No, this is not the book this post is about, but it is an important one nevertheless and seems to go along with a newly published work:
Luz Neira was in charge of the co-ordination and publication of Civilización y barbarie: el mito como argumento en los mosaicos romanos (Civilization and Barbarism: Myths as plots in Roman Mosaics).
A number of specialists in Roman mosaics collaborated on the book, which offers a new perspective in the approach to mythology and its re-use throughout history, which was a result of “a conscious and self-interested phenomenon of re-semantization.”
http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/10/2012/mythic-mosaics-conceal-subliminal-messages
Here’s the deal. Dennis MacDonald has suggested (pdf) that a theological crisis involving Homer plagued Mark’s tiny proto-Christian community. Yet, in several recent works, it has become apparent that by the time of the high Empire, the Greek and many of the Roman myths had been lost only to be recovered by the mythographer. Yes, we see Homer (or Aeneid) on mosaics; however, this is little more than patriotic artwork defined not by an acute sense of the meaning of the myth but by the borrowing of the myth to the point that it had become a shadow on the wall. No, Homer does not present the necessary theological crisis for Mark.
As a matter of fact, Homer doesn’t present a theological crisis to anyone – especially since Vergil.
Joel L. Watts holds a Masters of Arts from United Theological Seminary with a focus in literary and rhetorical criticism of the New Testament. His interests include exploring the role of mimesis in human civilization, specifically in the study of religion and media, as well as science fiction and the way in which it has allowed mythology to be explored in light of scientific discoveries of the past century. He is the author of Mimetic Criticism of the Gospel of Mark: Introduction and Commentary (Wipf and Stock, 2013) and a co-editor and contributor to From Fear to Faith: Stories of Hitting Spiritual Walls (Energion, 2013).
Website: → Unsettled Christianity
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Reminds me of the forthcoming English translation of Zanker and Ewald “Living with Myths:The Imagery of Roman Sarcophagi”.
Also, I may be misunderstanding you, but you aren’t suggesting that Homer’s myths weren’t anything but ubiquitous in classical antiquity during the 1st centuries BC/AD are you?