Roman Tomb Altar Showing a deceased Lap Dog Approaching a Table Set With Food Offerings – The Inscription Reads "Stop to look at the tomb of the jubilant dog Aeolis for whom I felt immeasurable pain as she was carried away from me by the swift fate"
Curator comments:
the choice of positioning of the words in the non verse in fact it seems casual but dictated by a desire to emphasize the words key to the text so as to arouse and draw the attention of the passer-by: see ad example,the separate provision, at opposite edges of the hexameter, of Aeolidis,proper noun expressed in the genitive case, and catellae, noun to define the-little dog‖; the word tumulum, "burial, sepulcher", is instead framed from the name indication and from the adjective festive and attributed to the animal.The adjective festivus is not found in other carmina5 and it is evident that it is here used to emphasize the playful liveliness of the animal. The second hexameterit ends with the noun fate, a term left deliberately isolated and centered in the last line to give prominence and depth to the concept of the transience of lifes object to the inevitability of the fatum6. The latter is also characterizedfrom the adjective, in the ablative case, praepes-etis,which gives the lexical binomialan almost epic solemnity and gravity.The expression praepete fato does not occur elsewhere in the carmina: itis preferred, albeit rarely, and in high diegetic contexts, the equivalent formula properantia fata7.While the first verse focuses onthe invitation to the viator (viathe imperative cerne) to look at the sepulcher of the jubilant dog14(topos also intensely exploited infunerary epigraphy) that it seems almost revived in the bas-relief, the second verse is instead characterized by boundless pain of the master for this death8. The choice of the verb dolēre(constructed with the accusation of the thing for which one feels suffering, in this case the relative pronoun quam), of the adverb in modice, and of the participle raptam contribute, albeit with extreme synthesis, to strengthen and enhance the deep sense of despair and helplessness that assails the master of Aeolis9. Aan interesting aspect is also constituted by the choice of the monumentum: it is in fact of a funerary altar on whose side faces urceus and patera are sculpted.This support, frequently usedto house sepulchral inscriptions intended for humans, is used here for a little dog denoting inin the first place the economic possibility and the cultural stature of the client,moreover anonymous, and, secondly,what could be defined as the"Humanization process" that involves theanimal both in life and in death. The symbolic and ritual value linked to this choice therefore emerges with clarity and is further corroborated by the relief on the forehead of the aretta depicting the animal approaching a table set with food offerings. The bas-relief seems to recall the funeral banquet, practical central to the Roman funerary tradition. In fact, death and banquet are two strongly interconnected aspects and full of concrete and symbolic values: to such Aeolis, alittle dog, takes part in the meal and therefore does not seem excluded from the ritual dimension reserved for men
by RomanVsGauls