Introduction

Recent excavations at the ruins of Antinoopolis (on the shores of the Nile where the body of Antinous washed ashore) have yielded the fantastic discovery of an incredibly well-preserved bathhouse on the outskirts of the city. Buried for centures, the newly exposed and restored frescoes depict identifiable scenes from the Epistles of Antinous, and are being dated to the early 3rd century CE (about a hundred years after the death of Antinous, in what was probably the height of his cult and his city's vitality).

Aptly named The Bathhouse Frescoes, these remarkable pieces will be presented here as they become available. They are also cross-referenced to the numbered Epistles with which they correspond, so that the first-person account of their narrative can be better appreciated.

The Frescoes represent an unusual departure from the known "genres" of both public and private wall-art in ancient times. Most other wall decorations fall into one of two categories: they are either extremely lofty (dealing in subject matter with the gods and their stories) or humorously farcical (especially in bathhouses, where their intent was to cause viewers to laugh and thus deflect the Evil Eye). But these Antinous Frescoes are neither heroic nor comical: they're lovingly biographical. Antinous is consistently portrayed as a regular human, engaged in human pursuits: Laughing with friends; enjoying the pleasures of his body; and learning to navigate the complexities of his world. In this, the Frescoes obviously take their tonal and narrative cue from the Epistles. Indeed, they would be far less comprehensible (and would likely not even exist) were it not for the autobiographical Epistles they so perfectly serve.

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I - THE YOUNG SCHOOLBOY

001

II - THE COURT PAGE

010	018	030

III - THE IMPERIAL FAVOURITE

056	058

IV - THE SEARCHING SOUL