Project « Gods and godesses from roman houses »

The Royal Museum of Mariemont’s Greco-Roman antiquities include a large number of bronze statuettes of Roman deities. They hail from small temples in Roman homes spread over all four corners of the Empire. The Vesuvius sites (Pompei and Herculanum) are used as points of reference in this field.

The aim is to study Mariemont’s statuettes, identifying parallel objects which have both date and origin identified. This type of analysis enables us to attribute production sites and chronological markers to try to “recontextualise” those objects that have no known provenance. The project also aims to better understand the journey of these figurines through the Roman world and how religion was practiced in the home in Roman times.