The Historical Interpretation of the Reliefs of Trajan's Column

H. Stuart Jones

doi:10.1017/S0068246200005353

The Historical Interpretation of the Reliefs of Trajan's Column

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 August 2013

H. Stuart Jones

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H. Stuart Jones: Affiliation:
British School af Rome German Imperial Archaeological Institute

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The object of this paper is neither to discuss the artistic significance of the reliefs which adorn the Column of Trajan, nor to solve the problem raised by the inscription on its base, but solely to treat the sculptures as embodying an historical narrative in stone, and to present certain conclusions differing from those of earlier interpreters. These conclusions were originally formed during my residence in Rome as Director of the British school; they were first tentatively expressed at a meeting of the School held on April 4, 1906 (when I had ceased to hold the office of Director) and developed with greater detail in a paper read before the Oxford Philological Society on March 15, 1907 (see Class. Rev. 1907, p. 125) and finally in a communication made to the International Historical Congress at Berlin on August 8, 1908. It is unnecessary to say that the great publication of Cichorius (and the incisive criticisms of that work by Petersen) have brought the question here to be discussed into the foreground of archaeological debate; the views since put forward by von Domaszewski and Weber appear to me (as will presently be shewn) to betoken a retrogression in the direction of theories which should have been recognised as put definitely out of court by the researches of Cichorius and Petersen.

Type: Research Article
Information: Papers of the British School at Rome , Volume 5 , 1910 , pp. 434 - 459

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0068246200005353 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © British School at Rome 1910

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^{page 435 note 1} Die Reliefs der Trajanssäule, 1896–1900.

^{page 435 note 2} Trajans dakische Kriege nach dem Säulenrelief erzählt, 1899–1903 (two vols., referred to below as ‘Petersen i and ii’)Google Scholar.

^{page 435 note 3} Philologus, 1906, pp. 321 ff.

^{page 435 note 4} Untersuchungen zur Geschichie des Kaisers Haarianus, pp. 18 f.

^{page 436 note 1} La colonne torse et le décor en hélice dans l'art antique, Paris, 1907Google Scholar.

^{page 440 note 1} Beiträge zu einer kritischtn Geschichte Trajans, pp. 81 f.

^{page 441 note 1} P. 333.

^{page 444 note 1} Dierauer, op. cit. p. 98, n. 2, questioned Froehner's identification and conjectured that Trajan wintered on the Danube in A.D. 104–5; but this view need not be seriously considered.

^{page 444 note 2} Juv. iv. 40.

^{page 445 note 1} Das Monument von Adam Klissi, pp. 155 ff.

^{page 445 note 2} Röm. Mitth. 1896, pp. 105 ff.

^{page 448 note 1} The accompanying sketch-map will serve to illustrate the argument of the text. Where Trajan's route is not precisely indicated (as by Cichorius and Petersen) it is schematically represented without regard to lines of road.

^{page 448 note 2} Domaszewski supposes the camp to be that of a legion ‘sent on in advance to Corinth.’ No legion destined for the seat of war on the Danube would be sent viâ Corinth; and the camp is evidently a permanent one.

^{page 450 note 1} On this question cp. Filow, Legionen der Provinz Moesien, p. 45.

^{page 450 note 2} Cichorius (iii. p. 57) suggests that Legio I. Adjutrix, which took part in both the Dacian wars, may have been stationed in Dalmatia in the interval.

^{page 450 note 3} See the report of excavations at Asseria in Oederreichische Jahreshefte xi. (1908), pp. 18Google Scholar ff. The remains of Trajan's arch are described pp. 32 ff., and a reconstruction given (Figs. 9-23); facsimile of the inscription p. 71. The view that Trajan passed through Asseria is suggested on p. 74, as also by Frothingham in the Nation (New York) 1908, p. 441, and in Roman Cities in Northern Italy and Dalmatia (1910), p. 308.

^{page 451 note 1} Benndorf identified the port in scene lxxxvi. with Byzantium, a view justly condemned by Petersen. Whatever is represented on the column, a strait such as the Bosphorus is not.

^{page 452 note 1} The direct ‘Slav’ route from the Danube to the Adriatic, by which it has recently been proposed to construct a railway in rivalry with that projected by Austria, running from Bosnia through the Sanjak to Salonica, follows this line and emerges at the little port of S. Giovanni di Medua, near Alessio.

^{page 452 note 2} Miss Durham has recently visited some of the sites; her interest, however, lay in history not ancient, but still in the making (cf. High Albania, chaps, vii., ix., xi.).

^{page 452 note 3} Archaeologia, xlix. pp. 58–68.

^{page 452 note 4} Arch, epigr. Mitteilungen cms Oesterreich xiii. p. 145 ff.; Westdeutsche Zeitschrift, 1902, PP. 173, 175 f.

^{page 452 note 5} This seems to be identical with the bridge called Ura Fshait by Miss Durham (High Albania, p. 268).

^{page 452 note 6} Figured by Mr. Evans, loc. cit. p. 68.

^{page 453 note 1} A.-E. M., loc. cit. p. 149.

^{page 453 note 2} Cf. Oesterreichische Jahrcshefte iv. Beibl. p. 167 (Gjorgjevic). The inscription of Kurshumlija with MIL -IX (cf. C.I.L. iii. 14595) is difficult to interpret.

^{page 453 note 3} The suggestion is due to Kiepert, cf. C.I.L. iii. p. 1024. In Kiepert's Formae Orbis Antiqui (sheet xvii.) both Veclanum and Ulpiana are given: the position of ‘Theranda,’ which is clearly quite conjectural, would correspond roughly with that of Prizren, which was certainly not on the road, whose course in fact is traced much too far to the South.

^{page 453 note 4} Cp. Oesterreichische Jahreshefte, vi. Beibl. p. 25.

^{page 453 note 5} Domaszewski, (A.-E.M. xiii. p. 152Google Scholar, note) recognised the significance of the termination, but drew no conclusion.

^{page 454 note 1} He mentions ‘Paeonian and Macedonian pieces, coins of the Illyrian mining cities Damastion and Pelagia, Celtic imitations of the coins of Philip of Macedon, coins of Thasos, and quantities of the silver pieces from Dyrrhachion and Apollonia’ (p. 67).

^{page 455 note 1} Festschrift für Otto Benndorf, pp. 287 f.

^{page 456 note 1} De aedif. iv. 6.

^{page 456 note 2} Wiener Denkschriften xli. (1892) p. 44Google Scholar.

^{page 457 note 1} P.B.S.R. iv. P. 243, Fig. 1.

^{page 457 note 2} Wiener Denkschriften, xli. (1892), facing p. 158Google Scholar.

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