Classics 310 I, Pagan Culture, Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste, California State University Long Beach By James R.

Walker - November 2001

Civic and Domestic Environs In Ancient Pompeii

California State University Long Beach Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste Classics 3 10 I Pagan Culture James R. Walker November 2001

Classics 310 I, Pagan Culture, Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste, California State University Long Beach By James R. Walker - November 2001

The urban environment in ancient Pompeii reflected changes in the cultural aspirations of the Oscan inhabitants. The cityscape, once established, was socially integrating, stabilizing and stimulating. Elements used in the city were, ornate architectural design, statues, and shrines and temples. What is more, affluent Pompeians built urban domiciles as retreats from the city and to imbue relaxation and aesthetic stimulation. The repeated daily experience of a placid and scenic home ameliorated the stress caused by the city. The aspects of the home that accomplished this end included, a garden, an atrium, rooms and terraces with panoramic views and embellishments such as wall paintings and statues. The Oscan people in Pompeii rightly considered education in a gymnasium, where emphasis was placed on physical fitness along with philosophy and the arts, the hallmark of Greek life and culture. They aspired to this high culture by incorporating Hellenistic architectural themes. Their veneration of Classical Greek culture inspired them to emulate some of the typical Greek public spaces and facades. Thus, they appropriated greater respect for themselves and from others. This self-identification encouraged the refurbishing of temples and shrines in the Doric and Corinthian styles. Also, an amphitheater, a palaestra and the Stabian baths or thermae, developed from the simpler baths of Greek gymnasia, all reflected their proclivity to Hellenizing. Statues were sculpted and marble imported for cityscape beautification. The environment created through all these efforts clearly proclaimed the imagearguably pretentiousof a highly developed society. The socially integrating consequence of these endeavors enabled a sense of stability within the psyche of the city dweller. Furthermore, all the building projects stimulated the economy. Once finished, the proud new city persona had an aesthetically stimulating effect as well.

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Classics 310 I, Pagan Culture, Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste, California State University Long Beach By James R. Walker - November 2001

The citizens of Pompeii clearly projected an image of high culture in their civic buildings. It is interesting to note, however, that the building projects were concentrated mainly in areas of entertainment and public shrines and temples. The Oscan citizens, in this way, demonstrated the focus of their interest. They were not so interested in legal and governmental buildings. They also turned their attention, however, to private homes in the city. City life in antiquity was quite trying. The stench of public toilettes, the filth in the streets, feral dogs running amuck and the throngs of people all conspired to produce a rather unpleasant experience. Noise pollution was so excessive that many apartment dwellers found it difficult to sleep. The cobble stone streets generated loud noises as wheeled carts traversed the by ways and stone edifices echoed the sounds from the streets and from within the buildings. One observer comments, . . . many people die from lack of sleep. Noise deprives them of sleep, and they develop indigestion and burning ulcers, which in turn produce illness. In the city, sleep comes only to the wealthy (Shelton 69; Juvenal, Satires). The wealthy had the means to circumvent these repugnant aspects of urban life. In Pompeii, those with the means directed their attention to creating home environments quite opposite from the city mayhem endured by the masses. They enlisted a structural concept reflecting a turning away from the city. The inhabitants turned, instead, to the interior of the home thereby creating sanctuary from the city din. The Pompeians revealed this intent unequivocally by means of additions and remodeling. While homes retained an entrance to the street and sometimes incorporated a shop accessed from the street, the Oscan homeowners began to convert their homes to exclude

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Classics 310 I, Pagan Culture, Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste, California State University Long Beach By James R. Walker - November 2001

the city. The wall facing the street had few windows, if any at all. Hellenistic interior design was preferred. The entrance exhibited grandeur while integrating elements alluding to Classical Greek themes. The House of the Faun, for example, conspicuously exhibited in an exedra between two peristyles a fine mosaic of Alexander the Great in battle. Also, the impluvium was constructed or embellished after the fashion of Greek atria. Peristyle gardens often with fountains, pergola or a watercourse graced the heart of the home. Although these gardens were outdoors they were cloistered by the home structure and maintained to suggest a pristine corner sequestered form the city muck and mire. Entirely inward-looking, these changes provided the occupants with the Hellenistic sense of space accentuated by shade and light through successive peristyles. If space was an issue, the homeowner commissioned a wall painting that gave the illusion of space. One such wall painting showed a view of a palace courtyard with a small, round Hellenistic temple in the center. Opulent living or dining rooms (oeci) displayed elaborate painted architectural vistas. Some interior designs confirm the owners ardent attempt to adopt this popular architectural expression in spite of the lack of space. In one such house the various components are squeezed into such a small space that the purpose of the structure and wall paintings lost its original function. The sole concern of the resident was to have a great variety of scenes, each one full of interesting detail but also to conjure up associations of magnificent surroundings. Consequently, these interior designs showed little or no concern with making these vistas spatially logical or consistent in content. As with civic environs, the homeowners remodeling asserts his aspiration to the prestige of Greek culture thereby engendering veneration for him. Later, the Oscans embraced Roman culture, which revealed a shift in home architecture, as Pompeii came under Roman rule.

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Classics 310 I, Pagan Culture, Professor Douglas Domingo-Foraste, California State University Long Beach By James R. Walker - November 2001

Wealthy Romans acquired a taste for villas, that is, country estates capitalizing terrains with spectacular vistas. The Oscan elite adopted the Roman villa motif in their city dwellings. In the last decades of Pompeiis existence the decor and lifestyle associated with villas spread to a broad segment of the inhabitants. These miniature villas exhibited work, as a rule, limited to gardens, peristyles and rooms and terraces with beautiful views. Although many of the original wealthy residents were uncomfortable with the Roman occupation of Pompeii, it was clear that city protection was no longer an issue. Therefore, the new inclination towards villa-like homes made use of the city walls and even extended beyond them in order to gain access to panoramic views. These complexes display the same orientation as earlier homes; they turn their backs, so to speak, to the city. While they preserved the secluded peristyle gardens, fountains and atria the living areas were extended out to elaborate terraces on different levels, opening the house to the landscape. For the Oscans this is a new concept in home design, one that implies leisurely indulgence of the gentry in casual contemplation of the beauty before them. The citizens of Pompeii, by adapting the architecture and interior design of the Hellenes and later the Romans in their civic and domestic structures, realized two aspirations: A) The Oscans attained a grandiose identity for themselves and the city by emulating buildings and decorations of cultures they respected and B) they shaped domestic spaces to induce tranquility and allusions to leisurely opulence quite antithetical to the poignantly harsh reality of crowded city squalor.

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