Imago, titulus et construction de la mémoire

Abstract

In the Roman world, funerary monuments were considered instruments of communication that could be used by an individual to perpetuate his memory in the local community. In this endeavour, the deceased had several ways of transmitting a tangible image of his previous life – with an epitaph, an image or both. This paper analyzes a number of epitaphs of medici accompanied by a figurative representation of the deceased and investigates more specifically the interactions and relations between imago and titulus, understood as elements which merge in a monumentum that had a meaning in a given socio-cultural environment. This then leads to the creation of a dialogue which enables us to understand the strategies of self-representation and self-promotion developed by these professionals, and to suggest some answers about the definition of social identity related to belonging to a socio-cultural context, and about the identity of the individual defined by status or profession. Geographically, the study is limited to monuments of the medici in regio X.

Keywords

• funerary iconography
• Latin epigraphy
• memory of the dead
• monumentum
• physician
• self-representation