Pompeii, Its Life and Art

Fiorelli put an end to haphazard digging, to excavating here and there wherever the site seemed most promising. He first set about clearing the undisturbed places lying between the excavated portions; and when in this way the west part of the city had been laid bare, he commenced to work systematically from the excavated part toward the east. Since 1860 only one public building has been excavated—the baths at the corner of Stabian and Nola streets; but many private houses have been uncovered, some of which are of much interest. Fiorelli remained in charge of the excavations until 1875, when he was called to Rome to become General Director of Museums and Excavations; he died in 1896, at the age of seventy-two. His successors, first Michele Ruggiero, then Giulio de Petra, have worked according to his plans, and in full sympathy with his ideals.

Up to the present time about three-fifths of Pompeii have been excavated. In 1872 Fiorelli made the calculation that if the excavations should continue at the rate then followed the whole city would be laid bare in 74 years. Since that time the work has progressed more slowly, partly in consequence of the greater care taken for the preservation of the remains. At the present rate of progress we may believe that the twentieth century will hardly witness the completion of the excavations.

Articles of furniture and objects of art that can easily be moved, as the statuettes often found in the gardens, are ordinarily taken to the Museum in Naples; a few things have been placed in the little Museum at Pompeii. Now and then small sculptures have been left in a house exactly as they were found; but the necessity of keeping such houses locked and of guarding them with especial care prevents the general adoption of this method of preservation.

In respect to the preservation of paintings the practice has varied at different periods. Generally, however, the best pictures have been cut from the walls and transferred to the Museum, while the decorative framework has been left undisturbed. It is keenly to be regretted that in this way the effect of the decorative system as a whole has been destroyed, for the picture forms the centre of a carefully elaborated scheme of decoration which needs to be viewed as an artistic whole in order to be fully appreciated; and the removal of a painting can hardly be accomplished without some damage to the parts of the wall immediately in contact with it. A far better method would be to leave intact all walls containing paintings or decorative work of interest, providing such means of protection against the weather as may be necessary. A good beginning in this respect has been made in the case of the house of the Vettii, the beautiful and well preserved paintings of which have been left on the walls and are preserved with the greatest care.

The treatment of a mosaic floor is an altogether different problem. While the floor as a whole, with its ornamental designs, is left in place, fine mosaics representing paintings, which are delicate and easily destroyed, are wisely taken up and placed in the Museum.

NOTES TO PLAN I

CHAPTER V
A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW

The outline of Pompeii, with its network of streets, may be traced on the accompanying plan.

The city took its shape from the end of the old lava stream on which it lay, which ran southeast from Vesuvius. It formed an irregular oval a little less than four fifths of a mile (1200 metres) long and a little more than two fifths of a mile (720 metres) wide in its greatest dimensions. On three sides, west, south, and east, the wall of the city ran along the edge of the hill; on the northwest side, between the Herculaneum and Capua gates, it passed directly across the ridge formed by the lava.

The eight gates are known by the modern names given on our plan. Two of them, the Herculaneum and Capua gates, lie at the points where the wall comes to the edge of the lava bed on either side; the streets that led from them descended to the plain. At the Herculaneum Gate the much travelled highway from Naples, passing through Herculaneum, entered the city; the Capua Gate does not seem to have been built to accommodate a large traffic. Between these two lay the Vesuvius Gate, through which the Pompeians passed out upon the ridge toward Vesuvius.

From the Herculaneum Gate nearly to the Stabian Gate, on the south side, ran a bluff, with a sharp descent. Nevertheless, as a gate was needed on the side nearest the sea, the Water Gate, Porta Marina, was placed here; through it a steep road led to the Forum, so steep that it could not have been much used by vehicles; but that may have mattered little to the fishermen bringing their catches to the market.

The Stabian Gate lay in a depression at the end of the lava bed and afforded a more convenient means of access to the city; thence a road ran to the harbor on the Sarno, and to Stabiae. At the left another road apparently branched off from this in the direction of Nuceria, which could be reached also from the conveniently located Nocera Gate further east; here also the slope of the hill was less pronounced. Two gates, finally, gave access to the city on the somewhat steeper east and northeast sides, the Sarno Gate, which takes its name, not from the river, but from the modern town of Sarno, and the Nola Gate; it is at least probable that the road passing through the latter led to Nola.

A glance at the plan will make it plain that the streets of Pompeii must have been laid out according to a definite system; an arrangement on the whole so regular and symmetrical would scarcely be found in a city that had developed gradually from a small beginning, in which the location of streets had been the result of accident.

Two wide streets that cross the city very nearly at right angles give the direction for the other streets running approximately north and south and east and west, Mercury Street with its continuations, and Nola Street. The former probably served as a base line in laying out the city; this we infer from the fact that while it is exceptionally broad, and the Forum lies on it, there is no gate at either end, and it could have been little used for traffic. Nola Street has a gate only at the east end; the west end opens into the Strada Consolare, which follows the line of the city wall and leads to the Herculaneum Gate at the northwest corner. That the other streets must have taken their direction from these two is clearly seen in the case of those in the northwest part of the city; on close examination it will be found that the arrangement of the rest also is in accordance with the same system, a fact which would perhaps be still more obvious if the unexcavated eastern portion of the city were laid bare.

In two instances, however, there is a deviation from this system. One is in the quarter near the Forum. For reasons which have not been satisfactorily explained, the Porta Marina was not placed on the prolongation of the street coming from the Sarno Gate, but further north. In order to reach this gate the street, as shown on the plan, makes a bend to the north which is reproduced in the other east and west streets lying south of Nola Street; west of the Forum, again, the streets converge in order to give access to this gate.

The other deviation, which affects Stabian Street, can be explained on grounds of convenience. This street, which runs from the Stabian to the Vesuvius Gate, abandoned the line of the north and south streets west of it in order to take advantage of a natural depression in the hill, by following which an easy grade could be established to the higher parts of the city; that the blocks along this important thoroughfare might not be too irregular in shape, the nearest parallel streets on the east were laid out in such a way as to follow the direction of Stabian Street. The street running south from the Capua Gate resumes, with slight variation, the north and south line of Mercury Street.

The public buildings of the city form two extensive groups. One group lies about the Forum (Plan II); with this we may reckon the Baths in the first block north, and the temples of Fortuna Augusta and Venus Pompeiana. The nucleus of the other is formed by the two theatres and the large quadrangular colonnade which, designed originally to afford protection for theatre-goers against the rain, was later turned into barracks for the gladiators (Plan III). There are in addition only four public buildings that need to be mentioned. Two are bathing establishments, the Stabian Baths, and those at the corner of Stabian and Nola streets. The third is a small building near the Herculaneum Gate, consisting of a hall opening on the street, with a base for a statue near the rear wall; this on insufficient grounds has been called a custom-house. The fourth, the Amphitheatre, lies in the southern corner of the city.

As the public buildings were thus located in clearly defined groups, it is not probable that many yet remain in the portion of the city which has not been excavated. We may expect to find only bathing establishments, and perhaps one or two temples. There were priestesses of Ceres and of Venus, but the sanctuary of Ceres has not been discovered. Mention is made also of a priest of Mars; but the temple of Mars, according to the precept of Vitruvius (I. vii. 1) would be outside the city.

A word should be added regarding the modern division of Pompeii into Regions, or wards, and Insulae. By an Insula is meant—in accordance with ancient usage—a block of houses surrounded on all sides by streets. The division into Regions was introduced by Fiorelli, and rests upon a misconception which has been corrected by more recent excavations. Fiorelli thought that the Capua Gate and the Nocera Gate were connected by a street, and that the city was thus divided by four streets (the assumed street, Stabian Street, Nola Street, and Abbondanza Street with its continuations) into nine Regions, marked on our plan with the numerals I-IX.

In each Region every block, or Insula, has its number, and in the Insula a separate number is given to every door opening on a street. This arrangement is convenient because each house can be accurately designated by means of three numbers.

On the plans the Insulae are designated by Arabic numerals, but in the text small Roman numerals are used for the sake of clearness; thus, Ins. IX. i. 26, means the first Insula of Region IX, No. 26.

The names of several of the more important streets, as of the better known houses, are given in the text in the English form.

CHAPTER VI
BUILDING MATERIALS, CONSTRUCTION, AND ARCHITECTURAL PERIODS

Six centuries lie between the dates of the earliest and the latest buildings at Pompeii; and in order to understand any structure rightly we must first of all ascertain to what period it belongs. It is indeed rarely possible to fix dates with exactness for the earlier time; but certain periods are so clearly differentiated from one another, that in most cases there is no room for doubt to which of them a building is to be assigned. Before undertaking to characterize these periods, however, it will be necessary briefly to notice what building materials were used, and how they were turned to account in construction.

Exclusive of wood, which was more freely used in Pompeii than in Campanian towns to-day, the principal building materials were Sarno limestone, two kinds of tufa (gray and yellow), lava, a whitish limestone often called travertine wrongly, marble, and brick.

The Sarno limestone (pietra di Sarno) is a deposit from the water of the Sarno, and is found in beds along the course of the river. It contains many impressions of the leaves and stems of plants, and varies greatly in compactness; it closely resembles the Roman travertine, except that it has a more decided yellowish tint.

Gray tufa is a volcanic dust which has been hardened by the presence of water into rock. It has a fine grain, and is easily worked; it was quarried in the vicinity of Nocera. The volcanic dust which formed the yellow tufa was thrown out in an earlier period, when the Sarno plain was still a part of the sea, and so hardened in salt water; it is more friable than the gray tufa, and not so durable.

The lava, which came originally from Vesuvius, was quarried at Pompeii. Three varieties may be distinguished, differing in density according as they were taken from the lower or the upper strata: solid lava, or basalt, which, being heavy and extremely hard, was extensively used for pavements and thresholds; slag, like the scoriae found on the sides of Vesuvius to-day; and cruma, the foam of the lava stream, which is light and porous, but on account of its hardness has good resisting qualities.

The whitish limestone has a fine texture, without impressions of leaves, and is of an even color; it was to some extent employed as a substitute for marble. It was not quarried at Pompeii, and was not extensively used; the most important example of its use is in the later colonnade about the Forum. The white Carrara marble (marmor lunense) was preferred for columns, pilasters, and architraves; but colored marbles of many varieties, cut into thin slabs and blocks, were used as a veneering for walls and in the mosaic floors.

Bricks were used only for the corners of buildings, for doorposts, and in a few instances, as in the Basilica and the house of the Labyrinth, for columns; brick walls are not found in Pompeii. The bricks seen in corners and doorposts (Figs. 11, 95) are simply a facing for rubble work. They are ordinarily less than an inch thick; they have the shape of a right-angled triangle, and are so laid that the side representing the hypothenuse—about six inches long—appears in the surface of the wall. Sometimes fragments of roof tiles, more or less irregular in shape, were used instead. The bricks of the earlier time contain sea sand and have a granular surface, with a less uniform color; the later bricks are smooth and even in appearance.

The flat oblong roof tiles (tegulae), measuring ordinarily 24 by 19 or 20 inches, had flanges at the sides; over the joints where the flanges came together, joint tiles in the form of a half-cylinder (imbrices) were laid, like those in use at the present day (Figs. 114, 117).

The styles of masonry are characteristic and interesting. We may distinguish them as masonry with limestone framework, rubble work, reticulate work, quasi-reticulate work, ashlar work, and, in the case of columns and entablatures, massive construction.

The masonry with limestone framework dates from the earliest period. The walls were built without mortar, clay being used instead. Since this served only as a filling, without strength as a binding material, it was necessary to arrange the stones themselves in such a way that the wall would stand firm. This result was accomplished by using large, oblong blocks, not only for corners and doorposts, but also for a framework in the body of the wall; as shown in our illustration, alternate vertical and horizontal blocks were built up into pillars which would hold in place the courses of smaller stones that filled the intervening spaces. The material of the larger, hewn blocks, as well as of the smaller fragments, was Sarno limestone, with occasional pieces of cruma or slag.

The rubble work, opus incertum, consists of fragments irregular in shape, of the size of the fist and larger, laid in mortar. The material used in the earlier times was ordinarily lava; later, Sarno limestone. Corners and doorposts at first were built of hewn blocks; afterwards bricks and blocks of stone cut in the form of bricks were used for this purpose, and in the latest period frequently brick and stone combined, opus mixtum or opus compositum—a course of stone alternating with every two or three courses of brick. An example of the opus mixtum is seen in the entrances of the Herculaneum Gate (Fig. 113). Rubble work is the prevailing masonry at Pompeii; in comparison the other kinds described may be considered exceptional.

The reticulate work, opus reticulatum, formed the outer surface of a wall, the inner part of which was built up with rubble. It was composed of small four-sided pyramidal blocks, of which only the base, cut square and smooth, showed on the surface; the tapering part served as a key to bind the block into the wall. These blocks, which measured from three to four inches square at the base, were laid on their corners, so that the edges ran diagonally to the horizontal and vertical lines of the wall; the pattern thus formed had the appearance of a net, hence the name. The material was in most cases gray, occasionally yellow, tufa. The corners and doorposts were at first made of the same kind of stone cut in the shape of bricks; later of bricks. This style of masonry was in vogue at Rome, and apparently also at Pompeii, in the time of Augustus (Fig. 12; see also the pedestal in the foreground of Plate I).

The quasi-reticulate work belongs to the early years of the Roman colony. In appearance it lies between rubble and reticulate work, differing from the latter in that the small blocks are less carefully finished and are laid with less regularity. The material is generally lava, but tufa and limestone are also found. The corners and doorposts are of brick, or of brick-shaped blocks of tufa or limestone (Fig. 11).

Ashlar work, of carefully hewn oblong blocks laid in courses, is found in the older portions of the city wall (Fig. 109) and in the walls of the Greek temple in the Forum Triangulare; it was used otherwise only for the fronts of houses (Fig. 10). The material in the earliest times was Sarno limestone, later gray tufa. With the coming of the Roman colony ashlar work went out of use, even for the corners of houses and doorposts.

In the construction of columns and many architraves large blocks were used. Previous to the time of the Roman colony these were of gray tufa, or, in rare instances, of limestone; a coating of white stucco was laid on the surface. From the advent of the colony to the time of the Early Empire, the whitish limestone was used; after that, Carrara marble.

Bearing in mind the styles of construction just described, we may now turn to the architectural history of Pompeii, which, as we shall see, falls naturally into six periods.

The first period is that to which the Doric temple in the Forum Triangulare and the city walls belong. From the style of the temple, we may safely conclude that it was built in the sixth century B.C.; the evidence is too scanty to enable us definitely to fix the date of the walls. The building materials used were the Sarno limestone and gray tufa.

The second period may be designated as the Period of the Limestone Atriums, so characterized from the peculiar construction of a number of houses found in different parts of the city. On the side facing the street these houses have walls of ashlar work of Sarno limestone (Fig. 10), but the inner walls are of limestone framework (Fig. 9).

Almost no ornamental forms belonging to this period have come down to us; so far only a single column has been found, built into the wall of a house. It is of the Doric style, and once formed part of a portico that ran along the west side of the small open space at the northwest corner of Stabian and Nola streets; it is thus the sole remnant of a public building. In the only complete house that has survived from this period, the house of the Surgeon, there was a portico in front of the garden, but the roof was supported by square pillars, not by columns. There is no trace of wall painting.

Characteristic as the construction of the limestone atriums is, it is difficult to determine to what age they belong. The beginning of the period cannot be determined even approximately. The end, however, is fixed by the earlier limit of the next period, the Second Punic War. We may, therefore, assign the houses with the limestone atriums to a period just preceding this war; reckoning in round numbers, they were built before 200 B.C.

In the third, or Tufa Period, came the climax of the development of Pompeian architecture prior to the Roman domination. The favorite building material was the gray tufa.

With the exception of the Greek temple mentioned above, all the public buildings of Pompeii that do not belong to the time of the Roman colony have a homogeneous character; a list of them would include the colonnade about the Forum, the Basilica, the temples of Apollo and of Jupiter, the Large Theatre with the colonnades of the Forum Triangulare and the Barracks of the Gladiators, the Stabian Baths, the Palaestra, and the outer part of the Porta Marina with the inner parts of the other gates. Closely associated with these public edifices is a large number of private houses; as a specially characteristic example, we may mention the house of the Faun.

All these buildings are similar in style and construction; they evidently date from a period of great building activity. It must also have been a period of peace and prosperity; for the whole city, from the artistic and monumental point of view, underwent a transformation. Certain Oscan inscriptions, an early Latin monumental inscription, and a few words, dating from 78 B.C., scratched upon the plaster of the Basilica, oblige us to place the Tufa Period before the time of the Roman colony; yet not long before, for the next oldest buildings date from the first years of the colony. The time of peace that furnished the background for the period can only have been that between the Second Punic War and the Social War, about 200 to 90 B.C.; the Tufa Period was approximately the second century before Christ.

In marked contrast with the Period of the Limestone Atriums, the Tufa Period has a pronounced artistic character. It is preëminently a period of monumental construction. Buildings and public places are adorned with colonnades of the Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian orders. The simple and beautiful forms of the Greek architecture are used, sparingly indeed, but without petty detail and with evident fear of excessive ornamentation. Columns and architraves are white, with only slight suggestion of the earlier Greek polychrome decoration. A variety of color, however, is laid on the walls, and with this period the history of Pompeian wall decoration begins.

The Tufa Period coincides throughout with the time of the first style of decoration. This, known as the Incrustation Style, aimed to imitate in stucco the appearance of a wall veneered with colored marbles. Wall paintings are wholly lacking, but pictures, often of rare beauty, are found in the mosaics of the floors. In this period, we may truly say that Pompeian architecture was at its best. With it the pure Greek tradition dies out; all the buildings of later times bear the Roman stamp.

The buildings of the Tufa Period are easily recognized by the unobtrusiveness of the materials used in their construction. The rubble work is mostly of lava; but gray tufa was used exclusively, not only for ashlar work in façades, but also for columns and entablatures. The surface of the tufa was coated with a layer of fine white stucco, which gave it the appearance of marble. The use of marble for building purposes, however, is foreign to this period; and it speaks well for the culture of the Oscan Pompeians that they had pleasure in beauty of form above richness of material.

The fourth period covers the earlier decades of the Roman colony, from 80 B.C. to near the end of the Republic. According to inscriptions which are still extant, soon after the year 80 a wealthy colonist, Gaius Quinctius Valgus, when duumvir with Marcus Porcius as colleague, built the Small Theatre, and afterwards, when quinquennial duumvir with the same colleague, the Amphitheatre also. Both structures have the quasi-reticulate facing (Fig. 11); and several other buildings in which the same style of masonry is found without doubt belong to the same period—the Baths near the Forum, the temple of Zeus Milichius, a building just inside the Porta Marina, and apparently the hall at the southeast corner of the Forum, which we shall identify as the Comitium; with these should be included also the original temple of Isis, which was destroyed by the earthquake of 63 A.D. Few houses dating from this period have been discovered; the provision made by the preceding period in this respect had been so generous that new houses were not needed.

The fifth period extends from the last decades of the Republic to the earthquake of the year 63 A.D. In the entire period, covering more than a century, we are unable to distinguish a series of buildings which may be classed together in style and construction as constituting a homogeneous, representative group. Here and there we can point out a piece of masonry which, from its similarity to that of the fourth period, may be assigned to the end of the Republic; again, walls with reticulate facing of tufa and corners of brick-shaped blocks of the same stone belong to the time of Augustus (Fig. 12), while reticulate work with corners of brick (Fig. 95) is of later date; but there is a total lack of those distinguishing characteristics which would serve to set off by themselves all the buildings belonging to a particular time. Consequently in the case of each structure it is necessary to take into account all the circumstances, and then to form an independent judgment regarding its style and date.

The difficulty is further enhanced by the fact that three styles of wall decoration fall within the limits of the same period. The Architectural Style, already mentioned, remained in vogue to the time of Augustus; it then gave place to the third or Ornate Style, which is characterized by a freer use of ornament and the introduction of designs and scenes suggestive of an Egyptian origin. The fourth or Intricate Style came in about the year 50 A.D., and represents, with its involved and fantastic designs, the last stage in the development of Pompeian wall decoration. In the fifth period marble began to be employed as a building material; the earliest dated example of its use is the temple of Fortuna Augusta, erected about 3 B.C.

The sixteen years between the earthquake of 63 A.D. and the destruction of the city form the sixth period in the architectural history of Pompeii. The buildings belonging to it can be easily recognized, not only from their similarity in style and ornament, but also from certain external characteristics, as newness of appearance, unfinished condition, and the joining of new to broken walls. The only important building wholly new is the large bathing establishment, the Central Baths, at the corner of Stabian and Nola streets. For the rest, effort seems to have been directed toward restoring the ruined buildings as nearly as possible to their original condition. The wall decoration throughout is of the Intricate Style.

The measurements of buildings in the Roman Period conform to the scale of the Roman foot, while the dimensions of structures antedating the Roman colony in most cases reduce to the scale of the Oscan or old Italic foot. The Roman foot (296 mm.) may be roughly reckoned at 0.97 of the English foot (304.8 mm.); the Oscan foot (275 mm.) is considerably shorter. As the Roman standard is of Greek origin, we may perhaps find a structure conforming to it that was designed by a Greek architect before the Roman Period.

KEY TO PLAN II

• A. The Forum.
  • 1. Pedestal of the statue of Augustus.
  • 2. Pedestal of the statue of Claudius.
  • 3. Pedestal of the statue of Agrippina.
  • 4. Pedestal of the statue of Nero.
  • 5. Pedestal of the statue of Caligula.
  • 6. Pedestals of equestrian statues.
  • 7. Pedestals of standing figures.
  • 8. Pedestal for three equestrian statues.
  • 9. Speaker's platform (p. 48).
  • 10. Table of standard measures (p. 92).
  • 11. Room of the supervisor of measures.
• B. The Basilica.
  • a. Entrance court.
  • 1. Corridor.
  • 2. Main room.
  • 3. Tribunal.
  • 4-4. Rooms at the ends of the tribunal.
• C. The Temple of Apollo.
  • 1. Colonnade.
  • 2. Podium.
  • 3. Cella.
  • 4. Altar.
  • 5. Sundial.
  • 6. Sacristan's room.
  • 7-7. Rooms made from earlier colonnade.
• D. D'. Market Buildings.
• E. Latrina.
• F. F. City Treasury.
• G. Commemorative Arch.
• H. Temple of Jupiter.
• I. Arch of Tiberius.
• K. The Provision Market—Macellum.
  • 1. Portico.
  • 2. Colonnade.
  • 3-3. Market stalls.
  • 4. Market for meat and fish.
  • 5. Chapel of the imperial family.
  • 6. Banquet room.
  • 7. Round structure with water basin—Tholus.
  • 8. Pen.
• L. Sanctuary of the City Lares.
  • 1. Main room, unroofed, with an altar in the centre.
  • 2. Apse, with shrine.
  • 3. Recesses with pedestals.
  • 4. Niche opening on the Forum.
• M. Temple of Vespasian.
  • 1. Colonnade.
  • 2. Altar.
  • 3. Cella.
  • 4. Portico.
• N. The Building of Eumachia.
  • See plan on p. 110.
• O. The Voting Place—Comitium.
  • 1. Recess opening on the main room.
  • 2. Recess opening on the Forum.
• P-R. Municipal Buildings.
  • P. Office of the duumvirs.
  • Q. Hall of the city council.
  • R. Office of the aediles.
• S. Fountain.

PART I
PUBLIC PLACES AND BUILDINGS

CHAPTER VII
THE FORUM

The Forum is usually approached from the west side by the short, steep street leading from the Porta Marina. Entering, we find ourselves near the lower end of an oblong open space (Plate I), at the upper end of which, toward Vesuvius, stands a high platform of masonry with the ruins of a temple—the temple of Jupiter; the remains of a colonnade are seen on each of the other three sides. Including the colonnade the Forum measures approximately 497 feet in length by 156 in breadth; without it the dimensions are 467 and 126 feet. The north side, at the left of the temple, is enclosed by a wall in which there are two openings, one at the end of the colonnade, the other between this and the temple; at the right the wall bounding the open space has been replaced by a stately commemorative arch, while the end of the colonnade is closed by a wall with a passageway. Another arch, of much simpler construction, stands at the left of the temple, in line with the façade; it cuts off the area between the temple and the colonnade from the rest of the Forum. A third arch once stood in a corresponding position at the right.

The colonnade is nowhere intersected by a street passable for vehicles. Even the entrances on the north side form no exception. At the left you descend to the area by several steps, at the right by one only; yet here the exclusion of carts and wagons was made doubly sure by placing three upright stones in the passageway. Only pedestrians could enter the Forum, and they, too, could easily be shut out by means of gates in the entrances; the places where the gates swung can still be seen in the pavement, and one of them is shown in a painting (Fig. 16). No private houses opened on this area; it was wholly given up to the public life of the city and was surrounded by temples, markets, and buildings devoted to the civic administration.

The colonnade was not uniform in character upon all the three sides. As will be seen from our plan (Plan II), on the south side, and on the adjoining portion of the east side as far as Abbondanza Street, it was constructed with two rows of columns and had a double depth. On the east side, north of this street, the porticos in front of four successive buildings (K, L, M, N) took its place. For the greater part of its extent the colonnade was built in two stories, the lower of the Doric, the upper of the Ionic order. The upper gallery was made accessible by three stairways, at the southeast and southwest corners of the Forum and at the middle of the west side; on the east side it did not extend beyond Abbondanza Street.

The portico in front of the first of the four buildings referred to, that of Eumachia, contained a double series of columns, one above the other, corresponding in style and dimensions with those of the colonnade; but there was no upper floor running back from the intervening entablature. The arrangement in front of the fourth building, the Macellum, was similar; as the remains of the porticos in front of the two intervening buildings have wholly disappeared, it is impossible to determine their character.

The area of the Forum was paved with rectangular flags of whitish limestone. In front of the colonnade, the pavement of which was about twenty inches above that of the open space, a broad step or ledge projected, covering a gutter for rain water; the water found its way into the gutter through semicircular openings in the outer edge of the step.

Of the many statues that once adorned the Forum not one has been found. As may be seen from the pedestals still in place, they were of three kinds, and varied greatly in size.

First, statues of citizens who had rendered distinguished services were placed in front of the colonnade on the ledge over the gutter. Four pedestals that once supported statues of this sort may be seen on the west side.

Then equestrian statues of life size were set up in front of the ledge, these also in honor of dignitaries of the city (Fig. 17). On one of the pedestals the veneering of colored marble is still preserved, with an inscription showing that the person represented was Quintus Sallustius, "Duumvir, Quinquennial Duumvir, Patron of the Colony."

Finally, on the south side, the life size equestrian statues, which seem at the outset to have been arranged symmetrically, were almost all removed in order to make room for four much larger statues, the pedestals of which still remain (Fig. 53, p. 122). These must have represented emperors, or members of the imperial families. The pedestal in the middle, which is in the form of an arch almost square at the base, is much the oldest. Upon it was probably placed a colossal statue of Augustus. It is incredible that during the long and successful reign of the first emperor no statue in his honor should have been erected in Pompeii; and this is the most suitable place. The other three pedestals are similar in construction, and clearly belong together. The one at the right (2 on the plan) supported a colossal equestrian statue; that at the left (3) a colossal standing figure; on the third, further forward (4), was a smaller equestrian statue. Here stood, then, emperor, empress, and crown prince—Claudius, Agrippina, Nero.

A fifth pedestal, for an equestrian statue of the same size as that of Nero, is seen further to the north, in front of the temple of Jupiter (5). While unquestionably later than the time of Augustus, it must on the other hand be older than the pedestals of members of the Claudian family; for aside from himself, no one belonging to Nero's time can be taken into consideration, and after his death the Forum lay in ruins in consequence of the earthquake of the year 63. Who stood here, however, can scarcely be even conjectured. Not necessarily an emperor; the younger Drusus, for instance, Tiberius's son, or Germanicus might have been thus honored if they had in any way come into relation with the Pompeians. But if an emperor, it must have been Caligula; another place was provided for the statue of Tiberius.

In the south side of the arch at the northeast corner of the Forum are two niches. It is highly probable that statues of the two oldest sons of Germanicus, Nero and Drusus, were placed in them; a fragment of an inscription referring to the former was found near by. These became presumptive heirs to the throne after the death of Tiberius's son Drusus, in 23 A.D.; but both afterwards fell victims to the morbid suspicions of the emperor and the plots of Sejanus, Nero in 29 A.D., Drusus four years later.

On the top of the arch an equestrian statue of Tiberius probably stood. That such a statue was placed here seems clear from analogy. North of this arch was another, almost in line with it, at the end of Mercury Street where it opens into Nola Street; and here the excavators found fragments of a bronze equestrian statue which were put together and set up in the Naples Museum. Whether this statue represented Caligula or Nero has been a matter of dispute, but the former is really excluded from consideration by the short, heavy figure, which is better suited to Nero. There is no decided resemblance to Nero either; but it is quite possible that, although as crown prince he had been honored with a statue in the Forum, the Pompeians thought it best to erect for him as emperor a more imposing monument.

Before leaving the area we may raise the question whether it contained a speakers' platform, like the Rostra in the Roman Forum. If we have reference to a special structure, probably not; no trace of a separate tribunal has been discovered. The orator who wished to address the people, however, could mount the broad platform in front of the temple of Jupiter, on which once an altar stood; before him the audience could gather in the open, on the only side of the Forum free from the colonnade. This place well suited the convenience of both speaker and hearers. It is possible that we should also identify as a tribune the platform in a recess at the southeast corner (p. 120).

On even a cursory inspection the Forum is seen to lack unity in the details of its plan and in its architecture; the fact soon becomes apparent that it reached its final form only as the result of a long period of development. It will be worth while briefly to trace this development, and to note at least the more important changes which followed one another in the course of the centuries.

In the earliest times the Forum was merely an open square bounded by four streets.