An Archaeology of Images: Iconology and Cosmology in Iron Age and Roman Europe by Green Miranda Aldhouse

Author:Green, Miranda Aldhouse [Green, Miranda Aldhouse]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2004-08-01T16:00:00+00:00

Figure 5.14 Nehalennia, from Colijnsplaat, the Netherlands. © Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden.

The imagery of Sucellus and Nehalennia is visually linked by the presence of the dog. The inanimate symbolism of both deities suggests a concern with well-being, plenty and transference to a life after death. The dog may present a further, r elated theme, that of healing, a quality widely accepted as associated with this animal: in some Nigerian traditions, dogs are symbolically linked with the care, health and cleansing of small children, for they consume their excreta and lick their anuses clean (Ojoade 1994: 215). Live dogs were kept in the grounds of the great Asklepeion at Epidaurus, for it was believed that their saliva could heal the sick pilgrims who came to pray for a cure ( Jackson 1988: 140–143; van Straten 1981: 61–151; Rouse 1902: 199–201; Jenkins 1957a: 60–76). The important late Roman temple to the British god Nodens has been identified as a healing-sanctuary largely on account of the numerous images of dogs found there (Wheeler & Wheeler 1932: 41); dog-figurines are habitual offerings at many Gallo-Roman curative thermal sanctuaries, such as Hochscheid in the Moselle Valley (Jenkins 1957a; Wightman 1970: 217, 223), and dog-sacrifices were apparently made in a healing-shrine at Vertault in Burgundy (Meniel et al. 1991: 268–275). Healing, like death, is a liminal state, inv olving transformation of being from illness to health: both involve risk both to the victim and others, thr ough infection, contamination and pollution (Lindsay 2000: 152–173). Because of their ambivalent links with dirt and cleansing, dogs may have been associated with curative cults as a metaphor for transference, whether in the context of health, death or other forms of becoming.The animal’s boundary-imagery may even contribute to its connection with Sucellus as a vintner-god, a ble to transform grapes into wine (and the sober to drunkenness), and with Nehalennia and the desire for safe transference across the ocean, whether in life or after death.

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