9. Suetonius, Vespasian, 5
10. Tacitus, Histories, in Annals and Histories, E. Cowan, ante, Book I, 86.
11. Suetonius, Titus, 1
12. “Colossus Neronis,” A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome, ed., Samuel Ball Platner, revised by Thomas Ashby, 1929, London: Oxford University Press. NOTE: Even ignoring their construction of the Colosseum, the importance of the Flavian dynasty, both culturally and politically, is hard to overstate. Not only were the works of Josephus and (at least) the first three Gospels written during the Flavian era, Pliny the Elder published his important Natural History in Vespasian’s reign and dedicated it to his friend Titus. Vespasian subsidized the educator and rhetorician Quintillian who may have taught the author and magistrate Pliny the Younger, the historian Tacitus, and the satirist Juvenal. The historian Suetonius served on the staff of his friend Pliny the Younger when the latter was governor of Bithynia-Pontus. In his youth, the influential Stoic philosopher Epictetus was a slave of Nero’s servant Epaphroditus. The Greek historian and biographer Plutarch probably began publishing his works under the Flavians. In the wake of the civil war, the Flavians had to restock the Senate and, in the process, they established the aristocracy that would come to rule Rome in the so-called era of “adoptive” or “good emperors” in the century that followed them. Vespasian advanced the careers of the father of the future Emperor Trajan, who brought the Empire to its greatest size, as well as the ancestors of the future Emperors Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.
13. John 8:12
14. Stevenson and Madden, A Dictionary of Roman Coins, Republican and Imperial, 1889, London: George Bell & Sons, p. 339.
15. Ibid
16. Forum for ancient coins, http://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=dolphin, emphasis added.
17. Venuti, Niccolo Marcello, A Description of the First Discoveries of the Ancient City of Herculaneum, trans. Wickes Skurray, 1750, London: G. Woodfall (original Italian edition, 1748, Rome); and Proceedings of the Antiquarian Society, With Communications Made to the Society, Volume 12, 1908, Cambridgeshire: George Bell and Sons; and Wollaston, Robert, A Short Description of the Thermae Romano-Brittannicae, Or, The Roman Baths Found in Italy, Britain, France, Switzerland, Etc., Etc. With Some Notices of the Mosaics and Paintings Which Formed a Part of Their Decorations, Especially of the Thermae of Titus and Constantine, 1864, London: Robert Hardwicke. NOTE: There is evidence Titus himself may have visited the pool at Herculaneum since graffiti apparently made by his physician found nearby, “Apollinaris, the doctor of the Emperor Titus, defecated well here,” must have been made in the two months between Titus’s ascension to the throne and the eruption of Vesuvius. There is no question that the style of the mosaic places the pool in the Flavian period and, as a large public work, it is all the more likely that it would sponsor their developing iconography. Also of note is that in the center of the cruciform pool a bronze fountain was found:
The fountain is in the shape of a five-headed snake wrapped around a tree trunk, each of which spewed water. This is a clear reference to Serapis and the healer god Aesclepius, whose famous snake-entwined staff is used as a symbol of medicine to this day.
18. Atwill, Joseph, Caesar’s Messiah, 2005, Berkeley, CA: Ulysses Press, pp. 38-44. NOTE: One certainly need not accept all of this writer’s various contentions—some of which are clearly dubious—in order to see some of these parallels. The Mount of Olives, just to the east of ancient Jerusalem, was a sort of base of operations for the ministry of Jesus when he came to Jerusalem, according to the Gospel of Luke, and so it was the spot where Christ prayed before he was arrested there (Luke 22:39-51). The same text also has Jesus start out on his Palm Sunday triumphal entry into Jerusalem from this location (Luke 19:28-44), and the book of Matthew places Jesus there for his apocalyptic prophecy of Jerusalem’s impending destruction (Matthew 24:3, et seq.). It is here, also, that Jesus commanded Peter to put away his sword (Luke 22:49-51). And this is where Jesus ascended into heaven following his resurrection, according to Acts (Acts 1:12). Eastern Orthodox tradition holds that Jesus’s Glorious Second Coming will commence here, as well. Curiously, as Atwill observes, the Mount of Olives was also the camp for the Roman Tenth Legion, Legio X Fretensis, under the command of Titus during his siege of Jerusalem, and an important base of operations for his triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Of note, the mountain was already the site of an important Jewish necropolis in Jesus’s time.
19. Levick, Barbara, Vespasian, 1999, New York: Routledge, p. 33.
20. Levick, ante, pp. 68-69
21. Tacitus, Histories, ante, Book IV, 83 and 84
22. See, generally, Burkert, Walter, Ancient Mystery Cults, 1987, Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press; cf. Plutarch, Moralia, Vol. V, Isis and Osiris, 1936, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press. NOTE: All mystery religions are sometimes referred to as “Orphic Mystery Cults,” although this is inexact. Orpheus, the poet and musician from Greek myth, was said to have visited Hades in an effort to restore the life of his beloved wife. Although his wife was not returned to him, Orpheus had successfully harrowed hell. As a consequence, his devotees believed Orpheus could assist one’s soul in the afterlife. His cult believed in punishments following death for the wicked and in a cycle of “transmigration of souls” that could be transcended only by adopting an ascetic lifestyle. Also according to his myth, the famous musician was torn to pieces by the crazed worshippers of Dionysus. The deity of this cult is named as either Dionysus (Bacchus) or Zagreus, and since this god is said to have experienced a similar martyrdom before his apotheosis, their cross identification with the Egyptian Osiris was inevitable. Orpheus was also said to have been a sun worshipper.
A 4th Century BCE Orphic grave prayer reads: “Now you have died and now you have come into being, O thrice happy one, on this same day. Tell Persephone that the Bacchic One himself released you.” (Graf, Fritz, and Johnston, Sara, Ritual Texts for the Afterlife: Orpheus and the Bacchic Gold Tablets, 2007, London, New York: Routledge, pp. 36-37.)
23. Graves, Robert, The Greek Myths, 1955, New York: Penguin, section 50, provides a good list of sources. NOTE: Temples to the god Aesclepius were both religious sites/centers of worship as well as the first hospitals and treatment facilities in the Hellenistic world. See, Risse, Guenter B., “Pre-Christian Healing Places, Asclepieion and Valetudinarium: the Confluence of the Sacred and Secular,” Mending Bodies, Saving Souls: a History of Hospitals. 1990, Oxford University Press, p. 56-59. Such temples, or “asclepeions,” became increasingly popular from the 4th Century BCE until the late Roman imperial period.