NIKOS IOANNOU
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Dionysus in Paphos: from Roman mosaic to gold earrings

The House of Dionysus in Paphos takes its modern name from the god of wine, because so many of its mosaics show scenes connected with him. One of them shows him seated with a bunch of grapes in his hand. Nikos Ioannou Jewellers, a family goldsmith in Cyprus, makes earrings inspired by the mosaics of this house, and the maker’s description is quoted below. This article looks at the house and its floors first.

A Roman house in Nea Paphos

The house stands in the Archaeological Park of Kato Paphos, on the UNESCO World Heritage list since 1980. Monuments in the park date from the 4th century BC to the Middle Ages. Four large Roman villas are among its main finds: the House of Dionysos, the House of Aion, the House of Theseus and the House of Orpheus.

According to the Cyprus tourism authority, the mosaics came to light in 1962, when a farmer ploughing his field uncovered one by accident. The Department of Antiquities then excavated the site under Kyriacos Nikolaou. Sources differ on how long this took: Paphos Life gives 1962 to 1965, and a review of the main scholarly book on the house gives 1962 to 1974.

It was a large private house, of about 2,000 square metres and more than 40 rooms, set around a colonnaded courtyard with a pool. Some 556 square metres of its floors are mosaic. Earlier structures lie beneath it, including a Hellenistic building whose sea-pebble floor shows the monster Scylla.

Dating has moved over time. The floors were first placed in the late 3rd century AD on grounds of style. According to the review of Christine Kondoleon’s 1994 book, pottery sealed under the mosaics and a deposit of amphorae later pushed that back to before 200 AD. Site information puts the building of the house at the end of the 2nd century AD. Other records vary: a Department of Antiquities record dates one panel between 175 and 225 AD, Paphos Life gives late 2nd or early 3rd century for most of the floors, and the Theoi Project and a stamp record say the 3rd century. The end of the house is less settled still. Local sources describe destruction, probably by earthquakes, in the early 4th century, while the review reports Kondoleon proposing an earthquake in the late 2nd.

What the floors show

Much of the decoration concerns Dionysus. In the dining room, the threshold shows his triumph: the god crowned with ivy in a two-wheeled chariot, returning from India with captives and panthers. Beyond it, vintage scenes fill the central carpet of the floor, with an inhabited vine scroll.

Other rooms move on to other stories, including Narcissus, Ganymede carried off by Zeus as an eagle, Phaedra and Hippolytos, and Pyramos and Thisbe, along with the seasons, hunting scenes and geometric floors. The patron is not known, and the review notes there is no inscribed evidence for one.

The panel with the grapes

The scene most relevant here is in the western portico, in what the Department of Antiquities records as Room 16. It tells the story of Icarios, and visitors crossed it on the way into the dining room.

In the myth, as told in a description on the Ancient Rome image archive, Icarios welcomed Dionysus to Athens, and in return the god taught him to grow vines and make wine. Dionysus warned him to keep the wine hidden. Icarios instead shared it with some passing shepherds. They became drunk, believed they had been poisoned, and killed him.

The mosaic shows the moment before this happens. At the centre, Icarios holds the reins of an ox cart loaded with wineskins. To the right are two men labelled the first wine drinkers, one slumped against a wineskin and the other still drinking. To the left sits Dionysus on a stool, holding a bunch of grapes and appearing to offer it to the nymph Akme, who drinks from a bowl opposite him. Both wear crowns of vine leaves and grapes, and an inscription gives Akme’s name, which means something like culmination or perfection.

Scholars have read this arrangement as a comment on drinking. Kondoleon, as summarised in the review, contrasts the dignified pair on the left with the drunken shepherds on the right, with Icarios between them. The Ancient Rome description offers a similar reading as a hypothesis: moderation on one side and excess on the other, placed where diners would walk over it before a meal.

In 1983 Cyprus Post used a detail of Icarios transporting his wine on a commemorative stamp.

From floor to earrings

The maker describes the earrings in these words:

“The grapes and vine leaf earrings inspired from the Paphos famous Roman mosaic of the House of Dionysus, the god of wine holding the grapes in his hand circa 2nd century AD”

The maker’s description does not name a panel. Of the scenes described in the sources for this article, Dionysus with the bunch of grapes in the Icarios panel is the closest fit, and the crowns worn by the god and Akme include both the vine leaves and the grapes the description names. Whether this was the actual starting point is a question for the maker. The date in the maker’s words sits within the range given above, towards its earlier end.

On method, the family’s own line reads: “Uniquely crafted from solid hand hammered and laid out 18 karat gold sheet, which is then formed to shape, in a specially blended archaic style yellow color.”

Gold sheet, in general terms

The phrase “18 karat” describes purity. Karats count parts of gold in 24, so 18 karat gold is 18 parts gold to 6 parts other metals, or 75 per cent gold by weight. Pure 24 karat gold is very soft. The added metals, usually silver and copper in yellow alloys, make it harder and more durable, and the balance between them shifts the colour. More copper warms the tone towards red; more silver cools it. That is why two pieces of the same karat can look quite different side by side.

Working from sheet is one of the oldest ways of shaping gold. In general practice the metal is rolled or hammered thin, then cut and raised into form with hammers, punches and stakes. Hammering also hardens the metal, so it is softened again with heat, a step called annealing, before work continues. A leaf or a cluster of grapes made this way is built up from flat metal rather than poured into a mould, and the surface keeps something of the tools that shaped it.

These are general points about goldsmithing, not a description of a particular workshop. For the earrings themselves, the maker’s own words above are the record.

The floors can still be seen in Paphos. The mosaics remain in place, apart from the Scylla floor, in a covered area with a raised walkway across some of the rooms.

Sources