A Mithraic Chronicle from Dura-Europos.
Dura-Europos, on the banks of the Euphrates. The Roman frontier stands only a short distance from the lands of the Sasanian kings. Merchants, soldiers, archers, priests and travellers from every corner of the empire cross paths within the city walls.
Hidden behind an unremarkable doorway lies the Mithraeum, a sanctuary adorned with painted mysteries, zodiacal signs and sacred images of Mithras. Here, members of a close-knit brotherhood gather beneath the gaze of the god. Some are seasoned Patres entrusted with ancient secrets; others are young initiates striving to advance through the grades of the cult.
The year is approximately 240 CE. The sanctuary has recently received its final decorations. The names of Kamerios, Theodoros, Mareinos, Capitolinus, Saturnilus and many others can still be read on its walls. Yet rumours of war spread through the garrison, strange signs are reported within the sanctuary, and old rivalries threaten the fragile unity of the brotherhood.
Nama. The spring floods of the Euphrates have begun to recede. Merchants arriving from Palmyra bring troubling rumours from the East. Within the Mithraeum, new inscriptions have appeared upon the walls. Some claim they were written during the night. Others insist they have always been there. On the seventeenth day of Xanthikos, in the year 552 of the Seleucid Era, the brethren gather once more beneath the painted vault of Mithras.
⚔ XV Kal. Mai. CMXCIII AUC
