Flavius Septimius Zosimus
Vir perfectissimus and priest of Zeus Brontes and Hekate, he erected a mithraeum in Rome.
![Bull. della comm. arch. comm., 1885, p. 27 et pl. IV-V; cf. Lanciani, Ancient Rome, 1890, p. 192. Fig. 25. [TMFMM]](https://www.mithraeum.eu/album/monumenta/mitreo_esquilino_004.jpg "Bull. della comm. arch. comm., 1885, p. 27 et pl. IV-V; cf. Lanciani, Ancient Rome, 1890, p. 192. Fig. 25. [TMFMM]")
Biography
of Flavius Septimius Zosimus
- Flavius Septimius Zosimus is attested as a Pater at the Mitreo dell’Esquilino.
- Attested in the 3rd – 4th century.
- Attested in Roma, Latium, Italia in 3rd – 4th century (TNMM 782).
TNMP 272
Clauss firmly states what Vermaseren only tentatively suggested: that the owner of this domus and mithraeum was one Flavius Septimius Zosimus, who stated in a dedicatory inscription that he was a vir perfectissimus and sacerdos of Bronto and Hecate, and that he built a Mithraic cave (speleum).
The vir perfectissimus Flavius Septimius Zosimus commemorated the construction of a Mithraic spelaeum. Though Zosimus did not call himself pater, he will have been leader, i.e. pater, of his self-built Mithraeum. Reasons for this unusual Mithraeum were not unknowledge or perversion of Mithraism because several ‘normal’ Mithraea still existed in Rome as example. Instead the construction plan mirrors the preferences of the pater who erected and financed this Mithraeum inside of his house. On the one hand, various statues found there suggest a personal syncretism: moreover, Zosimus was priest of Hecate.
—David Burkhart Janssen (2017) Mystery-cults in Tetrarchic Roman Empire (284-324 AD).
References
- A. B. Griffith (1993) ‘Mithraism in the private and public lives of 4th-c. senators in Rome’. The archaeological evidence for Mithraism in imperial Rome.
- Alfred Shenington Geden. Altar by Septimius Zosimus from Roma in EDCS.
- Luciano Lazzaro (1993) Esclaves et affranchis en Belgique et Germanies romaines d’après les sources épigraphiques.
- Vittoria Canciani (2022) Archaeological Evidence of the Cult of Mithras in Ancient Italy.
Attestations
Altar by Septimius Zosimus from Roma
TNMM 782
This altar dedicated to Sol Invictus Mithras by a certain Septimius Zosimus was found in the Basilica of San Martino ai Monti in Rome.
Mitreo dell’Esquilino
TNMM 83
In a house from the time of Constantine, a Lararium was found with a statue of Isis-Fortuna. The Mithraeum was a door next to it, on a lower room.
