of 



By HY. COLLEY MARCH, M.D., F.S.A. 



ITH increased knowledge I hope to be able to 

 throw further light on two motifs that are 

 frequent on the Roman mosaic pavements of 

 this and of other countries. The first one, 

 of which an example occurs in the centre of 

 the Olga-road tesselation in Dorchester, and 

 also on one of the Fifehead Neville pave- 

 ments, I have called the duplex, and have 

 associated it primarily with the Sun and 

 secondarily with Christ.* The other, of which examples occur 

 on the Frampton tesselation, I regarded as a lotus-derivative 

 and gave it a corresponding significance. 



It was well said by Renan that " Before religion reached the 

 point where it proclaimed that God should be sought in the 

 Absolute and the Ideal that is to say, outside the world one 

 cult only was reasonable and scientific, and that was the cult of 

 the Sun." 



To Greek philosophy the celestial bodies were divine beings ; 

 Neo-Pythagorism and Neo-Platonism saw in the Great Luminary 



Dorset Field Club, "Proceedings," Vol. XXI., p. 162. 



