Chapter 8:

The Re-use of Monuments

Early re-use of antiquities

The monuments of antiquity had been left naked of their precious

ornaments; but the Romans would demolish with their own hands

the arches and walls, if the hope of profit could surpass the cost

of the labour and exportation (Gibbon 71)

Gibbon's remarks indicate that the re-use of building materials is not a phenomenon new to the Middle Ages. Ruthless spoliation of earlier monuments was practised by the Romans themselves, as in the selection of spolia used by Alexander Severus for the restoration of the Portico of Octavia, the taking of material from the Forum Suarium to complete work on the Basilica Julia in 377 (Rodocanachi 1914, 14f.), or the `impressive list' of precious marbles re-used at Piazza Armerina, some of which we otherwise know only from first-century contexts (Wilson 1983, 32) - and many of which were robbed out again during the villa's decline. The practice was a normal one, and an essential ingredient in the recycling of a precious commodity: sometimes, indeed (as perhaps in the case of the Parian temple dismantled by the Venetians for use in their castrum at Paroikia: Gruben 1982), the material has been better preserved than would have been the case had the original monument been left standing. But we should distinguish the re-use of structural members from that of decorative elements: Deichmann (1976, 132) states that the latter was introduced no earlier than the Tetrarchy - perhaps the first stage in that respect for the past which informs so much mediaeval treatment of the antique. However, as Settis reminds us (1984B), the whole subject of spolia needs much more study. The majority of spolia were no doubt taken from disused buildings (surveys in Deichmann 1975; and Esch 1969), but constructions still in use were sometimes also in danger, as shown by the regulations on the taking of building stone from town walls, or the oath taken by the Ostiarius of the Lateran Palace in 1188, promising to guard against the thefts of building materials such as wood, metals, gates and stone (AIMA 1.121f.). Cities frequently promulgated regulations safeguarding their building materials - such as Modena's of 1327 forbidding the export of (surely antique) `lapides magni' from the city (Parra 1983, 469).

The decay of Roman civilisation in the West provided unrepeatable opportunities for spoliation, and the Theodosian Code throws interesting light on matters relating to the theft of antiquities for re-use, as well as on the apparent degradation of creature comforts. The edict of 382 that the various rungs on the social ladder should be allowed only half-an-inch, one inch, and one-and-an-half inches of bathwater (Cod. Th. 15.2.3) may say something about the state of the aqueducts, just as others in the same book make it clear that pilferage of antiquities was rife. Thus `No man shall suppose that municipalities may be deprived of their own ornaments, since indeed it was not considered right by the ancients that a municipality should lose its embellishments, as though they should be transferred to the buildings of another city' (15.1. 1). This could well refer to buildings in a ruinous condition, since an edict of 364 prevents officials from constructing new buildings within Rome without imperial permission, whereas permission is indeed given `to all to restore those buildings which are said to have fallen into unsightly ruins' (15.1.11). The same sentiment was reiterated in 365 (15.1.14), together with a prohibition against robbing monuments, which was sometimes the work of officials `who, to the ruin of the obscure towns, pretend that they are adorning the metropolitan or other very splendid cities, and thus seek the material of statues, marble works, or columns that they may transfer them'. However, this picture of officials dismantling new properties in order to recover the antique materials from which they had been illegally built may be a false one, for such a practice would contradict the normal run of Roman property laws, as Melillo points out (1971). His interpretation of the Ostrogothic Pragmatica Sanctio (which includes the phrase `modis omnibus restituere') is that objects could be recovered when damage would not thereby be caused to the structure concerned (ibid., 158f.); in any case, he believes the statute a reaction to the problems of war, and not applicable in times of peace. Hence it would seem unlikely that spoliation of monuments even before the time of Justinian usually met with much more than the imposition of fines.

The emperors could have a variety of reasons for wishing to preserve monuments, but there is no archaeological evidence that buildings were actually rebuilt as the edicts sometimes required (Kunderewicz 1971, 140): perhaps the looters preferred to pay the fines instead. Libanius, writing of reconstruction at Antioch, not only castigated the governor Florentius for destroying tombs to build a portico (Or. 46.34) but rejoiced when Constantius II, who visited Rome in 357 and apparently `discovered' his antique heritage, marvelling at the vast grandeur of the buildings, particularly the Forum of Trajan (Amm. Marc. 16.10.13-17), had looters return cut stone and columns for the reconstruction of sanctuaries they had destroyed (Or. 18.126). The Novels of Majorian (title 4) continue to rail against the same practices, still perpetrated by people in office: `While it is pretended that the stones are necessary for public works, the beautiful structures of the ancient buildings are being scattered, and in order that something small may be repaired, great things are being destroyed.' Private individuals robbed even funerary monuments for plain house-building. The emperors made some efforts, helped by promulgations, to repair those selfsame monuments, as in a decree of 365 (14.6.3) which assigned 1500 wagonloads of lime to the repair of the aqueducts, and the same amount to public buildings.

The popes were despoilers as enthusiastic as the emperors: as early as Symmachus, restoration was taking place at the expense of ancient monuments. That pope, according to the Liber Pontificalis, took part with vigour in the refurbishing of the city encouraged by Theodoric. The emperor made it his business to supply Rome with lime and bricks, and Dulaey (1977, 10f.) believes that Symmachus probably obtained the concession to make use of ruined monuments `which it was now impossible to rebuild: Theodoric, through his mouthpiece Cassiodorus, wished that, instead of sadly commemorating the past, those monuments should serve, thanks to their materials, to embellish the present'. The Church was therefore an early user of spolia, as the great basilicas testify; even in France, we find the Bishop of Limoges re-using spolia in the sixth century (Carver 1983, note 11).

Later re-use

For the needs of large cities, ambitious programmes sometimes imported material from a distance, just as desiderius and Charlemagne had done. Much of Venice may have been first built with antique bricks, and its churches then beautified with antique marble spolia: Roman bricks and some Latin inscriptions have been recovered from the foundations of the Campanile of S. Mark's, Venice, and one inscription has been traced to the colony of Este, nearly 70km away. We have the word of a fifteenth-century chronicler that marble was sought at Aquileia, Ravenna and Constantinople for the eleventh-century rebuilding of the cathedral (Caldwell 1975, 9ff.). Given the early Christian antiquities of Ravenna (that is, from a period which Venice wished to evoke in the thirteenth century for her own political reasons), and trade links between the two, much marble no doubt went north, transported conveniently across the upper Adriatic (Demus 1955, 358). Many of the Christian overtones would have been at second hand, given that much of the marble to beautify Ravenna came from the ruins of Rome in the time of Theodoric (Della Valle 1959, 129f; and cf. Cass. Var. 3.10, or 7.13: `What shall we say of the marbles, metals and precious works of art? It is a rare hand which, when free to snatch them away, is able to abstain ...').

Usually, however, material conveniently to hand was incorporated in foundations or in walls, frequently without any attempt in the latter case to disguise its origins (cf. Buis 1973-4, 19ff.; Esch 1969; Bertelli 1976-7). Complete excavation was frequently unnecessary in the search for spolia: mere tunnels would suffice - as seen in the fifteenth-century views of the antiquities of Rome which show a mound outside the walls, a tunnel leading into it, and the legend `beneath this mound there is a temple' (Scaglia 1964, plates 24f.). This fits in well with Schneider's suggestion (1975, 227f. and notes) that references to `grotte' in mediaeval documents could well indicate ruins where building materials were to be found (see above, p.00). Certainly, the common word for rooms is `criptae', as in the `ultra griptas antiquas' referred to in the fourteenth-century Roman statute `That rubbish be not thrown in the streets (in agora)' (Re 1883, 2, ch. 195). Recent excavations on the Palatine have revealed alarming gaps in travertine foundation courses: the material has been robbed out, presumably by recklessly dangerous tunnelling, similar to the marble hunting discussed in the previous chapter.

It was large constructions such as cathedrals which received the great share of spolia, as anyone could see; thus Odorici (1864, 15; 27), not only observed funerary monuments incorporated into the cathedral of Parma, but believed that the use of rich marbles in the nave must signal the demolition of sumptuous pagan buildings to aid its construction. At S. Giorgio di Valpolicella (Verona), inverted and sawn-down funerary altars are ingeniously employed as capitals and impost blocks (D'Angelis D'Ossat 1982, fig. 13) - as well as, the right way up, as a high base (ibid., fig. 12). The more usual destination of such altars was as holy-water fonts - as, for example, that at S. Angelo in Formis, and perhaps related to the antecedant cult of Diana (de Francescis 1956, 43 and fig. 14) - or as supports, such as that under the altar table at Popoli, near Norcia (Cordella 1982, fig. 69). At Tac, in Hungary, the cathedral was built using Roman gravestones, as well as material from Aquincum (Szekely 1973, 342). For the construction of the church of Saint-Pierre at Oudenbourg, in the late eleventh century, the antique town wall was used: it `stands so strong and solid that it cannot be destroyed with rams unless blocks first be extracted from the foundations ... I have seen the demolition with my own eyes' (Mortet 1911, 173). At Bremen in 1045, Archbishop Adalbert used stones from the (modern?) city walls to build his church - although the reference to `polished stones' for the cloister suggests he found some antique pieces (L-B no.232).

In England as well, the antiquities suffered from church building: at Croyland (Linconshire), Abbot Joffridus (from 1109) decided to build a new church and monastery `with stone walls on a marble foundation' (L-B England no. 1183). Even the Modena `miracle' of finding stones for the new Cathedral has an echo at Llanthony Abbey (Monmouthshire), where `Parian stones' were to be found nearby - easy to cut, and taking a polish (ibid., no. 2482).

Houses as well as churches needed material when cities expanded. At Spoleto, the expansion was first accommodated by allowing inhabitants to raise houses on top of the old wall (if this is the meaning of `supra' - rather than simply `outside'). But for building the new wall in 1296 (Di Marco 1975, 21), it was decreed (Constitutum cap. 28r: Antonelli 1962) that those citizens who owned parts of the old wall must give it up, presumably to provide stone for the new one. At Perugia also, inhabitants were encouraged to take stone from ruined sections of the old wall (statute of 1279: Nicolini 1971, 715) and to build houses on (supra) the new one, thereby helping to keep it in repair. The dangers of such a path were obvious, even though it only applied to people with properties up against the wall. For in this period of shortage of stone, it was wilfully misinterpreted and, by 1475, when the statute was tightened, it was too late (Nicolini 1971, 721). One factor which kept the city from the extremes of lithomania was the availability of stone and other materials in the citadel, seriously damaged in the revolt of 1375; these went to help build the Cathedral (Nicolini 1971, 727, n. 106).

At Florence also, because of her exceptional rate of growth, materials were always at a premium (described, with documents, by Sznura 1975). A document of 1299 gives to the workmen any `mactones et lapides' found in the course of digging, but only up to a value of ten pounds. Metal, on the other hand - `gold, silver, or any other metal' - had to be divided (ibid., 42). Such provisions ring very true: compare Villani's mention (8.2) of how the city sold the old walls and adjacent land in 1293, when money was short. The finding of valuables must have been a real possibility - as when antique pieces of gold to a value of 30,000 livres were unearthed at Padua in 1274 (Babelon 1901, 74). Perhaps workmen involved in demolition frequently made such contracts: Bartolommeo, whom a document of 1474 states was working on the building of Arezzo Cathedral, had to break down a wall `per li membri dele colonne' (a reference to spolia in the wall?), but was allowed to keep `the stones excavated from the outer skin', perhaps in payment for the work (Pasquini 1880, 178).

Not that lithomania is associated only with population expansion - witness the concessions for building stone in a diploma of 874, giving the right to found the Monastery of S. Sisto at Piacenza: scavenging for stone throughout the public streets is permitted, and a gift is made in perpetuity of `the whole wall of that City within and without the ditch, from the foundations to the top, from the Milan Gate as far as the next postern'; materials could also be sought in the surrounding fields and villages (AIMA 2.454D). In England, the dissolution of the monasteries provides a later parallel for such opportunism.

Some sites, of course, were uninhabited when urban life began to expand, and these were pillaged most professionally. The earliest full account is from England where, in the earlier eleventh century, abbots Ealdred and Eadmar sought stone and tiles from Verulamium for their abbey at St Albans (Gesta Abbatum Monasterii Sancti Albani, in L-B England, nos 3792-3). The former filled in the ditches and underground rooms (`quasdam speluncas') which were haunts for criminals. The ditches were carefully examined, and the earth turned over `to a great depth' in the search for stones, during which the remains of a boat were found. A successor attacked the foundations of the `great palace' in the middle of the city, and found some manuscripts in the hollow of a wall; those containing `invocations and idolatrous rites' were destroyed; that with the History of St Alban unfortunately fell to dust, we are told, when it had been copied. His excavations were thorough and fruitful, and he found `stone floor slabs, with tiles and columns, needed for the construction of the church he was building ... the diggers found, in the foundations of ancient buildings, and in subterranean rooms, water pitchers and amphorae, soundly made in both clay and turned work and also glass vessels, containing cremated remains ... Above all, half-destroyed temples, overturned altars and idols, various kinds of coins. All of which, at the command of the Abbot, were broken into small pieces'. It has been suggested, surely correctly, that some of the antique gems inventoried among the relics of the Abbey came from these excavations (Wright 1844, 442f.). Given the treatment meted out to the antiquities from Verulamium, some might consider the recycling of material yet again after the dissolution of the monasteries as no less than poetic justice (Aston 1973); and indeed, trade in second-hand building materials is frequently documented in earlier English records, which include many instances of theft of stones from the town walls.

Similar searches were made in Gaul, and for the same reason: the Chronicle of S. Hubert (MGH Script. 8.579, folio series) recounts how the abbot, `seeing an abundance of great stone blocks in the foundations of what was once the city wall (now, however, diminished by taking material for the castle), ... sought and was freely given sufficient to built crypts and cloisters' - and then had `altar tables, and columns with their capitasl and bases, brought from Arles.' In some locations, antique constructions were deserted early: Gregory of Tours tells of a `crypt' (perhaps a cryptoporticus analogous to that which survives at Arles, or like the horrea at Narbonne?) at Bordeaux, which had a vaulted roof and `a certain elegance in its construction', a corner of which was used by a boy who wanted to be a hermit (HF 8.34). It is no coincidence that religious foundations were most likely to find antiquities and to re-use them: for not only were such foundations frequently among the earliest solidly built mediaeval constructions, but they could also be located in `strategic' areas for making finds, such as immediately extra muros. Thus at Rovigo in 1667, digging for the foundations of the old Cathedral produced not only building stone, but pagan burials with `diverse medals', as Silvestri relates (Zerbinati 1974-5, 241f.); and in 1696, when the foundations of the new Cathedral were in progress, `at various spots earthenware urns were found, similar to so many others which have come my way' (ibid.). The manner in which the St. Albans abbot treated `pagan' finds was no doubt usual, and it is clear that, once `idols' were disposed of, any other materials (even altars) might be re-used. This may always have been the case: Montfaucon, for example, did not even bother to comment on their location when he found figured bases in re-use in the church at Flavigny, and his account kept to their significance as antiquities (L'Antiquité Expliquée, supp. 4, 1724, 86f. and figs 39-40). However, later ages took care not to despoil Christian graves: the account by the Abbé de Cocherel of the excavation of a prehistoric site near Evreux in 1685, related in Le Brasseur's Histoire civile et ecclésiastique du Comté d'Evreux (Paris 1722; reprinted in Archeologia 63, 1973, 80f.), describes his careful work in a manner worthy of the beginning of this century, which may represent the first `archaeological' dig of such a site (earlier openings had been very plentiful, but in search of treasure: Wright 1844, 439f.). Yet the motive for the work was familiar, namely to find stone for the Seigneur de Cocherel who, on the King's orders, was to do some building work on the Eure. The site - in fact a double tomb - was carefully examined to make sure it was not a Christian burial, and the conclusion was that the Seigneur could `employ the stones without scruple for whatever use pleased him'.

What a pity that words such as `lapides' and `petras' are so uninformative. There are many deeds like as the transfer of a property `cum petras' near the city wall of Lucca in 757 ( AIMA 3.569C) where it is tempting to assume a stock of stone from some ancient building, or even decorated material. But such texts cannot bear this weight of interpretation.

The re-use of antique foundations

The simplest of all types of re-use (except for straight conversion: cf. Esch 1969, 9ff.) was when antique foundations were left in place and used for new buildings (cf. Adhémar 1939, 63, note 2). There are many examples of city defences and castles built or rebuilt on Roman sites (Taylor 1970/2, 39f.; Cunliffe 1962); and Cramp, discussing monasteries, has noted (1970/2, 33) that in England `It is difficult to find sites which were more than four miles from a Roman building' - hence the enthusiastic use of spolia. Such re-use of materials or existing foundations must have been a common occurrence for masons: thus the two cathedrals at Thérouanne (Artois) accomodated their layout to what was already on the site, although the earlier structures were not oriented. The earlier one, both Carolingian and Romanesque, either had foundation walls straddling Gallo-Roman ones, or used them where possible by mortaring their tops and building on them. But the later Gothic building needed a much more regular set of foundations because of the problems of weight distribution: walls which interfered with new foundations were therefore destroyed, while those re-used were incorporated in something necessarily much stronger (Bernard 1975). The same must have happened for the extension of the cathedral at Le Mans, where there survives a request of 1217 to pull down part of the Roman wall and build across it (Biarne 1978). The value of old foundations is reflected in deeds, as at Salerno, where wood and stone were apparently re-used several times over; Delogu refers to a document selling a piece of land with `foundations of an ancient wall' (1977, 133, n. 82). At Poitiers, the re-use of ancient foundations, and of antique materials in new foundations, was common (Crozet 1956, 14); and in the cathedral of Grado, the columns of the south nave rest directly on the south walls of an earlier but smaller basilica underneath. At Bourges, the Ducal Palace was built right over the line of the ramparts, themselves overlying a monumental portico; evidence that the mediaeval masons used the antique remains even to the extent of vaulting them over can be seen in the cellars of the palace. When the abbot of Saint-Rémi at Rheims, c. 1039, pulled down the unfinished church of his predecessor and erected another structure on the same foundations (Mortet 1911, 41), he combined thrift with extravagance: but the technique has obvious attractions in house building as well (as at Siraf, where it was standard practice in the ninth and tenth centuries).

So keen were mediaeval builders to make thrifty use of all materials that they sometimes grubbed up complete foundations. When the Bishop of Anagnia rebuilt a church in the early twelfth century, he took up the foundations of its predecessor (L-B no. 2093: since he `had obtained a large collection of marble blocks' some of it may have come from such foundations).  The same happened when the Old Minster at Winchester was demolished at the end of the eleventh century. There is therefore no problem in assuming that even those spolia in the foundations of late antique walls (as in the Winchester example) would have been uncovered and reused. A bonus could be spolia from earlier mediaeval buildings, as with the building of the abbey church at Andres, near Boulogne, c. 1172, when `the earth being opened up, a mountain of stone was dug out, the old and ruinous church was overthrown to the foundations, and a new and suitable building begun' (Mortet 1911, 391). Indeed, the stones in antique walls were referred to approvingly in the late eleventh-century account of the rebuilding of Saint-Pierre at Oudenbourg, near Bruges: `an ancient hand laid the northward foundation (of the city wall) in great squared blocks, firmly fixed in place with iron and lead' (Mortet 1911, 172). The fact that such blocks were already squared clearly made the masons' task easier; and, as we have seen, the term or its equivalent (e.g. `petras congruas' at Aecae: De Santis 1967, 181ff.) is common in mediaeval writings. The desire for a straight 90-degrees edge might have led the builder of the foundations of the Chapelle Saint-André at Saint-Victor, Marseille, to use some older ranks of sarcophagi, which are not, however, laid with any great care (Demains d'Archimbaud 1971, 94).

The beginnings of widespread destruction

From the above sketch, we can see that there is good reason for believing that much of the destruction of antiquities in Italy and Gaul is attributable only to the late Middle Ages, when new constructions needed stone and marble and old ones required repair. Rodocanachi (1914, 4) has calculated that in Theodoric's day, Rome could still boasted eleven fora, ten basilicas, twenty-eight libraries, two colossi, twenty-two equestrian statues, eighty gilded statues of deities, thirty six triumphal arches, and over three thousand seven hundred statues of emperors or illustrious citizens. It is unlikely that the barbarian sacks destroyed any of her architectural beauties, or many of her sculptures. This is supported by Magister Gregorius' remarks on the destruction in Rome: he believed that the `Palace of Augustus', rich in marble, was plundered for material to rebuild churches, and then for twelfth-century refurbishings (Rushforth 1919, 16f.). The cause was the devastating Norman sack of 1084, of which Rickman (1971, 158) writes, `All previous sackings of the city were nothing to this vicious and comprehensive reduction of the city to ashes.' Earlier barbarians had merely sacked Rome for valuables (Rodocanachi 1914, 1ff.; Bracco 1979, 29); for, as Gibbon has it (71), `though incapable of emulating, they were more inclined to admire than to abolish the arts and studies of a brighter period' - an inclination illustrated by the action of Genseric in carrying off statues in the 455 sack of Rome to embellish his African palaces. This accords with records of prefects moving statues from neglected areas of the city to those still used, `evidently as part of an attempt to enhance streets and public places' (Matthews 1975, 356).

For the city of Rome, then, the first searches for large quantities of building materials followed Robert the Guiscard's sack of 1084, which destroyed many churches (Lanciani 1902-12, 1.5ff.). Gibbon again (71), citing Petrarch: `Behold the relics of Rome, the image of her pristine greatness! neither time nor the barbarian can boast the merit of this stupendous destruction: it was perpetrated by the most illustrious of her sons; and your ancestors (he writes to a noble Annibaldi) have done with the battering-ram what the Punic hero could not accomplish with the sword.' This is not to say that large buildings had necessarily survived intact into the late Middle Ages: the dearth of antique columns, bases and capitals in matching sets is sufficient indication that they had not - a penury illustrated by the ingenious attempts of high mediaeval architects to arrange what little they could get into more or less `significant' patterns (Malmstrom 1975; and note the plethora of ill-matched slabs in the aisle paving of the SS. Quattro Coronati: Munoz 1914, 48ff.). But some buildings were substantially intact and used until the Norman sack: one such was the Curia, which contained the church of S. Adriano, and which was transformed into a `mediaeval' building only c. 1100 (Mancini 1967-8, 215ff.).

Consciousness of a wasting asset appears in the fourteenth-century statutes of Rome, in a chapter entitled Of the ancient buildings, which are not to be pulled down: the penalty was heavy fines, for `antique buildings represent an ornament for the city in the public interest' (Re 1883, 2.191) - an echo, so to speak, of the legislation of late Antiquity. But the spoliation never stopped: one energetic nineteenth-century author counted no less than 7012 antique columns and ornamental blocks in re-use in the city (Müntz 1884, 305, n. 2); and plain blocks were re-used on a large scale - witness the use in Roman church foundations of the eighth and ninth centuries of tufo blocks which, with their frequent cramp-holes, clearly came from antique buildings; the Servian Wall must have been robbed frequently for such a purpose (Bertelli 1976-7, 163). But the destruction of Rome began in real earnest with the building projects of the Renaissance, when those popes who evinced the greatest love of antiquity - such as Pius II and Paul II - were amongst the greatest destroyers of the patrimony (Müntz 1884, 305ff.; Lanciani 1902-12; Weiss 1969, 98ff.). Thus Nicholas V took no less than 2500 carts of travertine from the Colosseum in one year (Müntz 1878-82, 1.104ff.). Indeed, so fast was the destruction that Albertini, writing in 1509, names five triumphal arches he himself has seen destroyed (Müntz 1884, 306). A cynic might wonder whether some of the measured drawings by Renaissance architects (which include blocks as well as columns) were sometimes to record suitable spolia for their projects, rather than a simple love of exact knowledge.

There is some slight evidence (as well as the hints adduced above) that even Rome was running short of marble by the fifteenth century: the stone-masons were against the breaking of marble in order to provide lime, and forbade it on pain of heavy fines in their statutes of 1406 and again in 1598 (Rodocanachi 1913, 172f.). A cynic might suggest that they were simply protecting the raw materials for their livelihood while sheltering the same materials from the lime burners. Accounts of the city in the Renaissance period, such as those by Albertini (Valentini 1940/53, 4.462ff.) or Vergerio (ibid., 4.97) reflect the dismal story; and Poggio, for instance, records the Colosseum as `for the most part gone for lime, on account of the stupidity of the Romans' (ibid., 4.238).

With the further expansion of Rome in the Baroque period, destruction continued; for example, in 1605 José de Sigu[um]enza conjured up the past glories of the Via Appia, with `a great number of precious statues, excellent tombs, superbly built; pyramids, obelisks, well made inscriptions of great erudition' (1909, 221); he does not claim to have seen all these, but surely rebuilds them in his imagination from the remains he has seen - remains which must have been more extensive than those visible today or even in the nineteenth century. Most people marvel that so much of Rome has survived: Rodocanachi's position (1914, 7f.) is however much more realistic for, numbering the monuments of which we have knowledge but of which no trace remains, he marvels at how much has disappeared.

The same profile of destruction probably applies to much smaller centres like Vaison (Sautel 1924): with the decrease in European population after the end of the Empire, there simply was not the pressure on objects or property to occasion destruction, until the expansion of population from the eleventh century. Only with that expansion did antique buildings begin to disappear in substantial numbers: compare, for example, the plentiful descriptions of antique buildings standing in England even after the Norman Conquest (Higgitt 1973, 3f.), or the startling case of the sanctuary of Fortuna Primigenia at Palestrina. The owners, the Colonna, accused the papal troops of its destruction in 1298, stating that it had been built by Julius Caesar himself; yet even in the sixteenth century much of its structure remained visible (Zevi 1979, 4f.). In Gaul, for example, the great forum built by Trajan at Fourvière (Lyon) is recorded as collapsing in 840; but it was not until 1192 that we know of its limestone and marble blocks being plundered for the building of Lyon cathedral (Mortet 1911, 269f.). Another example is the great Roman villa of Chiragan, near Martres Tolosanes, where the ruins stood to a height of 4m in the eighteenth century: a scholar in 1900 found only the foundations (Harmand 1961, 11).

A few hints will indicate what treasures must still have been available in mediaeval Italy, which the Renaissance destroyed. The first, the Basilica of Junius Bassus at Rome, which was re-used only in the sixteenth century, is well known and need not be repeated here. The second example concerns the marble veneer on the monuments of Ravenna. Quantities from S. Apollinare in Classe were taken for the decoration of S. Francisco at Rimini, apparently without payment (Ricci 1909, 260f.). Alberti's antiquarian interest in coloured marbles is rare for the period: we may imagine that he re-employed the antique decorative patterns he must have found in Ravenna when he designed the facade of his church. A complaint (and quittance for the sum of 200 ducats) survives by the Abbot of S. Apollinare in Classe, and dated 1450, that Sigismondo's men `extracted, removed and broke many slabs of marble and other kinds of stone, which were a fitting ornament for that church' (Ricci 1974, 586, doc. 5) - surely the references are to opus sectile decorating the interior walls of the church. The third is an earlier depredation of the same site, for Charlemagne had preceded Alberti and Sigismondo. The papal permission to take mosaics for Aachen included veneers as well as mosaics - `mosaics and marbles from the city of Ravenna, both from the churches and from the houses and paved streets'. And given the similarities between Ravennate styles and those employed at Trani (Raspi Serra 1973), it could well be that capitals were exported thither from Ravenna, rather than just imitated in local productions.

Only exceptionally, of course, were such depredations recorded. For the `Tempio di Romolo' on the Roman Forum, for example, some of the losses were clearly late ones: compare the rich opus sectile decoration of the Aula Flavia, in Pirro Ligorio's drawing (Flaccominio 1980, 58, fig. 65). However, when we turn to the rotunda itself, we have no drawings of decoration in place - only the regular holes in the fabric itself for the pegs which once held the marble veneer (ibid., 101f.). For Ravenna, we have much less evidence than for Rome and so cannot fully answer Ricci's question (1909, 277): `Where did all the marbles go from the more than eighty ruined or destroyed churches in Ravenna or her suburbs?' Large amounts went to Puglia, to Otranto and to S. Nicola at Bari, as Ricci points out (ibid., 284). But apart from odd pieces, identified on stylistic grounds, there is no evidence of what happened to such structures - themselves surely built with marble from the monuments of the city of Rome (and Constantinople - the probable source of the columns and capitals in S. Apollinare Nuovo). One clue might be the mention of an area of Ravenna as `ad calchi', in an account of c. 839 (Colin 1947, 91); this is a reference to lime kilns, and since Agnelli mentions this toponym as in the palace area (cf. Della Valle 1959, 128), the destruction of Ravenna began with the choicest structures, as it did at Rome.

Monuments were less liable to post-mediaeval spoliation when antique floor levels were lost under silting or detritus. This happened when drainage channels became blocked, as at Bath or Canterbury. Some areas of Rome, such as the Forum, were particularly susceptible to silting (cf. Rodocanachi 1914, 10): thus the original ground level of the Horrea Agrippiana appears to have been abandoned by the later sixth century, for the church of S. Teodoro was then built much higher on part of the site. The great flood of 589 may have been the cause of the abandonment of the site by 600 at the latest (Astolfi 1978). Other floods were to cause even greater havoc in mediaeval Rome (Homo 1934, 64f; Llewellyn 1970, 195). Such disasters may have set the seal on existing neglect: excavation in the Schola Praeconum on the other side of the Palatine has shown the abandonment of the site by c. 430-40, when its Room A began to be used as a dump for miscellaneous materials, including large quantities of marble veneer. In other words, the decay and destruction of this part of the city, at least, began early.

Pride in the antique past?

Although our main interest is in the very fact of survival, we cannot ignore motives, and might therefore speculate whether the prominence of some re-used pieces in walls (tombstones and inscriptions) or as lintels (ornamented sarcophagus sides) does not carry the implication of approval or even pride (cf. Hamann-Maclean 1949-50, 168ff.). This was the case at Montecassino, where the re-use of spolia was but one element in a wide scheme of "renovatio" of the antique (Cowdrey 1983, 73ff.). In many cases mere convenience was the reason for re-use, as with the sections of a large Roman tomb set into the tower of the Abbey of San Guglielmo ad Goleto (Avellino), which was dismantled in its entirety and can now, for this reason, be reconstructed on paper (Coarelli 1967). In others, particularly those involving inscriptions, pride may have been a governing factor in survival, as we have seen at Pisa (above, p.00). Against this we must balance the frequent re-use of marble in foundations (as in the footing of S. Johann at Müstair: Oswald 1966, 227f.), where strength not visibility is of the first importance.

Lassalle (1970,15) maintains that much re-use is decorative, and betokens some notion of protection and display, as in a museum: citing several cases from Provence, he notes `the clear intention of offering to the admiration of all those antique remains considered particularly remarkable'; Mâle (1950, 65-6) makes the same point. An Italian illustration would be the doorway of the Duomo at Trieste, a building which contains many spolia: the jambs are made froma tall, three-tier stele with paired busts in niches, sawn down the middle so that the left edge forms the right jamb, and the right edge the left one (Susini 1982, pl.60); and one of the busts has been `Christianised' into S. Sergius. But the material can also be important for itself: we have seen how marble tends to get mentioned in contemporary documents (Buis 1976, 233, 238), and that `more romano' can apply to materials as well as to construction techniques. Pride can derive from both, as when Cuthbert is shown the Roman remains of Carlisle by the city reeve, including the city walls and a fountain (Colgrave 1969, vii, 122). And although those cases where rulers tend to live in or near amphitheatres or theatres could be simply because of the solidity of such buildings, we have also seen that such a location can make a political statement, as can substantial quantities of spolia left visible in completely new constructions. Thus Verzone (1967, 128), attributing the Clitumnus Temple and S. Salvatore at Spoleto to the seventh century, believes that the re-use of spolia should be read `as an anti-Byzantine gesture and as a manifestation of monarchical prerogative', erected by the Lombard dukes with workmen imported from Rome.

In some cases, indeed, it is certain that the choice of antiquities was specific rather than haphazard: Venice apparently wished to concoct an impressive ancient pedigree for herself, but it was to the Christian and not the pagan past that she looked, so that there seems no vested interest in the display of pagan antiquities (Demus 1955; Caldwell 1975, 91f.). Much the same conclusion can be drawn from Carolingian imitations of earlier architecture: as Krautheimer (1971a, 230) notes, `the aim of the Carolingian Renaissance was not so much a revival of Antiquity in general as a revival of Rome, or specifically of one facet of the Roman past: the Golden Age of Christianity in that city.'

Nevertheless, the exact impression mediaeval builders wished to create when they used spolia often remains elusive. Sometimes, the care with which spolia are incorporated (as with the pieces of frieze set into the nave pillars in S. Giustino at Paganica, L'Aquila) make it clear that they were prized. More often, however, antique capitals and pieces of column are used in a haphazard fashion, particularly in crypts: the crypt to S. Clemente, at Torre dei Passeri (Pescara), of the ninth century, for example, has stumpy pieces of column supporting full-size corinthian capitals! Much the same happens in the early eleventh-century crypt of San Giovanni in Venere at Fossacesia (Chieti), which was supposedly founded not later than the seventh century on the ruins of a temple dedicated to Venus (cf. the `villa qui dicitur Veneris' in a document for Arezzo in 961, where the toponym presumably has the same origin: Pasqui 1899, 1, doc. 69). Even in the church proper, the ensembles are often ungainly to the modern eye: at Santa Giustina at Bazzano (L'Aquila), of the early thirteenth century, the column nearest the altar on the south side of the nave is part of a cannellated Roman one, while its neighbour toward the west is part of a Doric frieze, with objects in the metopes, and dividing triglyphs - naturally on its side. What is more, the three faces which are not turned into the nave are, again naturally, bare of any kind of ornament. If part of the intention of such displays was to `mislead' admirers into misdating the age of the building in which they were incorporated, success can often be noted. The case of the Florence Baptistery is well known; and Montfaucon, already the author of the huge L'Antiquité expliquée, proclaimed in his Monuments de la Monarchie française that the iconography to be seen on French churches showed them to be early in date; his knowledge of antiquities built into some of these encouraged such radical misdating (Vanuxem 1957, 54ff.). What, indeed, are we to make of those many cases where figured antiquities are indeed displayed, but on their side, as for example at S. Agata dei Goti (Cielo 1980, fig. 29), or upside down, as with the cippi at S. Giorgio di Valpolicella (D'Angelis D'Ossat 1982, fig. 13)?

Valcabrère: simple re-use or proud display?

One structure which illustrates the problem of assessing intention is the church of S. Just at Valcabrère, near Saint Bertrand de Comminges, itself once an important and prosperous Roman centre, as the many remains testify. The present church is probably of the eleventh century, but an earlier structure may well have acted as a cathedral extra muros for Saint-Bertrand. There are certainly Roman levels in the churchyard, and substantial sections of a triumphal frieze from a funerary or honorific monument are incorporated in the structure (Gavelle 1967). What is more, the porch is flanked by Romanesque statues which are in part late antique in inspiration (cf. the `Caesar' at Saintes, in Maurin 1978, figs 125ff., with the figure of S. Just).

At first sight, the antique fragments of marble, stone and tile from which the church is built seem to have been put together in an haphazard manner: no attempt has been made to match the dressing of the stones, and rough and smooth chiselling sit side by side - the roughest of all being when antique tenons or decorations have been removed. The pillars at the `crossing' are unequal in height, and the one to the East is even stepped; the antique columns which they support have been given mediaeval capitals, which are no more than simple cubes.

However, a more careful inspection reveals that the masons have attempted symmetry, as when they match the cubic capitals just mentioned. These provide a rough base for the upper rank of columns (of which only one has an antique entablature) and give the rest blocked out but matching pieces - surely evidence enough of a concern for uniformity. Similar but isolated matches are attempted in other churches, such as the two series of sculptures at Vence, of which the one is a clumsy imitation of the other; unfortunately neither can be closely dated (Buis 1976, 241-2). But at Valcabrère an attempt has been made to balance the whole church: in the apse, for example, the decoration of coupled columns (all antique, but awkward in conjunction) has been supplemented by the mediaeval mason with a series of vestigial capitals, together with sufficient extra column piece in each case to bring everything up to the new entablature level which surrounds the apse and, indeed, nave and aisles at the same level. The idea for the entablature (a chequerboard pattern of raised and lowered squares) could well stem from the antique piece incorporated in the north side of the central pillar, to the south of the nave; the motif is, in any case, common in the area (cf. Larrieu-Duler 1972, fig. 2). The same concern can be seen in the placing of stones for the pillars, for the best-looking and most regular pieces are reserved for the two pillars which we see on entering the church by the north porch (past the column-figures which decorate it, including one which looks like a young Augustus!). Nor are the pieces simply thrown together, for the courses are levelled with slate, stone or tile where necessary.

But we must also conclude that, if the masons of Valcabrère desired symmetry, they did not take any particular delight in Roman sculptured reliefs, except for those which were purely decorative: for there are no figured reliefs in the church, and only one mask outside it (and that on the south flank); one piece of sarcophagus (Christian or pagan?) is set near the entrance porch. As for the fine antique floral scroll reliefs incorporated in the apse, neither is placed so as to balance the other (and one is partially hidden behind a pillar). What is more, it appears that neither has been cut in the Middle Ages to fit its location: the one terminates at the end of a motif; its fellow, higher up, is fractured, but the ends are weatherworn, so it must have lain around for some time at the mercy of the elements before being used.

The availability of antique sculpted blocks

Nowhere at Valcabrère do we see that feeling for true balance or selection of antique finery that is present in, for example, some of the Early Christian churches of Rome (cf. Deichmann 1975, 5ff.). Can we conclude that this is because little of quality was available? Surely not, given the size of that site in antiquity, and the finery to be seen in its museums today (and cf. Adhémar 1939, 48ff. for a survey of the riches in Provence). Either the masons were unmethodical in what they selected for their church, or their notions of harmony and balance were rudimentary - probably the latter. The problem varied according to the region, of course: Hexham had used Roman sculptured reliefs as rubble, while Lincoln was proud of the work there `in Parian marble, and the marble columns, placed alternately and regularly' (L-B England, no. 2367); although much of this material was presumably new, the description hints at the untidiness which a dearth of suitable spolia could encourage. The re-use of Carolingian decorative reliefs in the south east of France also displays scant regard for symmetry or aesthetics in the majority of cases, although it has been argued that some (such as the panel above the tomb of S. Véran at Vaucluse) are deliberately placed in privileged locations (Buis 1973-4, 12ff.) - a contention supported by the occasional imitation by Romanesque masons of Carolingian pieces (ibid., 14, n. 11; 16f.). Much the same occurs with the display of bacini in Italy on churches of the eleventh century or later: for it seems that asymmetry simply did not offend the mediaeval eye when it occurred as ornament.

The wide availability of antique capitals and bases must also be assumed as a precondition for the revivals of the Romanesque period - although supplies of matched sets of columns and capitals were by now in short supply. If, in Provence, limestone replaced marble, areas such as Aquileia maintained a tradition of working in marble - without a break, according to Barral I Altet (1981, 356f.), who also suggests that antique capitals re-used in the basilica there were the models for strict eleventh-century imitations in the same structure. Whereas the spolia do not necessarily fit their shafts, which vary in diameter, the new capitals (which he dates to 1020-30) do, which means that each one has been tailored for its respective shaft. Aquileia had its own antique buildings, but insufficient spolia; in most places material had to be imported. This is the case even in the Cathedral at Otranto: although a Roman municipium, the few antique capitals re-used only near the entrance to the crypt probably came from the amphitheatre at Lecce, a more prestigious site. Vergara (1980, 65) sees in their re-use a desire for `latinitas' and `dignitas' - that is, that impulse to impress by conspicuous placing of available treasures which is an important reason for the use of spolia. .st Re-Use of Monuments: Roman Techniques

The imitation of Roman techniques

It goes without saying that the column and lintel, and column and arch construction techniques of the Middle Ages are antique in inspiration; also that when walls are erected using antique materials, particularly tiles, there is a tendency to put them up in a way which is similar to their original layout, as can be seen from a survey of the early churches of Rome (Bertelli 1976-7). Furthermore, of course, many mediaeval buildings were directly inspired by ancient ones (e.g. the influence of N[ci] imes: Lassalle 1981, 86f.). But how often were the more complicated Roman techniques imitated during the Middle Ages? The question is confused by the fact that antique styles were imitated and antique materials re-used  of actual antique materials (as at Vaison: Sautel 1924, 10, pl. 1). Sometimes the antique materials on site must have governed the style of building, as in the Longobard re-building of the much reduced walls of Benevento, razed by Totila, in opus incertum (Rotili 1979, 36f.). Much later, we find a rather crude version of opus reticulatum in the castello at Ordona, which may date from the thirteenth century or earlier - perhaps even from the period of the Lombard/Byzantine wars (Mertens 1974, pl. 7). The stones were no doubt brought no more than 500m from the antique site, where superb examples of the technique were to be seen - for example in the side walls of the chapel on the east side of the Forum (ibid., pl. 11). Much finer examples of the technique are to be found in the North - as in the `Torhalle' at Lorsch, or the crypt of Saint Paul at Jouarre, both of the later eighth century. And Einhard, perhaps influenced as much by the text of Vitruvius as by surviving buildings, attempted to imitate Roman masonry at Steinbach (Frankl 1960, 88, n. 16). Naturally, the two types conveniently called `grand' and `petit appareil' in French were employed most frequently when in association with some antique ruin (Adhémar 1939, 138f.).

A feature of Romanesque building practice in Provence is the masons' imitation of Roman techniques in the very dressing of the stone (Lassalle 1970, 17-20). In locations where the example of the antique was readily available, as at Saint-Victor, Marseilles (Demains d'Archimbaud 1971, 93, n. 1), such imitation is less than surprising. It underlines not only the interest of the period in antique styles, but also the close attention paid to details: if it is frequently very difficult to find exact parallels for the `antiquarian' figures and reliefs of the sculptors, the relationship of their brother workers to the antique sources is much clearer. Examples of just how smoothly antique pieces can - with care - be integrated in Romanesque work are plentiful in Genoa (Bozzo 1979).

Just as antique capitals were among the most prized of spolia, so they were frequently imitated, for example in the south-west of France, where over three hundred pre-Romanesque but post-antique capitals have been studied (Larrieu 1964; 1972; Cabanot 1972; see also Fossard 1947), but there seems little consensus about dating. Fossard (1947, 69) believes she can date her series accurately because they come from dated buildings; whereas Larrieu, in her main catalogue (1964, 109) disclaims any attempt to date, and maintains that position in a later article (1972). Cabanot, while admitting that any attempt at dating is premature, maintains that the marble quarries were at work into the eighth century (1972, 1; 17). But the important features of these capitals are, first, that they are of marble - and therefore imitate one of the most prestigious features of Roman architecture - and, secondly, that several of them were themselves re-used in later buildings: they took their place, as it were, in the canon of `good' architecture. The proof of this is that they were sometimes themselves imitated in stone during the Carolingian period (Fossard 1947, 85, note 4).

Of course, it is possible that some techniques simply survived, and therefore did not require revival. How this may be ascertained is difficult to say: for example, the use of lost-wax casting techniques in Carolingian Aachen (Gazda 1970, 249) could point either way.

The imitation of Roman ground plans

If Roman techniques were often imitated, Roman foundations often built upon, Roman sites continuously inhabited, and Roman materials re-used, then what was the importance of Roman ground-plans for the overall design of mediaeval buildings and the setting they occupied (cf. the comments on this matter for Vaison: Sautel 1924, 13ff.)? If, for example, the ceremonial of Charlemagne's palace at Aix derived from Byzantine prototypes, did the setting for them derive from late Imperial architectural fashion? Was the basilica modelled on the Constantinian specimen at Trier? Were there not close ties between the layout of the Royal Villa at Ingelheim (near Mainz), with its great eastern hemicycle, and antique villas such as that at Montmaurin? Such questions must be answered with a cautious `perhaps', for we have insufficient evidence to build sequences century by century. By the seventh century, perhaps, nobody lived in antique villas any more, so the genre must have died out until the later fifteenth century (Greenhalgh 1978, 62ff.), when architects could begin a thoroughgoing revival because there were still plenty of ruins visible.

The Survival of Mosaics, Frescoes and Inscriptions

Mosaics

The use of mosaic decoration is characteristic of antique urban living, and many thousands of floor mosaics (but far fewer wall and vault mosaics) have survived: these have been used as an index of prosperity and fashion, and thereby as a means of dating the continuation of urban life (Dauphin 1980). Unlike statues, which could be removed for breaking or admiration, or sarcophagi, which could be re-used, mosaics may seem to have been useless in any form other than fixed to wall, floor or vault. The qualification is necessary for two reasons: first, because antique tessera (so conveniently sized for spoliation) were sometimes dismounted and then re-used in different patterns; and, secondly, because glass tessera appear to have been sought in order to recycle the glass. This is supported by the suggestion that the millefiori work in the Sutton Hoo treasure could well be reused Roman millefiori, or just re-used Roman glass (Bruce Mitford 1983, 936); and it is also one of the recommendations of Theophilus, who writes (Dodwell 1961, 44f.) that `In the ancient buildings of pagans, various kinds of glass are found in the mosaic work ... From these, enamels are made in gold, silver and copper ... One also comes across various small vessels of the same colours, which the French - who are most skilled in this work - collect. The blue they melt in their kilns, adding to it a little clear and white glass, and make from it precious blue sheets of glass, which are very useful for windows ... the Greeks also make from these blue stones precious goblets for drinking.' Similarly, Eraclius gives a recipe De gemmis quas de Romano vitro facere quaeris (1.xiv, in Merrifield 1849, 1.183ff.), and another for glazing earthenware pots with glaze made from Roman glass (ibid., 1.iii; and cf. Ballardini 1964, 220ff.). The mediaeval love of glass and marble is but a continuation of Roman traditions: Pliny describes the mixture used at the theatre of M. Emilius Scaurus as being `an extravagance unparalleled even in later times' (Nat. Hist. 36.114); and pieces of glass imitating marble have survived, surely from wall decorations (Campus 1982, esp. pl. 46f.).

It can easily be explained how mosaics became available, for builders certainly came across them casually. At Trinquetaille, the villa of the Clos S. Jean had a fine mosaic of the Golden Fleece, substantially restored in the Gallo-Roman period: the site was re-occupied and, while some walls cut through the mosaic, others - perhaps those of the church of S. Thomas - rest directly upon it (Benoit 1934, 221ff.). At the villa of La Hillière, near Montmaurin, mediaeval burials lie right on a large Roman mosaic (James 1977, 447).  Place-names reflect such knowledge of antique floors: Cameron (1977, 111-12) reports two British occurrences of `fawler', meaning a mosaic pavement - one of which has been confirmed by excavation. Perhaps the same applies to the appellation `flor', OE `floor', also indicating earlier settlement, and Chessel, which may mean tesserae from ploughed up mosaic.

Such depredations apart, the survival of mosaics intact depended on the integrity of the buildings which contained them. Opened to the elements, frost and moisture could combine quickly to destroy them: well maintained, they could last for centuries with relatively little attention. Repair and restoration are themselves a gauge of the esteem in which mosaics were frequently held: in Byzantium, there is evidence of repair (and alteration) after the period of iconoclasm and, in the West, the earliest restoration extant is of the Carolingian period, on the mosaics of S. M. Maggiore (Alexander 1977), the next perhaps the sensitive work of a late twelfth-century artist on Torcello (Andreescu 1977, 20). Several antique floors survive in place, but with altered or later buildings protecting them. One even has an antique mosaic inscription: S. Angelo in Formis, built in the temple of Diana Tifatina, retains the original floor, with sections of an inscription of 74 BC relating to the `titulus magistrorum Campanorum'; and although some of its sections have had their black tessera replaced by white at some stage, `L. F.' and then `IVS. L. F.' are clearly visible and, together with traces of the cella wall, would have been so throughout the Middle Ages (De Franciscis 1956, 18ff. and figs 8-10). And a reference in Beowulf has been interpreted as meaning that Saxon halls were sometimes erected on former villa sites, using their mosaic floors (Higgitt 1973, 2); there is as yet no archaeological evidence for such a practice, but that the floor referred to could well be mosaic, taken up from a Roman building and re-used (Cramp 1957, 76).

The durability of mosaic meant that it was easy to re-use. Tessera were sometimes ripped out for use elsewhere, although the evidence usually comes to light only when the `new' work is examined back and front. At the villa of Sette Finestre, for example, this happened in the Roman period itself, as it did at a villa near the `Tomba di Nerone' on the via Cassia; but here, for reasons unknown, the tessera were discovered by the excavators in a pile in one of the rooms - although the marble cladding from that and another room had already been stripped and carried off (Ward Perkins 1959, 155). It is certain that the practice was common in Roman times, for many mosaic floors, particularly of the late Empire, make use of spolia, identifiable by inscriptions or architectural decoration on the verso. In some cases, however, we can only guess: surely so little of the superb opus sectile work remains in Nero's Domus Transitoria that we may assume it was removed very quickly - for use in the Flavian layers above. Given the `jigsaw' nature of mosaic, it is likely that at least a few antique schemes were grubbed up and `re-cycled' in the Middle Ages, not necessarily in the same patterns. A study of the porphyry roundels which are such a feature of Cosmatesque and Carolingian pavements shows that whereas many clearly have been sawn (presumably from columns, as the traditional view has it), many more are completely smooth, suggesting a direct antique source in opus sectile decorations on antique walls or floors (Glass 1980, 29); indeed, Becatti (1948, 207) remarks that the marble wall decoration at Ostia is a prelude to Byzantine taste. An examination of the underside of such roundels and smaller tesserae could indicate whether they were in fact spolia; but the only firm way of deciding whether tesserae are reconstituted from antique works, or alternatively contemporary pieces put together in an antiquarian pattern, would be to rely on differences in the way they were cut: this does not appear to have been attempted.

Survivals of wall mosaics were relatively rare outside Rome, and the account of Abbot Agnellus, of about 839, of two mosaics of equestrian groups of Theodoric in the palaces of Pavia and Ravenna is therefore valuable (Colin 1947, 89ff.; Della Valle 1959, 128) - although he writes of the Ravenna one in the past tense. In Rome, those in the Basilica of Junius Bassus and the church of S. Adriano (which occupied the seat of the antique Curia: Mancini 1967-8, fig. 2). were well known. And, of course, large expanses of Ravennate mosaics were available and esteemed enough to be imitated - earliest of all, perhaps, in thirteenth-century Venice (Demus 1955). One bridle on the extended use of mosaic during the earlier Middle Ages may have been the lack of skilled craftsmen. Bernward of Hildesheim (bishop 992-1022) was an undoubted innovator in the arts, and his antiquarianism is, of course, well known from his triumphal candelabrum. His biographer, Thangmar, notes that `he also taught himself the art of laying mosaic floors and how to make bricks and tiles ... And the old places, which had belonged to his predecessors and which he found destitute, he brightened with excellent buildings. Some of these he adorned with alternating white and red stones according to a beautiful pattern and by various mosaics' (Davis-Weyer 1971, 122-3).

A broken and uncertain tradition

The uncertain history of mosaics in the earlier Middle Ages has provoked more questions than answers. Dufrenne enquires (1980) why opus tessellatum and opus vermiculatum disappeared in the Middle Ages, while musivum opus survived. At Ravenna, Farioli (1971) maintains that these techniques continued without a break from the fourth to the twelfth century. Barral I Altet has now claimed (1973) that, in other areas as well, there is no break between Antiquity and the Romanesque period, because several pavements can now be dated to the eighth and ninth centuries, thereby filling in vital gaps. Such continuous traditions are local, not widespread; and in all of them (particularly in Italy), the antique heritage plays a strong part. In Rome, where mediaeval pavements are more common than anywhere else, we await a coherent series of dating for floor mosaics.

Mosaics were but one feature of an antique desire for sturdy splendour: according to Pliny (NH 36.184), the practice of decorating pavements `after the fashion of painting' was begun by the Greeks. Fine examples of interior decoration using different varieties of marble can be seen at sites such as Ostia, but a coherent account of how techniques and styles were imitated is not yet possible, because (in spite of the bold statements relayed above) we have insufficient examples from the earlier mediaeval centuries in the West - the East being a different matter (Dauphin 1980, 114ff.). Consequently, survivals are difficult to date: an illustration of the problem being Stern's dating of the Pomposa mosaic to the Romanesque period, in the face of other scholars who believe it to be paleochristian (Toubert 1970, n. 14). With many works we can, naturally, be more precise, but such exactitude only serves to emphasise the surrounding darkness. Dufrenne has recently suggested (1980) that `the antique inspiration for certain iconographic details of manuscript images (she cites the Utrecht Psalter) had once been furnished by mosaic pavements of Late Antiquity' - a suitably cautious formulation for the present state of knowledge. We will argue below that schemes such as those at Ostia - ensembles which are in sympathy with practice of the High Middle Ages (Cagiano de Azevedo 1970) - were available and imitated, using spolia; but whether the practice was widespread (except of course in church decoration) seems in doubt. Mosaic work was of great interest for parts of the Middle Ages because it is a type of painting, frequently in semi-precious materials - marbles and coloured stones for the floor designs, and glass for the wall and vault mosaics. The richness of the latter, and the scarcity of the various kinds of tessera required for the former, would contribute to the attraction of the medium, which was highly prized, as can be seen in mediaeval descriptions, encyclopaedias, poems and sermons (Barral I Altet 1978, ch. 2).

Opus sectile is, according to McClendon (1980), the technique which reveals the revivalism of the Carolingian period because, although a feature of late antique work, it was mosaic and opus tessellatum which were used between then and the ninth century. He sees in the striking similarities between antique work (citing examples from Ostia) and Carolingian work an indication that much of the later work may be spolia (ibid., 161). Ensembles in the same manner were also available in Rome itself (Becatti 1948, 210f.). A similar revivalism informs the wall mosaics of the Carolingian period, when popes, `particularly Leo II and Paschal, returned to mosaic, a medium characteristic of the great early Christian monuments, but scarcely practised in Rome since the mid-seventh century' (Alexander 1977, 18).

Monte Cassino may also have used spolia for its mosaic pavement as it did for the rest of its building works, for Leo of Ostia in his Chronicle of Monte Cassino (3.18.26-32; Davis-Weyer 1971, 135ff.) notes that the abbot from 1058 to 1087, the resourceful Desiderius, undertook a rebuilding programme on a large scale, making great use of antique materials, as we have seen. That this was part of a programme of conscious antiquarianism can be deduced both from Alfanus' poem composed to honour the dedication, and from the inscription placed on the chancel arch, which paraphrases that of Constantine at the Vatican basilica (texts in Bergman 1980, 116f.). Such a commission highlights the decadence of the tenth century after the conscious revivalism of the ninth when, for the first time in several centuries, it appears, mosaics were produced in Rome as part of a concentrated and sustained building programme pursued by a series of popes elected from the great and wealthy Roman families (Krautheimer 1980, 141-2). The Cosmati were to be an important part of this programme, and much of their material must have been obtained by breaking up antiquities, perhaps even floors (Wentzel 1955, 57ff. for general comments). The many examples of direct imitation of antique motifs in Roman pavements of the eleventh and twelfth centuries (Toubert 1970, n. 14) indicate but one aspect of a widespread and skilful revival of antique forms in several media. Thus Toubert (ibid., n. 84) suggests that the makers (surely Roman?) of the San Clemente absidal mosaic may have examined the work in the lower church before it was abandoned, as well as that at Monte Cassino. And some of the decorative patterns in the Lower Church of San Clemente have also been linked (Toubert 1976, 22ff., figs 13-15), together with others found at Monte Cassino and in Salerno Cathedral, with antique patterns found at Herculaneum - more evidence of a revival of the antique based on the survival of antique exemplars.

The revival of ancient Roman (not Byzantine) styles

We can also turn to the various mosaic techniques to show that Western revivals depend on the Western antique and not on Byzantium. In the East, opus tessellatum and opus vermiculatum (the first rather plain patterns, the second pictures made from coloured marbles) declined and gave way to opus musivum - patterns of glass cubes, largely on walls and vaults. Rather than a reaction to the fear of trampling images, the change was probably aesthetic, as pleasure was derived from large plaques of marble on the floors, and glinting glass mosaics on the walls (Dufrenne 1980). In the East, marbles like porphyry and serpentine were in constant use; in the West, on the other hand, it was not until the twelfth century that they were much used, and then consistently in Cosmatesque pavements, which nearly always use only a mixture of white marble, serpentine, giallo antico and porphyry (Glass 1980, 3). It has been convincingly argued that this revival, with its emphasis on porphyry, forms part of the Investiture Controversy (Glass 1969); its formal elements derive ultimately from Byzantine practice, and the use of what was essentially opus sectile exactly matches that of the ninth century (as seen, for example, at Farfa, and in the S. Zeno Chapel at S. Prassede), for both make use of the central porphyry roundel, and patterns in white marble, serpentine and giallo antico (Glass 1980, 32). That such work is a variation of opus sectile known as opus alexandrinum, which came into fashion in Italy during the late Empire, makes it the more likely that both revivals depend on direct knowledge of antiquities; not that there is any question of the wholesale imitation of antique works, for what happens is that some antique details are elaborated into patterns. Indeed, no antique schemes give such prominence to porphyry, supplies of which in the time of the Cosmati are traditionally explained as deriving from porphyry columns, so that `the diameter of the porphyry roundel, cut from an antique column, determined the entire layout of a Cosmatesque floor' (Glass 1980, 22). We know, furthermore, that such highly coloured opus sectile pavements, an Hellenistic tradition absent from Italy until perhaps the late third century, were probably available to the Middle Ages, for many have been found at Ostia (Becatti 1961; 1969); and these, like many other pavements there, have been robbed out at various times, leaving only the screed behind (Becatti 1961, 251f.). Outside Europe, of course, the possibilities were much greater; thus Buondelmonti, travelling in the early fifteenth century, found on Crete `underneath a heap of rubble a mosaic pavement with all its figures perfect' (Weiss 1969, 136).

To take but the most famous example of supposed Eastern influence: one might imagine that, with imported craftsmen, not to mention the high regard in which the civilisation of the East was held at this time (Rentschler 1978), the Monte Cassino pavement (church dedicated 1071) would be in an imported style, but this is not the case. Glass (1980, 26, 29) provides comparisons in her study of Cosmatesque pavements which make the matter very clear: the Cosmati were much influenced by the Monte Cassino pavement, and six of the patterns they use derive from it; three of these selfsame patterns are antique in origin - but not one of them appears in Byzantine pavements. Much the same equation can be made by comparing Cosmatesque pavements with Byzantine ones: eleven antique patterns have been identified in the work of the Cosmati, but only one of these appears in antique Roman pavements in the East, and not a single one in Byzantine pavements of the tenth or eleventh centuries. We must conclude that both the Monte Cassino craftsmen and the Cosmati knew and imitated antique Western designs - and not antique designs filtered down to them through intermediaries in the Byzantine Empire. And because mosaic designs are unlikely to have been handed down to such craftsmen through another medium (compare manuscript illumination as the carrier of traditions of monumental painting), it follows that artists of the eleventh and twelfth centuries had access to antique pavements. For our purposes, then, the fact that there are whole centuries without any fully proven mosaic `tradition' at all is a piece of luck, for it tends to show that the revival of interest in mosaics at various periods of the Middle Ages must repose on the survival of pagan and paleochristian schemes - that is, across a gap of several centuries (cf. Venice's early use of such schemes: Demus 1955). Such is certainly the case with Carolingian work in Rome (Belting 1976).

Barral I Altet's assertion of continuity may change this state of affairs; but the existence in seventh- to ninth-century Rome - that centre of revivals - of two pavement types, one antique-based, the other proto-Cosmati (Barral I Altet 1973, 191) strongly suggests the existence of antique exemplars and even, as we have seen, the re-use of actual antique tessera. In this respect, it is surely no coincidence that all Barral I Altet's suggested `continuous' centres - Aquileia, Rome, Ravenna and parts of Gaul - are areas with a strong antique (and often paleochristian) presence. Indeed, the latest student of Desiderius' plans (Carbonara 1979, 37-8) parallels the choice of the paleochristian basilican plan with the use of opus alexandrinum, itself classical in origin, pointing out that such a mosaic type was also used at about the same time in Longobard southern Italy, particularly Benevento. Like all scholars of the period, Carbonara bemoans the gaps in our knowledge, particularly for the tenth century, which make it impossible to establish the correctness of Desiderius' claims that there was indeed a break in continuity between the classicism of the eighth and ninth centuries, and that of the eleventh.

What is more, so frequently do artists of the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries make use of antique motifs - including masks, cornucopia, putti, dolphins and other forms hitherto unseen since Antiquity - that `they seem to have been collected with some archaeological pedantry by painters struck with an interest in the antique' (Toubert 1970, 105). And while the models for the great apse-mosaic at S. Clemente are largely paleochristian, as Toubert has suggested, this work is also as far as we know the first such decoration for two centuries. Nor was the phenomenon of interest in antique mosaics confined to the West; Velmans (1967, 232) detects in the designs of the Palaeologan artist of the fourteenth century Parisinus Grecus MS no. 135 an interest not only in Gothic forms, but also in antique pavement mosaics.

Some archaeological evidence

If hints that ancient mosaics survived above ground during the Middle Ages can be gleaned from their reflections in mediaeval schemes, the archaeological evidence can be equally tangential. For, even if it can show availability, it cannot tell us about appreciation. For example, twelfth-century coins have been found on the Roman floors of the Lower Agora at Corinth (Scranton 1957, 31f.), but we can draw no conclusion from this. Equally uninformative is the case of the late Roman villa at Piazza Armerina, Sicily, the scandal of the `excavation' of which has been underlined by Carandini (1982, 7f.): those who dug there omitted either to describe or to publish fully the later settlement evidence (cf. Gentili 1950). It has been suggested (Ampolo 1971, 167) that in Arabic and Norman times (when there were indeed kilns on the site: Carandini 1982, 146) the floor level in the villa was the antique one - that is, that the splendid series of mosaics were in full view. Exact dating is lacking, but the terminus ante is suggested as 1161, when the Lombards destroyed Casale, creating a clear stratum with cinders all over the villa (Ampolo 1971, 265). Continuity of life is certain at the villa for the fifth to seventh centuries, on pottery evidence, and Byzantine coins have been found up to 832/9. This fits well with restorations of some mosaics, as in the Frigidarium, bracketed by Carandini (1982, 343ff., 376f.) as late as 550/850. The site may well have been abandoned for a time in the Arab period, but it was then occupied by a sizeable community (Gentili 1950, 334f.); from which Cecchi (1970, 261ff.) concludes that the availability of these superb designs until after 1000 was of great importance for the development of polychrome pavements in the Romanesque period. The converse argument (Wilson 1983, 41f.) is that by the eighth century the mosaic must `have long been covered with rubbish and earth'. Although contextual evidence is lacking; but the existence of Byzantine, Arab and Norman additions to the site, which were removed when it was excavated (plan in Wilson 1983, pl. 23), demonstrates at least the opportunity to find and view the mosaics.

Paleochristian mosaics naturally survived even better than pagan ones, although the Renaissance, usually unsympathetic to  the medium (Andreescu 1977, 21f.), sometimes replaced them with frescoes, and did not even re-use the tessera as Charlemagne had done. One example of destruction is the Baptistery of Sant' Ambrogio in Milan, whose vault was covered with gold-leaf tessera, large quantities of which were found when the site was excavated (cf. Nordhagen 1978, 263). When it was demolished in the fifteenth century, the marble veneers were saved for re-use, and the task accomplished by sapping, mining and fire. The tessera were left in the rubble.

Mosaics in the north

If a complete `history' of mediaeval mosaics is lacking for Italy, Gaul presents even greater difficulties, for not only can the production of mosaics be traced no later than the early fifth century (and this in a Christian context, in Provence), but Barral I Altet (1978) can find no more than 41 survivals for the whole mediaeval period: the majority are Romanesque, for there are only three fragmentary paleochristian designs, and scarcely six others which antedate the eleventh century (Stern 1962, 18, 32f.). The vagueness of the figures is due to the difficulty of dating several of the examples, or even deciding whether they might be re-used antique sections. One scholar (James 1977, 143) has argued that the survival of mosaic floors in Aquitaine into the Merovingian period is assured on stylistic grounds, because mosaic-derived patterns appear on buckles; he notes that `it is probable that it is these (mosaics surviving after the end of the Empire) which are now lost to us, for they were in houses and villas which were preserved, used, restored and `improved' in the centuries after the collapse of the Empire: most of those Gallic mosaics which survive to this day appear to have been in villas which were destroyed in or soon after the barbarian invasions'.

However, unlike those in Italy, French Romanesque mosaics do not continue antique fashions; not only is that period characterised as `an ephemeral splendour, after several centuries of neglect' (Barral I Altet 1972, 118), but the type of opus sectile adopted is unlike that used in Antiquity both in its colouring and in its use of plaques of marble. The survival of antique patterns and materials in France therefore antedates the Romanesque period, as for example the mosaic found on the site of the Saint-Martial crypt at Limoges, dated to the ninth century, or the fragments on the site of Saint-Croix at Poitiers, which might be sixth or ninth century (ibid., 119). The Limoges mosaic, condemned by Stern as `clumsy' (1962, 16), somewhat incongruously uses cubes of gilded glass and deep green marble, probably taken from antique pavements. This could also be the case with the early ninth century mosaic found under the cathedral of Saint-Quentin, where antique motifs are copied - but using only simple colours, and not the rich polychromy usual in the late Empire. The mosaics in the Cathedral of Saint-Jean, Lyon, have been dated to the eleventh century (rather than much earlier) because they employ the same non-antique simple colours.

More sophisticated mosaic schemes did exist, but the inspiration for them was probably from the South: Charlemagne robbed Rome for material for the monastery at Centula: the `marble and columns' mentioned in the account could include mosaic work (McClendon 1980, 163f.). But the best-known example concerns Charlemagne's building of the Chapel Palatine at Aachen (Knoegel 1936, no. 876), when not only did he import craftsmen for the work, as Desiderius was to do (Notger Charlemagne ch. 28), but he also got permission from Pope Hadrian to take mosaics and marble from Ravenna: but we do not know whether he re-used the tesserae in new designs, reproduced the original ones, or simply had areas of wall carried to Aachen and set in new mortar. He could also have found useful spolia already on site (cf. ANRW 2.4, 146). He would have known of the possibilities of secular mosaic from the survival in Ravenna of the mosaic representation of Theodoric (already mentioned), as well as the actual statue he had taken to Aachen (MGH Script. rer. Lang. 1.337f.). On balance, transportation in `tessera' not `wall' form seems the more likely: the Venetians appear to have brought back mosaic tesserae from Constantinople as part of their booty from the Fourth Crusade (Andreescu 1977, 22); but as there is no suggestion that actual slabs of finished mosaic were transported, perhaps Charlemagne's craftsmen had done likewise. That the transplantation of small areas was feasible is suggested by the likelihood that this was done in twelfth century restorations in S. Giovanni in Laterano, S. Pietro, and S. Paolo fuori le Mura. An analogy is the re-use of mediaeval stained glass in later structures, at least from the twelfth century (Caviness 1973, 206ff.). Perhaps, therefore, we should not read too much into the importation of mosaics by Charlemagne, for the recycling of mosaics might have been as common a practice as the re-use of columns: Liutprand, for example, boasted of decorating his monastery church of S. Anastasio at Corteolona  (built 729ff.) with precious marbles, mosaics and columns - surely mostly spolia (Calderini 1975, 179).

Not all material re-used in the North need have been imported, however: the early ninth century mosaic at Saint-Germigny-des-Prés uses tessera of red and pink, cut from the debris of antique pots, but also cubes of gold and silver foil on green glass supports, for which the only (surviving) comparisons are at Ravenna and Aix. Their commissioner, Theodulf, may well have made his own tessera, because débris of glass pastes have been found in the presbytery garden (Louis 1975, 426ff.). The Rhine had had a large glass industry since Roman times, which certainly survived the fall of the Empire (Snijder 1933, 119); and there is evidence for a thriving glassmaking industry at Trier in the ninth century, producing material for the cathedral (Roslanowski 1965, 104): could any of this have gone toward the decoration of the palace at Aachen? These can be no more than suggestions, for Theodulf could easily have first robbed old mosaics and then melted down the glass for his own purposes - and Charlemagne's workmen could have done the same for Aachen. In this connection it would be interesting to know to what extent Roman mosaics outside Italy used what Nordhagen (1978, 259) calls `the pure glass tradition' - and, therefore, their level of susceptibility to recycling. Similarly, it would be helpful to know whether any of the gold sandwich tessera in mediaeval schemes are indeed spolia.

But even if there is no strict parentage between Gallo-Roman and Romanesque mosaics, and direct evidence that Charlemagne preferred southern work, this does not necessarily mean that antique mosaics were unavailable during our period - and Theophilus' remark, quoted above, suggests that they were. Crozet, for example, argues (1956, 22f.) that the identity of certain patterns between the two periods does indicate the use of Gallo Roman models (and cf. James 1977), but he is in a distinct minority, for neither Stern nor Barral I Altet are disposed to see the revival of mosaic in the eleventh century as having any other than vague connections with either Gallo-Roman or paleochristian work, and then usually only in iconography: the latter believes that any continuity between Antiquity and the Middle Ages was in any case only at a local level (1978, ch. 1); he is also more confident over dating than, for example, Stern (e.g. Stern 1962, 22-3).

Few examples of actual re-use have come to light. One is the pavement at Sorde (Landes) which, while it certainly might be eleventh century, could equally be a collection of antique Gallo-Roman and Carolingian pavements found in the region and put together patchwork-fashion in the choir (arguments in Stern 1962, 21f.). Another is the pavement found underneath the apse of Saint-Pierre-des-Cuisines, Toulouse, which consists of fragments of birds and fish in a geometric framework; the supposition is that parts of a paleochristian mosaic were re-used at a time when there was a dearth of craftsmen skilled enough to create a new design (Barral I Altet 1973, 195). In the case of Valence, there is a possibility that the mosaic is indeed re-used in a later baptistery, or even that the building itself (now disappeared) and mosaic are both Romanesque; but whatever the dating, it is clear that baptistery and mosaic continued in use for several centuries (Stern 1962, 24). However, what re-use there was may continue traditional interest in mosaics in Gaul, for there are references in Gregory of Tours to new mosaics being made (died 580; Knoegel 1936, nos 42, 239); to a large mosaic apse in S. Etienne at Auxerre, by 614 (ibid., no. 142), and to work in S. Eusebius in the same city by the next bishop (623-59; ibid., no. 149). Much earlier, Childebert I's (511-58) basilica of S. Vincent in Paris has not only marble columns, but also a figured pavement (ibid., no. 401). He perhaps robbed out Parisian ruins for his materials, just as S. Aritus (died 518) surely did when he built at Vienne a baptistery `marvellously decorated with mosaic and marble, and including a finely worked pavement' (ibid., no. 501). This same tradition of robbing antique sites was surely continued when Archbishop Léger of Vienne, in the mid-eleventh century, decorated his choir `with the most precious stones'; it was perhaps he who made the `marble mausoleum' in which he was buried (Mortet 1911, 86f.).

Post-mediaeval destruction

In order to place in perspective the difficulties of tracing actual survivals `on the ground' we must bear in mind what has disappeared in the course of only the last few centuries. In 1554, Francis I had an antique mosaic at S. Gilles du Gard taken up to decorate Fontainebleau. A Provençal historian, writing about 1650, Remerville de Saint-Quentin, noted that `whenever one digs, one finds the remains of old buildings ... and even whole pavements of that admirable material which the Romans used for the embellishment of great cities, and which ordinary people in this province call "mosaic"'. The modern cataloguer of the surviving mosaics of the province of Gallia Narbonensis has far greater problems: he has 223 catalogue entries of mosaics known to have existed, but actual descriptions of only 75 of these. Moreover, for 40 of the 75 only descriptions or reproductions survive, so great have been the depredations of urban expansion, indifference and neglect (Lavagne 1979, 13). In rough terms, therefore, the survival rate from about 1700 (the date of the earliest descriptions and illustrations of mosaics) would be under 16 per cent.

One monument's mosaic decoration disappeared partly for medicinal reasons. Sections of the opus sectile work in the fourth century Basilica of Junius Bassus (which G. da Sangallo had recorded in all its splendour) survive because the French fathers of the church which occupied the site and the hall of the basilica gave them away as presents, for they wished to use the resin with which the tessera were fixed to the wall as medicine (Becatti 1969, 183f.). That the scheme really was as sumptuous as the surviving fragments and Renaissance drawings suggest can now be shown by the discovery of similar schemes at Ostia (Becatti 1969, passim). .st Other Survivals: Frescoes

Frescoes

Just when the panel paintings of antiquity were destroyed or stolen is often impossible to say; but according to the writings of Bishop Synesios of Cyrene, of c. 400 AD, the paintings in the Stoa Poikile at Athens had been taken away (he implies recently) by a certain proconsul - that is, some of the works of Polygnotus survived several centuries before being carried to Rome.  The fate of frescoes, on the other hand, like that of mosaics, was tied to the building in which they were made. Although they were certainly as available in the Middle Ages as the structures in which they were located, we have no clear picture of what part they might have played in the `rebirth' of antique forms of art. Indeed frescoes and manuscript paintings are the realm in which the problem of `tradition' versus direct imitation is at its most thorny: either side can be supported, because we no more possess the Byzantine works from which Giotto is supposed to have taken some of his work than we do those antique works he could equally well have imitated. Sometimes, however, the resemblance between mediaeval painting and its antique forebears is too close to permit exclusive use of the `tradition' argument. Although it had long been assumed that antique frescoes were not well known before the uncovering of the cities of Pompei and Herculaneum (and scarcely known at all before the uncovering of the Golden House of Nero late in the fifteenth century), their echoes in the work of the Middle Ages have led Krautheimer (1980, 186f.) to assume that the Golden House and the Palatine palaces were not only accessible but actually visited. Less securely, it might be maintained that catacomb frescoes were visible and available long before Chacon drew some of them in the later fifteenth century (Bovini 1952).

Certainly, much of mediaeval iconography is traditional but innumerable details make it certain that artists like Cavallini and Giotto had antique frescoes before their eyes. Beyen (1960, 23) makes the very interesting observation that whereas, in antiquity, the invention of illusionistic fresco followed that of panel painting, in the Middle Ages it preceded it - suggesting, if we accept the usual thesis of movement from the simple to the complicated, that mediaeval artists did not invent their own schema. Beyen, however, never considers what archaeological evidence might exist for survival of antique works of art, and even denies (ibid., 36) that the Renaissance had access to antique still lifes. Indeed, familiarity with true classical vocabulary - rather than with some watered-down `tradition' of antique technique or style - can be seen in the design of the Torhalle at Lorsch, or at Assisi, where Kruft has shown (1971) that the frescoes of the Legend of S. Francis have connections with the Second and Fourth Pompeian Styles which are so close that direct knowledge must be assumed; these are particularly evident in the painted architectural system. John White had already made similar comparisons which emphasised the importance of Rome and its surviving antique art for the work in Assisi and throughout Italy, and his conclusion is unequivocal: `it was in Rome that Italian painters first rediscovered nature through the art of late antiquity' (1956, 93ff.).

As early as the the beginning of the twelfth century, knowledge of ancient fresco schemes is in evidence at Rome, as we can see from three types of work. First, a wide range of decorative motifs is used in both fresco and mosaic, and could have been imitated from either. Secondly, the artists of the 1120s begin to collect a whole series of motifs from antiquity hitherto unused even in such a traditional city - works `which seem to have been collected with a certain pedantry by painters rapt in enthusiasm for antiquity' (Toubert 1970, 105). Thirdly, and most important, whole antique schemes are imitated, including settings of fictive architecture; little remains either from antiquity or the twelfth century to study the comparisons, but Toubert's juxtaposition (ibid., figs 17-18) of the S.M. in Cosmedin scheme with Sangallo's drawing of the Basilica of Junius Bassus is convincing. Such antiquarian traditions continue into the thirteenth century: compare the perspective niches frescoed on the walls of Nicholas III's Vatican Palace c. 1280, with those made by Giotto at Padua a little later; or, indeed, the work at S.M. Maggiore with that in the Papal Palace of the Vatican, and of Orvieto and Viterbo (Radke 1984, figs 6, 15-17, 20) - proof of Krautheimer's contention (1980, 222f.) that the late thirteenth-century revival of the antique was more broadly based in its sources than that of a century and a half previously, and more inclined to look further afield than mere late antique and Christian exemplars (cf. Gardner 1973, 35-8). But these certainly played an important role (P[um]aseler 1950); for example, Cavallini's restoration of the fifth-century frescoes in S. Paolo fuori le Mura, and his own great series which he added to them, with their many `antiquarian' overtones, must have helped the process (White 1956; Kruft 1971, 169). Panel paintings were sometimes transported: Benedict Biscop brought some on religious subjects to Wearmouth, from his fifth and sixth visits to Rome (Hist. Abb. 6, 9), although it is not known if these were old.

It is difficult to speculate about mediaeval knowledge of antique frescoes without remembering the many instances in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century art where antique influences are to be seen but where no suitable comparanda have survived (Greenhalgh 1982, 28ff.); one example where the whole ethos of the antique villa is also promoted is the fresco of the Vatican Belvedere, published by Ackerman (1951, 78ff.). Let us hope that greater attention to mediaeval layers on classical sites will illuminate this interesting area.

Inscriptions

Why inscriptions survived so well

Many inscriptions survived because the gravestones or architectural members on which they were written had at least one plane face and three squared sides, and therefore made useful building material. Because Christian structures often rise over pagan cemeteries, it is churches (the most solidly built structures of the Middle Ages) which usually harbour them, so that the proportion of surviving or known inscriptions found in the walls of churches is high, as can be appreciated from any volume of the CIL. Around the Comminges and the Couserans, for example, the subject of a study by J. J. Hatt on Gallo-Roman funerary monuments (1942-3), about 50 per cent of the objects are set in church walls both internal and external, bell-towers or cemetery walls, while a few are in use as key-stones and one as a water stoup. Indeed, that many inscriptions must have been on view for many centuries can easily be deduced from their surface state: for where museums display pieced-together inscriptions (e.g. at Saint Bertrand de Comminges, or at Aquileia), the pristine sharpness of the recently unearthed and tended sections contrasts with the weatherworn surface and softened detailing of those parts that have been out in the weather.

Funerary stelai and altars were often re-used when cities expanded in the Middle Ages, and were probably a main source of mediaeval knowledge of antique inscriptions. Originally located outside the Roman walls, we find that churches built extra muros harbour large quantities of them - as at Modena (see above, p.00), Spoleto (for the collections of which, and list of locations, find-spots and comments, see Sansi 1869, 255ff.) or Milan, where finds have been used to pin-point cemeteries (Arslan 1982, 206ff.).

Although there are exceptions (particularly from cities like Ostia, which were systematically plundered), most inscriptions probably did not move far from their original location, and many took a long time to degrade. Rome provided for the surrounding area, as we know from the fragment of the Arval acta found in a mausoleum at the destroyed church of S. Rufina on the Via Cornelia: of the second century AD, the re-use is of the fifth or sixth century, and came `presumably in a load of building material brought out from the city to the site' (Reynolds 1969); indeed, it would probably have come from near the fifth milestone on the Via Portuensis. Even such a small distance was probably exceptional, when compared with the story of that extraordinary plan of Rome, the Forma Urbis Marmorea. Thanks to the ingenious detective work of Cozza and others, its post-Roman history can be reconstructed (Rodriguez-Almeida 1981, 21ff.). It was fixed to a wall of the Forum Pacis, through which a passageway was made about 420, and punched from the inside out, so that bits of the map fell off; this was later blocked by a wall. In the late Middle Ages, the Forum was abandoned. The upper slabs of the Forma began to fall off, and the lower sections were systematically robbed. At some stage those pieces still in place were damaged by fire, which must have happened when the plan was no longer whole, because adjacent surviving fragments are sometimes damaged and sometimes not. The difficulties of dating such a sequence of events underline the problems involving other monuments and works of art which have not been so intensively studied: compare Degrassi's description (1947, 1ff.) of the discovery in 1546 of the Fasti on the site of lime kilns, whence they might have been extracted had any hunt for inscriptions gone on in earlier centuries.

A cornerstone of interest in Antiquity

Calabi Limentani (1966, 192) believes that the Renaissance considered inscriptions the most important remains of the Latin language. This was surely also true of the Middle Ages, for inscriptions were probably always studied, given that the first collections on paper were made at the end of the fifth century; however, the earliest survival dates from the Carolingian period (ibid., 155f.). Inscriptions have an important place in the development of ideas about the antique because they are, as it were, verbal testimony from the ancients: they make monuments come alive and illustrate ideas and actions some of which are also found in the ancient authors (Saxl 1941; Weiss 1958 sets them in the context of other antiquarian pursuits). For the city fathers of expanding mediaeval communities, therefore, they could sometimes be used as examples of past greatness and as a spur to local pride - preserved because they were considered appropriate to some political or religious purpose - a recycling, as it were, of their original aims (Susini 1982, 116ff.). We can, indeed, trace the `decline of secular munificence' by studying inscriptions relating to the restoration of buildings and statues - and then, in their turn, the decline of inscriptions as well (Ward-Perkins 1984, 3ff., 230ff.). Fortunately, however, the Church tended to record foundations and endowments in inscriptional form (ibid., 73ff.), thereby helping preserve the medium. Generally, however, inscriptions were re-used as building material (although often with the inscribed face visible), and thus preserved especially in the fabric of mediaeval churches and city gates (as at Norcia: Cordella 1982, plan A).

Perhaps because they were in a sense the `very words' of their author, inscriptions have often been considered `authoritative' - witness the interest apparently roused during the reign of Nero when tablets with script (whether Linear A or B is not known) were found at Knossos (Gordon 1971); or the (false) interpretation about 1300 by a pilgrim of a pagan inscription (CIL 11.1926) semi-hidden under the altar of Sant'Angelo in Perugia as having to do with the foundation of the church (Calabi Limentani 1970, 257). Not surprisingly, then, antique inscriptions were often displayed and imitated in the Middle Ages (survey in Kloos 1981) - as in the copying of actual Roman inscriptions for the dedication stone of the church at Jarrow in 685 (Bruce-Mitford 1961); the titulus found on the chest of S. Dunstan at Canterbury, written in `Roman letters' (L-B England  no. 945); the altar in the catacomb under S. Michele Archangelo, at S. Vittorino (Aquila), probably done under the sixth-century Bishop Quodvult Deus, which has good lapidary capitals inscribed on a tabula ansata held by a figure at either side; or the fixing of a bronze inscription on the wall of S. Basilio in Rome, said in the Mirabilia to refer to the pact between the Romans and the Jews (Calabi Limentani 1970, 259). Collections of inscriptions made in the Middle Ages were surely done for practical rather than purely scholarly ends - a parallel, perhaps, to the writing of the Mirabilia, which Gregorovius has explained as part of such a political (rather than simply `archaeological') context (1972, 3.162ff., 167).

Of course, not all inscriptions survived whole, and most in re-use were extensively damaged: what, then, were the reasons for such fragmentary re-use? At Pisa, we have seen that fragments were re-used in some prominent position only when they were legible, and perhaps had some specific meaning for the spectator. This explanation certainly fits the display of `key' words in the twelfth century papal throne in S. Clemente, Rome: this was apparently made out of the consecration inscription of the church of c. 384/99, rescued for the purpose after doing service as a paving-slab in the lower church. The largest piece became the back-rest of the throne, and bears vertically in large lapidary capitals the word MARTYR (Gandolfo 1974-5, 208 and fig.2). Other fragments, probably of the same inscription, appear in the ambone (ECCL) and the ciborium (PRAESBYTER); and yet more, with less recogisable fragmentary words, have been found in various parts of the paving (Guidobaldi 1978, 80ff.). Equally, we often find an attempt to unify  modern inscriptions with existing re-used spolia, as with the the consecration stone of 1112 in S.M. delle Grazie at Coppito (L'Aquila); this blends well with the use of a Roman architrave over the door, and an acanthus scroll frieze of about 1150 to which are added a lion and a griffon.

However, most re-use of inscriptions (Calabi Limentani 1968, 84ff.; Susini 1982, 32ff.) is very casual, ignoring what is written and simply re-using the material. At the SS. Quattro Coronati, for example, after the Norman sack of 1084, the rebuilding used many epitaphs in the paving of the aisles, some pagan, most Christian, and the latter said by Munoz (1914, 130) to have come from the catacombs in the ninth century. Some were used face-up, most face-down. Nor was such crass disregard for antiquities unusual: at S. Paolo fuori le Mura, the Museo Lapidario was largely constituted from inscriptions re-used in that church as paving slabs. In the Cathedral of Trieste, they were re-used face-up and face-down (Della croce 1698, 381). At S. Giorgio di Valpolicella, altars were used (D'Angelis D'Ossat 1982). At S. Gennaro, the oldest cemetery church extra muros at Naples, and itself on a pagan site, the same happened when, in 1468, it was taken over for a hospital: `worthy marble memorials in Greek and Latin' were taken from the tombs in the cemetery, broken up and used for paving the church (Carletti 1776, 324). Frequently, the re-use required hiding the original inscription by using the other side of the slab, as in the strange fifth century tympanum to the Porte Papale in the Cathedral at Le Puy, the now hidden verso of which bears a dedication not only to the Emperor, but also to Adidon, a local pagan god - the whole made safe for Christianity, perhaps, by the addition of the cross (Bréhier 1945, 69f.). Another example is that of the bronze tablet with part of the Lex de Imperio Vespasiani, which Cola is said to have found hidden against an altar in the Lateran, supposedly put there by Boniface VIII with the inscription facing inwards `in odium imperii' (Calabi Limentani 1970, 255); the subsequent inspiration of this work is related below.

Such contrasting attitudes - the inspirational and the opportunist - appear side by side throughout the Middle Ages. Sometimes the imitations inspired by antique inscriptions are so close that models must have been directly available to the masons. At Modena, for example, the apsidal foundation inscription for the Cathedral (consecrated 1106) demonstrates a clear respect for funerary antiquities in lettering, proportions and scale (for it is not imitated from civic inscriptional styles); there are mistakes, to be sure, and the sculptor must have been somewhat relieved to carve the last two lines in modern - rather than antique - letter forms. If some people prized antique inscriptions, did they prefer those of any particular date or type? There is some evidence that certain styles of inscription were espoused for particular political ends, even as early as the seventh century: thus Morison sees the marble diploma of Gregory the Great in S. Paolo fuori le Mura, with its antique square lapidary capitals, as in a style `which would have been considered `pagan' in Constantinople' (1972, 104). In this perspective, Charlemagne did indeed appropriate, `with calligraphic consequences, the insignia of ancient Rome' as seen both in manuscripts produced during his reign and in the famous epitaph of Hadrian I; Morison contends that he deliberately abandoned `the notion of a Christian lettering-style appropriate to a Christian Roman emperor ... in favour of an Imperial letter-style appropriate to a pagan Roman emperor' (ibid., 145). In other words, the Carolingians sometimes based their own lapidary inscriptions on the style of the early Empire: they certainly knew antique monumental inscriptions, for they often filled the channels of their letters with lead, in imitation of the Roman practice of using bronze letters (Deschamps 1929, 14ff.). Had antique comparanda not been readily available, there would have been little point in such painstaking work. Such a feeling for the splendour of the antique manner is seen in the epitaph of Hadrian I (died 795), which Charlemagne ordered to be made in France, and written in marble with golden letters, as the Lorsch Annalist says (ibid., 13f.). Indeed, as Gray remarks (1948, 97), `the lettering is beautifully formed, regular and skilful; only occasional ligatures and inserted letters differentiate it from a classical inscription'. This work from far outside Rome is something of a landmark for, in spite of the likely Byzantine origins of the decorative border, it apparently provoked a new classicism in Roman letter forms (ibid., 97ff.) which is echoed in some inscriptions of the next centuries; and, like them, it was surely imitated directly from antique models and not through small-scale intermediaries (Morison 1972, figs 105f., 109, 128ff.). That the classical manner is linked to classical sites, and fed by them, is seen in the tenth century in Gaul, where little remains of such a style except in centres such as Vienne (ibid., fig. 14) or Rheims (fig. 11), who maintain their manner into the following century (Rheims: fig. 24; Poitiers: fig. 27); while elsewhere a style develops and flourishes which is far removed from the antique. Thus the propaganda value of antique lapidary capitals may first have been recognised by the papacy, and popularised by the emperor so that, by the later Middle Ages, cities were themselves conscious of the tokens of their ancient grandeur.

The best documented and most thoroughly studied example of inscriptions being manipulated for political ends concerns Cola di Rienzo, whose anonymous biographer underlines the political implications of inscriptions in the very first chapter of his work. We have to take his word that Cola read ancient inscriptions lying around Rome every day, and was the only man who knew how to translate them; we are told that they caused him to ponder on the ancient Romans and their justice: `Every day he made observations on the marble reliefs lying about Rome - and none besides him knew how to read ancient epitaphs. He translated all the inscriptions, and correctly interpreted the marble figures ...' (AIMA 3.399). This passage is perhaps a gloss on Cola's use in about 1346 of the large bronze tablet containing parts of Vespasian's Lex de Imperio as a prop for his political oratory (for he neither invokes nor quotes the monuments of Rome or their inscriptions in his letters): and Weiss comments (1969, 40f.) that `it was the first time that a classical inscription had furnished a text for a political sermon'. Pope Boniface had hidden this tablet, as we have seen; and (as Calabi Limentani 1970, 255, remarks), he must have been able to read it, and considered the text important, or there would have been no point in hiding it.

But probably the biographer's statement has wider implications: Cola dreamed of Roman grandeur, which was evoked for him by the intagli di marmo, and he was the first to explain li antichi Pataffi to the common people; the account cannot imply that Cola was the first to understand such inscriptions, particularly since there are but a few very minor contractions used in the Lex. Sordi (1971) presents the two extreme arguments, namely that either Cola had more than the remaining section of the Lex available to him, or alternatively that his knowledge of Roman law was comparable with that of Mommsen; and adduces evidence that two tables were displayed in the Lateran in the thirteenth century. It seems to Sordi, then, that at least one tablet has been lost since Cola's day; but this will not square with Gregorius' statement that `aenea tabula est', referring only to one tablet (Degrassi 1946).

It is informative to parallel Cola's call to Roman grandeur with Michael Choniates' work in Athens, where he became Archbishop in 1182 after an education in Constantinople. His first sermon to his people, from the pulpit in the Parthenon, was a salute to the city and the ancient traditions of her inhabitants. Was only the glorious name of Athens left? No, for `this is the Peripatos, this is the Stoa, over here is the Akropolis, down there is the Peiraeus, and right here is the Lantern of Demosthenes.' Unfortunately, the learned discourse of this scholar was over the heads of his flock, disillusionment quickly set in, and he was soon complaining about the `barbaric' Attic dialect (cf. Setton 1944, 187ff.). With Choniates as with Cola, therefore, the poetry of the past foundered on the mere prose of the present.

Could inscriptions be read in the Middle Ages?

Cola's activities could be placed in perspective if we knew whether antique inscriptions were fully understood in the Middle Ages. The locus classicus which implies that they could not is Gregorius' admission concerning (probably) the same tablet of the Lex de Imperio Vespasiani that `I read many words, but understood few'. Certainly, examples of mis-readings are common (e.g. Degrassi 1946), but it is difficult to explain mediaeval interest in inscriptions if they were largely unreadable. Most difficulties, surely, were with formulas and contractions: for the mere fact that the Portico of Octavia is called `Severiano' in documents of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries (Petrignani 1960, 51) means that the inscription in lapidary capitals must have been understood; and this accords with Rushforth's view (1919, 15, 29) that Gregorius' problems also had to do with contractions (he believes the tablet he saw was not the Lex de Imperio). Not that Gregorius was alone in his difficulties, for an unknown thirteenth-century scholar also bemoans the fact that `once they made marvellous sculptures in the finest marbles with punctuated letters (litteris punctatis), which today we are not fully able to read or understand' (Weiss 1969, 19). The stumbling block would be the contractions (the litteris punctatis), as Calabi Limentani (1970, 254ff.) makes clear with ample examples which also demonstrate that most inscriptions could indeed easily be read in the later Middle Ages. She points out that the passage cited above probably referred to funerary inscriptions, which were widely available, and where contractions are frequently used. Compare the comments in the Guide to the Pilgrimage Route to Santiago on the Alyscamps: `Indeed, there are sculpted ancient words on different kinds of works and in Latin letters, yet they are unintelligible' (Bédier 1914, 395). There must indeed have been added problems about reading such inscriptions, which had stood in the open air and become degraded, or used bronze letters most of which would have disappeared (ibid., 258f.).

However, whether inscriptions were correctly interpreted as well as being correctly read is another matter. There are many instances of citizens invoking the antiquity of their particular city by pointing with pride to inscriptions which - so they believed - recorded their famous sons: thus Lovato Lovati found in 1318/24 a funerary inscription in Padua featuring the name T. LIVIUS, and immediately proclaimed it to be the historian. They did not notice that the inscription contained the cognomen HALYS, or that the dead man was a freed slave (cf. Weiss 1958, 150f.).

Gloria Romanorum

Inscriptions were useful, then, as high-quality indications of the past - and continuing - glory of the cities which displayed them, as with Pisa (Scalia 1972), or with Spoleto, where inscriptions were placed in the mediaeval walls (Sansi 1869, 259ff.; and cf. nos 4, 9, 71 and 113). However, since the majority of inscriptions in fifteenth century written collections were taken from stones in use as constructional elements in buildings (Calabi Limentani 1970, 279ff.), we should be careful about over interpreting connections between availability, display and `pride'.

To Brescia goes the honour of creating the first lapidary museum in Italy, placed by public decree on the façade of the Monte Vecchio, built 1484-9 (Brescia 1979, 1.185ff.; 2.6f., 18ff., and 82, fig. 6). At first this seems to have been made up exclusively of material found on her own territory. Decisions to ornament a main square in this manner had been taken earlier, in 1465 and again in 1480 (Zamboni 1778, 30). Finds were made when driving a wall for the construction of the present Piazza della Loggia (after the decision, in 1484, that the shops should be built of stone, following fires caused by fireworks). During the digging of trenches for the foundations, `very beautiful pieces', some bearing inscriptions, others reliefs, were discovered. Since this site was just outside the Porta Mediolanensis, it is clear that the builders had found one of the ancient cemeteries. An even greater quantity of inscriptions (which were recognised as coming from pagan tombs) was found in the Torre di Paganora (Zamboni 1778, 29, n. 36: `cavati ... nella Torre'), which formed part of the twelfth century town walls, being at the south west corner of the old Roman wall - presumably re-used in its foundations; and although the stones were found near and not under it, we can assume that similar material was available to its builders. The decree for the creation of the `lapidario' is dated 13 October, 1480. As Zamboni (1778, 29f.) relates:]] [t2]  Indeed, scarcely had those inscriptions been discovered,

style='mso-tab-count:1'>      than our City understood their value, and conceived the

style='mso-tab-count:1'>      idea of setting them in public buildings, thereby

style='mso-tab-count:1'>      providing not only for the beautification of those

style='mso-tab-count:1'>      structures, but also for the preservation of those

style='mso-tab-count:1'>      precious monuments of antiquity ...]] [cr] [t1]Otherwise, like so many others, they would have been lost. As well as the sites by the old walls, inscriptions were also taken from the Piazza del Novarino (i.e. the Piazza del Foro, with the Roman Capitol at one end), and from near the Cathedral, which was built by the Roman west wall (Brescia 1979, 1.200). At the same time, heavy fines were levied on any misuse of rediscovered stones, which were considered the property of the city - perhaps because they were discovered underground (cf. Rebecchi 1984, 322). Modena was far from alone in having pride in her antiquities, although the expression of the idea by other cities is later: Della Croce, having discussed (1698, 273) the inscriptions and monuments of Trieste, notes that these provide an `authentic proof of the great antiquity of the town, and an infallible indication of its magnificence and greatness in times gone by.'

The taste for antique inscriptions extended even to painted ones. Given the suggestion (Alfieri 1961, 2.750) that Mantegna might have been influenced by the architecture of the Monte di Pietà in Brescia, we might wonder whether his attention was not equally drawn to the inscriptions placed on the façade of that building (and cf. Brescia 1979, 6ff.; 18ff.), for he incorporated inscriptions in his frescoes. So too did the now lost works by Bernardino da Parenzo, in the cloister of S. Giustina at Padua: it has been shown (Billanovich 1969, 241) that these inscriptions, like the artist who painted them, are not Paduan but from Parenzo - he presumably got hold of a sylloge, and copied the contents quite accurately. This explains how inscriptions were placed in a cloister, but not why: the reason could be a consciousness of the antiquity of the site, which was over an old pagan cemetery, where the tombstone of `Livy' had been found (ibid., 226). Billanovich reprints (ibid., 291) a seventeenth-century description of what was found when new foundations were being dug: apses, bricks, fragments of obelisks, large slabs of stone, and other `very old monuments'.

Can any connections be discerned between such interest in antique inscriptions, and the state of contemporary politics? This was surely the case at Modena, where inscriptions joined other antiquities on the Duomo as a reminder of the city's past (Parra 1983, 470f.). But such interest was neither uniform nor continuous: the Paduan interest in classical epigraphy (no matter how shaky it may have been: Weiss 1969, 18ff.) did not survive the end of the Commune and the arrival of the Carraresi, which may indicate that such antiquities were then considered an important link with the free past and its glories. And there is a poignant confirmation of the value placed on inscriptions as tokens of past grandeur at Arezzo where, in 1384, the Florentines deliberately buried some, as we learn from a much later account (which may, of course, have misrepresented the motivation): [t2]

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    The marbles with ancient inscriptions of the Romans are

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    manifest signs of their high dominion, and their antiquity.

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    Our city used to be full of them but, when ceded in 1384 by

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    the valorous General Conciaco for forty thousand gold

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    florins, they were placed in the foundations of the new

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    fortress, in contempt for their worth as antiquities and

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    against the wishes of the citizens. But confounding those

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    who sought to bury them in oblivion, a note had been taken

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    of them in the year 1350, now preserved by the most learned

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    antiquarian in Tuscany (Farulli 1717, iii; the

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    contracts for the money are reprinted in RIS 24.1,

style="mso-spacerun: yes">    95ff.). [[ [cr] [t1]One is reminded of Livy's comment (23.203) on the Perugians: `casus obscurior fama est, quia nex ipsorum monumento ullo est inlustratus nec decreto Romanorum.'

However, according to Cittadini (1853, 51f.), the Florentines did exactly the same thing in 1502, throwing `all Etruscan and Roman relics' into the lime kilns, or into new buildings. Is this a confused tradition, or did it really happen twice? The matter is complicated, because the Florentines had also bought possession of the city and its forts after the peace of March 1337, and for the same sum (RIS 24.1, 877; Rondinelli 44, n. a). The topography of the city (cf. plan of the ninth and tenth century city in Schneider 1975, opposite p. 288) would have helped the Florentines in what could have been a casual collection of suitable building materials, for the earlier fortress partly overlies the ancient theatre, and is very close to the baths - both locations where inscriptions were likely to have been frequent. However, there are two indications that the Aretine resentment was both accurate and justified; for when the fortress itself was razed in 1688, inscriptions were indeed pulled out from its foundations, as they were from the nearest gate, the Porta di Colcitrone (Cittadini 1853, 190ff.); and the Florentines in 1384 also took from Arezzo to Florence `the books of their civil and communal affairs, together with other documents public and private' (Farulli 1717, 13) - surely more than was needed just for efficient administration. There seems at least a possibility that the Florentines did likewise when they captured Pisa in 1406: the walls of Pisa are built in conspicuously regular fashion, of stone and brick, with no marble spolia whatsoever - except in the area of the Fortezza, where the contrast between the (normal) regularity of the stonework and the varying sizes of marble blocks may indicate that the latter are spolia. Perhaps such `cultural genocide' was indeed standard practice, for Frederick II at Ravenna took `all the stone blocks, and marble slabs at Porta Aurea, wherever they were found, to the lime kiln, and from them was made lime for the Imperial castle' (cited in Zirardini 1762, 234, from the Chronicle in RIS 1.2, 578). Since the same entry records his spoliation of Ravenna, and transport of spoils to Palermo, surely the slight was intentional. Nevertheless, it must be remembered that the rampart was traditionally the property of the ruler in the Middle Ages, and stones from it within his gift (Février 1974, 73f.), which changes the perspective somewhat.

The Renaissance vogue for antique inscriptions

As with other classes of antiquity, it was the interest and spolia collection of the Middle Ages which prepared the ground for the furhter study of inscriptions during the Renaissance, when the veritable vogue for them was, therefore, neither sudden nor unexpected. It begins with a reform of lettering style from at least 1423 in Florence and of content from the 1430s, when the imitation of antique forms of inscription indicates that sufficient models were available (Calabi Limentani 1966; Kajanto 1980). Study of the question in Rome is `handicapped by the wholesale disappearance of the inscriptions of the early Quattrocento' (Kajanto 1980, 12); and it may well be that Florentines such as Donatello and Ghiberti (who certainly provide the only surviving `firsts' in the imitation of antique lapidary styles: cf. Greenhalgh 1982, 40f.) were innovators in the genre. Pseudo-antique inscriptions on Renaissance churches are common, and there is even one case of spolia: the word AVGVSTO on the façade of S. Michele at Fano (finished 1512) comes from the partly dismantled antique arch, and its use perhaps parallels that of similar lapidary capitals on the Duomo at Pisa.

In Renaissance France as well, antique works of art, including inscriptions, were seen as reflecting glory upon their city. In 1594, the search for building materials in a field of ruins (Roman baths?) outside Bordeaux uncovered two white marble statues, which were subsequently displayed at the Hotel de Ville with an inscription containing the words CIVITATIS HIC IN MEMORIAM ANTIQUITATIS ET AD PERPETUAM BURDIGALAE GLORIAM PONENDAS CURURANT ... MULTA RENASCITUR (Jullian 1897/90, 1.91ff.). There is also the story of Joseph de Chassaigne (died 1572) who, desirous of owning some inscription referring to Ausonius, favourite son of Bordeaux, forged one on a fragment taken from the old walls, and incorporated it into a sun-dial in his garden (Jullian 1887/90, 1.262).

Collections of inscriptions

When the original inscription cannot be moved, it is natural that antiquarians should note them down and study them, as was done from the late fifth century. Christian material began to be collected, for a religious rather than epigraphic purpose, as early as the seventh century (Gray 1948, 40f.). We know the names of collectors of inscriptions in pre-Renaissance Venice - including Oliviero Forzetta of Treviso (died 1369), and Marin Faliero (died 1355), who may have formed his collection when Podestà of Treviso - but nothing about what their collections contained. What can be proved is that inscriptions were brought to Venice from Aquileia, Altina and Este for, together with large quantities of Roman tile, pieces with identifiable provenance have been found in the ninth-century foundations of S. Mark's Campanile (cf. Forlati Tamaro 1953). For the many Greek inscriptions in Italian collections we may also have the Venetians to thank, because of their connections with the Greek mainland, the islands, and Asia Minor, as well as Propontis and Thrace (Guarducci 1942). Such imports may well have come from the second Grimani Collection, that of Giovanni, who is recorded as getting material from Rome and Greece (Beschi 1972-3, 481ff.; collection presented to the State in 1587); but they did not come from the first, formed by Cardinal Domenico in a palace on the Quirinal in Rome, and given to the State in 1523. Direct imports were surely made even before the fifteenth century, and passed through Venice like so many `oriental luxury goods' of which we have records; but there are no records of the importation of inscriptions. If we accept Beschi's argument (1972-3) that much of the Greek sculptural material in the Grimani Collection must have come from Crete, and after 1453, then how much more available were other Greek lands before the Fall of Constantinople!

Inscriptions continued to be collected in `paper museums' during the fifteenth century, and many must have been copied from their position in walls (cf. the operations of Cyriacus of Ancona). At Bordeaux, for example, we have an account of the Sieur du Haillan, brother of the Historiographer of France, having the foundations of the walls of Bordeaux searched for inscriptions in 1594 (Jullian 1887/90, 1.368). But one of the first collections of inscriptions about which we are relatively well informed is that of Raffaelle Fabretti (1619-1700), and the way in which it was formed (as we learn from his own accounts) would have been equally possible five hundred years earlier: countrymen around Rome, sometimes digging speculatively on their own land, sometimes finding works by chance, took to the city any inscribed stones they found, where they were snapped up by collectors (Mennella 1973, 18-19). And thanks to the post of `Custodian of the Holy Relics and Cemeteries' granted him by his protector, Fabretti could roam freely in his search for inscriptions, and also visit catacombs which were normally closed; indeed, one day he actually found a lost catacomb, namely that of S. Castulo on the via Labicana (ibid., 23).

A modern footnote

Perhaps the measurement of a city's importance by inscriptions has not totally vanished. Pierre Garmy, Keeper of the Musée Archéologique at Nîmes, arrives at an appreciation of the monuments in Provence via the numbers of visitors, and asserts that Nîmes stands with Narbonne in the count of surviving inscriptions - way ahead of Lyon, Vienne and Arles (Garmy 1981). Indeed, it would be interesting to survey the reasons for establishing museums in ancient monuments: the Maison Carrée at Nîmes displayed antique and modern works for many years, and there are new museums set in Roman baths at Poitiers and Dijon, as well as older ones in Paris and Rome.