Mithraic brooch of Ostia

Bronze brooch (diam. 0.07), found at Ostia in 1899. It came together with the Sir John Evans Collection to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford in 1927.

The brooch is a thin disc of bronze slightly convex, and the reverse is plain, except for a high pin and catch-plate. Mithras slaying the bull. The god is in oriental dress and with a nimbus and crown of nine rays. He kneels in the normal manner on the bull, which bears two bands round its body and has a tail ending in a single tuft. Mithras raises the dagger. The wound is clearly visible and the dog stands by with open mouth to lick the blood.

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