In a corner of an ancient Roman warehouse, a later occupant installed a shrine to Sabazius, a god whose cult arrived from the east with a strange, syncretic baggage. The horreum itself, a practical building for storage, had stood since the early second century; the shrine was a later addition, likely early third century, a quiet insertion into a commercial space. Sabazius was a Phrygian deity, often merged in the Roman mind with Jupiter or Bacchus, and his worship involved nocturnal rites and a curious hand-sign, the manus panthea, a bronze hand covered in symbolic figures. The shrine’s discovery in 1909 by Dante Vaglieri revealed a small, intimate space, a testament to how foreign cults could take root in the capillaries of the Roman city, tucked away behind the grain and oil of everyday commerce.
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