The Vase’s Representation (Cantharus, Crater) on the Roman Mosaic in Portugal: A Significant Formal and Iconographic Path from Classic Antiquity to Late Antiquity

11TH INTERNATIONAL COLLOQUIUM ON ANCIENT MOSAICS OCTOBER 16TH  20TH, 2009, BURSA TURKEY Mosaics of Turkey and Parallel Developments in the Rest of the Ancient and Medieval World: Questions of Iconography, Style and Technique from the Beginnings of Mosaic until the Late Byzantine Era

The aim of the present work is to analyze the shape and outline the meaning and evolution of the vase’s iconography on roman mosaics belonging to Classic Antiquity (II and III centuries) and Late Antiquity (III/IV centuries to VII/ VIII centuries) found in current portuguese territory. A formal and typological comparison of the vases’ representation on pavement mosaics will be performed relating them to their composition context. Thus, it will be possible to understand the plural iconographic meaning of the vase and its evolution since Classic Antiquity to Late Antiquity. The iconographic changes of this motive are noticeable above all by the transition of its significance as an attribute (Dionysian and Mitraic) to a sign-image progressively autonomous during Late Antiquity. The iconographic presence of the vase at this two Antiquity stages is explained by the way it symbolizes the funda- mental and everlasting human interrogations and paradoxes: life, death, eternity, the human and the divine, body and soul.