Villa
of
the Mysteries
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0501Villa_Rustica-a.jpg
Ancient Roman villas were country homes, and they spanned a
continuum from simple farm houses through huge complexes that
may or may not have any agricultural purposes. The
simplest form, illustrated above, has a house with two connected
rooms and another separate room beside them. Inside the walls
and behind the house is a small garden. There is a small
partly shaded area (call it a patio?) in front of the house and
in front of that a farmyard where animals could be
corralled. Side rooms off the farmyard could shelter
animals or slaves or could be used for storage of tools or
products. The whole structure is walled for security --
enemies or bandits come to mind -- and fields, pastures, etc.
would expand outward.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0502HadrianVilla.jpg
The other end of the
continuum is Hadrian's Villa (Villa Adriana) in Tiburtina, now
Tivoli, about forty-five minutes east of Rome by car. It
had pools, baths, two theaters, entertainment areas, and
everything else an emperor might desire. Many features
were modeled after things Hadrian saw in his extensive
travels. He traveled so much, in fact that he seldom had
the opportunity to enjoy his country home. Complexes of
this size would always be under continuous construction and
reconstruction, but architects and archeologist nonetheless say
that it was "completed" shortly before Hadrian's death in 138
AD. There are no agricultural production areas (presses,
carding rooms, etc.) although tools consistent with
floriculture, arboriculture, and kitchen gardening were
found. Imperial real estate would have included productive
farms either adjacent of elsewhere, under management of
subordinates -- probably imperial freedmen and slave
overseers. This site has nothing to do, of course, with
Pompeii/Vesuvius, etc., but it's included to show the range of
possible villa establishments.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0503LaterRomanVillas.jpg
Roman and Roman type villas spread throughout the empire and
beyond and also down through the centuries. Prior
civilizations also had their agricultural establishments and
ex-urban estates, but the Romans seem to have, from our
perspective, gotten it just right: we all yearn for that
big country estate to which we could retire -- with, of course
ample servants and currency to keep it fun. Our
aspirations are not accidental. Our own "forefathers" (the
word translates exactly with
patricians)
built country estates modeled after those big ancient Roman
villas as they had been envisioned by Renaissance and English
and French interpreters. "Provincial" villas almost always
had agricultural as well as representational functions.
And that includes, of course, those in Virginia. The Image
shows artistic representations ancient villas in Britain,
France, and Germany in the period of their Roman occupation and
photographs of Mount Vernon and Monticello in Virginia.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0504VillaMyst.jpg
Our primary subject matter for this unit is the Villa of the
Mysteries, which is located on the road that archeologists have
dubbed the Street of the Tombs: it ran out of Pompeii
through the Herculaneum Gate. There were two other
suburban properties between the gate and the Villa of the
Mysteries, which have been denominated by their excavators as
the Villa of Cicero and the Villa of Diomedes. Being on
the side of the city toward Vesuvius, they were buried deep in
ash before taking the brunt of the pyroclastic surges/flows that
crashed down the volcano's slopes. Although the Villa of
the Mysteries was built on a high artificial platform on the
slope of the volcano, it was completely covered by the
debris: the current ground level is above the level of the
top of the villa (including the 20th century roofs that were
added to protect excavated wall art.) The Villa complex
dates from the 2nd century BC but also includes important
renovations and expansions from around 60 BC and again in the
first half of the 1st century AD. It was seriously damaged
during the earthquakes of the 60s AD and was still being
repaired when it was overwhelmed by the eruption of 79 AD.
The Villa is also known as the Villa Item (after the owners of
the property on which it was excavated). Most of the
excavation was done by Maiuri in the 20th century -- he was
fascinated by the Dionysian mystery mural and turned it into his
showpiece.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0505VillaMysteriesElav.jpg
The Villa of the
Mysteries as it would have looked before the 79 AD
eruption. It was built on the southeastern slope of mount
Vesuvius, a short distance outside the Herculaneum gate.
To make a level site, an artificial platform was built, the
spaces below ://www.mmdtkw.org/the platform being used for
storage and later as cellars for the winery installed late in
the structure's history. The side to the left of the
picture and the side facing the viewer had good views of the
sea. The side to the right of the picture contained
servants'/slave quarters and work areas. The main entrance
was on the side away from the viewer, and it was on both sides
of that entrance that more rooms associated with agriculture and
wine making were added.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0505xVillaMysteries-Drone.jpg
Drone image of the Villa of the Mysteries
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0506VillaMysteriesPlan.jpg
The plan shows a conjectural core area that would have been an
"atrium house". There were several periods of expansion
and rebuilding, the last of which involved major repairs after
the earthquakes of the early 60s AD. The areas labeled
viridarium are gardens, and
the
areas pensilis are
suspended or hanging, i.e., supported on arches. "Hanging
gardens" are built over cryptoportici = subsurface arched
passageways, and that's what we have here.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0507NewRoofs.jpg
The arches of the cryptoportici are clearly seen in the sides of
the platform. They were designed to support the load, not
to admit light, so they there was no problem closing them off
with masonry for security purposes. Small
grated windows did allow
some air circulation and light penetration. Maiuri rebuilt
the walls and added roofs to protect the art on the inside
walls.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0508VillaBridge.jpg
Access to the Villa site is over bridges from the surrounding
un-excavated areas, this one into the area where the
semi-circular exedra stood: the stumps of the two brick
pillars that supported the exedra roof are visible as are
several types of masonry work. All follow the same
principle with stones of various shapes being inserted into the
surface of cement. The part with the diagonally placed
square stones is called
opus
reticulatum, which means "netted work" -- looks like a
fishing net. The intermixture of different masonry work is
the result of repeated reworking and repairs. Everything
would have been sheathed either in smooth stonework or in stucco
with the latter being most commonly used.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0509SlaveServantPortico.jpg
On the side where the slave/servant quarters and work area was
located there was a long covered portico to provide shade for
outdoor work. The other side, with the winery, was
unshaded -- standard practice was to keep the fermenting area
warm to speed the process. Here we can see some of the
stucco still on the outer wall of the house and some of the
fluted stucco work on the brick pillars.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0510BurnishedBlkGarlands.jpg
The Villa of the Mysteries was lavishly and expensively
decorated. Burnished black walls like these have always been
associated with great wealth. These were probably part of
the post earthquake remodeling, and are in the eclectic "fourth
style".
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0511Black-ChangeStyles.jpg
Another room with black burnished walls, these with including
crossed geometric incisions. The small medallions at the
intersections have painted miniature scenes as do the ovals and
frames above the black panels. This is also fourth style,
and at the upper edge and on the perpendicular side wall are
visible the remains of earlier "second style" frescoes.
There appears to be an intermediate layer, but its style in not
determinable.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0512FirstStyleDepth.jpg
Bright and shiny new
looking "first style" decoration -- actually shading a little
bit into "second style". There was a continuum here
also. The walls are flat, and the impression of depth is
provided only by manipulation of shadow within the fresco
work. The artists had total command of perspective.
The four styles are no longer considered to be strictly
sequential. Different styles could be applied
simultaneously and even in reverse or jumbled sequence in
different rooms of the same house, just as we might decorate
different parts of our own houses today -- we might have a
"formal" dining room, plain bedrooms, and a Spanish colonial
family room. In big Roman houses there might be multiple
"theme" rooms for entertaining guests or for private
activities. This villa had multiple large and small
entertainment spaces is several different themes. (Slave
and servant areas -- work and living spaces -- would not
be decorated as lavishly if at all.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0513Archtectural2ndStyle.jpg
This is very complex "second style" -- overlapping architectural
elements all frescoed on flat walls. The tholos under the
arch is very similar to the one on the "wall of the tholos" in
the Getty Museum in Malibu, but the overall effect here is
much deeper. The idea is, of course to add
apparently endless vistas to inside rooms.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0514FalsePerspective-Door.jpg
Here,
false
perspective is again used to "extend" a room which has the
appearance of double trabeated columns overarched with coffered
vaults, the ends of which are open to the outside. But
it's all illusion as is the doorway on the right wall, which is
simple painted on a flat surface.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0515CofferVaultsFresco.jpg
This is a closer
view of the same wall, included to show the perspective of the
coffered vaults, the trabeation, and the pillars. It's all
very well done, but the important part is the pictured
coffering, which indicates a much earlier command of the
coffering technique than otherwise might be expected. The
weight saving method was especially suited to concrete vaults
and domes, and it was used on a grand scale a century and more
later in Rome's huge baths, in the Basilica of Maxentius in the
Roman forum, and especially in the pantheon which was the
largest concrete dome ever built until the middle of the 20th
century (and the 20th century dome, unlike the Pantheon, had
steel reinforcement).
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0516FiorelliDoors1.jpg
The
view
from the tablinium and across the atrium toward the
peristyle. There was a wide central doorway flanked
by two narrower doors. What looks like a bi-fold door on
the left is really a plaster replica made by the "Fiorelli
method" of pouring plaster into a void caused by the
disintegration of organic matter.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0517FiorelliDoors2.jpg
The same bi-fold
door, and a slightly unhinged four-leaved model. There are
several more around the Villa: folding doors of this kind appear
to have been fairly common, and they were certainly much used to
cover wide storefronts in towns. The storefront models
were more heavily built for security and the whole assemblage
could often slide into a side niche so as not to take up any of
the display or service area.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0518LiviaMatron.jpg
This statue, now in
the Naples Archeological Museum, was found in the Villa of the
Mysteries. It is usually identified as Livia, the wife of
Augustus because of its similarity to other portrait
statues identified as Livia. The costume, and particularly the
scarf over the top of the head, makes it a "priestess"
statue in modern archeological parlance, although any
matron would be so attired at prayer -- it is
assumed that only a priestess would rate a statue.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0519NQTricoloreMosaic.jpg
A well preserved
three color geometric mosaic floor -- three colors, but not
quite the Italian flag "triclore" which is red, white, and
green.
The Italian "tricolore" flag has the same colors as those of the
ingredients that are used in Pizza Margherita -- tomatoes, basil
and Mozzarella cheese. A version of pizza with those ingreients
was legendarily presented to and named after Italy's
Margherita of Savoy
(Margherita Maria Teresa Giovanna; 20 November
1851 Ð 4 January 1926) who was the Queen
consort of the Kingdom
of Italy by marriage to Umberto
I. The
Pizza is not to be confused with Palazzo Margherita, also
named after the Queen Dowagers, which is now the main building
of the American Embassy in Rome and was the Queen's official
residence until she died. Another building on the
Palazzo Margharita grounds was General Patton's HQ in Rome.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0520Egyptianisation.jpg
As noted above, the
Villa of the Mysteries has entertainment rooms decorated in
particular themes. This one is Egyptian, and again on an
expensive background of burnished black. (The cost of room
background colors, from dearest to cheapest, is thought to be as
follows: black, dark blue or brown, red or yellow,
white. This villa has a lot of black.) Except in
temples of Isis and Isis priestly quarters, there appears to be
no knowledge or care about what is shown in "Egyptian"
rooms: temples and priestly quarters presumably had real
imported Egyptian priests to keep things honest.
"Egyptianisme" was regaining its popularity after falling into
disrepute because of the affairs of Julius Caesar and Mark
Anthony with that foreign hussy, Cleopatra. At about the
same time this room was decorated (after the 60s earthquakes),
Nero caused another obelisk to be shipped from the Alexandria
port to to decorate the spina of his new circus on the Vatican
Hill, and, as we have seen, the Isis mystery cult was very
popular in Pompeii.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0521BirdMiniatures.jpg
There were also
birds -- a fact for which paleo-ornithologists are suitably
grateful. All that I, a non-ornithologist, can determine
is that the two with the long legs are water birds.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0522PeristyleMysteries.jpg
The peristyle
changed its aspect as the complex went through its phases.
The top view is what was excavated, with the addition of a new
roof. Note that although the roof was replicated, the flat
ceiling below the roof was not. The lower view is how the
peristyle looked in an earlier phase. At some point a
stone roofed stairway down into the cryptoporticus below the
platform was added inside the peristyle. Its purpose was,
it is thought, to service the wine fermentation and storage
areas that were built into the cryptoporticus when the winery
was added to the villa.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0523WinePress.jpg
In the 'working'
section of the Villa, there is this wine-pressing room (
torcularium) where there is
a reconstructed grape press. The lever arm (the "torque'
in torcularium) was an oak trunk with a carved ram's head (
ariete). The juice flowed
down a duct into the cellar below, where it was stored in huge
pitch-lined terracotta jars (dolia) set into the floor. In
ancient times there were two presses in the room, each of which
had "double action" machinery. The capstans could lift the
levers to allow the crushing chambers (the square boxy thing) to
be filled but they could also pull the levers down to to add
force to the crushing weight of the press-stone and the lever
itself. The flat area between this box and the other one
on the other side of the room was the treading floor. The
pivot, adjustable with wedges, is on the far wall.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0524WineryVillaMysteries.jpg
A schematic of the
torcularium room and associated fixtures, but it doesn't show
much of the storage area in the cryptoporticus and cellars,
parts of which have not been excavated.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0525PompeiiWinery.jpg
This is a much
smaller winery inside the walls of Pompeii. Until the time
of the 79 AD eruption, Pompeii wines were considered to be the
best in the empire -- when the Pompeii and Vesuvius
vineyards were buried, Falernian, from the northern fringe of
the Campi Flegrei, also in the Campania became the most desired
Roman wine. There are Pompeii, Vesuvian, and Falernian
wines on the market today, but nobody knows if they have the
authentic taste of the ancient wines. Oenologists have
studied what remains in the bottom of ancient jugs that have
been dug up and have even found some liquids in pitch-lined
amphorae in shipwrecks and have used these remains to try to
duplicate ancient wines, but it's all guesswork. At any
rate, cultured Romans drank their wines differently than we
do. It was considered uncivilized to drink unwatered wine,
and wine was often heavily flavored and spiced (in addition to
the pine-pitch that some lined storage jars, which
probably gave "authentic" ancient wines a "retsina"
taste). Wine also might be served chilled, room
temperature, or heated. At orgies (which were food and
wine feasts, not what you think) there would be a
master-of-ceremonies who set the order and additives and
watering rate of the wines. Finally, some wines were
stored in lead or lead-lined tanks, and wine, being acidic,
would have quickly become contaminated by lead salts leached
from the tanks -- lead salts would have sweetened the taste of
lead aged wines.
Excess in food and drink consumption was entirely disapproved,
and public drunkenness was a sign of weakness and would cause
disgrace (which was a major factor with Mark Anthony's
reputation and later with Claudius.)
The old wheeze about bulimic throat-tickling and quick trips to
the
"vomitorium" is a
modern (1923) misinterpretation that the Oxford English
Dictionary lays at the feet of Aldus Huxley. The Romans
knew about mealtime excess and vomit, but it was
tres
declasse. After a meal, however, if you were in
distress, whether from overeating, drinking, or otherwise, it
was considered wise to use an emetic, both because it was
considered silly to remain in distress and because inadvertent
poisoning was always a worry.
Vomitoria, by the way, really were only exits from
public venues like theaters or amphitheaters, built in multiples
to allow quick dispersal of agitated audiences. The
Colosseum in Rome had eighty
vomitoria,
seventy-six of which were for the general public.
Magistrates bragged that the Colosseum routinely emptied and the
crowds dispersed to their homes in under fifteen minutes.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0526DolliaDefossa.jpg
This set of dolia
defossa (big jugs, buried) was used for fermentation at a nearby
villa. The main fermentation area at the Villa of the
Mysteries is a still-buried mystery. The dolia were lined
with pitch -- by which the Romans meant pine-tar, so wine
fermented and stored this way would surely have had a "retsina"
taste. From Silenus statues it's clear that wine at some
point in history was also carried in "wineskins" which also
would have been lined with pitch, as are authentic Spanish bota
bottles -- the inauthentic ones have latex or plastic liners and
the wine tastes better. Eventually the Romans started
using metal tanks instead of pitch-lined dolia, but the first
ones were lead, and you can bet that didn't improve their
health.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0527BacchusCaravaggio.jpg
The "Mystery" that
everyone talks about in the Villa of the Mysteries is the
"Mystery" cult of Dionysus (Dionysos in Greek).
Etymology: the Greek word <
mysta > simply meant "priest". A
mystery religion or cult was one in which part or all of the
knowledge or ritual was known only by or was reserved to the
priesthood. Mystery temples had a section inside the
cella called the
mysterium (
mysterion in Greek) where
only the priests were allowed and where they performed secret
rituals. Some of the early cults in the pre-Roman Italian
peninsula had this mysterious aspect, but they were mostly
subsumed into more sophisticated Greek cults. The Dionysos
cult was also a Greek import, but because of its wild and
contrarian nature it was not subject to gradual
sophistication. The more "standard" or orthodox Roman and
Greek "pagan" cults, on the contrary, were usually quite open
and public. Their ritual sacrifices were performed at
altars outside, in front of the temples. Traditional
Romans -- i.e., pagan conservatives -- had a great distrust for
the "new" religions arriving mostly from what we would call the
Middle-East because of their secrecy.
But new "mysterious" cults did arrive and became popular, and
then they became more popular as Romans became bored with their
"old time religion". The new mystery cults included that
of Isis, the Mithra cult, the cult of Dionysos, the Orphic cults
(more than one), the Cybele cult with its self-castrated
priests, and Judaism and Christianity. The latter
two, which were long considered identical by the Roman
authorities, had closed ceremonies which only the priests were
allowed to see. Western Christianity lost its "mystery"
when it abandoned the
iconostasis,
and Judaism without a temple (i.e., "Rabbi/synagog Judaism", as
opposed to High-Priest/temple Judaism) was also no longer
"mysterious". The Roman urban core, the city itself, was
slower to adopt these new religions, but outlying areas, and
especially areas like the Campania and the Bay of Naples, which
had many more foreign trade contacts and alien residents, saw
much earlier adoption of the mystery religions. In the
eastern provinces, where most of the "mysteries" originated,
they always had a strong foothold, and in the western provinces
-- less "civilized" and therefore under tighter military control
-- the Mithraic cult gained ground quickly, because that
exclusively male cult was very popular in the military rank and
file.
Bacchus was another name for Dionysus, and some sources say that
the Bacchus name was originally
onomatopoeic and
referred to drunken shouting (two kinds:
iacchus et bacchus, which,
we think, was loud raucous laughter and doglike barking of
Dionysus adherents -- the words raucous, laughter, and barking
may all well be onomatopoeic as were iaccgus and
bacchis)). Dionysos in art is usually soft, often young
and effeminate (but sometimes old and fat), always with wine and
grapes at hand. He was the god of wine, fertility, and
excess and was much loved in the Campania where he was also a
"patron saint" of the Vineyards and wineries.
In the early days of his cult, the rituals were limited to
women, and men approached only at their ultimate peril.
According to many contemporary and subsequent accounts, the
women drank and danced themselves into a frenzy and then tore
apart and ate raw animals associated with virility -- rams,
bulls, cocks, and any stray men who might wander in.
In later days in Rome, Bacchus rituals became co-ed and the
famous Bacchanalia resulted. This was after Bacchus had
become totally identified with -- merged with -- Libertus, the
Roman god of moral license. The initiation ritual for female
"Bacchantes" is thought to have stayed pretty much the same
(although the only pictorial representation we have of the
ritual is from one room of the Villa of the Mysteries.
It's appropriate that a female initiation rite would be pictured
in a Villa with a winery. It's most often assumed that the
initiate would have been a wife or daughter of the house, but
it's also possible that the frescoes were simply homage to the
god who protected the livelihood of the establishment. Or
both.
This young Dionysus/Bacchus image, of a painting by Caravaggio,
is one of the more famous of the Renaissance. Caravaggio was
himself said to be enamored of young effeminate males. The
model for the painting us tentatively identified as Cecco del
Caravaggio. See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecco_del_Caravaggio.
This Caravaggio Bacchus is in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence,
Italy.
Caravaggio is all over the Internet, but one article I
particularly like is at
http://www.mmdtkw.org/VCaravaggio.html
-- it's by me.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0528BacchusLeBrun.jpg
From Bulfinches Mythology:
"We have seen in the story of
Theseus how Ariadne, the daughter of King Minos, after helping
Theseus to escape from the labyrinth, was carried by him
to the island of Naxos and was left there asleep, while the
ungrateful Theseus pursued his way home without her.... The
island where Ariadne was left was the favorite island of
Dionysos... As Ariadne sat lamenting her fate, Dionysos found
her, consoled her and made her his wife...."
The image is of Dionysos with Ariadne. The artist,
Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun, although not well known today,
was the most popular European portrait artist of her day.
She was the court artist at Versailles during the reign of Louis
XIV and painted everyone who was anyone -- including thirty
known portraits of her friend Marie Antoinette. She
survived the Revolution and spent twelve year as a peripatetic
artistic exile in Europe during which time she expanded her
portfolio of European royals and aristocrats. Eventually
she was taken off the rolls of wanted emigres and allowed to
return to Paris. The portfolio, by the time of her death in
Paris in 1842, included over 900 known works, some 700 of which
were portraits. Everything that is known about her seems
to be on the Internet. Just look up her name using any search
engine (Google, etc.).
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0529BacchusRubens.jpg
Peter Paul Rubens here shows what can
happen when excess is taken to excess. Bacchus and Ariadne
have reached vastly overweight middle age and have not yet
thought about dieting. The kids are moving in the same
direction, and even the lion that Dionysus/Bacchus rode in his
youth is "round and on the ground." Rubens also can
be found all over the Internet including at
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/R/rubens.html.
Critics said Rubens always painted himself.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0530dionysos's_birth.jpg
The artist of this
ancient Greek fresco is unknown. It shows the second birth
of Dionysos, a name that means "Twice Born".
According to the most common versions of the Dionysos myth a
child named Zagreos was born of Semele after Zeus in the guise
of a python snake had an affair with her. Hera, as usual,
was infuriated by Zeus's infidelity and had her friends, the
Titans, dismember and eat the boy. They somehow left his
heart uneaten, and Zeus retrieved it. Zeus either ate the
heart himself or sewed it into his thigh, and, after some
interval, gave the boy his second birth by cutting him out of
his thigh. (It helps to know here that prudish European
translators always translated as "thigh" the Greek word that
really means "crotch"). Zagreos, now Dionysos,
appropriately becomes the god of fertility, of abandon, and
especially of wine, which is regarded by many as an aid to
fertility and abandon.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0531DionysosHerculesMosaic.jpg
Zeus was a master of
disguise: he was the Swan who seduced Leda, the Bull who
frolicked with Europa, the Snake who snuck into bed with Semele
to produce Zagreos, and he was several other things that fooled
several other women. His least common disguise was that of
a man, but that's just what he did when he put on the skin of
Amphitryon to seduce Alcmene. The real Amphitryon had just
left his marital bed. When his wife produced very
dissimilar twins it was clear what had happened: Iphicles
was the son of Amphitryon, and his robust brother, Hercules, was
the son of Zeus. Once again, Hera, the one and only wife
of Zeus, sought revenge against the already-sinned-against
mother and her innocent child. Hercules strangled the
snakes she sent against them and survived to become the great
hero of the big and small (but getting ever bigger)
screens. With a common background, it was inevitable that
Hercules and Dionysos would be friendly rivals. What they
both apparently best liked to do was have drinking
contests. The image shows a Greek mosaic that was often
copied in the Greco-Roman world -- or perhaps it's just the
oldest known copy of an earlier work. Although the two men
are identified in several iterations of the image, I'm not aware
of any that of the images identify the woman.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0532Dionysos4SeasonsSarcophagus.jpg
A common scene on
Roman sarcophagi is a young Dionysos side-saddle on a big cat --
sometimes a lion and sometimes a leopard -- and surrounded by
the personified Four Seasons. Experts say that the meaning
is the obvious one: it's always a good time for a glass of
wine. It also refers, they say, to the all-season work
that is required to make a good wine.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0533MysteryFresco.jpg
We finally get to
the Dionysus cult initiation fresco in the Villa of the
Mysteries. The images are bigger than life-size (assuming
your not an outsized athlete) and have been
variously interpreted as a number of scenes of one woman's
initiation or scenes of a number of women being initiated.
Everyone agrees that it's the Dionysian cult that she/they are
joining. This was not always the case: these images
provoked a search of Mediterranean art for analogs that made the
identification certain. It's also universally agreed that
this cycle of frescoes is the most complete and perhaps the only
full depiction of the initiation ceremony that has been seen
anywhere. Since their is almost complete silence about
Dionysian initiation in the ancient written literature this has
become the standard source on the subject. Like much
else in the Villa of the Mysteries, it appears that these
frescoes were completed as part of the post-earthquake
redecoration and that they were almost immediately placed in
"hot storage" by the 79 AD eruption.
Note that unlike the Christian, Isis, Mithraic, and Orphic cults
(the last being a more austere form of Dionysos cult) the
Dionysos cult left behind no known "scriptures" and little in
the form of pictorial representation, so there is a lot of
guesswork in the interpretation of Dionysos rituals.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0534DionysusAriadne.jpg
Unfortunately, the
the participants of this central scene in the initiation fresco
at the Villa of the Mysteries are both damaged and not named in
the fresco. Most experts, basing their judgments on
analogous images with named characters, now say that the woman
in the fresco is Ariadne. The long staff is a
thyrsus which is one of the
"attributes" of Dionysos, a symbol that is considered to
have been included in his images to make them easily
identifiable. The Dionysian
thyrsus is a long staff tipped with a cone of
a pinion pine, that same famous Italian and Plinian "umbrella
pine". The staff is often beribboned or wound with vines,
often ivy. A more general definition of a
thyrsus would include any
bunch of seed pods or flowers. It's thought that the word
is related to the sound that would be made if a
thyrsus was shaken, so the
word is often associated with anything that is shaken for
sound. The word is also used in botany. The long
shaft clearly also has phallic significance. And just look
at the shape and position of the ribbon in this picture.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0535Flagellation-Mysteries.jpg
This is the third
"scene" depicted in the fresco and it takes place after the
initiate enters (scene 1) and disrobes/prepares for the
initiation (2). In this scene a winged figure, sometimes
identified as Agnoia (Ignorance) is flogging or preparing to
flog the initiate while another naked figure dances.
Various theories are advanced for the meaning of the
scene: a feminist version says it depicts the subservient
and downtrodden state of ancient womanhood and that its very
depiction is a rebellion against this state; a realist
interpretation is that candidates for initiation were actually
flogged during the ritual; a "figurative" view states that
the initiate would not really be flogged (the figure with the
whip is, after all, depicted as a mythical spirit) but that she
is beset by ignorance which she will shed by becoming a full
member of the cult. The dancing figure is sometimes
described as the same initiate celebrating (or anticipating) her
freedom from ignorance. Others say she is a different girl
who is already a member of the cult and is encouraging the new
initiate by showing her that her new religion will liberate
her. The swirling cloth over the shoulder of the dancer is
an artistic attribute of a Dionysian ecstatic or entranced
Bacchante.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0536SilenusSatyrsVision.jpg
There are males in
the fresco but they fall into three categories: (1)
pre-pubescent children, (2) satyrs, who are not completely
human and have short horse tails and pointed ears, and (3)
Silenoi, satyrs who have aged. Silenoi are supposed to supervise
the Satyrs who are there to assist in the ceremonies as needed,
but, in fact, the Silenoi spend much of their time drunk or
asleep or playing tricks. Here, a Silenus has enticed a
Satyr to look into a bowl to see a reflection -- a vision
-- in the liquid, which here would be wine. The Satyr
peers in, not knowing that the accomplice of the Silenus is
holding a mask behind him, the reflection of which he will see
in the trembling bowl. "Theatrical" masks (comedy and
tragedy) developed from masks used in Dionysos rituals, and many
sources say that theater itself developed from the frenzied
choric
hymns and dances (
dithyramboi) that the ancient Greeks
performed in honor if Dionysius. (A dithyramb, technically, is
an antiphonal performance by two groups of singers or by a
leader and a chorus.)
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0537PhallicTotem.jpg
The most common image in Dionysos art is the moment in which
an initiate lifts the double veil from the phallic totem.
It is often shown as just a long smooth stone, but it can also
be quite realistic. In times past you could buy one of the
realistic type from young boys and old men (Satyrs and Silenoi?)
that hung out around the Villa entrances, but there were none to
be seen when I last visited the site a few years ago. It
was a rainy day, so they just may have stayed home. Here
our initiate is lifting the final veil, but has not yet exposed
the phallus. In some other images she is in the same pose
and has already lifted the last veil, but what is exposed is one
of these "theatrical" masks rather than a phallus.
Theories have been advanced as to why, but they are all just
guesswork.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0538VillaMysteriesGraffito.jpg
One of Pompeii's
most famous graffito caricatures, and not just because of its
remarkable resemblance to Mr. Magoo or LBJ, was uncovered in the
Villa of the Mysteries. Its discovery and, ever so much
more so, its making long predated both Magoo and LBG. It
has long been thought to represent Vespasian who died peacefully
at Aquae Cutiliae near his birthplace in Sabine country on 23
June, 79 AD, after contracting a brief illness, often said to
have been dysentery. A month later, his son and successor
visited Pompeii to dedicate a new altar in front of the temple
of the Imperial Cult in the forum, and just a month after that
came the big Vesuvius eruption. Portrait and coins of
Vespasian show a tightly contracted face, which, his
enemies said, made him look permanently constipated.
Ironic that he may have died of the opposite.
Bronze age Nola and "Rustic" and Seaside Villas at Oplontis,
Boscoreale, Boscotrecase, and Stabiae
The map shows the
places, highlighted in yellow, that are covered in this unit.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0602PeutingerMap.jpg
Oplontis first shows up on the Peutinger Map, a Medieval copy
of the map put on display by Agrippa, Caesar's Chief of
Staff and an early candidate for the succession. The map
came into Peutinger's possession early in the Renaissance and
has borne his name ever since. (This is a part of a
modern copy of the Peutinger map.) The green area is the
sea, and the part of the green that looks like an alligator
with its nose pointed to the left is the Bay of Naples.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0603NolaBronze1700BC.jpg
The bronze age village at Nola, east and slightly north of
Vesuvius, was discovered under a thick layer of volcanic ash
from an eruption about 1700 BC (see image) while a building
foundation was being excavated. Archeologists had found
other ruins from the 1700 BC Eruption, but these were
certainly the best: whole buildings were preserved as
well as a goat pens, a pottery kiln with a pot still inside,
and numerous artifacts.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0604NolaVillage17cBC.jpg
The Nola site is the best preserved bronze age
site in Italy. These are two huts -- "long
houses" -- each of which may have housed more than one family
or an extended family group. The upper hut is about 24
feel long, and the lower one is about 50 feet long. Each
is divided into two rooms, a living area and a storage area
(further from the entrance. The Nola/Croce del
Papa/Avelino eruption details are all over the internet.
A simple earch will find more than you ever wanted to know.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0605Nola1700BC.jpg
(not to scale)
Artifacts and plant material from Nola: Human figure,
found at the bronze age level, may actually be older and may
have been preserved frome earlier times as a cult
object. The pottery kiln, about two feet high and
buried during the eruption, still had a pot
inside. Stalks of wheat were buried and carbonized.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0606BoarIvoryHat170.jpg
A boars' teeth cap or helmet, reconstructed, from bronze age
Nola. It may have been ceremonial or may have been a
protective battle helmet.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0607OplontisVillaPoppea.jpg
Oplontis: A sumptuous villa that probably
belonged to Nero's second wife, Poppea, in modern Torre
Annunziata.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0608PoppeaVillaFresco.jpg
Fresco from inside the Poppea villa -- now in the Naples
National Archeological Museum -- shows two view of a villa, the
left of which looks remarkably like the exposed side of the
Villa of Poppea. The other side (front entrance side?) is
still buried under the Sarno River Canal and the modern city, so
there's no way to tell whether it looked like the right side of
the image.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0609VillaPoppeaReconst.jpg
A computer generated view of Poppea's villa. The
green wall away from the viewer is the still unexcavated
volcanic debris. The lighting is a modern effect that
allows viewing of the site at night.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0610PoppeaVolcDeposit.jpg
At the right side is the debris wall, and above it is the
town of Torre Annunziata.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0611PoppeaOecus.jpg
Three views inside the Villa of Poppea: the Oecus or
main entertainment space (where large meals could be held, for
example), a cubiculum or bedroom (note the stucco decorations
around the ceiling), and the underground cryptoporticus passage
between the living quarters and the pool.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0612PoppeaPeristyles.jpg
An external portico with half-fluted columns. A
perisyle courtyard.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0613PoppeaPeristyleLit.jpg
The archeological site is not open after dark, but it is lit
for viewing from the walkways above, at the modern ground level.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0614PoppeaPortico.jpg
Another Villa Poppea peristyle, this one with stuccoed
columns in a feather pattern.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0615PoppeaTriclinium.jpg
In triclinia dining rooms, food was often part of the
decorations: here, a painted basket of fruit on a painted
shelf. Restorers have inscribed the upper wall to
complete the architectural pattern of the fresco.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0616PeacockGlassBowl.jpg
Two of the Villa's more famous artworks: pomegranates
in a glass bowl, and a peacock on the wall.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0617PoppeaTheatrical.jpg
Architectural second style decoration is often
described as "theatrical". Here, modern
archeologist-architects have lifted the "set" from the wall in a
three dimensional projection.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0618PoppeaOplontisGold.jpg
Villa Poppea jewelry: (clockwise from upper left)
rings, two sets of earrings, an emerald necklace, three
bracelets, and two belts -- all in gold.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0618AOplontisNecklace.jpg
A gold and emerald neckace found with the body of an eruption
victim in "Villa B" in Oplontis -- go to
http://www.smatch-international.org/Fascinating.htm
for information on emeralds from
SMATCH.
There's a mystery here -- crystalographic tests indicate that
some of the emeralds burried in the 79 AD eruption of Vesuvius
came from Colombian mines.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0619LCrassius3Peristyle.jpg
Villa B at Oplontis was not as big as Villa A ("of Poppea"),
but it had good architectural features like this long two level
peristyle courtyard. Discovered in 1974, it is still not
open to the public.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0620LCrassius3Winery.jpg
Like Villa A, Villa B was not inhabited at the time of the
eruption, because Villa B had been converted into a
winery. Wine amphorae, already coated on the inside with
pine-pitch, were stacked upside down, waiting for the year's
vintage.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0621LCrassius3Skeletons.jpg
Although no landlord family was present (no furniture in the
living quarters) these and sixty or so others took shelter in
the villa during the eruption's Plinian phase only to be killed
by the pyroclastic flows that followed during the Peleean
phase. Like the bodies found in the boat sheds at
Herculaneum, these people may have been blasted into this corner
by the first surge-flow that hit the villa.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0622LCrassius3StrongBox.jpg
A strongbox of oak, iron, and bronze: it would
have held valuables and important papers.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0623BoscorealeView.jpg
A view of Vesuvius from Boscoreale, a prominence on
the slope that held several large Villas. In the lower
right corner, one of the dikes built in the town to hold back
lava from the nearby town of Boscotrecase durin a 1906 eruption.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0624SynistorBedroom.jpg
A room from the villa of Lucius Fannius Synistor in
Boscoreale, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New york.
See
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/247017
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0625SynistorBedroomFurn.jpg
Replica bed and stool from the Synistor bedroom.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0626SynistorBdrmStyle2.jpg
Style 2 architectural and rustic scenes from the Villa
Synistor bedroom.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0627SynistorCithara.jpg
Woman with a
cithara,
(kithara), fresco from the Villa Synistor. The
stringed cithara was the predecessor of the harp and of the
guitar, the latter of which derived its name from
Kithara.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0628SynistorGarlands.jpg
A Villa Synistor first style fresco: garlands,
bucrania, and small images on a faux marble background.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0629WomanShield.jpg
A woman with a shield: Greek woman mourning a husband
lost in battle. There is no necessary connection between
the image and any of the inhabitants of the house; this was a
repertoirial image.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0630PisanellaArtifacts.jpg
Artifacts from the Villa Pisanella: a name seal,
two carriage ornaments, a large olive crusher, a bronze door
handle, and bronze fittings for a bed. The villa was
excavated in the late 1890s and then re-buried.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0631PisanellaGold.jpg
Gold jewelry was found with the silver "Boscoreale
treasure" found in the Villa Pisanella. Copies like these
can be purchased on line. Incuded in the "treasure",
probably the loot of the thieves found nearby, were more than
1000 gold coins, each of which was the size and shape of a US 5
cent coin.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0632PisanellaTreasure1.jpg
More than one hundred pieces of a serving and eating silver
set were found at the Villa Pisanella. Most of the pieces
are now in the Louvre in Paris.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0633PisanellaTreasure2.jpg
More of the Villa Pisanella Boscoreale silver.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0634PisanellaSkelFeath.jpg
Two cups from the Boscoreale treasure. Replicas are
available on line from the Louvre store.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0635PisanellaTwoEwers.jpg
Two Boscoreale silver ewers.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0636PisanellaTray1.jpg
One of several large silver trays from the Boscoreale
treasure.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0637VillaReginaFarm.jpg
The Villa Regina at Boscoreale was a working farm with no
entertainment rooms. It has been restored and replanted as
it was before the 79 AD eruption.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0638VillaReginaDolia.jpg
The main product of the Villa Regina was wine. In this
image are two views of buried dolia, large jugs in which wine
was fermented.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0639VillaReginaArtifacts.jpg
Various artifacts from the Villa Regina. The amphora,
upper right, was the type used for storage of honey or
fruit. Below it is a Silenus.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0639bBoscrealeFoods.jpg
Food items recovered from Boscoreale villas. Bread, figs,
and walnuts are carbonized.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0639cBoscorealeArtifacts.jpg
Artifacts recovered from the Boscoreale villas (not to scale)
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0640AgrippaBlkRmPanel.jpg
Agrippa's country villa at Boscotrecase was decorated in
third style. The two most important rooms are now called
the Black Room and the White Room. The image shows a
single panel from the black room. Agrippa probably build
the retreat for use by his patron, Caesar Augustus.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0641AgrippaBlkRmDetails.jpg
Details -- black room.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0642AgrippaEgyptian1.jpg
Egyptian details -- black room
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0643AgrippaEgyptian2.jpg
More black room details.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0644AgrippaBlkRmMythol.jpg
Mythology details -- black room: Perseus and Andromeda
/ Polyphemus and Galatea.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0645AgrippaWhtRm3rdStyle.jpg
White room decorations.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0646AgrippaWhtRmDetails.jpg
White room decorations.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0647CastellammareDiStabia.jpg
Castellammare di Stabia now stands where ancient Stabiae was
laid out along the south eastern end of the Bay of Naples.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0648PlinyRouteMap.jpg
On "Eruption Day" of 79 AD Pliny was summoned to
rescue the wife of a friend at Oplontis (Torre
Annunziata). He was unable to put ashore there because of
the accumulation of volcanic debris -- probably floating pumice
-- and because the water may have receded in early-stage tsunami
activity. He went ashore at Stabiae and died there the
next morning, probably of heart failure.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0649StabiaeVillasMap.jpg
A modern internet tourist map of the villas at
Stabiae: The map shows only the few that were excavated,
but they probably were strung like pearls, side by side along a
low cliff that was separated from the shore by a narrow
beach. The shoreline is now more than a mile from the
ruins, mostly as a result of volcanic deposits. The
Pyroclastic flows stopped short of Stabiae but it was directly
in the path of the Plinian ashfalls.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0650DianaFlora.jpg
Stabiae's two famous fashion plates inspired 18th, 19th, and
20th century designers of women's clothing. Also
influential were images of female worshippers depicted in
frescoes at the Isis temple in Pompeii. See "Empire style
and derivatives at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire_silhouette.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0651HarborScene.jpg
A fresco from one of the Stabian villas shows the Stabiae
harbor.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0652HarborFrescoShoreline.jpg
A closer view of the upper part of the same fresco gives an
idea of what the Villas looked like along the shore.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0653StabiaVillaPastore.jpg
From the Villa Pastore (Villa of the Shepherd) comes this
non-Christian image of the "Good Shepherd". The villa
appears to have built in two phases on different axes.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0654StabiaeVillaArianna.jpg
What is now identified as the Villa Arianna is actually 2
adjacent villas. In the larger of the two is a fresco of
Dionysus and Ariadne, shown here.
http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRIVes0655StabiaeVillaSMarco.jpg
The Villa San Marco is at the end of the string of pearls at
the eastern end of the low cliff. The fresco has been
miss-identified as Mercury; it is clearly Perseus with the
head of Medusa.
Aided by
Hermes and
Athena, Perseus pressed the
Graiae, sisters of the Gorgons, into
helping him by seizing the one eye and one tooth that the
sisters shared and not returning them until they provided him
with winged sandals (which enabled him to fly), the cap of Hades
(which conferred invisibility), a curved sword, or sickle, to
decapitate Medusa, and a bag in which to conceal the head.
(According to another version, the Graiae merely directed him to
the Stygian Nymphs, who told him where to find the Gorgons and
gave him the bag, sandals, and helmet; Hermes gave him the
sword.)