In 1929, land subsidence along the river Aniene was found to have revealed an ancient marble structure. Archaeologist Gioacchino Mancini was put in charge of the excavation works, which uncovered the tomb of a vestal virgin named Cossinia (see here for very brief soundless footage from 1930 of the freshly exposed monument). In the video you can see there is a structure with steps and a cippus atop it. The inscription on it reads

V V COSSINIAE L F
L COSSINIUS ELECTUS

(Vestal Virgin Cossinia, daughter of Lucius
Lucius Cossinius Electus)

On the side, it says VNDECIES SENIS QVOD VESTAE PAVIT ANNIS HIC SITA VIRGO MANU POPVLI DELATA QVIESCIT L D S C (roughly, ‘Here lies the virgin, carried to this resting place by the hands of the people, after having served Vesta for 66 years. The site has been granted by decree of the Senate.’) [Side note: Vestal Virgins were sworn to serving Vesta for 30 years but could choose to continue as long as they wanted, which is why Cossinia did so for so long.]

There are decorative funerary elements on the sides; beneath it, no remains were found. However, there is an additional structure of simple steps that are partly superimposed over the first, with no pedestal. Under this structure, human remains and burial goods were found.

I first came across mentions and images of this doll in several sites, described as belonging to Cossinia. Indeed, that is what Mancini declared back in the day, interpreting the body and the burial goods as those of Cossinia, who would have been somewhere between the age of 72 and 76.

It made for a curious story, and I was keen to find out more, as it offered an interesting counterpoint to the more famous doll belonging to Crepereia Tryphaena. In that case, the doll was included in a wonderful collection of grave goods buried alongside the body of a young woman who may have tragically died on the eve of her wedding and was possibly even buried in her wedding attire. The discovery of that particular grave is described in great detail in this article by Rodolfo Lanciani published in the North American Review in 1890 (A Romance of Old Rome), which I first came across as a piece in the Daily Alta California issue of February 2 of that year, with the wonderful heading:

“A ROMANCE OF OLD ROME.
A Bride Buried in her Wedding Dress 1500 Years Ago.
THE ENGAGEMENT RING FOUND”  

I can almost hear the voice of a child singing ‘Read all about it!’. If you have a little time to spare and feel like going on a little journey, I very much recommend reading the article (about a 12-minute read), worth it just for the effusive way in which Rodolfo Lanciani conveys his delight about every little discovery, and for his penchant for going off on tangents. It also made me think about the extent to which certain things might have boiled down to conjecture and avid enthusiasm in those days – but he sets the scene convincingly and is charmingly persuasive.

In fact, I was very tempted to choose Crepereia’s doll – that really is a perfect story and those are stunning grave goods – but this one connected to the Vestal Virgin Cossinia provided an opportunity to look into dolls as symbols, the idea of what makes a woman, and how concepts of childhood, virginity, and old age might relate to one another.

However, I soon came to understand that in recent times archaeologists have been calling for a more careful interpretation of the doll and who it might have belonged to. The site itself is strange, with the second structure partly mounted on the first (the structures we see today were in fact ‘reassembled’ and put together, which would be unthinkable today), and there are several issues with Mancini’s interpretation. The first is that the dates for both structures don’t seem to match up – it is thought that the structure dedicated to Cossinia is from 50 AD at the latest, whereas the second structure seems to be from the late 2nd C AD, possibly even 3rd C AD, judging by the hairstyle of this doll, among other things, which appears Severan in style (see the very particular hairstyle of Julia Domna, Septimus Severus’ wife).

It also seems that the human remains were not described much when they were found, beyond the fact that they had “almost intact and very white teeth” (see this interesting article by Francesca Boldrighini, in Italian), which is telling, given Cossinia’s age. The ArcheoTibur site states that the remains belong, in fact, to a young girl (the site, run by archaeologists specialising in the Tivoli area, does a good job in sorting out fact from conjecture, and clarifying the issues).

In Roman times, brides-to-be would make offerings of their dolls and toys, as a rite of passage and a good-bye to childhood. Dolls are often found in Roman burials next to children – in the case of Crepereia Tryphaena, a young unmarried woman –, so the idea that a 70-year-old virgin would be buried with a doll from her childhood seemed an interesting one, but then I wondered whether perhaps it was also a little morbid. It made me think about the stages in a woman’s life, from childhood to old age, especially today, when pubescent and menopausal bodies are taboo, especially so the latter. I didn’t quite know what to make of the story of a woman being a virgin her whole life (a Vestal Virgin no less) and then being buried with her doll, and I realised that what was springing to mind were narratives of crazy women who live with cats and die alone. Of course, Vestal Virgins were very important figures in Ancient Rome, and this was no ordinary old woman, but it did make me think about our fascination with chastity, people who live without a partner and do not have children, and ideas about how that might influence someone’s experience of being a woman, whatever that is. The doll would suggest a sort of linear progression, where the virgin is left stuck at the childhood stage. It may be that Vestal Virgins did get buried with their dolls at the age of 70, but something about the focus seemed off – perhaps I didn’t like that 1800 years later the doll would make us talk about her being a virgin, rather than a Vestal Virgin.

This doll was lovely to draw, though I had already drawn most of her by the time I found far better photographs that show her looking quite different than she does here. What moved me most was the quality and the precision of the sculpture and the way the lines were handled by her maker. I was struck by how agreeable her body looks to me – it is a slightly foreign language, stylised yet specific and realistic enough for me to admire and appreciate the care with which each curve was crafted. It made me think about how rare it is for children to see human bodies depicted like this now, unless they are sexualised; the contrast between the two modes that seem to be on offer can feel violent at times.

My daughter was watching a cartoon recently and remarked that none of the girls had any breasts, regardless of the fact that most were teenagers. I thought about this as I rounded those small bumps and shaded the pubic area. I wonder what the owners of the other dolls I have portrayed here would have thought of her. Whether they would have looked at her shapes, frowning and feeling strange or even shocked, or whether they would have simply delighted in her beauty, the smoothness of her long belly, and those wonderfully crafted joints.