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Socius

The New Mithraeum

Community dedicated to the study, disclosure and reenactment of the Mysteries of Mithras since 2004.

the.new.mithraeum
Joined December 2020
 
 
January 2023
Monumentum

Aion of York

The statue was found in 1874 under the city wall of York during the construction of the railway station.

 
December 2022
NewVideo

Dans les coulisses de l'exposition « Le mystère Mithra. Plongée au cœur d'un culte romain »

Découvrez les coulisses de la réalisation et du montage de l'exposition « Le mystère Mithra. Plongée au cœur d'un culte romain ».

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Lion-headed figure of Mérida

The lion-headed figure, Aion, from Mérida, wears oriental knickers fastened at the waist by a cinch strap.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Aion gold figurine from Geneva

This small golden figurine seems to represent the Mithraic god Aion, as usual surrounded by a serpent.

 
December 2022
Syndexios

Tiberius Claudius Balbilus

Scholar, politician and a court astrologer to the Roman emperors Claudius, Nero and Vespasian.

 
 
December 2022
Monumentum

Aion of Orazio Muti

This monument has been identified from 'Memorie di varie antichità trovate in diversi luoghi della città di Roma', a book by Flaminio Vacca of 1594.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Mithraeum de Vienne

Emperor Julian may have been initiated into the cult of the god Mithras at the Mithraeum of Vienne, France, according to Turcan.

 
We totally need a picture of this. Who's in the area? ;-)
 
I think there is no trace of this mithraeum since long time ago...
 
December 2022
Monumentum

Aion from Vienne, France

The relief of Aion from Vienne includes a naked youth in Phrygian cap holding the reins of a horse.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Inscription to Mithras by from Köln

Votive inscription dedicated to Mithras by the veteran soldier Tiberius Claudius Romanius, from the Mithraeum II Köln, 3rd century.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Altar to Sol by brothers of Budaors

This fragmented altar was erected by two brothers from the Legio II Adiutrix who also built a temple.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Mithraeum of Colchester

One of the rooms in a sustantive masonry building in Hollytrees Meadow was considered to be a Mithreum, a theory that has now been discarded.

 
December 2022
NewMonumentum

Frescoes from the tomb of Aelius Magnus and Aelia Arisuth in Oea

The Mithraic nature of the frescoes of Oea, according to the scholars Cumont and Vermaseren, is now questioned.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Taurcotony sculpture from Sidon

The Mithras killing the bull sculpture from Sidon, currently Lebanon.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Mitra de Cabra

The Mithras of Cabra is the only full preserved Tauroctony sculpture found in Spain yet.

 
The sculpture was found, according to its discoverer, next to the western wall that delimits the impluvium, not inside the pond. The 'Casa del Mitra' is near Igabrum.
 
December 2022
Monumentum

Tauroctony of the Mitreo delle Sette Sfere

The relief of Mithras slaying the bull from the Mithraeum of the Seven Spheres was discovered in 1802 by Petirini by order of Pope Pius VII.

 
December 2022
Monumentum

Mithraeum of Rudchester

The Mithraeum of Rudchester was discovered in 1844 on the brow of the hill outside the roman station.

 
The Rudchester (Vidobala) Mithraeum Sometime before 1772 an unfinished altar was found at Rudchester although the exact find spot is unrecorded. RIB 2344 - No Translation The capital carries two wheel-patterns above three recesses. After its discovery the altar was inverted and the base was recut to carry heraldic shields and the lettering: R + H and beneath WRAH, and on the face a simple IR. Hodgson noted that the initials wr and ir may refer to members of the Rutherford family, which owned Rudchester until 1667 It was taken to Gateshead, where the Rev. Andrew Wood built it upside down into the garden-wall of his Rectory. Later presented to the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne and kept in the Black Gate, being finally transferred to the Museum of Antiquities The Mithraeum In August 1844, 5 altars and a statue were discovered by men 'working stones out of a mound of earth” about 200 yards west of Rudchester Manor. This find was published by John Bell and Thomas Hodgson in Archaeologia Aeliana Series 1 Volume 4 for 1855 The statue was broken up, for the purpose of covering a drain, by the labourers employed (and subsequently lost). Of the altars 4 bore inscriptions RIB 1395 - To the Invincible god Mithras, Publius Aelius Titullus, prefect, gladly, willingly, and deservedly fulfilled his vow. RIB 1396 - To the Invincible Sun-god, Tiberius Claudius Decimus Cornelius Antonius, the prefect, restored this temple. RIB 1398 - To the God, Lucius Sentius Castus, (centurion) of the Sixth Legion, set this up as a gift. These 3 'perfect' altars as they were called were at first moved to Otterburn Castle on 14th December 1844. In 1931they were moved to the Black Gate Museum in Newcastle and then to the Museum of Antiquities at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. One altar was broken upon discovery and one was a plain altar with a socketed base RIB 1397 - To the Sun-god Apollo Invincible Mithras, Aponius Rogatianus … This broken altar and the socketed uninscribed altar were formerly held in the Black Gate museum and later transferred to the Museum of Antiquities, Newcastle upon Tyne All are now held in the Great North Museum in Newcastle. The Mithraeum at Rudchester was located and excavated over a period of 14 weeks from May to 28th August 1953 by Gillam and MacIvor and published their findings in Archaeologia Aeliana Series 4, Vol 32 Gillam identified two distinct phases of use in two successive Mithraea on the site. He concluded that the first Mithraeaum was built in the late second or early third century AD, oriented east west, and was constructed in stone with clay used to bond the blocks. The plan was of a rectangle with an apse to the west was 43 feet long by 22 feet wide. It was of a typical Mithraeum plan having a central nave flanked by low benches. A roughly-built narthex was later added to the outside of the east wall, but so that there was no direct view from the front entrance into the temple. Similar to the shrine at Carrawburgh this anteroom contained a low stone bench, possibly for the use of the Corax grade, the messenger of the temple or for those uninitiated who were requesting admission to the Mithraeum. A Centurial stone which may have come from the Vallum, was reused and built in upside down in the third course of the secondary wall in the south jamb of the east entrance into the nave. RIB 1406 - The century of Imid[… (built this). A second Centurial stone was reused and built into the eighth course of the outer face of the north wall of the nave. RIB 1406 - The century of Juventius (built this). The east wall was built over a badly filled-in pit and an earlier, unidentified stone structure apparently of Antonine date. Subsidence into the pit caused the collapse of this first incarnation of the building near the end of the third Century. A second Mithraeum was rebuilt soon after, but without the ante-room, and access was now directly into the shrine from the outside, a stone podium was constructed in front of the apse and the free space within the building was reduced by extending the benches, perhaps the religion was growing amongst the soldiers. A new roof with wooden posts standing in front of the benches was built, much like the plan of the Mithraeum at Carrawburgh, which we will visit later. Four small uninscribed altars were found inside the nave beside the benches, and the remains of a stone cut water-basin was recovered about two-thirds of the way along the northern bench. Gillam found the two heads of the torch-bearers Cautes and Cautopates, and speculated that this was the result of a deliberate decapitation of the statues. The lack of any trace of the tauroctony scene remaining in the Mithraeum was also used to argue for a deliberate desecration It was short-lived, and the pottery evidence from the area shows that it was out of use and desecrated by the mid-fourth century. All the finds and altars were placed in the Museum of Antiquities at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, and are now on display in the Great North Museum – formerly named Hancocks Museum
 
November 2022
Monumentum

Inscription of Tellius Agatho in Mitreo delle Sette Sfere

This inscription found in the Mithraeum of the Seven Spheres mentions the Pater Marco Aemiliio Epaphrodito known from other monuments in Ostia.

 
November 2022
Monumentum

Mithras riding a horse from Neuenheim

Mithras galloping, in a cypress forest, carrying a globe in one hand and accompanied by a lion and a snake.

 
November 2022
NewMonumentum

Mithras on a horse

This small bronze statuette of Mithras riding a horse is composed of two pieces.

 
November 2022
Syndexios

Cracissius

Senilius Carantinus, also named Cracissius, was a citizen (civis) of Mediomatrici.