PRAECO: [Web : Vesti] Rare statue of Hercules discovered in Northern Israel

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

[Web : Vesti] Rare statue of Hercules discovered in Northern Israel

A rare statue depicting the Roman god Hercules has been discovered during an excavation in the Jezeel Valley in the north of Israel.

By Phoebe Greenwood in Tel Aviv

16 August 2011

The white marble figure stands at 0.5 metres and is thought to have originally decorated an alcove in a Roman bathhouse. It has been dated to the second century AD and is said to be of exceptional quality.

Dr Walid Atrash of the Israel Antiquities Authority said: "This statue is unusual because it is small. Most statues of gods from this period were life-size. This is something special."

The demigod is depicted leaning on a club, draped with the skin of the Nemean lion that he slew in the first of his twelve labours.

The son of Zeus and the mortal Alcemene, Hercules was ordered to undertake twelve superhuman feats, known as 'The Labours of Hercules', by the Mycenaean King Eurystheus to atone for the murder of his wife and three children in a fit of mad rage.

The statue was discovered in Hovrat Tarbenet during work on the new Valley Rail line, which will run through the Jezreel Valley connecting the northern port of Haifa with Bet She'an on the Jordan border. Excavations have only recently begun on this site and Dr Atrash believes this may be the first of many archaeological discoveries.

The Jezreel valley was an important stop along the Roman Via Maris, an ancient trade route connecting Egypt to Mesopotamia, or modern day Iraq.

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PRAECONES

PRAECOʹNES, criers, were employed for various purposes:

1. In sales by auction, they frequently advertised the time, place, and conditions of sale: they seem also to have acted the part of the modern auctioneer, so far as calling out the biddings and amusing the company, though the property was knocked down by the magister auctionis (Hor. Ars Poet. 419; Cic. ad Att. XII.40, de Off. II.23). [Auctio.]

2. In all public assemblies they ordered silence (Liv. III.47; Plaut. Poen. prol. 11).

3. In the comitia they called the centuries one by one to give their votes, pronounced the vote of each century, and called out the names of those who were elected (Cic. c. Verr. V.15, pro Mil. 35). They also recited the laws that were to be passed.

4. In trials, they summoned the accuser and the accused, the plaintiff and defendant (Suet. Tib. 11).

5. In the public games, they invited the people to attend, and proclaimed the victors (Cic. ad Fam. V.12).

6. In solemn funerals they also invited people to attend by a certain form; hence these funerals were called Funera Indictiva (Festus, s.v. Quirites; Suet. Jul. 84).

7. When things were lost, they cried them and searched for them (Plaut. Merc. III.4.78; Petron. 57).

8. In the infliction of capital punishment, they sometimes conveyed the commands of the magistrates to the lictors (Liv. XXVI.15).

Their office, called praeconium, appears to have been regarded as rather disreputable: in the time of Cicero a law was passed preventing all persons who had been praecones from becoming decuriones in the municipia (Cic. ad Fam. VI.18). Under the early emperors, however, it became very profitable (Juv. III.157, VII.6; Martial, V.56.11, VI.8.5), which was no doubt partly owing to the bribes which they received from the suitors, &c.

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