Mithras rock-born from Housesteads
TNMM 200 ↔ CIMRM 860
Stone relief (H. 1.33 Br. 0.82), found ’between two altars (Nos 863-4) about 0.66 before the back wall (Hodgson).
The lower part has not been worked and is rough. Above it in an open oval circle, the torso of a young naked Mithras with long curly hair, emerging from an egg, the two halfs of which are visible above the head and below the hips. The raised arms have got lost, but his hands, in which a dagger (r) and a torch (l) have been preserved on the rim of the circle. This part is framed by a rim on which the signs of the Zodiac: Aquarius-Pisces-Aries-Taurus-Gemini(lost)-Cancer and Leo-Virgo-Libra(lost)-Scorpio-Sagittarius-Capricornus.
References
J. Hodgson in Archaeologia Aeliana 294 No. 53; Hodgson History of Northumberland 1827 190 Pl. LIV 16; Bruce Lap. Sept. 96 No. 188 and fig. Rom. Wall 398f and fig.; MMM II No. 273d and fig. 315; Hinks in Bruton The Roman Fort at Manchester 1909 Pl. 174; Adams Mithraism 1915 fig. 35; Eisler Weltenmantel II 410ff fig. 43; Saxl fig. 159; D. Levi in Hesperia XIII 1944293 fig. 18. See fig. 226.
- Vermaseren, Maarten Jozef (1956) Corpus Inscriptionum et Monumentorum Religionis Mithriacae
