Fragment of two-faced pluteus

The fragment, whose iconography and size would suggest it is a presbytery enclosure pluteus, is a rare specimen in coarse-grained marble, proconnesian type, and was probably repurposed in the Middle Ages (Melucco Vaccaro 1999; Latini 2008). The ornamental motifs, decorating both sides, are still clearly visible even though the slab, which has been cropped and chipped, is now no more than a mere fragment. On one side it has a geometric decoration of bisected wicker ribbon quadrilaterals intersecting to form a star pattern, perhaps originally filled with a cross, in the center of a specularly mirrored border surrounded by a sawtooth frame. On the opposite side, a network of two-lined wicker ribbon motifs forms a quadrangular mesh decoration, knotted in the center of each side and connected to a long ribbon running parallel to another sawtooth frame. The meshes are filled with the symbolic figures of a heart-shaped leaflet (an iconic reduction of the vine), a lily, and a Solomon’s knot, an early Christian motif alluding to the cross and wisdom of Christ (Righetti Tosti-Croce 2005).
The singular, staggered arrangement of the decoration on the two faces of the slab allows for different theories regarding its placement in the lower chancel. It has been speculated that the star-shaped ornamentation originally faced the chancel (Latini 2003), with the lower portion devoid of reliefs placed close to a podium raised above the level of the nave, and with the square-mesh side facing the worshippers, as in the extant iconostasis at the church of San Leone in Leprignano (Raspi Serra 1974, fig. 210 and 216 detail, which, however, bears carved decoration on only one side). More likely, wooden benches used as kneelers may have been set against the remaining half of the slab, as is likely for the two-sided plutei from the presbyterial enclosure of Santa Maria in Trastevere (Bull-Simonsen Einaudi 2001, fig. 4), so that the faithful, kneeling on this side of the enclosure, could receive the Eucharist directly into their mouths from the hands of the presbyters in the enclosure, in keeping with the Carolingian liturgical rite. In this case, we should assume that the side with the eight-pointed star faced the faithful and the side with the filled-in links faced inward.
The ornamental motif of the eight-pointed star derives from an early Christian and early Byzantine model which had already been borrowed in the eighth century for the presbyterial enclosure of Gregory III (731–741) in St. Peter’s in the Vatican (Russo 1984; Guiglia Guidobaldi 2002) and reproposed as a programmatic and ideological version of the older form in the period of Leo III (795–816) and Paschal I (817–824) (Ballardini 2008, but Flaminio 2018 traces three compositional variants), overlaid with the new Carolingian aniconic and abstracting repertoire.
The decorative pattern of filled quadrangular meshes is widely attested in the repertoire of interlaced figures from the Carolingian age: it can be found, for example, in the verso of the sepulchral epigraph of San Cumiano in Bobbio, commissioned by Liutprand but reworked in the ninth century (Calzona 2002; Destefanis 2008; Lomartire 2013). A similar fate seems to have befallen the two-faced slab from Santa Maria in Cosmedin, of which there is an extant fragment (Melucco Vaccaro 1974, figs. 104 and 115; Macchiarella 1976, fig. 267). More generally in Rome, in the first half of the ninth century, the motif of filled square meshes turns out to be interchangeable with that of circular meshes (identified as early as 1939—see Kautzsch 1939). Typological parallels with the inhabited mesh face of our fragment can be traced back to the plutei of Santa Sabina (Trinci Cecchelli 1976, figs. 239, 241, and 245), referring to the presbyterial enclosure of Eugene II (824–827), where we find the same iconic motifs—including the detail of the fleur-de-lis and small leaves arranged in opposite directions—the meshes of a two-lined wicker ribbon and the sawtooth frame; these can be associated with the fragments from San Giovanni a Porta Latina (Melucco Vaccaro 1974, figs. 32-34), dated to the first quarter of the ninth century, and a fragment from the same period with the plutei of Santa Sabina from San Giorgio in Velabro (Melucco Vaccaro 1974, fig. 11).
On the technical–formal level, the assured, regular carving, the broad, well-spaced layout, and the use of proconnesian marble recall quality standards that were typical of the artisans who worked for Paschal I (817–824; Paroli 2001; Ballardini 2019), and subsequently used in the workshops patronized by Paschal’s successor.

Valentina Brancone

Mediocre. Chipped and cropped into a wedge shape, with deep hole at base.

2002–2003 (restoration directed by Maria Giulia Barberini and Maria Selene Sconci, undertaken on the occasion of the founding of the Museo di Palazzo Venezia Lapidarium).

Unknown. Found during excavations for the Palazzetto, as part of demolition carried out in the area for the relocation of the Palazzetto di Venezia (1910–1914).

Rome, Archivio del Museo del Palazzo di Venezia, inventorying the sculptures of the lower and upper loggias (manuscript inventory edited by Maria Vittoria Brugnoli, 1973).

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Raspi Serra Joselita, La Diocesi dell’Alto Lazio. Bagnoregio, Bomarzo, Castro, Civita Castellana, Nepi, Orte, Sutri, Tuscania, Corpus della scultura altomedievale, VIII, Spoleto 1974;
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Ballardini Antonella, Scolpire a Roma per Pasquale I (817-824)? L’Oratorio di San Zenone, in «Hortus artium medievalium», 25, 2019, pp. 376-391.