Palmyrene Iconographic Traditions and Their Mediterranean Connections

doi:10.1017/9781009532044.004

4 - Palmyrene Iconographic Traditions and Their Mediterranean Connections

A Note on Some Signet Seal Impressions on the Palmyrene Tesserae

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 October 2025

Rubina Raja

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Rubina Raja

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Rubina Raja: Affiliation:
Aarhus Universitet, Denmark

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Summary

The Palmyrene banqueting tesserae, clay entrance tickets to religious banquets, have been revisited over and over again since the publication of the RTP in 1955. These small but often elaborate objects have been used as lenses into Palmyra’s religious life and the general organization of social, cultural and religious life in the city. However, only in recent years have they become the object of new detailed studies, which aim to systematically examine this unique group of objects within their local context. In this contribution, the focus is on disentangling the tesserae as physical objects to be used, touched and looked at; in particular it seeks to understand a facet of their rich iconographic repertoire, which in so many ways stands in contrast to the otherwise allegedly streamlined visual art repertoire found at Palmyra, namely that of the signet seal impressions. These signet seal impressions were impressed on many of the tesserae, most likely by the sponsor of the banquet, who left his personal mark on the tickets. The seal impressions give us insight into the images circulating in Palmyra in the Roman period in a material group, which today is almost lost to us, namely the glyptic art.

Keywords

Palmyra religious life religious dining banqueting representations of deities entrance tickets

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Type: Chapter
Information: Palmyra, the Mediterranean and Beyond , pp. 49 - 109

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009532044.004 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2025

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