[157] Shakespeare is unfortunately of no help here, because he follows Plutarchus who does not report anything about the ritual of the funeral. Dio’s speech of Antonius seems also rhetorically finessed. We reconstruct the situation here mainly from Suetonius and Appianus, who agree with each other; but where Appianus says (BC 2.146) that Antonius ‘recited many other things’, we refer to Dio. We follow partly Stauffer (1957), p. 21-23. But he overlooks that the effigy of wax had to be hanging on the tropaeum, because according to Suetonius (Jul. 84, first paragraph: Funere indicto rogus instructus est in martio campo iuxta Iuliae tumulum et pro rostris aurata aedes ad simulacrum templi Veneris Genetricis collocata; intraque lectus eburneus auro ac purpura stratus et ad caput tropaeum cum ueste, in qua fuerat occisus.) the toga was hanging there right from the beginning. It must have covered the effigy, as is evident from Appianus (BC 2.146: τὸ σῶμα τοῦ Καίσαρος ἐγύμνου καὶ τὴν ἐσθῆτα ἐπὶ κοντοῦ φερομένην ἀνέσειε, λελακισμένην ὑπὸ τῶν πληγῶν καὶ πεφυρμένην αἵματι αὐτοκράτορος.): When Antonius removes the toga, the effigy is exposed. Also the fact that Antonius uses a spear to remove the toga (l. c.), speaks for it unambiguously. With τὸ σῶμα τοῦ Καίσαρος—‘the body of Caesar’—Appianus could only mean here the ἀνδρείκελον αὐτοῦ Καίσαρος ἐκ κηροῦ πεποιημένον—‘the effigy (literally: the mannequin) of Caesar himself formed from wax’ (BC 2.147)—because Antonius as priest—apart from being flamen Diui Iulii and lupercus he was also augur—was not allowed to see a corpse (cf. Weinstock 1971, p. 354(5), with further proofs); besides—Caesar’s body was lying in the death bed as Appianus himself reports: τὸ μὲν γὰρ σῶμα, ὡς ὕπτιον ἐπὶ λέχους, οὐχ ἑωρᾶτο. τὸ δὲ ἀνδρείκελον ἐκ μηχανῆς ἐπεστρέφετο πάντῃ.—‘as the body, lying flat on the bier, could not be seen. But the model, with the help of a mechanical device, could be turned in all directions.’ This ‘mechanical device’ could only have been set up in advance, and therefore only at the tropaeum. So the previous sentence of Appianus refers to the erecting of the tropaeum itself, together with the mannequin, or to the heaving of the wax mannequin onto the tropaeum: Ὧδε δὲ αὐτοῖς ἔχουσιν ἤδη καὶ χειρῶν ἐγγὺς οὖσιν ἀνέσχε τις ὑπὲρ τὸ λέχος ἀνδρείκελον αὐτοῦ Καίσαρος ἐκ κηροῦ πεποιημένον·—‘While they were in this temper and already near to violence, somebody raised above the funeral couch a mannequin of Caesar himself made of wax.’
On the relation of mêchanê and cross in the liturgy cf. Ignatius, Ephes. IX, I: ἀναφερόμενοι εἰς τὰ ὕψη διὰ τῆς μηχανῆς Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὅς ἐστιν σταυρός—‘raised above by the mechane, the “theatrical machine” of Jesus Christ, which is the cross’.
Unless there were several tropaea because, after all, Caesar had celebrated at least four triumphs, or two tropaea, like on the denarius of Caldus, ill. 22, one with the arms of Vercingetorix and one with the wax model of Caesar. This is conceivable insofar as there are two different crosses to be seen in our churches or Ways of the Cross as well: on the one the figure of Christ is attached, on the other the instruments of the crucifixion, what is called croix des outrages, ‘cross of insults’, or creu dels improperis, ‘cross of improperies’, in other languages. In English, like in German, it is not by chance called by the Latin name Arma Christi, which stresses its proximity to the Roman tropaeum on which the ‘arms’ of the succumbing commander were appended as well. Compare ill. 114 with ill. 21 p. 90 and ill. 33 p. 97, i. a.

Based on the descriptions that are preserved by Suetonius (Jul. 84.1), Appianus (BC 2.146-147), and the parallel tradition, the Utrecht artist Pol du Closeau has tried in a first approximation a drawn reconstruction of the central scene of Caesar’s funeral.

The perspective is from the Forum Romanum, from the side of the Basilica Aemilia on the Rostra, the rostrum, where Antonius is just delivering the funeral oration to Caesar. On the left we perceive the gable of the temple of Saturnus and in the background the rocky Capitol with the temples of Jupiter and Iuno. We are in the year 44 BC, so the temple of Vespasianus, which was built later, does not yet exist so we have a clear view of the capitol. The Tabularium which was attached to the Capitol on the end of the Forum remains just outside the section of the picture on the right from this angle.
Caesar’s body is laid out in a gilded model of the temple of Venus Genetrix. One perceives the frieze with the egg-motif, the symbol of birth (Genetrix), which in Christianity was to become that of reincarnation (Easter eggs). Beneath, the carrying poles can be seen. At head height of this little temple of Venus stands the tropaeum-like device (Suetonius: tropaeum; Appianus: mêchanê) on which the mannequin made of wax is hanging with the wounds on the body caused by the dagger thrusts. Marcus Antonius is just about to pull away Caesar’s gown, the bloodstained toga which first covered the wax figure and the tropaeum, by dint of a lance, and in this way reveals the corpus. In the background the people are crying out, filled with indignation, as can be seen through the bier.
Caesar’s wax figure on the tropaeum has outstretched arms not only because on a tropaeum the arms could only be fastened like that (cf. also ill. 61) but because somebody who falls down dead stretches out his arms and because Caesar’s body had been seen like that when three servants carried him home with the arms hanging out of the litter on both sides (cf. quotation from Nicolaus Damascenus, p. 83, note 193). For Antonius wanted to show how Caesar had lain there, murdered. But because the body would not have been visible if lying on the Rostra, he had the wax figure produced and erected it—like a tropaeum. Thus Caesar’s wax simulacrum which should have depicted him lying, appeared as if it were hanging on a cross.
The tropaeum is made of plain planks instead of round posts here because a wax figure could be affixed better to those. The artist has purposely not drawn any fastenings for the wax figure in this reconstruction. When wax manufacturers were asked about this detail, they said that full-scale representations made of wax can only be held upright by a scaffolding, or a structure. It is known that in antiquity wax figures had a structure made of wood; they were actually wooden figures with a wax outer-layer (cf. Marquart-Mau (1886), p. 354). The most functional and direct way to fasten such a wooden figure coated with wax to a tropaeum would involve nails through the hands. This would explain why the ‘Crucified one’ has nails through his hands in spite of the fact that for a real man hanging on the cross, one would best use rope. Anyway, nails would have to be driven through the wrists because if attached to the palms the body weight would tear through the flesh.
As said, this drawing is a first attempt and unfinished: the rents and blood stains on the toga caused by the dagger thrusts are still missing. The drawing was not yet ready when it was shown at the lecture and subsequent discussion in the Lutherse Kerk (Lutheran Church) in Utrecht on Nov. 28th 2002, and also during the telecast ‘Buitenhof’ in the contribution of Prof. Paul Cliteur Ph. D. on the following Dec. 1st. Both times it caused a sensation. Therefore we want to reproduce it here as incomplete and as effective as it was first shown, with some slight improvements.
It might appear strange because it is not done in an archeologically correct and anatomically perfect late Hellenistic style. It is from the hand of a contemporary artist with his personal style affectionate to popular art. But for that very reason it has an eminently documentary nature, since it brings home to us for the first time how the exposition of Caesar’s ‘body’ during his funeral might have looked, true to the original, according to the sources, but at the same time in an anachronistic, almost naive way so that we can already get a feel for the alienation that the depiction of these scenes was to experience in Christian art in the course of time. As an identikit picture this drawing serves very well: it realizes graphically what the eyewitnesses had seen and makes it possible for us to catch a glimpse of the instant in which the genesis of the ‘crucified one’ occurred.
This moment was short because as we have seen the sight was unbearable: the people revolted, became enraged, pursued the assassins and burned Caesar’s body right there at the Forum. This was interpreted as his resurrection. Accordingly the moment of the re-erecting of the body on the pyre was frozen on Caesar’s coins (cf. ill. 67, p. 108) together with the ascension in the apotheosis (cf. ill. 85 and 86, p. 116 as well as ill. 87, p. 117). For the exhibition of Caesar’s martyred body had indeed fulfilled its function to incite the people to revolt, but it still belonged to the assassination, i. e. to what one wanted to overcome, to the parricide, the commemoration of which should be wiped out by the execration of the day of murder as dies parricidii, ater, funestus (cf. referring to this, p. 88). So it is not astonishing that this image was never shown except for in the liturgy of Passion Week.
A glance at the appearance of the ‘crucified one’ in Christian art confirms this. In the Christian iconography there are pictures of the ‘crucified one’ dating only from the 5th century on, and as one who suffers only in the second millennium. Prior to that, the cross appears alone initially as crux invicta, as the invincible laureate cross, which the victorious Christ carries like a tropaeum in triumph (compare the way Simon a Cyrenian carries the ‘cross’ on the late Constantinian passion sarcophagus of 340/370 AD (ill. 116, left) with that of Romulus resp. Mars carrying the tropaeum in ill. 23–25, p. 91.

Also notice in the second scene from the left side that the crown of thorns really is a laurel wreath which is held above the head of Christ like in the triumph of the imperator, Christ who is depicted beardless and in toga just as a Roman, the roll in his left hand like the commander’s rod; on the right he authoritatively instructs Pilate).

And after 420/430 ad, when the first depictions of the ‘crucified’ Jesus Christ surface, he doesn’t appear as dead man but as one who defies death, victorious, anticipating his resurrection in his posture—like on this ivory relief on the London casket in the British Museum, even emphasized by the anticipated death of Judas by hanging (ill. 117, left).

Also note the way Longinus applies his ‘lance’-stab to the heart region: like a dagger thrust. And here also, Jesus is beardless, i. e. in Roman symbolism: without mourning—like Divus Iulius.

If one then looks at the development of the picture of the ‘crucifixion’ through the course of history, two things are detected: firstly the earliest pictures preserved were also popular-naive, and sparsely classical, and secondly there is no effect of gravity at all initially.

It was not until the second millennium and then only slowly that gravity becomes apparent in the ‘crucified one’—and slowly pulled him down. In former times it was different and in Byzantine resp. Greek Orthodox art it has largely remained that way to date.

Where does this illogical manner of representation stem from? Traditionally two reasons are given: The basis is said to be that originally no one wanted to portray a suffering one but rather one overcoming death-and for that a man in a standing position is better suited. Additionally there must have been a fearfulness of depicting one’s own Godman as a crucified one, a fear that allowed cross representations to develop in art only after Theodosius I had abolished the penalty of crucifixion and when the cross no longer triggered negative associations. Meanwhile, one refrains from this earlier prevailing interpretation (the Rabula-Codex and the casket in Sancta Sanctorum in Rome, both from the 5/6th century, indeed show a standing as well as suffering Jesus on the cross), opining that it simply originates from the fact that the Christian artists had no ancient examples of crucified ones available—the crucifixion was sporadically described in texts from classical times, but never portrayed, neither by painters nor by sculptors—and that no pictures nor descriptions of Jesus’ crucifixion had been passed down either. These two competing arguments, neither of which are very convincing, point to the helplessness of the circles of experts, who are still struggling for a plausible explanation. The more so as it is obvious that as soon as the man on the cross was perceived to be a crucified one, the artists immediately started to let him hang and fall down more and more. And although the artists in these instances did not have examples either, they knew that somebody who is hanging on a cross just hangs.
This is confirmed by the third century signet stones and gems from the fund of numerous small pilgrim’s souvenirs which were produced to satisfy the great demand for them after Helena the mother of Constantine had discovered the pretended ‘true’ cross of Christ in Jerusalem—at least according to tradition—and brought a part of it to Constantinople and had built a church in Jerusalem, ‘(To the) Holy Tomb’ while Constantine had further memorial buildings erected, all of which attracted more and more pilgrims in the course of time.

Irrespective of whether the signet stone resp. the gem reproduced here is about Christ, Bacchus, Dionysos or somebody else and whether they evolved from a Orphic-Christian syncretism or served for pagan-magic use, they do show that not only the artists of the second millennium but also artists from late Antiquity knew clearly, that one who was crucified has to hang on the cross and not stand up straight. One has to ask oneself whether there was a model for the atypical and unnatural representation of Christ standing on the cross which was the exclusive way of depicting him for a thousand years, a model that counteracted the hanging Christ and demanded that the ‘crucified one’ was not to hang.

The return to Caesar’s funeral again explains this paradox: originally it was not the presentation of a crucified one but the expositio of a stabbed one lying on the floor who was only erected that all could see him. Thus his arms should not be stretched upwards but rather downwards, or straight out at the most. And this is exactly what can be observed in the antique ‘crucifixions’.
The solution to the mystery of the late and anomalous appearance of the ‘crucified one’ in Christian art would then be easy. The ‘crucified one’ was at first only shown in the liturgy of the passion of Divus Iulius. This meant, according to tradition during the first centuries, that a wax simulacrum had to be made for it year after year, that was to be burned in the Easter fire. This was very important because it signified the moment of the resurrection, when the people cry out Christos anesti! resp. resurrexit! Only later, when the Christian aversion to cremation established itself and beginning with Constantine, inhumation became traditional for the emperor as well, could the liturgy be partially adjusted to the texts of the Gospels too. The Easter fire remained in symbolic form, but ‘Jesus’ was no longer burned in it, and instead of his wax simulacrum only the Easter candle, possibly together with a co-burned Judas (instead of Julius). From then on the simulacrum could also be made of different materials, out of gypsum or carved in wood, and could, for use in the next year, be preserved in the churches, which had been built in the meantime after the acceptation by the emperors. That was more economical too, which was certainly welcome in the meager years that accompanied the triumph of Christianity.
Then it was only a question of time as to when these pictorial representations of the crucified one would occur in art also, for instance at the gates of churches like in Santa Sabina in Rome where it is still visible today. However, since they not only emblematized the suffering of the Christians from the persecutions but also the victory from Constantine’s time on, they did not emphasize the suffering, but rather the victorious aspect of the crucified one, for quite some time. It was only after the decay of the Roman Empire and the triumph of the barbarians—and the accompanying subjugation of the free Roman peasants as serfs—that the suffering Christ alone remained as symbol, and of the former victory not even the remembrance remained and if any still did, then it was as a painful one also. The never-ending suffering of the Christians summoned the permanently present and everywhere visualized suffering of Christ. The age of the Crucifixus, of the Crucified one, had dawned. Caesar’s tropaeum had finally become Christ’s cross. [<]