House of the Faun

House of the Faun
Casa del Fauno
Front view of the house

General information
Location	Pompeii, Roman Empire
Country	Italy
Construction started	180 BC

The House of the Faun (Italian: Casa del Fauno), constructed in the 2nd century BC during the Samnite period (180 BC),^[1] was a grand Hellenistic palace that was framed by peristyle in Pompeii, Italy. The historical significance in this impressive estate is found in the many great pieces of art that were well preserved from the ash of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. It is one of the most luxurious aristocratic houses from the Roman Republic, and reflects this period better than most archaeological evidence found even in Rome itself.^[2]

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STEVEN ZUCKER: In baseball, in soccer, sometimes sports announcers will look for the turning point of the game. And the scene that we're looking at-- a battle, not sport-- in fact, one of the most important battles in ancient history-- is at that particular turning point, the moment when the great ruler of Persia turns and flees under the onslaught of the great Greek general Alexander. BETH HARRIS: Darius, the king of the Persians, has just ordered his troops to retreat. STEVEN ZUCKER: So there's tremendous tension at this moment because we have this reversal of momentum. We can feel, still, the momentum that is moving in from the right because we can still see the Persian guards' spears facing towards the Greeks. But just at that moment, one of the largest objects in this mosaic, the chariot, is being spun around. And the tension and the torsion that's required for that is creating this tremendous sense of dynamism. BETH HARRIS: On the ground, we see the wounded and the dying. STEVEN ZUCKER: One of my favorite details is the reflection of one of the Persian soldiers in his own shield. BETH HARRIS: He's looking at himself fallen in battle, perhaps about to die. I think my favorite part is the horse that's part of the team leading Darius's chariot. Almost all four hoofs are off the ground. As it's being pulled toward the left, its head turns to the right. STEVEN ZUCKER: There is this almost frenetic quality to this image. BETH HARRIS: And you have a sense of confidence when you look at Alexander's face as he heads toward Darius. Darius looks fearful as he gestures toward Alexander. It looks to me as though Darius is almost pleading for the lives of his soldiers. STEVEN ZUCKER: Well, there is a look both of surprise and worry and of seeking compassion. I think that that's exactly right. Alexander is known ultimately for his compassion, at least towards Darius's family. BETH HARRIS: And Alexander is the great Greek general, the founder of an enormous empire. STEVEN ZUCKER: Well, that's right. He not only unifies Greece, but he will then move south into Egypt. He moves east into Persia, and he gets to the Indus Valley itself. So he puts under Greece's control an enormous area of the known world. And all of these details are rendered in tiny pieces of stone and glass. BETH HARRIS: So we're looking at a mosaic that we think is based on an ancient Greek painting. We hope it's based on an ancient Greek painting because almost nothing of ancient Greek painting survives. And Pliny talked about how amazing Greek painting was. STEVEN ZUCKER: Well, it's true. When we think of Greek art, we think of Greek sculpture. We might think of Greek architecture. Perhaps we think of Greek vase painting. But you're absolutely right. In the ancient world, literature tells us that what the Greeks did better than anything was wall painting. We just don't have any. BETH HARRIS: So maybe this gives us some idea. STEVEN ZUCKER: But I do find it really interesting that the mosaic is almost empty at the top and is so much weighted down towards the bottom. Especially when we remember that this was based on a painting that would have been on a wall. And so this was intended to be seen vertically, at least initially. At least, that's our best guess. BETH HARRIS: Art historians link this mosaic to a literary description of an ancient Greek painting by an artist named Philoxenos. And in this literary source by Pliny, Philoxenos is said to have created a painting of the Battle of Alexander and Darius. STEVEN ZUCKER: But here's the problem. There were probably lots of paintings of that subject. BETH HARRIS: And we know for certain that there, for example, was a woman artist who painted this subject in ancient Greece, as well. STEVEN ZUCKER: This was an incredibly important confrontation between these two generals, between these two civilizations. I'm sure there were many more. BETH HARRIS: But this is what we have, and this is what was found. And we have it because of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in '79, which preserved under a layer of volcanic ash the city of Pompeii. STEVEN ZUCKER: Including this mosaic. BETH HARRIS: This was found on the floor between two peristyles, that is, between two open courtyards that were surrounded by columns in the largest and most elaborately decorated mansion in Pompeii, often called the House of the Faun after a bronze sculpture of a faun that was found there. STEVEN ZUCKER: And the mosaic itself is of extraordinary quality. And so it's not surprising that we find it in such a lavish environment as the House of the Faun. There are apparently a million and a half pieces of stone and glass that make up this mosaic. BETH HARRIS: And the quality is not just in the fineness of the materials, but in the incredible naturalism of what we see here, which is what the ancient Greeks were known for. We have forms that, even with these tiny pieces of stone, we have a sense of modeling, of the use of light and dark to create a sense of three-dimensional forms. If we look at the horses or the faces of the figures, we see the turn of the face, the anatomy of the body. STEVEN ZUCKER: And look at the foreshortening of the animals-- for instance, of the horses. BETH HARRIS: That ancient Greek knowledge of the human body, of how it moves through space, is so clear here. STEVEN ZUCKER: And of course, all of this speaks to the Romans' regard for the achievement of ancient Greek art. BETH HARRIS: Sometimes it seems as though everyone in Pompeii wanted to imitate the ancient Greeks, to own copies of ancient Greek sculptures, ancient Greek paintings. There was a real mania, as in Rome itself, for ancient Greek culture.

Houses of the higher class

The House of the Faun, along with the House of Pansa and the House of the Silver Wedding represent the higher class of the Roman houses of the Republic.^[3] More than 190 years after its excavation, the craftsmanship and quality of materials have been found to be exceptional, even amongst the other noble houses in Pompeii.^[3] There is evidence, most notably in the eastern walls of the tetrastyle atrium, that after the AD 62 Pompeii earthquake, the House of the Faun was rebuilt and repaired, as revealed by excavation beneath the floor of the house;^[3] yet, the building was only used again until AD 79, when it was ultimately rendered unusable by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Although the eruption was devastating, the layers of ash covering the city preserved artworks, like the mosaics, which would have otherwise been likely destroyed or severely decayed due to the passage of time.

Faun statue

The bronze statue of a dancing faun (actually a satyr, since the lower body is that of a man) is what the House of the Faun is named after. In the centre of the atrium there is a white limestone impluvium, a basin for collecting water. The statue was found on October 26 of 1830 near one side of the impluvium and a small fountain in the center.^[4] The original statue is currently located in the National Archaeological Museum (Museo Archeologico Nazionale) in Naples, thus the statue seen today in the house’s ruins is a copy.^[5] Fauns are spirits of untamed woodland; they are typically depicted as half human and half goat. Literate and Hellenized Romans often connected their depictions of fauns with Pan and Greek satyrs, who were the wild followers of the Greek god of wine and drama, Dionysus. It is purely a decorative sculpture of high order: "the pose is light and graceful," Sir Kenneth Clark observed.^[6]

Inscriptions and their familial associations

Archaeologists discovered an inscription bearing the cognomen Saturninus, suggesting that the dwelling was owned by the important gens, or clan, Satria; a ring bearing the family name Cassius was also found, indicating that someone of the Cassii family married into the gens Satria and lived in the House of the Faun.^[7]

Excavations

The Alexander Mosaic, showing Alexander at left. A copy is displayed in the House of the Faun, where the original was found.

The House of the Faun was initially excavated in 1830 by the German archaeological institute.

Five bodies were found in the house including one woman and three boys.^[8]

The most notable of the artworks found in the House of the Faun is the Alexander Mosaic; a reconstructed version of the mosaic can be seen today, but it was originally removed from the floor where it was found and placed in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples.^[9] In the 1830s when it was first discovered, the mosaic was thought to represent a battle scene depicted in the Iliad, but architectural historians have found the mosaic actually depicts the Battle of Issus in 333 BC between Alexander the Great and Darius III of Persia, which took place about 150 years before the House of the Faun was constructed.^[10] This mosaic may be inspired by or copied from a Greek painting finished in the late fourth century BC,^[2] probably by the artist Philoxenus of Eretria.^[11] Unlike most Pompeian pavements of the late second and early first centuries, this mosaic is made of tesserae, and not the more common opus signinum, or other kinds of stone chips set in mortar.^[12]

The Alexander Mosaic is complemented by other floor mosaics with Nilotic scenes and theatrical masks.^[2] Other notable works of art from the House of Faun include an erotic Satyr and Nymph and the fish mosaic, a piece closely resembling other mosaics in Pompeii.^[2]

Architectural design

The House of the Faun was the largest and most expensive residence found in Pompeii, and today it is one of the most visited of the ruins. The house occupies an entire city block or insula, and the interior covers about 3,000 square meters, which is nearly 32,300 square feet.^[13] The house is based upon two magnificent colonnaded gardens or peristyles, one Ionic and the other Doric. It also has two atriums, the Tuscan and the peristyle atrium.^[3] The focus of the decoration of the house, the Alexander mosaic, is placed on the central visual axis between the first and second peristyles, in a room referred to as an exedra. Mosaics on the floors of the peristyles evoke the flora and fauna of the Nile. The wall frescoes above these pavements are the largest surviving example of the false marble panelling characteristic of the First Pompeian Style.^[14]

Several historians (such as M. Bergmann, F. Guidobaldi, J.J. Thomas, A.-M. Guimier-Sorbets) have pointed out that the decorational scheme of the house's second phase shows clear links to Egypt and specifically to Ptolemaic Alexandria. The mosaics include typically Alexandrian/Egyptian iconography and motifs or appear to follow Alexandrian types.^[15]^[16] They also make liberal use of faience, which was somewhat rare outside of Egypt at the time. Some of the paint work in the house mimics types of Egyptian stone that were not yet known on the Italian peninsula and the illusionistic stucco facade in the house's vestibule echoes Alexandrian architecture. Bergmann has suggested that even the bronze satyr which gave the house its name may have been created in Alexandria or by Alexandrian artists. Both Guidobaldi and Guimier-Sorbets conclude that Alexandrian workshops were responsible for at least parts of the decorational scheme of the second phase (such as the mosaic, opus sectile and paint work).^[15]

Like many ancient Roman houses, the House of the Faun had tabernae, or storefront shops, and a highly sophisticated building plan, which details the many rooms. The entryway of the House of the Faun is decorated by red and white stone that read out the Latin message “HAVE”, which can be translated to “Hail to you!”.^[14] The fact that this mosaic is not in the local languages, Oscan and Samnian, has caused debate between historians on whether it was put into place before the Roman colonization of Pompeii in 80 BCE or if the owners had "pretensions of Latin glory."^[17]

Like other wealthy aristocrats of the Roman Republic, the owners of the House of the Faun installed a private bath system, or balneum, in the house. The baths were located in the domestic wing to the right of the entrance, and it along with the kitchen was heated by a large furnace.^[3] The servants’ quarters were dark and cramped, and there was not much furniture.^[18] The house features beautiful peristyle gardens, the second of which was created as a stage to host recitations, mimes, and pantomimes. Additionally, the house contained an entrance passage, a number of bedrooms (cubicula), dining rooms (triclinia) for both the summer and winter, a reception room (oecus), and an office (tablinum).^[3]

Tourist attraction

In the present day, visitors can still explore the remains of the House of the Faun in modern Pompeii, along Via di Nola. Although most of the original artworks have been relocated to the National Archaeological Museum, Naples, the most famous pieces, like the Dancing Faun and the Alexander Mosaic, have been recreated to give tourists a clearer picture of what the house was originally like.^[19] Pietro Giovanni Guzzo, one of Pompeii's past archaeological superintendents, explained, "I want visitors to have the impression that they are entering the same luxurious house in which the ancient Pompeian owners lived before it was destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79."^[19]

Gallery

Fruit and masks mosaic (detail)
The "HAVE" Mosaic (spelling variant of Ave)
Opus sectile in vestibulum
Nile River mosaic landscape
Detail of an illustration from 1854. Impluvium with a small fountain in the center and copy of the Faun on the edge.^[4]

References

^ Cambridge Ancient History. [New] ed. London: Cambridge University Press, 1970.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Grant, Michael; Kitzinger, Rachel (1988). Civilization of the ancient Mediterranean: Greece and Rome. New York: Scribner's. ISBN 0-684-17594-0.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Dwyer, Eugene J. (2001). "The Unified Plan of the House of the Faun". Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians. 60 (3): 328–343. doi:10.2307/991759. JSTOR 991759.
^ ^a ^b Zahn, Wilhelm Johann Karl (February 1831). "Ultime scoperte di Pompei ed Ercolano. Lettera del prof. Guglielmo Zahn al prof. Gerhard". Bullettino dell'Instituto di Corrispondenza Archeologica (in Italian). Rome: Instituto di Corrispondenza Archeologica: 19, 25. Retrieved 1 May 2023. Il 26 ottobre si scoprì nell'atrio, e propriamente vicino all'impluvio, una figura di bronzo… ...nel mezzo è l'impluvio con una piccola fontana. Su di uno de' suoi lati si è rinvenuto un simulacro di bronzo.
^ Donovan, Matt (2012). "House of the Faun, Pompeii". Agni (76): 26–33. JSTOR 23621338. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
^ Clark, The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form 1956:263 (illustrated fig. 145).
^ Gordon, Mary L. (1927). "The Ordo of Pompeii". Journal of Roman Studies. 17: 165–183. doi:10.2307/296132. JSTOR 296132.
^ G. Luongo et al. / Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research 126 (2003) p195
^ Hirst, K. "House of the Faun at Pompeii - Pompeii's Richest Residence". ThoughtCo. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
^ Hirst, K. "House of the Faun at Pompeii - Pompeii's Richest Residence". ThoughtCo. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
^ Pliny the Elder, Natural History xxxv. 10.36§ 22.
^ Westgate, Ruth (2000). "Pavimenta Atque Emblemata Vermiculata: Regional Styles in Hellenistic Mosaic and the First Mosaics At Pompeii". American Journal of Archaeology. 104 (2): 255–275. doi:10.2307/507451. JSTOR 507451. S2CID 194101486.
^ Hirst
^ ^a ^b "Perseus Digital Library".
^ ^a ^b Guimier-Sorbets, Anne-Marie (1 October 2021). The Mosaics of Alexandria: Pavements of Greek and Roman Egypt. Cairo, New York: American University in Cairo Press. pp. 194–197. ISBN 978-1649030740.
^ Thomas, Joshua J. (June 2022). "The Ptolemy Painting? Alexander's "right-hand man" and the origins of the Alexander Mosaic". Journal of Roman Archaeology. 35 (1): 306–321. doi:10.1017/S1047759421000532. ISSN 1047-7594.
^ Hirst, K. "House of the Faun at Pompeii - Pompeii's Richest Residence". ThoughtCo. Retrieved 30 November 2017.
^ Stillwell, Richard; MacDonald, William Lloyd; McAllister, Marian Holland (1976). The Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691035420.
^ ^a ^b Merola, Marco (2006). "Alexander, Piece by Piece". Archaeology. 59 (1).

Butterworth, Alex; Laurence, Ray (2005). Pompeii: The Living City. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-35585-8.
Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony (1996). The Oxford Classical Dictionary (3rd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-866172-6.
Little, A. M. G. (1935). "The Decoration of The Hellenistic Peristyle House in South Italy". American Journal of Archaeology. 39 (3): 360–371. doi:10.2307/498623. JSTOR 498623. S2CID 192938430.

External links

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Pompeii

History

Buildings

Villas	Villa of Diomedes Villa of the Mysteries
Domus	House of the Centenary House of the Faun House of Julia Felix The Garden of the Fugitives House of the Greek Epigrams House of Loreius Tiburtinus House of Menander House of Octavius Quartio House of the Prince of Naples House of Sallust House of the Silver Wedding House of the Small Fountain House of the Surgeon House of the Tragic Poet House of the Vettii
Public	Aqua Augusta Macellum of Pompeii
Recreational	Amphitheatre Lupanar Suburban Baths Stabian Baths Theatre Area
Temples	Temple of Apollo Temple of Isis Temple of Jupiter

Art

Other sites destroyed
in the 79 eruption

Archaeological

Museums	Naples National Archaeological Museum Secret Museum, Naples
Artefacts	CIL 4.5296 Pompeii Lakshmi Sator Square (CIL IV 8123, 8623)

40°45′4.5″N 14°29′4.5″E / 40.751250°N 14.484583°E / 40.751250; 14.484583

This page was last edited on 13 April 2024, at 15:59

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