Title

Plaque of the Zoelas

Anonimous

Generic classification

Object

Date

Century

Cultural context / style

Material

Technique

Provenance

Current location

Inventory Number in Current Collection

Inscriptions / Marks

M(arco) Licinio Crasso / L(ucio) Calpurnio Pisone co(n)s(ulibus) / IIII K(alendas) Maias / gentilitas Desoncorum ex gente Zoelarum / et gentilitas Tridiavorum ex gente idem / Zoelarum hospitium vetustum antiquom(!) / renovaverunt eique omnes ali(u)s alium in fi/dem clientelamque suam suorumque libero/rum posterorumque receperunt egerunt / Araus Ablecaeni et Turaius Clouti Docius Elaesi / Magilo Clouti Bodecius Burrali Elaesus Clutami / per Abienum Pentili magistratum Zoelarum actum Curunda / Glabrione et Homullo co(n)s(ulibus) V Idus Iulias / idem gentilitas Desoncorum et gentilitas / Tridiavorum in eandem clientelam eadem / foedera recepunt ex gente Avolvigorum / Sempronium Perpetuum Orniacum et ex gente / Visaligorum Antonium Arquium et ex gente / Cabruagenigorum Flavium Frontonem Zoelas / egerunt / L(ucius) Domitius Silo et / L(ucius) Flavius Severus / Asturicae

Object history

The Staatliche Museen in Berlin preserves a small bronze plaque (32 x 24 cm) of rectangular shape crowned on one of the smaller sides with a simple pediment. Known as the Plate of the Zoelas, it is a legal text, in Latin, which refers to a pact of hospitality renewed in the years 27 and again in 152 n. e., and which must have been made at the latter date.

On the pediment appears the consular date of the first pact, sanctioned in Curunda on the 4th of the calends of May of the year 27; the renewal of the agreement was made, as expressed in the paragraph below, on the 5th of the ides of March of 152, and was signed in Asturica (Astorga).

This juridical text records the agreement of hospitality between two groups, the descocos and the tridiavos, belonging to the people of the Zoelas, a pre-Roman ethnic group settled in a territory that extends through the northeast of Portugal and the nearby regions of Spain. There is no unanimity among researchers on what their capital was, perhaps Curunda, where the first agreement was signed, an unidentified place and which is thought to have been near Rionegro del Puente (Zamora). Others think that the capital may have been Astorga, where the second agreement was signed.

Its original location was probably Astorga, although it is not possible to say for sure, nor its subsequent fortune until the 17th century, when we know that it belonged to Lorenzo Ramírez de Prado (1583-1658), royal advisor, diplomat and humanist. In that same century it passed into the hands of Cardinal Camillo Massimo (1620-1677), who was apostolic nuncio in Spain between 1654 and 1658. A great collector of antiquities, he may well have acquired the Zoelas plaque in Madrid and added it to his collection. Cardinal Massimo maintained a close friendship with the scholar, collector and art critic Giovanni Pietro Bellori (1613-1696), who was its next owner, perhaps as a gift from the cardinal.

Bellori inherited a magnificent collection of art and antiquities from his uncle Francesco Angeloni, which he expanded. In addition to his well-known writings such as Le vite, which includes the most important theoretical text on the arts of the 17th century, "Idea", and his Description of the images painted by Raphael of Urbino in the rooms of the Vatican palace, there is his collaboration with F. Perrier in the publication of the Icone et segmenta illustrissimi e marmore tabularum quae Romae Adhuc extant, in 1645, which shows his early interest as an antiquarian, which he never abandoned.

After Bellori's death his collection was eventually dispersed and in 1726 the Roman busts arrived in Dresden as a gift from King Wilhelm I of Prussia to Frederick Augustus II. Among the works of Bellori that arrived in Germany must have been the panel of the Zoelas preserved in Berlin.

Description

Bronze plaque showing a hospitality pact and its renewals between the years 27-152.

Locations

• Mid II^th c. - Mid XVI^th c.

  municipality

  Astorga, Astorga (Spain)

• XVI^th c. - ca. 1620

  private collection

  Lorenzo Ramírez de Prado Collection, Madrid (Spain) *

• ca. 1620 - ca. 1677

  private collection

  Cardinal Camillo Massimo collection, Roma (Italy) *

• ca. 1677 - ca. 1696

  private collection

  Giovanni Pietro Bellori Collection, Roma (Italy) *

• XVII^th c. - present

  museum

  Berlin State Museums, Berlín (Germany)