Tabula Iliaca or Tabula “Tomassetti”
Photogallery
Tabula Iliaca or “Tomassetti” Tabula
The category Tabulae Iliacae includes a series of tabulae that represent the principle scenes of Homeric or cyclic poems, carved in bas-relief. Their function is still not clear (didactic, votive, decorative, or erudite games for the élite). Twenty-two of them are known, of which the most famous is the Tabula Capitolina, found at Bovillae, and produced at the court of Augustus, depicting episodes from the Iliad, the Ethiopid, and the Little Iliad. Only two tabulae are illustrated with episodes from the Odyssey, of which one is the tabula displayed here: known also as the “Tomassetti” Tabula, from the name of its first owner, it was found in the Roman countryside, possibly originating from a catacomb, as would be indicated by the “note on relics found in cemeteries and presented to the Supreme Pontiff Leo XIII” in 1899. It depicts 24 scenes from the Odyssey (of which only 14 remain), arranged around a central frame with Neptune and Amphitrite on a dolphin.