#purpurarius
LightNews LightNews
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
#EpigraphyTuesday takes us into the #ParcoArcheologicodelCelio in #Rome to find a late-Republican #cippus testifying to the remarkable social mobility of #Ostia, the port of the Urbs. Call the #purpurarius, I need a new stripe on my tunic! #AncientBluesky 🏺
GUILD CIPPUS FROM OSTIA (?), C1 BCE. PARCO ARCHEOLOGICO DEL CELIO This late Republican cylindrical base records a project funded "ex pecunia decuma"—from a religious 10% tithe pooled by a local guild. The text tells us a lot about social mobility. Five magistri oversaw the works, with a 4-to-1 ratio of freedmen to free-born citizens. We have L. Modius Philomusus, a freedman who got rich as a luxury purple-dye merchant (purpurarius), alongside fellow liberti L. Bennius Mida (the freedman of an unnamed woman, perhaps a Bennia), M. Aeficius Menopo, and Q. Atonius. The lone free-born Roman is Sex. Herennius Rufus of the Palatine tribe. Here, a traditional citizen and entrepreneurial former slaves with Greek names worked side-by-side, using devotions and trade wealth to shape their community. This list testifies to how high a savvy merchant could climb in Rome's roaring commercial world.
May 26, 2026 at 3:34 PM
mumblerjamie.bsky.social
For #EpigraphyTuesday we're back at Museo delle Terme with this inscription from a funerary monument of the freedman Decimus Veturius Atticus, who was a purpurarius.

#AncientBlueSky🏺

More info at - www.flickr.com/photos/mumbl...
December 10, 2024 at 9:52 AM