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On this page: Matrona – Matronalia – Mausoleum

MAUSOLEUM.

odd Fescennina [fescennina], and are frequently called Epithalamia. At the end of the repast the bride was conducted by matrons who had not had more than one husband (pronubae), to the lectus genialis in the atrium, which was on this occasion magnificently adorned and strewed with flowers. On the following day the husband sometimes gave another entertainment to his friends, which was called repotia (Fest. s. v. ; Horat. Sat. ii. 2. 60), and the woman who on this day undertook the management of the house of her husband, had to perform certain religious rites (Macrob. Sat. i. 15), on which account, as was observed above, it was necessary to select a day for the marriage which was not followed by a dies ater. These rites pro­bably consisted of sacrifices to the dii Penates. (Cic. de Republ. v. 5.)

The rites and ceremonies which have been men­tioned above, are not described by any ancient writer in the order in which they took place, and the order adopted above rests in some measure merely upon conjecture. Nor is it, on the other hand, clear which of the rites belonged to each of the three forms of marriage. Thus much only is certain, that the most solemn ceremonies and those of a religious nature belonged to confarreatio.

The position of a Roman woman after marriage was very different from that of a Greek woman. The Roman presided over the whole household ; she educated her children, watched over and pre­ served the honour of the house, and as the mater - familias she shared the honours and respect shown to her husband. Far from being confined like the Greek women to a distinct apartment, the Roman matron, at least during the better centuries of the republic, occupied the most important part of the house, the atrium. (Compare Lipsius, Elect, i. 17 ; Bb'ttiger, Aldobrandin. Hoclizeit, p. 124, &c.; Bris- sonius, De Ritu Nuptiarum^ de Jure Commbii, Paris, 1564. 12mo.) [L.S.]

MATRONA. [matrtmonium, p. 741, a.]

MATRONALIA, also called MATRO-NA'LES FERIAE, a festival celebrated by the Roman matrons on the 1st of March in honour of Juno Lucina. From the many reasons which Ovid gives why the festival was kept on this day, it is evident that there was no certain tradition on the subject; but the prevailing opinion seems to have been that it was instituted in memory of the peace between the Romans and Sabines, which was brought about by means of the Sabine women. At this festival wives used to receive presents from their husbands, and at a later time girls from their lovers ; mistresses also were accustomed to feast their female slaves. Hence we find the festival called by Martial the Saturnalia of women. (Ov. Fast. iii. 229, &c. ; Plant. Mil. iii. 1. 97 ; Tibull. iii. 1 ; Hor. Carm. iii. 8 ; Mart. v. 84. 11 ; Suet. Vesp. 19 ; Tertull. Idol. 14 ; comp. Hartung, Die Religion cler Romer, vol. ii. p. 65.)

MAUSOLEUM (Mau<roAe?oi>), which sig­nified originally the sepulchre of Mausolus, was used by the Romans as a generic name for any magnificent sepulchral edifice. (Pans. viii. 16. § 3. 8. 8, and the Latin Lexicons.)

The original building was the production of the piety of a wealthy queen, and the skill of the great artists of the later Ionian and Attic schools of architecture and sculpture. Mauso-lus, the dynast of Caria, having died in b.c. 353, his queen Artemisia evinced her sorrow by

MAUSOLEUM.

observing his funeral rites with the most expen­sive splendour, and by commencing the erection of a sepulchral monument to him, at Halicnrnns-sus, which should surpass anything the world had yet seen. (See Diet, of Biog. arts. Artemisia^ "Mausolus.} She entrusted its erection to the architects Phileus (or Phiteus, or Pytheus) and Satyrus, who wrote an account of the work and its sculptural decorations; and to four of the greatest artists of the new Attic school, Scopas, Bryaxis, Leochares, and either Timotheus or Praxiteles, for respecting this name, Vitruvius tells us, the au­thorities varied. These artists worked in emu­lation with one another, each upon one face of the building, and, upon the death of Artemisia, who only survived her husband two years, they con­tinued their work as a labour of love. Pliny men­tions a fifth artist, Pythis, who made the marble quadriga on the summit of the building. (Vitruv. vii. Praef. § 12 ; Plin. H. N. xxxvi. 5. s. 4. § 9 ; Did. of Biog. under the names of the artists.)

It was chiefly, Pliny tells us, on account of the works of these artists that the Mausoleum became celebrated as one of the seven wonders of the world. Unfortunately, however, the ancient authors, who have celebrated its magnificence, have furnished us with such scanty details of its construction, that the restoration of its plan is almost hopeless. (Strabo, xiv. p. 656 ; Cic. Tusc. Disp. iii. 31 ; Gell, x. 18 ; Val. Max. iv. 6. ext 1 ; Proper! iii. 2. 39 ; Suid. Harpocr. s. vv. 'Aprejuio-fa, Matitrw-Aoy.) There are, indeed, coins which give a re­presentation of it ; but they are modern forgeries. (Rasche, s. v. ; Eckhel, vol. ii. p. 597.) The edi­fice has so entirely vanished, that even its site is doubtful, although some precious fragments of its sculptures survive, and are now in our own possession.

Pliny is the only writer who gives any thing like a complete description of the edifice ; but even in this account there are considerable diffi­culties. The building, he tells us, extended 63 feet from north to south, being shorter on the fronts, and its whole circuit was 411 feet (or, ac­cording to the Bamberg MS. 440) ; it rose to the height of 25 cubits (37-^- feet) ; and was surrounded by 36 columns. This part of the building was called Pieron. It was adorned with sculptures in relief, on its eastern face by Scopas, on the northern by Bryaxis, on the southern by Timo­theus, on the western by Leochares. Above thig pteron was a pyramid equal to it in height, dimi­nishing by 24 steps to its summit, which was sur­mounted by the marble quadriga made by Pythis. The total height, including this ornament, was 140 feet.

The limits of this article do not admit of a dis­cussion of the various proposed restorations of the plan of the edifice. They will be found enume­rated and carefully examined by Mr. Charles Newton, in a very valuable essay On the Sculp­tures from the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus in the Classical Museum for July, 1847, vol. v. pp. 170, foil., with a chart of Halicarnassus, a restoration of the Mausoleum, and other illustrations.

Thus much is clear enough from Pliny's ac­count ; that the edifice was composed of an oblong quadrangular cella (the pteron), surrounded by a peristyle of columns (which were in all probability of the Ionic order), and elevated on a basement (for this supposition presents the only means of