And it was this fillip that must have given the owner of our villa the confidence to show us Christ looking out at us, full face, unequivocally a man of power. He wears the rich robes and the stylish hairdo that might well have been sported by the villa owner himself, but this is no local ruler and indeed no local god. The Chi Rho monogram makes it clear that what we're being shown is Jesus Christ. And there's a further clue to this man's true nature. On either side of Christ's head the artist has put pomegranates. Now, to any educated visitor, this would recall at once the myth of Persephone, carried off to the underworld, rescued by her mother, and brought back to the land of the living as a great allegory of the cycle of the seasons, of death and rebirth, of descent into hell and return to the light. By the inclusion of this simple fruit, the artist links Jesus to the pagan gods who'd also been gods of dying and returning; to Orpheus, who went to the underworld in search of Eurydice and returned, and to Bacchus who was similarly associated with resurrection.

This Dorset Christ pulls together all the hopes of the ancient world, the deepest of all human hopes: that death is only part of a larger story that will culminate in abundance of life and even greater fruitfulness.