dAf 82
ROMEUF Anne-Marie et Monique DUMONTET
Les ex-voto gallo-romains de Chamalières (Puy-de-Dôme)
Building work on he Roches springs at Chamalières brought to light a deposit of some 3500 wooden ex-votos lying in a peat layer covered by mineral waters.
This assemblage, remarkable both for the number of objects and their state of preservation, constitutes the remains of the first century A.D. healing sanctuary. The major aspects of this find treated in the present work include the context of the discovery ; subjects represented (primarily anthropomorphic) ; typology ; carving techniques ; « styles » ; comparative studies.
This votive statuary, an expression of a popular art form known elseswhere in
Abstract
Abstract
The present publication concludes
a rescue excavation carried out from 1968 to 1971 prior to construction work undertaken on the Roches mineral-water springs site at Chamalières.
The ex-voto discovered there form part of a folk-worship tradition which is well-documented for Antiquity and which has continued up to the present day.
1 The excavations
Following the discovery of a layer of wood in the section of a drainage ditch, two excavation campaigns, lasting three and five months, enabled archaeologists to dig the entire deposit by successive phases over the period from 1968 to 1971.The ex-voto had collected over an area of a little more than 200m2 in a depression hollowed-out naturally by the springs: the objects were immersed in mineral-water, encased in peat and covered by a layer of diatomite. Although the deposit had been disturbed by various XIXth century activity, its northern and north-eastern boundaries, composed of a simple stone lining, had survived. The lack of evidence for a building or reservoir tends to suggest that it was a place of outdoor water worship. Pottery and coins associated with the ex-voto date this activity to the first century A.D., between the reigns of Augustus and Nero.
This is the largest deposit ever discovered in
Appendix 1: Conservation of the ex-voto
To ensure long term preservation, the water-logged wood has been treated: following tests with methods using alum or alcohol / ether / resin, the finest objects were taken to
2 The small-finds
Several other offerings were intermingled with the wooden ex-voto: a lead spell tablet bearing the name of the god Maponos (one of the longest Gallic-language inscriptions yet known), sixty-odd coins (13 Gallic and 35 Roman, 20 of which are from Nîmes with crocodile and palm-tree motifs), pottery (primarily painted bi-conical bowls), five brooches, small objects made from metal, glass, clay, or wicker-work, and the remains of fruit (walnuts, hazelnuts, cherries, peaches, grape-seed).
3 The ex-voto: subjects and types
The majority of the ex-voto are anthropomorphic sculptures:
- complete people, clothed and standing on a base (with the exception of one horseman, two seated women and three bound figures), or rudimentary statues with no indication of clothing;
- busts and heads which often have the beginning of the shoulders indicated or sometimes a suggestion of the neck, and three examples of superimposed heads;
- lower parts of bodies including the pelvis and legs, generally standing on a base;
- arms, hands, legs and feet cut out in silhouette or carved in Ronde Bosse;
- representations of internal and external organs (anatomical drawings, breasts, eyes).
A small group of fifteen objects pertaining to the animal kingdom: horses, horses’ legs, cows’ feet.
The deposit also includes more than a thousand thin rectangular tablets which were probably originally painted or inscribed. All of these subjects are known from the Greco-Roman period as well as from modern times. Comparison with other sites shows that the Chamalières material covers a wide range of subjects with a high percentage of healing ex-voto -legs in particular- and tablets. Types vary primarily as a result of the species of wood used, as is demonstrated by technical and stylistic analysis.
Appendix 2: Clothing and headdress
Male dress usually consists of a tunic or the traditional cape, or much more rarely of a cloak pinned at the shoulder over a tunic; a hat appears only once. Most of the women wear a cloak which may be draped in different ways over a long tunic; some are wear a cape.
The bodice is rarely visible; hair is occasionally covered by a veil; one bust shows both a torque and a brooch. Several long dress forms have not been identified; three seem to be children’s wraps.
The men’s hair is most often arranged in stiff symmetrical waves, though it may sometimes be smooth, with a fringe and a point at the neck: this may be the same hairstyle given two different stylistic treatments.
The women’s hair is generally long, often separated into two strips by a parting in the middle; the hair falls straight onto one or both shoulders. Hair from the top of the head was sometimes twisted into a crown or, more rarely, arranged in a shell-like shape.
Appendix 3: The offerings
One third of the individuals are shown carrying attributes such as, in decreasing order of frequency, round or rectangular objects, ears of corn, pinecones, purses, bunches of grapes, a bag and bird. One quarter of the arms present a round offering, two arms are shown carrying two of the offerings. These attributes are all commonplace in Greco-Roman religious symbolism and provide little concrete information on the nature of the god being honoured.
4 The ex-voto: techniques and style
An inventory of wooden sculptures from antiquity indicates their rarity not only in
The Chamalières sculptures are primarily made from beech, much less often from oak and very occasionally from other species. The tablets, generally oak, may sometimes be from ash or conifer. Cutting technique varies according to the species but the most typical is that used for beech: logs are split into roughly triangular sections before being reworked to form droplet shapes.
The tools used to produce the form and the fine detail (plane, adze, chisel, knife, gouge, burin) have left little trace inasmuch as polishing was commonplace. Occasional vestiges of paint suggest that the assemblage was painted.
Three sculptural styles are apparent and correspond to the species used: this may indicate either three local workshops or three groups of sculptures working in the same workshop.
The most widely used style is that which appears on the beech-wood statuary and which can be described as the “Chamalières” style. Its quality is achieved by a perfect balance between wood-sculpting technique and indigenous stylistic expression. This is visible in the modelling of the head and the shaping of the body, as well as in anatomical features or in the way in which clothing is rendered. It would seem that this art was influenced by that of Italic ex-voto, at least insofar as the busts are concerned.
The oak-wood sculptures are those which bear the closest stylistic resemblance to other known Gallo-Roman wooden ex-voto, in particular those found at the source of the river
Rudimentary wooden sculptures of inferior quality are often carved from branches: unlike the oak ex-voto, they show no signs of classical influence and they are generally less well made than the beech sculptures. Although a few may be considered to be relics of early Celtic art, the majority are simply inexpensive products of sanctuary art.
Conclusion
The Chamalières deposit is exceptional for several reasons: the number of ex-voto discovered, their remarkable state of preservation, the diversity of subjects and types represented, the quality of the sculptures, and the date of their deposit at the beginning of the first century A.D.
The ex-voto form part of a tradition of popular devotion common in the classical world and demonstrate the existence of contacts amongst sanctuaries in
