Although it seems unlikely to find a physical representation of disorders that might be said to be ‘inside’ people’s heads in the verism of ancient portraiture, some neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders are symptoms of diseases that do leave certain signs on the body. This article aims to draw attention to the possible application and the usefulness of archaeology and the history of art for understanding mental illness in the Roman world. Modern archaeological historiography, while recognising the cognitive bias generated by the survival of written sources describing their adversaries, has often accepted these diagnoses and assertions with little critical inquiry.
Nonetheless, some of the most evenemential figures in Roman history were frequently described as ‘mad’ in the chronicles of their contemporaries.
Accordingly, there is no apparent space for the analysis of mental illness in Roman Archaeology. In fact, scientifically speaking, it is currently impossible to approach such infirmities paleopathologically. Given the ‘immaterial’ nature of mental illnesses, there are so few archaeological sources that they are often not even considered.
The available sources for the study of mental illness in the Roman world comprise of a limited range of literary medical, philosophical, and occasionally legal treatises. Researching the Signs of the Mind on the Body
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