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The Arch of Constantine and the Genesis of Late Antique Forms Author(S): Jaś Elsner Source: Papers of the British School at Rome, Vol

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The Arch of Constantine and the Genesis of Late Antique Forms Author(S): Jaś Elsner Source: Papers of the British School at Rome, Vol From the Culture of Spolia to the Cult of Relics: The Arch of Constantine and the Genesis of Late Antique Forms Author(s): Jaś Elsner Source: Papers of the British School at Rome, Vol. 68 (2000), pp. 149-184 Published by: British School at Rome Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40311027 . Accessed: 25/11/2013 07:34 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. British School at Rome is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Papers of the British School at Rome. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 129.67.21.201 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 07:34:38 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions FROM THE CULTURE OF SPOLIA TO THE CULT OF RELICS: THE ARCH OF CONSTANTINE AND THE GENESIS OF LATE ANTIQUE FORMS THE MONUMENT TheArch of Constantine (Figs 1 and2) has occupieda singularlycontroversial posi- tionin thehistoriography of Roman art, since the painter Raphael wrote a famous reporton antiquitiesfor Pope Leo X in about1519. In Raphael'swords: Althoughliterature, sculpture, painting, and almostall theother arts had longbeen declining and had grownworse and worse until the time of the lastemperors, yet architecture was stillstudied and practised according to thegood rules and buildings were erected in the same style as before... Of thisthere are manyevidences: among others, the Arch of Constantine, whichis well designedand well builtas faras architectureis concerned. Butthe sculptures of the same arch are very feeble and destituteof all art andgood design. Those, however, that come from the spoils of Trajan and AntoninusPius are extremelyfine and done in perfectstyle. TheArch, or moreparticularly the contrast of itsfourth-century sculpture with the spolia fromthe second century incorporated on it,has cometo signifythe onset of lateantiquity and the emergence of medievalstyles. In a rhetoricaltradition reach- ingback from Berenson in the1950s via Gibbonand Vasari to Raphaelhimself, the archhas beenthe paradigm for the study of stylisticdecline (Berenson (1954) with Eisner(1998), Gibbon(1776: 428), Vasari(1568: 224-5 {Proemiodelle Vite,5)) withHaskell (1993: 118-21)). Today,the notion of decline,and withit thevery practice of styleart history, arerather out of fashion (pace Spivey(1995)). As earlyas 1901,Riegl had attempt- ed to rehabilitatethe Constantinian reliefs of theArch in a formalanalysis which accepted,their radical difference from earlier Roman images but attributed that styl- istictransformation to the emergence of what he calleda 'lateRoman Kunstwollen' (Riegl, 1901: chapter2 (= Riegl, 1985: 51-7, 77-8, 91-5, 101-2)).2Effectively, Rieglaccepted the formal differences, first signalled by Raphael,between the late antiquesculptures and theearlier spolia includedon theArch, but put them down notto thejudgmental (and in his view anachronistic)concept of declinebut rather 1 Raphael'sletter (translation: Goldwater and Trêves,1945: 74-5; Camesascaand Piazza, 1993: 257-322). The referenceto Pius is wrong:modern scholarship attributes the sculptural spolia to the reignsof Trajan,Hadrian and MarcusAurelius. Positive attitudes to theArch before Raphael's letter: 1993. Massini,2 On 'Kunstwollen':Olin, 1992: 129-53;Iversen, 1993: 71-90. 149 This content downloaded from 129.67.21.201 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 07:34:38 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 150 ELSNER -g s 1 ! ON (N <N vO où ^ o£ ^. oc § < •£ '6 "o I?o- £ II I c c iS c o U ^-i o < U- This content downloaded from 129.67.21.201 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 07:34:38 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ARCH OF CONSTANTINE 151 "S 1 §■ 1 r- to . - <u§ o ^ oc S - ~> < .s 1? -C >« 3 S ^^ uo c(U c S C O U ^t-o < (N U- This content downloaded from 129.67.21.201 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 07:34:38 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 152 ELSNER to a setof choicesgoverned by a newlate Roman aesthetics. Recentscholarship has soughtto reintegrate the sculpture of the Arch into the tra- ditionof Imperialstate reliefs set up in thecity of Rome.The reuseof spolia from monumentsoriginally dedicated by Trajan,Hadrian and MarcusAurelius has been analysedin terms of a specificallyConstantinian programme of Imperial propaganda:3 the of312 justifies his ofRome in a monumentded- usurpingconqueror4 appropriation icatedin 315, whichsimultaneously celebrates his victoriesover Maxentius in 312, hisdecennalia of 315 andthe new Constantinian golden age evokedin theimages of 'good' emperorsfrom the second century ad.5 Thisapproach is an importantcorrect- iveto the exaggerated rhetoric of stylistic decadence which characterized earlier liter- ature(Kleiner, 1992: 454-5), and one can hardlydeny the ideological effect of the Arch'sprogramme of pro-Constantinian propaganda.6 But the risk of emphasizing the Arch'sessential continuity with the past (againstboth Riegl and the adherentsof 'decline'(for example, Brilliant (1984: 122) andPierce (1989: 416))), is thatwe lose sightof thekey cultural insight embodied in Raphael'ssharp distinction of styles, whetherthis leads to the Berensonian lament over decline or a Riegliancelebration of earlymedieval form. That is, the Arch did precipitate a fundamental and radical set of changesin Romanvisual practice which the 'style merchants' may have identified in waysthat now seem outmoded and inappropriate, but which none the less did happen. Muchremains controversial about the monument.7 Indeed, every time a scaf- foldingis erectedto restorethe Arch, close visualanalysis persuades some that it was reallyerected earlier than Constantine - by Domitian,8for example, or by Hadrian,9or that even its apparently Constantinian sculpture is in factspolia (Wace, 1907;Knudsen, 1989; 1990).In additionto these debates, we needto remember that theArch is no longerin itsfinal state of completionin Constantiniantimes.10 It has 3 On thelate antique materials: L'Orange and von Gerkan, 1939. On theearlier sculpture: Trajanic - LeanderTouati, 1987; Kleiner, 1992: 220-3, 264; Hadrianic- Boatwright,1987: 190-202;Evers, 1991; Oppermann,1991; Turcan,1991; Kleiner,1992: 251-3, 265; Schmidt-Colinet,1996; Aurelian - Ryberg,1967; Angelicoussis,1984; Kleiner,1992: 288-95, 314. For a generalbibliography: De Maria,1988: 318-19. Photographs:Giuliano, 1956. Post-antique illustrations: Punzi, 1999. 4 Fordiscussion of the dates see Buttrey(1983: 375-80); pace Richardson(1975), whoargued for ad 325-6. 5 Forthe programme and ideology:Brilliant, 1984: 119-23;Pierce, 1989; Pensabene and Panella, 1993-4: 125-7. Fora cogentcritique of the view effectively assumed by L'Orange and his successors thatthe spolia ofthe Arch posit a 'particulardiplopia ... [that]postulates an idealviewer with historic- allyspecific knowledge', see Kinney(1995: 57). The ideologicalargument is notnecessarily opposed to thepragmatic case forthe reuse of older marblesas a exercise:Ward-Perkins, 1999: 227-33. 7 cost-cutting For discussionof the architecturesee WilsonJones (forthcoming) and of the archaeology Pensabeneand Panella( 1999). 8 Domitian:Frothingham (1912-15) opposedby Walton(1924) and L'Orangeand von Gerkan (1939: 4-28). 9 Hadrian:Melucco Vaccaro and Ferroni,1993^; Steiner,1994. This view has beenopposed by Pensabeneand Panella 174-5, 10 (1993-4: 217-20). On thearchaeological context: Panella, 1990; Panella et al, 1995. This content downloaded from 129.67.21.201 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 07:34:38 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ARCH OF CONSTANTINE 153 lostthe sculptures which once adornedits top (Magi, 1956-7),and ithas lostmost of thecoloured stones which were inlaid both round the Hadrianic tondi and in a now entirelyvanished frieze which ran all theway aroundthe top of the arch's middlesection beneath the cornice on whichthe attic storey stands.11 In thispaper, I explorethe cultural implications of theArch of Constantinein itsfourth-century context, to see ifwe can redefineits meanings and its innovations moreprecisely. I focuson twocentral aspects of theArch's construction: first, its functionas a collectionof spolia (and as a carefullydesigned object for the display ofspolia), and, second, the implicit meditation on thenature of history and the past embodiedin thejuxtaposition of objectsfrom different periods on a new,compos- ite,monument. What I haveto sayassumes inevitably that any lost materials would nothave transformedsubstantially the issues of spoliationand iconographywhich will be discussed.Also, I assumethat once theArch reached its finalstate under Constantineitconstituted a Constantinian monument, whatever the previous history of supposedearlier arches on thesite. SPOLIA Muchhas beenwritten about the incorporation within the Arch of Constantine- - alongsideits fourth-century friezes, arch-spandrels and pedestals offour portions of a greatfrieze celebrating Trajan, eight roundels from what was possiblya Hadrianichunting monument, and eight relief panels from a lostarch commemorat- ing MarcusAurelius. The Archis notthe first monument in Rome to use spolia. Enoughfragments survive from the Arcus Novus of Diocletian, erected in 293-4 on theVia Lata inRome (Laubscher, 1976; Koeppel, 1983: 79
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