David Woods: Rome, Gregoria, and Madaba: A Warning against Sexual Temptation

The pavement of the so-called Hipppolytus Hall discovered beneath the Byzantine Church of the Virgin at Madaba in modern Jordan preserves a 6^th century mosaic which depicts the personification of Madaba itself, together with what appear to be the personifications of two other cities, situated above the left-hand corner of a large rectangular panel. Each of the three personifications takes the form of a traditional urban tyche, a woman seated on a throne, and the name of each appears immediately above her head in Greek capitals. There is no problem concerning the identification of the tyche labelled Mēdaba, clearly identifiable as the personification of the town of Madaba itself. The problems lie in the identification of her two companions labelled Rōmē and Grēgoria. It has generally been agreed that the tyche labelled Rōmē must represent either Rome in Italy or Constantinople as the New Rome, but there is no known city by the name of Grēgoria. However, Bowersock has recently argued that Gregoria represents the city of Antioch in Syria, and that it was nicknamed such after its famous patriarch Gregorius (570-92), so that the three tychai represent Madaba, Antioch, and Constantinople, the purpose being to praise Madaba by associating it with the two greatest cities of the eastern Byzantine empire. It is the purpose of this note to offer an alternative interpretation of the terms Rōmē and Grēgoria. I suggest that these terms identify the virtues with which Madaba wished to be associated, ‘strength’ and ‘vigilance’, and they serve to comment on the dangers of sexual temptation as illustrated by the accompanying depiction of Aphrodite and Hippolytus, and the virtues needed to resist the same.