The first time I saw an image of this mosaic I thought the spellings of the names very odd. PWMYΛΛΟC and PWΔC, except the delta looks like it has a tail like a funny iota script. So perhaps its reads PWAiC, but that doesn’t make much sense either. At with point I stopped worrying about it because its way after my period and just a distraction from getting this book done.
Then today I started thinking about that odd letter in the twin’s name who isn’t Romyllos or Romulus or however you want to spell it. I was reading Wiseman’s chapter on L. Brutus in his Unwritten Rome (2008) and I read this fragment of Alcimus (FGrH 560 F 4 = Festus 326-8L):
Alcimus says that Romulus was the son of Aeneas’ wife Tyrrhenia, and from Romulus was born Aeneas’ granddaughter Alba, whose son, called Rhodius, founded Rome.
Wiseman goes on (p. 302 ff.) to explain that ardea means heron and so does rhodios in Greek and so this passage is about Ardea claiming to be founder of Rome.
Anyways. I doubt a late Syrian mosaicist was following Alcimus or anything.
Liv Mariah Yarrow 