The Layout of a Typical Roman Mithraea
The Design of Temples of Mithras in the Roman Empire
Jan 21, 2009
Mithraeum were found all over the Roman Empire. Small, compact underground structures, they were designed to take accommodate only a few worshippers. Their designs closely represented the beliefs and mythology of the cult of Mithras.
Where were Mithraeum found?
Traces of the cult of Mithras have been found in every part of the Roman Empire. Particular points of concentration were along the empire’s frontiers and in cities important to trade. Fifteen mithraeum have been found in the port town of Ostia and there are thirty five known locations in Rome. Many other temples to Mithras have been found on military frontiers in Germany along the Rhine and Danube and along Hadrian’s Wall in Britain.
What was a Mithraea?
Each Mithraea was designed to represent the cave of Mithras. For that reason, they were windowless, underground chambers. Natural caves were sometimes used, as in the case of the mithraea found at Jajce in Bosnia. Otherwise, they were purpose built structures, often constructed underneath other temples or even bathhouses, as with many of the mithraeum of Ostia.
The sheer numbers of mithraeum have been used to build a case for Mithraism as a cult to rival Christianity. This is debatable. The all male membership of the cult meant that Mithras was not a cult for the population as a whole. Most excavated temples of Mithras were small and compact and very few could accommodate more than a hundred people. Additionally, not all the temples were in action at the same time, which means that active cells of worshippers, would have been relatively few.
The Layout of a Mithraea
The design of each mithraea was intended to represent a microcosm of the universe, incorporating the mythology of the cult and the Neo-Platonist philosophy. Access was often down stairs and then through a series of passageways. These passageways were not just a means of access to the main chamber; they also featured in the cult initiation ceremonies.
Each main chamber was of roughly the same design and had various features in common:
- Every mithraea had a central aisle flanked on each side by a platform. This was where the cult participants would recline during cult activities and also recline to take part in the ceremonial replication of the feast between Mithras of the sun god.
- At one end of the aisle was an apse containing a cult relief or fresco depicting a scene from the mythology of Mithras. Often the relief was reversible, showing on one side Mithras’s sacrifice of the bull and on the other the celebratory feast of Mithras and the sun god.
- In addition to the central relief, temples of Mithras were decorated by frescos, reliefs and statues representing figures from the cult myths and the planets which were representative of the Neo-Platonist ideas of the ascent of the soul that had become part of the cult philosophy.
Sources
Encyclopaedia Britannica
The oxford Dictionary of Classical Myth & religion Ed Simon Price and Emily Kearns (2003) Oxford University Press.
