disposita, ut quocumque respexisset ibi ei imago
trans. J.C. Rolfe (Loeb Classical Library), rev. ed., Cambridge, Mass.,
coitus referretur," Suetonius, II, trans. J.C. Rolfe (LoebClassicalLibrary),
1951, Tiberius,43; my trans.
Cambridge, Mass., 1950; my trans.

ity by substituting mythical creatures for human beings.49 just that. They give us little insight into how wealthy Pom-
Already in the sixth century B.C., the Greeks had used satyrs peians thought of their own sexual activity.
and nymphs as mythological stand-ins for human beings. More revelatory is the way the upper class represented
These and other mythological lovers inhabit both Greek art lovemaking between real human beings in realistic settings.
and Roman adaptations of Greek art. Myerowitz has recently The degrees of intimacy cover a range from amorous
listed famous male-female and male-male mythological paint- dalliance-embracing and kissing-to outright sexual inter-
ings mentioned in the literature.50 Although none of these course. The newly excavated House of Chaste Lovers got its
has survived, both mosaics and wall paintings found in name from the three pictures decorating the elegant black
excavations show how such mythological trysts fit into the dining room.56 Rather than depicting lovemaking per se, the
decoration of the Roman house. Portable mosaic insets, room's three central pictures show couples drinking heavily
called emblemata,were expensive copies of paintings carried and engaged in amorous dalliance. In one image, a male has
out with minute tesserae. In the wealthy House of the Faun, even passed out, and in another there is a woman who has no
an erotic mosaic emblema adorned a bedroom;51 a satyr- mate and consoles herself with drink. Several of the couples
with his donkey ears-and a maenad prepare to engage in kiss passionately. Although such scenes of drinking parties
lovemaking. The seated satyr grasps the crouching maenad's with heavy sexual overtones had been the stock-in-trade of
left arm to draw her closer to him, while both gaze at his artists in both the Greek and Hellenistic worlds for centuries,
genital area. Another emblemawith similar erotic features is it is their appearance in the triclinium of a moderately
still in place in a bedroom of the equally elegant House of the wealthy house that is of interest. The owner who commis-
Menander.52 Although badly ruined, the main elements are sioned them for the best room of his house believed that
still legible. Whereas the mosaic in the House of the Faun these mildly erotic images were both appropriate and pleas-
implies that the maenad is about to comply with the satyr's ing, suitably fitting the fashion of the time, which is the
sexual wishes, here the theme is assault. A nymph struggles period of the Third Style of about A.D. 10-30. Admittedly,
with a satyr who surprises her from behind, while an this is rather tame, or chaste, sexual activity.
onlooker with goat horns (Pan) watches from the upper But in the bedchambers of a few aristocratic houses are
right.53 more explicit scenes of lovemaking, similar in tone and
Another mythological representation quite common in subject matter to sides B of the two silver cups from the
both statues and paintings at Pompeii is the hermaphrodite, House of the Menander discussed above. The painted walls
a sexual curiosity who is both man and woman.54 Two images of three cubicula in the villa found under the Farnesina in
of hermaphrodites appear in prominent places in the house Rome include pictures showing the preliminaries to lovemak-
of the wealthy Vettii brothers. Both appear at the doorways ing (Fig. 17).57 All the couples are on beds, and in most cases
of the two most expensively and elaborately decorated servants are present. Although these small pictures appear in
reception spaces in their house.55 Although there are varia- secondary positions, to the sides of and above the large
tions on this oft-repeated theme of Hellenistic and Roman pictures that form the centers of each wall's decorative
art, the narrative always concerns male attraction to the scheme, they nevertheless have an important function in the
hermaphrodite's female beauty, followed by dismay at his/ ensemble, that of introducing the theme of human lovemak-
her male genitalia. Silenus approaches Hermaphrodite from ing into an otherwise mythological iconography. Clearly, the
behind to discover that despite his/her light-colored skin-a patron and the painter knew (like Ovid) that the small erotic
convention for the female-he/she is sporting an erection. panels belonged in "proper"-and fashionable-bedroom
There are many other less directly erotic mythological decor. The owner of the Villa of the Farnesina was certainly a
representations of sexual attraction and sexual activity, member of the aristocracy, even if, as some scholars have
where gods, goddesses, and demigods do what human claimed, the villa did not actually belong to Augustus's own
beings do. But these metaphorical representations remain daughter and son-in-law.58 The wall painting dates to the
49 G. Hedreen, Silenes in Attic Black-Figure Vase Paintings, Ann Arbor, 6 A. Varone, "Attivitadell'UfficioScavi: 1987-1988," Rivistadi studi
1992. Pompetani,ii, 1988, 147-148, fig. 8.
50 Myerowitz, 137-138. 57All the erotic pinakesare discussed and illustratedin color in I.
51 From Cubiculum 28, now in Naples, Museo Nazionale, inv. no. Bragantini and M. de Vos, Le decorazionidella villa romanadella Farnesina,
Museo Nazionale Romano,II, 1: Le pitture, Rome, 1982: Cubiculum B, p.
27707; dated to the period 100-50 B.C.by E. Pernice, Die hellenistische
Kunst in Pompeji, Vl, Pavimente und figurliche Mosaiken, Berlin, 1938, 130, pl. 40,inv. 1128;CubiculumB, p. 133, pl. 51, inv. 1117;Cubiculum
176-177, pls. 76-77. B, p. 133, pl. 51, inv. 1117; CubiculumD, p. 189, pl. 85, inv. 1188;
Cubiculum D, p. 189, pl. 86, minv.1188; Cubiculum D, pl. 96, p. 191, inv.
52The emblemais in Cubiculum 21, and dates to the period of the room's
1187; Cubiculum E, p. 284, pl. 172, inv. 1174; Myerowitz, 138-139.
original Second-Style decoration, about 40-30 B.C.;see Maiuri, 85-86, 58 H.
fig. 42. Beyen, "Les Domini de la Villa de la Farnesine," Studia varia Carolo
GuilielmoVollgraffa discipulisoblata, Amsterdam, 1948, 3-21, attributes
53 For the representation of onlookers in Pompeian wall painting, see D.
the villa to Agrippa and Julia, followed by P. von Blanckenhagen, The
Michel, "Bemerkungen uiber Zuschauerfiguren in pompejanischen soge-
Paintings from Boscotrecase(RomischeMitteilungen, Erganzungsheft, vi),
nannten Tafelbildern," in La regione sotterrata dal Vesuvio: Studi e 1962, 60, but F. Bastet and M. de Vos, Propostaper una classificazionedel
prospettive(Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Nov. 11-15, 1979), Naples, terzostile pompezano(ArcheologischeStudien van het NederlandsInstituut te
1982, 537-598. Rome,IV), The Hague, 1979, 8-9, question the date of the closely related
54A. Villa of Agrippa at Boscotrecase, and R. Lloyd, "The Aqua Virgo,
Ajootian, "Hermaphroditos," Lexicon zconographzcummythologiae
classicae, v, 1, Zurich and Munich, 1990, 268-285; Pollitt (as in n. 16), Euripus, and Pons Agrippa," AmericanJournal of Archaeology,LXXXIII,
131, 149. 1979, 193-204, attributes the villa under the Farnesina to A. Crisipinus
55 Clarke, 213-214,
fig. 123. Caepio.

period of the late Second Style, around 20 B.C., near the recent Western, capitalist, bourgeois society.62 Halperin and
beginning of Augustus's long reign. other so-called constructionists maintain that it is a person's
Later in Pompeii, in the House of the Centenary, the society that determines what sexual acts he or she might
patron had two even more explicit scenes of male-female perform, and indeed the sexual feelings one person might
couples painted in one of his elegantly appointed bedrooms have toward another. Applying the concept of "homo-
(Fig. 18).59 Although the poses resemble those of the "popu- sexuality" to history is bound to force modern concepts of
lar style" painting in the House of the Vettii or the Marine self and other onto the ancient world. Whereas there are
Gate Baths, the artist's true fresco technique, his ample plenty of words in Greek and Latin for what two people of the
palette, and his concern for shading identify him with the same sex might do in bed, and words to define the role a
refined, high-art tradition. The artist has taken care with the person might have in sexual activity and in a sexual relation-
figures' proportions and details of the setting, such as the ship, there is no word to denote a state of being homosex-
textiles on the bed.60 Both their location in a private ual-or even a word corresponding to our modern term
bedroom meant for the owners of the house, and the high "sexuality."63 Can we call the couples on the Warren Cup
quality of the representations, separate the erotic paintings "homosexuals"? Using the language of Augustan Rome, we
in the House of the Centenary from the sloppily executed cannot. No Greek or Roman word corresponds to our
pictures in low-class or public contexts. modern concept of the "homosexual," and any attempt to fit
What does this rapid survey of scenes of lovemaking in the practices of twentieth-century homosexuals with male-
painting and mosaic tell us about context? First, that high- male representations in ancient art or text is certain to be
quality representations appear in the important rooms of anachronistic.
upper-class houses: the dining rooms or bedrooms of the The problem with such strict constructionist stances is that
owners. Second, that poor-quality-but often surprisingly they make it very difficult to explain the positive signs of a
inventive-images decorate spaces frequented by the under- homosexual culture in Roman society-signs that include
class: public baths, public whorehouses, and, in one case, a not only the Warren Cup and the images of male-male
servant's room in a private house. Third, although the upper lovemaking on Arretine ware but also the relatively large
classes often put mythological beings into scenes of lovemak- number of poems addressed by poets to their male lovers.64
ing, in their own bedrooms they frequently preferred to see Richlin has convincingly argued that if ancient texts reveal
human beings like themselves engaging in sexual inter- Roman homophobia, they also reflect what could be called a
course. homosexual subculture:
Whereas this examination of works of art establishes the
likely range of contexts for scenes of lovemaking in the What is to gain from a model that says there was no
Augustan period, texts-both ancient and modern-might "homosexuality" in antiquity? Such a model allows us to
help to answer several remaining questions. What did Augus- stress the difference between ancient societies and our
tan society think of the male-to-male sexual contact pictured own, to explore what they did have in their own terms.
on the Warren Cup? What would this representation of This move, however, when it comes up against Greek and
same-sex lovemaking have meant for its owner and his or her Roman invective against male-male love, emphasizes its
social equals? Was it shameful, naughty, and taboo-or was it political use, its quality of "bluff'; homophobia tends to
amusing, exciting, or even routine? disappear along with homosexuals. And this model makes
In the recent literature on homosexuality in the ancient it very hard to talk about real cinaedi. What, on the other
world, there is considerable disagreement about using the hand, is the gain from a model that uses "homosexuality"
word "homosexual" for same-sex relationships in antiquity (I as a category for analyzing ancient societies? A gay-history
have avoided using it in this article). Halperin has pointed analysis ... ,which stresses continuity rather than differ-
out that the word "homosexuality" is only one hundred years ence, would emphasize what ancient invective has in
old, and-like the word "sexuality" itself-it describes a common with homophobia, and would focus on real
culturally determined concept. Following Foucault,61 he cinaedi, both on their oppression and their possible
contends that the concepts of sexuality itself, and especially subculture.65
homo- and heterosexuality, are cultural constructions of
In the last half of the second century B.C. and in the first
two-thirds of the first century B.C., much of the wealth of the
59Pompeii,IX,8, 3, Casadel Centenario,Cubiculum43: K.Schefold,Die
WandePompejis,Berlin, 1957, 280; I. Bragantini,M. de Vos, and F.
Parise Badoni, Pitture e pavzmentidz Pompei:Repertorzodellefotografie del 62 D.
GabznettoFotografico Nazionale (Istituto Centrale per zl Catalogo e la Halperin, One Hundred Yearsof Homosexuality,New York, 1990, 8:
Documentazzone-ICCD),III, Rome, 1986, 533-534. There are two erotic "Homosexuality and heterosexuality, as we currently understand them,
are modern, Western, bourgeois productions. Nothing resembling them
pictures:north wall, central picture, 59.5 x 54.5cm, photo ICCD 79 can be found in classical antiquity." See also Foucault (as in n. 61),
GFNN 49815; south wall, central picture, 60 x 54cm (here Fig. 18),
ICCD79 GFNN49817; Myerowitz,141-142. 187-246.
60 The
small, much-faded squares above the beds in each picture 63A. Richlin, "The Meaning of irrumare in Catullus and Martial,"
probably represented erotic tabellaehanging in the bedchamber, as seen Classical Philology, LXXVI, 1981, 40-46; Richlin, 1983, 26-30; J.N.
in the mirror of the Flavian period preserved in the Antiquarium Adams, The Latin Sexual Vocabulary,London, 1982, passim; Vorberg,
Comunale, discussed in n. 89 below. passim.
61 M. Foucault, The Use Pleasure: The 64 Cantarella, 120-154.
of History of Sexuality, II, trans. R.
63 Richlin, 1993, 571.
Hurley, New York, 1985, 187-246.

17 Rome, Villa under the Farnesina, Cubiculum D, Museo Nazionale delle Terme (photo: DAI Rome)
ancient Mediterranean poured into Rome.66 Along with the since male prostitutes paid taxes on their earnings and
money came a passion among the rich to import Hellenistic celebrated their own holiday like female prostitutes.68
Greek art, customs, and people into Rome. Thus it comes as Modern authors have repeatedly pointed out the "phallic"
no surprise that wealthy Roman gentlemen adopted the construction of sexual activity in ancient Rome: all the texts
fashion of buying slaves to satisfy their sexual whims. Upper- that have come down to us frame sexual experience in terms
class people took it for granted that the male aristocrat of the freeborn, aristocratic male who inserts his penis into
would have his puer delicatus or pretty boy to make love to. He the body of another, whether that other be male or female.69
would also probably have his female love toys-all under the One will look in vain for records of the feelings of the
same roof with his wife. Such sexual usages, rather shocking receptive partner of these phallic acts, whether male or
to modern bourgeois morality, were commonplace for the female, of equal or lesser status. Texts tell us only of the
Roman aristocrat, since it was love between unequal part- desires of the aristocratic male and his fulfillment of those
ners, strictly speaking, between the owner of the property desires with the sex object. But one rule seemed universal for
and his or her property. Rousselle sees sexual relationships the Roman aristocratic male: he must not have sex with
between male master and slave in terms of power: ". .. the another freeborn male, whether a boy or an adult. It was easy
inferior, servile position of defeated Greeks in Roman to know the status of people in Roman times because of their
households must have helped to impart an aspect of power dress: a freeborn boy or ingenuus, who was off-limits for sex,
to the sexual relationship obtained in a partnership involv- wore a golden amulet, or bulla, around his neck, and a special
ing two men, one of whom was master, the other slave."67
Roman law did not forbid another kind of lovemaking
between males, that provided by homosexual prostitution, 68
ScriptoreshistoriaeAugustae, Aelius Lampridius, Alex. Sever. 24.3-4:
Alexander Severus decreed that the taxes on pimps, prostitutes, and
male prostitutes (exoleti) should not go into the public coffers; The
Scriptoreshistoriae Augustae, trans. D. Magie (Loeb Classical Library),
66 H.
Jucker, Vom Verhdltnisder Rdmerzur bildendenKunst der Griechen, Cambridge, Mass., 1924; Griffin, 25: "Boys employed in male prostitu-
Frankfurt, 1950; M. Pape, GriechischeKunstwerkeaus Kriegsbeuteund ihre tion had their own holiday, and this was duly recorded in the State
iffentlicheAufstellung in Rom. Von der Eroberung von Syrakus bis in calendar."
augusteischeZeit, Hamburg, 1975. 69 See
Halperin (as in n. 62), 165-166, n. 83, for the definition of
67 A. Rousselle, "Personal Status and Sexual Practice in the Roman phallus, and n. 67, pp. 164-165, for the distinction between phallus and
Empire," Zone,v, 1989, 309. penis.

see that law and anecdote and literature gives us not only
differing but conflicting views of reality."74
The art historian must ask whether works of art tell the
same story as the literature. Although standard interpreta-
tions of Roman love poetry addressed to the beloved boy
have flatly stated that the poets are simply imitating Greek
fashions in lyric,75 Griffin and others have argued that the
Roman poets are articulating a social and sexual reality.76
Part of the problem rests in determining the extent to which
Romans of the late Republic and early Empire adopted the
Greek institution of boy love, or pederasty.
Dover's Greek Homosexuality turns to both legal texts and
images in vase painting to articulate the practice of pederasty
among the Greeks of classical times.77 The social institution
of boy love expected adult aristocratic males to be attracted
to, court, and engage in insertive intercourse with adolescent
boys of the same class. For the aristocratic Greeks in some
city-states, as in Thebes or Athens before the late Classical
period, such love was institutionalized, as long as the "passive"
partner was under eighteen. The only trouble came if the
former eromenosgrew to maturity and refused to take his new,
socially prescribed role-if, rather than becoming the active
partner (the erastes) and finding his own new beloved, he
preferred so-called passive sex.
18 Pompeii, IX, 8, 3, House of the Centenary, Cubiculum 43, Scholars, basing their arguments on textual evidence,
south wall, central picture (photo: Michael Larvey) disagree on the extent to which Romans of the late Republic
and early Empire espoused Greek boy love of any sort. Veyne
believes that the Romans had an indigenous tradition of
toga, the toga praetexta.70 It seems that the axiom voiced in pederasty (and therefore no need of the Greeks to "teach"
the mid-second century B.C. by a slave in Plautus's Curculio them its practices);78 MacMullen, mostly on the evidence of
still held in Augustan Rome: "Love whatever you want, as the plays of Plautus, argues that most Romans abhorred
long as you stay away from married ladies, widows, virgins, homosexuality.79 Lilja, carefully considering a larger body of
young men, and free boys."71 evidence than does MacMullen, concludes that many socially
In addition to prescribing the inferior status of the love approved forms of male-male sexual activity were present in
object, the whole of Roman literature, from poetry to the law, the late Republic and early Empire.80 Cantarella's somewhat
makes it clear that the aristocratic male's role must only uncritical overview argues for a pattern of increasing social
consist in inserting his penis into the love object. Words such acceptance of male-male love in the same period.81
as pathicus and cinaedus, denoting the male passive partner in
insertive sex, carried great stigma. Whereas the "active" or
74 Richlin, 1993, 572.
insertive stance carried no blame, the Romans scorned and 75 G. Williams, Traditionand
Originalityin Roman Poetry, London, 1968,
sometimes penalized freeborn men who voluntarily had sex 551.
in the "pathic" or receptive position; Richlin has recently 76
Griffin, 22: "Asfor homosexual relationships in poetry and in life, one
detailed the range of these penalties as indicated in legal, of the chief arguments used by those who regard the poems as 'unreal' is
that at Rome such practices were 'the object of penal legislation.' I do
rhetorical, and literary texts.72 Although it is difficult to find
not find this such an obstacle as do its proponents." See also J. Griffin,
evidence in ancient texts for socially established homosexual
"Augustan Poetry and the Life of Luxury,"Journalof Roman Studies,LXVI,
relationships between freeborn men of the same age,73 this 1976, 87-105; Cantarella, 120-156; Richlin, 1993, passim.
77 Dover (as in n.
simply means that being a cinaedus (like being a woman in 35).
ancient Rome) was incompatible with the act of writing. 78 P.
Veyne, "L'Homosexualite a Rome," Communications,xxxv, 1982,
Richlin concludes that with respect to the social status of the 27-28: "Should we really believe that Rome learned of this kind of love
from the Greeks, who were its masters in so many other domains? If the
passive male homosexual, "... we need not be surprised to answer is 'yes,' the inference must be that love between men is a
perversion so rare that one people can only have learned of it from
another who set a bad example. If, on the other hand, it would seem that
pederasty was indigenous in Rome, the conclusion must be that it would
70 H.
Gabelmann, "Romische Kinder in Toga Praetexta," Jahrbuch des be astonishing, not for a society to know of love between men, but for it
DeutschenArchdologischenInstituts,c, 1985, 497-541; W. Gercke, Untersu- not to. What calls for an explanation is not the tolerance of the Romans,
chungen zum rdmischenKinderportrdt,Hamburg, 1968; Richlin, 1993, but the intolerance of modern societies. The right answer is surely the
537-539. second one."
71 "Dum ted
apstineas nupta, vidua, virgine,/ iuventute et pueris liberis, 79R. MacMullen, "Roman Attitudes to Greek Love," Historia, xxxI,
ama quidlubet"; Plautus, Curculio, 35-38; Plautus, II, trans. P. Nixon 1982,484-502.
(LoebClassicalLibrary),Cambridge, Mass., 1917; my trans. 80 S.
Lilja, Homosexualityin Republican and Augustan Rome, Helsinki,
72
Richlin, 1993, 554-571. 1983.
73Richlin, 1983, 226. 81
Cantarella, 97-186.

Although some Romans of the late Republic publicly beard nor larger size nor degree of activity distinguishes one
decried the institution of pederasty among aristocratic Greek youth as older than the other. For these individuals, the
males and their equally aristocratic young lovers, they shared painter portrays a relationship of equality. Is it possible that
with the Greeks certain attitudes that shed light on the either patrons or artists deliberately desired such "non-
representations on the Warren Cup. The prime question in standard" representations?
the ancient viewer's mind-whether Greek or Roman- Although there are no other representations of male-male
would not be what the couples were doing but rather what lovemaking in the exact pose found on side A of the Warren
status the individuals had. Given the overwhelming testimony Cup, two of its features have clear ancient precedents. The
in literary texts for social approval only of phallic, unequal lover's use of the strap in the lovemaking chamber seems to
love, the representation on side B remains unproblematic. have had a long history, to judge by the red-figure cup by
Furthermore, as has been seen, the pose is quite stan- Onesimos, where a female spreads her legs in anticipation of
dard-so standard, in fact, that it appears in Arretine vessels. titillation while grasping a strap with her left hand.86 Further-
The boy's long hair is a clear indication of his foreign and more, the act of one male lowering himself onto another's
possibly servile status (Fig. 9), since freeborn males of the penis appears on a vase by the Dinos Painter, although he
Augustan period consistently maintained short-cropped coif- uses a staff, rather than the strap, as an aid.87 Yet in both of
fures.82 A fragment of an Arretine crater in the Ashmolean these representations, the person in the receptive position is
Museum pictures an adult male with a boy with similarly long also of inferior status to the male whose penis he or she
hair, suggesting that the boy's hair length was part of the accepts. Nothing in the body size, facial type, or hairstyles
original composition.83 His long locks separated him from (aside from the "active" lover's beard and laurel wreath)
the freeborn boys who were off-limits; long hair, because it differentiates the two men on side A of the Warren Cup. If we
was forbidden to aristocratic Roman boys, may have pro- did not know the overwhelming evidence adduced from the
vided an extra sexualfrisson for the Roman male. literature against the possibility of lovemaking between
The image on side A of the Warren Cup is much more males of the same age and class, we would be inclined to read
problematic, for it seems to show love between men of equal this image in terms of late twentieth-century definitions of
age, with a curious reversal of the active and passive roles. It reciprocal "gay" or "homosexual" lovemaking.
is difficult to see any great difference in age between the two Who are these men with their unusually equal lovemaking
partners, although the man on the bottom has a close- activities? Vermeule, the only scholar to have attempted to
cropped beard. In addition to their similarity of age, the two identify them, believes that they are princes of Augustus's
men are about the same size. In fact, the sheer weight of the family. His thesis is that the cup is a degrading satire on the
man on top keeps the viewer from seeing him in a typically dynasty that Augustus founded. "On one side [side B] an
passive role. He uses a strap to lower himself onto his lover's elderly man with the features of the Pheidian Zeus is coupled
penis, yet his lover seems to be working hard not be crushed. with a Julio-Claudian prince. On the other side, the scene
Although this awkwardness may not be entirely intentional, involves two princes, one older than the other, with faces like
there is no doubt that the artist strove to make the two as Tiberius and Drusus Jr. ... Needless to say, this type of cup
equal as possible in age, size, and activity. There are some was produced for private viewings by a very limited, ex-
artistic precedents in Greek vase painting for representing tremely sophisticated audience."88 Although this is an inter-
lover and beloved as near equals. esting notion, the boy's long hair on side B disqualifies him
Some vase painters make it difficult to distinguish man as a Julio-Claudian prince. The likenesses that Vermeule
from boy by depicting both erastes and eromenos as the same proposes for the men on side A simply are not there. Rather
size and age. Huppertz has recently challenged the long- than being Augustus's heirs to the throne, Drusus the
held assumption that black-figure vases always depict the Younger and Tiberius, these are generic Augustan males-in
"ritual" of pederasty between an older male and a boy. His their faces, haircuts, and bodies.
many examples argue for the existence of a variety of sexual Other features of the scene may provide clues to the lovers'
activities between males of the same age.84 The red-figured identities. The meaning of the accessories in the room might
psykter by Smikros in the J. Paul Getty Collection shows be questioned once again. In the red-figure vase picturing
males courting and kissing.85 For two of the couples, neither the strap as a lovemaking accessory, the woman is clearly a
82 85 Frel,
The visual evidence for short hair: Gabelmann (as in n. 70); C. Rose, J. "Euphronios and His Fellows," in W. Moon, ed., Ancient Greek
"'Princes' and Barbarians on the Ara Pacis," American Journal of Art and Iconography,Madison, 1983, 147-151, figs. 10.2-10.6; Arezzo,
Archaeology,xcrv, 1990, 456, n. 11, for long-haired Bosporan princes; Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Capolavorzdi Euphronzos:Un piontere
pp. 459-461 for barbarian princes from Gaul with long hair. della ceramografiaattica, exh. cat. (May 26-July 31, 1990), 192-193, cat.
83 no. 43, attributed to Smikros by D. von Bothmer.
Brown, 8, cat. no. 6, pl. 6, figs. 1 and 2: "The companion (sex
86 Ill. in
uncertain) lies on the left side, twisted round with the head in profile; Brendel, fig. 19.
looking up at the youth, the right arm outstretched. A lock of hair, 87 E.
Keuls, The Rezgn of the Phallus, New York, 1985, 293; Keuls's
perhaps suggesting the figure could be a girl, falls onto the nape of the interpretation is not entirely convincing: see P. von Blanckenhagen,
neck." "Puerilia," in In MemorzamOttoBrendel, Mainz, 1976, 37-41; see also the
84 C.
Hupperts, "Greek Love: Homosexuality or Paederasty? Greek representation of a female lowering herself onto a male seated on a
Love in Black Figure Vase-Painting," in Proceedingsof the 3rd Symposzum chair, Brendel, figs. 25 and 26.
on AnczentGreekand Related Pottery,Copenhagen,August 31-September 4, 88 Vermeule, 39.
1987, ed. J. Christiansen and T. Melander, Copenhagen, 1988, 255-
268.

prostitute. Other details on side A of the Warren Cup could moral rigor. Poets sing the praises of the boys they love,
indicate that this is a room specially outfitted for lovemaking. frequently alternating with love poems to their mistresses;94
The lyre, instrument of the muse of love poetry, Erato, seems artists provide images of male-male lovemaking for the rich
calculated to establish a refined, cultured atmosphere in the and for people of slender means (in mass production). It is
room. Had love songs been a prelude to the lovemaking also instructive that the visual artists who created these
pictured here? It is also useful to note what accessories images of sexually explicit couplings of males employed the
commonly found in scenes of lovemaking are absent: there very neoclassical style that Augustus favored as the vehicle of
are no signs of the symposium, or drinking party, that so his Golden Age propaganda, even though these portable
often constitutes the narrative framework of erotic imagery objects meant for private use reflected personal, rather than
on Greek vases: there are no drinking vessels or tables. Nor official, standards. They responded to actual fashions of
has the artist pictured the erotic panel paintings, or tabellae, private behavior rather than the constructed moral probity
that sometimes appear above the couple's bed.89 of official public life.
The detail of the boy in a tunic entering the room is more The various contexts examined here allow us to say several
difficult to interpret. He may fit into the broad category of things about the meaning of the scenes of lovemaking on the
the so-called onlooker.90 Scholars have grappled with the Warren Cup. Explicit representations of male-female love-
ubiquitous onlookers who seem to intrude into mythological making cut across class boundaries, appearing in a variety of
scenes in Pompeian painting; recently Michel has hypothe- places, from popular brothels and baths to aristocratic
sized that they are stand-ins for the viewer, placed there to bedrooms. The Warren Cup's neoclassical figural style and
make the event more theatrical.91 Another possibility is that composition fit well with other Augustan silver vessels.
the scene takes place in a brothel, and that the entering boy Although no other silver cup depicts lovemaking between
is an attendant-or another possible partner for one of the two males, the two cups from the House of the Menander
men. One could also interpret the onlooker as the bridge could easily be read as lovemaking between human males
figure in a narrative that circles the cup from side A to side B. and females. The numerous examples of both male-female
In such a reading, side A would picture lovemaking between and male-male lovemaking on Arretine wares indicate that
two adult males, one of whom then makes love to the lovemaking scenes must have been relatively common in
entering boy on side B. I have also considered the possibility precious materials. Textual evidence for Roman attitudes
that this is a scene in a hotel for gay men, where two men of toward males making love to each other sometimes contra-
equal age and status have rented a room in an establishment dicts the way artists pictured such lovemaking in the visual
that countenanced, and even encouraged, same-sex lovemak- arts. Just as there are exceptions to the rule of representing
ing.92 Finally, it is possible that all the imagery on the cup is the erastes as the older male and the eromenos as the boy on
designed to evoke not the everyday world of the Roman Greek vases, so it seems that the artist of the Warren Cup was
aristocrats who looked at it, but rather a world of sexual picturing a couple of the same age on side A. And, just as the
fantasy. In that world, the individuals making love were not distinction between the passive and active partner seems to
fixed in time, place, or social status-this in spite of the blur on certain Attic vases, so, five hundred years later, it
clearly contemporary, Augustan style of the figures. seems to blur for the couple on side A of the Warren Cup.
As I remarked above, literary sources from the time of They illustrate, so to speak, the activity of the passive partner
Augustus dealing with matters sexual provide a contradic- and the passivity of the so-called active partner.
tory interpretative apparatus for the Warren Cup. Because Although the Romans left us very little in writing about
Augustan Rome represents a chilly, somewhat reflective sexual activity between males in the Augustan period, they
epilogue to the wholesale importation of Hellenistic luxuries bought, looked at, and drank from cups whose images
in the late Republic, one would expect a rather sober tone in reflected their own sexual fantasies. Scenes of beautiful males
both art and poetry. On the one hand, Augustus heralded a making love to each other constituted a frequent motif in
new Golden Age, which was to renew the virtues of the old cups meant for both wealthy and poor consumers. The fact
Republic. He revived antiquated Roman rituals that had that images of lovemaking like those on the Warren Cup fail
gone out with the influx of glittering, sophisticated Hellenis- to fit commonly held modern notions about Augustan moral
tic religions.93 He tried to get aristocratic Roman women to probity is a very good argument for studying them. It is a
bear children-a task they abhorred. Yet Augustan art belies case where visual art-not literature-comes closest to life.
John R. Clarke recentlypublished The Houses of Roman Italy,

89
E.g., on the bronze relief from a mirror cover of the Flavian period: 100 B.C-A.D. 250. Ritual, Space, and Decoration (Berkeley,
Rome, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Bellezzae seduzzonenella Romaimperzale,
exh. cat. (June 11-July 31, 1990), Rome, 1990, 99, cat. no. 145, color pl. 1991). He is currently researching the visual constructions of
35 on p. 54; see also Myerowitz, 145-147, fig. 7.10. lovemaking in Greek and Roman art for a new book, Looking at
90An Lovemaking in Roman Art [University of Texas at Austin,
unpublished relief from the Sebasteion at Aphrodisias, securely
dated by inscriptions to the later Julio-Claudian period, pictures a Austin, Tex. 78712].
similar voyeur in the person of Eros watching Leda being penetrated by
the swan. I owe this reference to the late Kenan Erim.
91 Michel (as in n. 53), 537-598.
92 93 P. Zanker, The Powerof Imageszn theAge ofAugustus, trans. A. Shapiro,
J. Clarke, "The Decor of the House ofJupiter and Ganymede at Ostia Ann Arbor, 1988, 101-166.
Antica: Private Residence Turned Gay Hotel?," in E. Gazda, ed., Roman
Art: The Private Sphere,Ann Arbor, 1991, 89-104. 94 Griffin, 18-26; Richlin, 1983, 34-49; Cantarella, 120-154.

Maiuri, A., La Casadel Menandroe il suo tesorodi argenteria,2 vols., Rome,

Frequently Cited Sources 1933.
Brendel, O., "The Scope and Temperament of Erotic Art in the Myerowitz, M., "The Domestication of Desire: Ovid's Parva Tabellaand
Greco-Roman World," in T. Bowie, O. Brendel, P. Gebhard, R. Rosen- the Theater of Love," in A. Richlin, ed., Pornographyand Representationin
blum, L. Steinberg, Studiesin EroticArt, New York, 1970, 3-107. Greeceand Rome, Oxford, 1992, 131-157.
Brown, A., Catalogue of Italian Terra-Sigzllatain the AshmoleanMuseum, Richlin, A., 1983, TheGardenof Prapus: Sexualityand Aggressionin Roman
Oxford, 1968. Humor, New Haven.
Cantarella, E., Bisexualityin the Ancient World,trans. C. 6. Cuilleanain, , 1993, "Not before Homosexuality: The Materiality of the
New Haven, 1992. Cinaedusand the Roman Law against Love between Men,"Journal of the
Chase, G., Catalogue of Arretine Pottery, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Historyof Sexuality,in, 4, 1993, 523-573.
enlarged ed. with additions by M. Comstock and C. Vermeule. Cam- Richlin, A., ed., Pornography and Representationin Greece and Rome,
bridge, Mass., 1975. Oxford, 1992.
Clarke,J., The Housesof Roman Italy, 100 B.C.-A.D. 250: Ritual, Space,and Vermeule, C., "Augustan andJulio-Claudian Court Silver,"AntikeKunst,
Decoration,Berkeley, 1991. vI, 1963, 33-46.
Griffin,J., Latin Poetsand Roman Life, Chapel Hill, 1986. Vorberg, G., Glossariumeroticum,Stuttgart, 1932.


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The Warren Cup and the Contexts for Representations of Male-to-Male Lovemaking in

Augustan and Early Julio-Claudian Art

This content downloaded from 96.234.1.138 on Fri, 26 Jul 2013 22:26:01 PM

This content downloaded from 96.234.1.138 on Fri, 26 Jul 2013 22:26:01 PM

1 Warren Cup. New York, Metropolitan Mu-

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2 Warren Cup (photo: Mu-

8 C. 10The best modern treatment is Brendel, 3-107.

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3 Warren Cup, Side A (pho-

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8 Warren Cup, Side B (pho-

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Roma.23 A similar layering occurs by necessity in the image of

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11 Arretine bowl fragment. Boston,

12 Arretine mold fragment. Boston,

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13 Arretine bowl fragment. Boston,

peristyle that housed the servants' quarters.37 Whereas the

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bered (Fig. 16). Above the cubicles appear figures on beds,

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-ii 'rYA i' K'I

southwall (photo MichaelLarvey)

44 Myerowitz, 151-155. 47 Myerowitz, 137, with further references in n. 6.

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This content downloaded from 96.234.1.138 on Fri, 26 Jul 2013 22:26:01 PM

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John R. Clarke recentlypublished The Houses of Roman Italy,

This content downloaded from 96.234.1.138 on Fri, 26 Jul 2013 22:26:01 PM

Maiuri, A., La Casadel Menandroe il suo tesorodi argenteria,2 vols., Rome,

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