Marcus Statius Niger
Marcus Statius Niger was a lion who erected an altar to Cautopates in Statio, the present-day Angera, with his brother Gaius.
Biography
of Marcus Statius Niger
- Marcus Statius Niger was a Leo.
- Active c. 2nd century in Statio, Transpadana (Italia).
TNMP 183
Marcus was a sevir Augustalis appointed by a decree of the city council and representative of the dendrophoroi of the colonia Aurelia Augusta Mediolanensium, as mentioned in the marble base inscription that he and his brother Gaius erected at Station, Angera, in northern Italy.
—The New Mithraeum (2022).
In northern Italy, we have a single mention of a Mithraic grade other than that of pater: on a base consecrated to Cautopates found in Angera, the two devotees Marcus Statius Niger and Caius Valerius Iulianus call themselves leones. The former mentions also in the same inscription his belonging to the collegium dendrophororum of the city of Milan in the quality of representative (legatus dendrophororum). The term is iterated in the last line, giving the expession leones legati. This phrase results unprecedented with respect to the Mithraic organization, and it thus seems more likely to belong to the community of the collegium of the dendrophoroi, of which both the devotees should have been representatives.
—Vittoria Canciani (2022) Archaeological Evidence of the Cult of Mithras in Ancient Italy
References
- Vittoria Canciani (2022) Archaeological Evidence of the Cult of Mithras in Ancient Italy
Mentions
Inscription of two lions from Angera
TNMM 567
This marble base found in Angera in 1868 bears the inscription of two people who reached the degree of Leo.
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