I want to turn from Roman residential architecture in Herculaneum and the developments there, to early Roman wall decoration, painted decoration. And as I said at the beginning, specifically to the first and second styles of Roman wall painting, which are particularly interesting in the context of a course on architecture because as we'll see, they are so architecturally oriented. I want to begin with a wall from the House of Sallust, then we'll go back to Pompeii. We'll be looking at examples both in Pompeii and Herculaneum, and also Rome. I want to look at the House of Sallust in Pompeii. And you can see from your monument list, that the tablinum was decorated with what we call first style Roman wall painting. That's obviously a modern, scholarly designation. They didn't call it that in ancient Rome or Pompeii or Herculaneum. First first style Roman wall painting. This tablinum in this house was decorated in around 100 B.C., which is when we date most of the examples of first style Roman wall painting. It is very well preserved, and it gives us a very good sense of what the Romans, or what the, in this case the Pompeians, were trying to achieve. This style, the first style of Roman wall painting is also, you'll see it referred to in your books and in your textbooks and in scholarship in general, as, as, as either the masonry style or the incrustation style. And the reason for this, both of those are good descriptions because you can see that what is at work here is that the designers are trying to create a wall, they're trying to create the illusion that what we're looking at is not a stucco and paint wall, which is actually what it's made out of, but a real marble wall. We can see that the wall is divided into a series of zones, architectural zones, which are exactly the zones that were used in Roman building technique. We don't quite see it here, I'll show it to you in another example. There's usually, way of the bottom, a very narrow band which is called a plinth, plinth. The plinth is, has above it what's called the socle, socle. Which is a higher, a slightly higher element. Then what are called the orthostats, orthostats. The orthostats are these blocks here. And then the isodomic, isodomic. The Isodomic courses, you see those here. And then usually either a string course, or more likely, or in addition to a cornice. A projecting cornice, cornice, at the top. So plinth, socle, orthostats, isodomic blocks and then the string corse and the cornus. Which again corresponds to actual Roman building technique. But more important than those, that terminology is again what's they're trying to achieve here. It is clear when you look at, well first of all keep in mind that this is not flat, it's a relief. It's a relief wall, and the wall has been built up in relief through stucco. They've taken the rubble wall, they've added stucco, and they made that stucco look like a series of blocks that are divided by these string courses. Then what they've done is painted those blocks. And they painted those blocks not all one color. Not all Pompeian red. But all different kinds of colors, green and red and pink and beige and sometimes multicolored, as we'll see. What is the implication here? What the implication here is that we are looking, that they're trying to create the illusion through stucco and paint, of a marble wall. Of a marble wall that would have been very expensive to build, because you would have had to bring all of these multicolored marbles, which you could not find in Italy, from places very far away. From North Africa or from Asia Minor or from Greece. You'd have to bring, or from Egypt, you'd have to bring it from very, very, very far away. And that would cost a tremendous amount of money. So what they are saying here is, I am, I, I'm the owner of this house. I am wealthy enough to be able to afford bringing marble from all over the world and using it to decorate my my tablinum. Now was anyone fooled that this was a real marble wall and not a painted wall? Well, probably not. But the idea was to give one the sense that this was a very expensive wall. And we'll see one of the most, well, I'll, I'll hold that till later. Hold that thought till later. Here's another example in the same house. This is the House of Sallust, we are looking, we have just. Here's the tablinum wall that we just looked at. We are we are now in the atrium of the house, or what survives of the atrium of the house. We are looking at two of the cubicula that open off the atrium. And if you look at the walls you can see, again, the same effect: that the rubble wall has been covered with stucco, that the stucco has been divided, the stucco has been built up in relief. That it has been divided into a series of architectural zones. And then the individual blocks, in the orthostat level and in the isodomic level, have been painted different colors, again to give this illusion that what we are looking at is a marble wall, not a painted wall. So an attempt, attempt to make something, to fictionalize and make something seem more than it actually is. Here's another view a restored view, that gives you a sense perhaps, of what this might have looked like when the colors were more vivid. We do believe that those cubicula had doors, probably wooden doors that no longer survived. And you can see not only the architectural courses here but the effect that this would have had. Here's one of these multicolored blocks again that cut marble that would have had to be brought from North Africa or somewhere like that where they had these kinds of multicolored marbles. But this gives you some sense of what the appearance would have been. And perhaps, from a distance, you, you, your eye really would have been fooled, into thinking that this was a real marble wall. You'll remember the restored view I showed you of the House of the Faun, where we stood again in the atrium looking back at the statuette of the Faun. And I mentioned that the walls were decorated with first style Roman wall painting and so we see that again here. And see the kind the effect it would have had if the entire space was covered with this kind of wall painting. You can also see the relationship between those paintings and the vista that one saw as one stood and looked back through the columns on to the additional columns of the peristyle court. Another example of a first style wall, this one from Herculaneum. Is the so called Samnite House which we saw earlier today. [COUGH] With that fabulous atrium. The Samnite House and this is the fauces of the Samnite House. Also dates to 100 B.C., and you can see the same scheme as we already saw. One additional feature that you can see better here is the plinth. This very narrow band that we see at the bottom, the plinth, the socle here, the orthostats here the isodomic courses here, the string course, and then the cornice. So exactly the same scheme that we saw in the other house at Pompeii. We see here in the Samnite House at Herculaneum. This one even better preserved. And that's actually a very washed-out view, but I can show you a better one where you can get a better sense of the coloration of this particular wall. The plinth, the socle, the orthostats, the isodomics and then a frieze. As you can see in between the string course and the cornice there is a red frieze. And look at, this is, this is better preserved so you can get a better sense again of what this might have looked like in ancient Roman times. This wonderful contrast between the reddish porphyry-like stone that probably would have come from Egypt, the multigrained stone that might of come from North Africa. The kind of impact that this would have had. But again, most important for us is, what they're trying to do is create an illusion. They're try, trying to create, make something look like something it really isn't. They are using again stucco and paint to make a wall to make a very plain wall. To make a rubble and stucco and painted wall into a very grandiose wall that looked like walls that were probably the kinds of walls, in fact we're sure they were the kinds of walls that decorated the palaces of great Hellenistic kings and Hellenistic East. We know the great kings of Pergamon and some of the other kingdoms had palaces that had real marble walls. And we think that it's very likely that, that is the sort of thing that they are trying to recreate here. And then a very, a, a particularly important point I think is the fact that even though I would love to lay claim to this particular style for the Romans, the Romans did not invent the first style of Roman wall painting. They copied it from the Greeks. We know that the Greeks used this first style of Roman wall paint, whatever, whatever, it wasn't called the first style of Roman wall painting, obviously, for them. But, they used what, something comparable to the first style, which we believe was derived from these Hellenistic palaces ultimately. And you can see here, a view of a wall or a drawing of a wall that was in, and it's on your monument list, from the House of the Trident on the Island of Delos. Late second early first century BC. The Island of Delos was a strategically located between, what was located between Ital-, Italy and Greece and Asia MInor and so on. It was one of these crossroads of trade and it was a place where Romans settled in the late first, in the fir-, first centuries BC, especially. And we see houses is there probably some Greek owners, some Roman owners, that have the same kind of style. It's painted, we see the same zones, I won't describe them again, with the same architectural zones that we see in the first style paintings in Pompeii and in Herculaneum. But and, and, and we believe that those are based on Hellenistic precedence. But they show us again that this was used in the Greek East, it was probably picked up by some of the traders, brought back to Italy and used there. The fact that it's a Greek import is extremely important because then we can group it with all the other Greek imports that we've been talking about. The columns, the peristyles, the Alexander Mosaic all of the things that, that the that the Romans, the Hellenizing elements that we have seen the Romans be particularly fond of in this early period. And have used, themselves, in their architecture and in their architectural decor. So we see that here again, the taking over of a Greek style of organizing and decorating a wall for these Roman buildings. This is a house we'll look at later in the semester, at Ostia, the port city of Ostia, the so-called House of Cupid and Psyche, and we see the two lovers here on a pedestal in the center. I show it to you here only, it's a much later structure, but I show it to you only because we'll see when we get to that, that the Romans do and we'll see it much earlier than that. In fact, the Romans do begin to rivet some of their structures with marble. This begins already in the age of Augustus so we'll see it very soon. And eventually it becomes part of house design as well. So while this isn't as, as grandiose as a Hellenistic palace would have been, it does give you some idea of what a house would look like or a palace would look like that had marble on the floor and marble on the walls. And it's this kind of thing, that they're trying to create the illusion of. This is very subtle with pastels and so on. But it's this kind of thing that they are trying to create the illusion of with the Roman first style. We see first style Roman wall painting also in also in also in Rome. And in fact I can show you an even more spectacular example in Rome. It's from the House of the Griffins. And I show you a view into a great barrel vaulted room. We're walking along the corridor of a great barrel vaulted room in the House of the Griffins in Rome on the Palatine Hill. In fact, under the later imperial palace of the emperor Domitian. It dates to 80 BC. This particular room, which we call Room 3, dates to the eighth to 80 BC. It's from this room that the house gets its name. As you can get a glimpse of, and I'll show you a better view in a moment, of the griffins. There are heraldic griffins in a lunette, painted red in the background. They are made out of, they are built up in stucco, and then the lunette itself is painted red. It's from those griffins that the house got its name. We are looking down the side of that house, and we see again that, that is built up in stucco, so it's still a kind of stucco relief. But if you look at the paintings on the walls, and on the back wall, the side wall and the back wall, and I'll show you a better view here, you will see that although we are dealing with something that looks like a first style wall. It's very flat. It's decided, di, divided into architectural zones. The socle, the orthostats, the isodomic courses here. That is all done entirely in paint as you can see. It is not built up as a relief. The only relief here that we see, is the relief that is used for the heraldic griffins up, up in the uppermost part. When this was in better condition it was a painting was made of it. And I showed that painting to you here and I hope this will give you a better sense than anything else I've shown you today, of how glorious these things must have been in antiquity. And how, again, if you stood back from them, you might have been somewhat fooled. We see the wall here. We can see all the components that we've already described, the plinth, the socle, the orthostats, the isodomic courses, and then the lunette with the heraldic griffins. And again, the whole idea of this being to give you the impression that you were looking at a real marble wall, even though you are looking at a painted wall.
