Images and artworks

Abstract

Due to the regular presence of works of art in Roman everyday life, cases involving images and other artefacts were often dealt with by Roman jurists. Specifically art-related questions and decisions, however, were quite rare. In the case of tabula picta, legal reasoning was affected at least by the value of art. For the asylum of imperial images (confugere ad statuas), the identification of emperor and statue was decisive. In most instances, however, the outcome was not affected by the fact that the object in question had been an image or artwork. However, the Digest can nevertheless reveal details about the roles of art in everyday life not mentioned in other sources. One reads about the art-love of slaves, damage caused by falling paintings or attacks against memorial statues, and about the cost of training slaves as painters and their increase in value. Likewise, jurists were asked for their opinions on questions regarding the decoration of houses with frescos, the positioning of statues, or testamentary manumissions of slave artisans. The generally adopted down-to-earth approach towards artworks, however, did not prevent one Roman jurist from going into substantial reflections about the essential qualities of images.