Collecting Gods in Roman Houses: The House of the Gilded Cupids (VI.16.7, 38) at Pompeii

This essay takes up the theme of eclecticism in Roman domestic decoration by exploring the wide range of representations of gods in Roman houses. Specifically, it examines painted and sculpted images of deities in the House of the Gilded Cupids at Pompeii to shift attention from issues of style and the attendant debates on copies, both of which have largely dominated discussions of painted and sculpted displays in domus . This paper, instead, situates the seemingly haphazard collection of gods within the contexts of Roman religion and collecting practices more generally and aims to demonstrate that despite their presumed “kitschy” or idiosyncratic quality, these displays were perhaps a bit more canonical than we have allowed them to be.