Mounting four steps of basalt we pass from the narrow court into the building. The five entrances here are separated by four columns. Those next to the two sides on the right and on the left were closed by a wall in which was a wide doorway; the three at the middle were left as open intercolumniations. The enclosed space before us measures 180⅓ English feet (200 Oscan feet) in length, 78¾ feet in breadth. Twenty-eight massive brick columns, 4 Oscan feet in diameter, separate the great central hall from the broad corridor running about it; only the lower part of the columns, built of small bricks evidently made specially for this purpose, is preserved (Fig. 24). Attached half-columns, with a diameter a little more than three fourths that of the others, project from the walls; the wall decoration, which imitates in stucco a veneering of colored marbles, is of the first style (p. 41). The columns of the entrance and those at the rear have the same diameter as the half-columns; part of the Ionic capitals belonging to them have been found, but the capitals of the large columns have wholly disappeared.

There are only scanty remains of the floor, which consisted of bits of brick and tile mixed with fine mortar and pounded down (opus Signinum); it extended in a single level over the whole enclosed space, and from this level our estimates of height are reckoned. On three sides of the main hall near the base of the columns under the floor is a square water channel, indicated on our plan; eight rectangular basins lie along its course, but the purpose of it is not clear. The tribunal projects from the rear wall, its floor being six Oscan feet above that of the rest of the building.

The large columns about the main hall, with a diameter of more than 3½ feet, must have been at least 32 or 33 feet high; the attached half-columns with the columns at the entrance and at the rear, including the Ionic capitals, were probably not more than 20 feet high. But assuming that the roof of the corridor was flat, the walls must have been as high as the entablature of the large columns, and so must have extended above the entablature of the half-columns; considerable portions of this upper division of the walls remain.

Along the walls on the ground are to be seen a number of capitals, fragments of shafts and bases belonging to a series of smaller columns with a diameter of 1.74 feet, all found in the course of the excavations. They are of tufa, coated with white stucco; they can belong only here, and by the study of their forms—columns, half-columns, and peculiarly shaped three-quarter-columns—the upper division of the walls can be restored with some degree of certainty. Not to go into technical details, in the upper part of the side walls a section of wall containing a window alternated with a short series of columns in which the columns, for the sake of greater solidity, were set twice as close as the half-columns in the lower division of the wall, the intercolumniations being left entirely open (Fig. 25); over the entrances at the front the wall was continuous but was divided into sections by half-columns corresponding with the columns below, a window being placed between every two half-columns in order to conceal the difference in width between the sections of wall at the front and those at the sides. The arrangement was similar at the rear, on either side of the tribunal, as may be seen from the section (Fig. 27).

With this restoration of the outer walls completed we are able to form a clear idea of the appearance of the main hall. Whether or not the rafters could be seen from below is uncertain, but the probability is that, as assumed in our restoration (Fig. 26), they were hidden by a coffered ceiling. The simple and beautiful interior abounded in fine spatial effects. The corridor and main room were almost as high as the main room was wide, that is between 35 and 40 feet. The light streaming in through the openings in the upper portion of the walls was evenly distributed throughout the hall; we may assume that when the sun became too hot on the south side it could be shut out by curtains.

In our Basilica, then, we notice a wide divergence from the ideal or normal plan. Instead of a clerestory above the main hall a proportionally greater height is given to the corridor. The normal height of a basilica corridor is represented by the lower division of the walls with the attached half-columns and their entablature; this, however, is here treated simply as a lower member, and upon it, rather than upon the entablature of the columns about the main hall, was placed an upper division of wall admitting light and air through intercolumniations and windows.

The tribunal at the rear is the most prominent and architecturally the most effective portion of the building. The base is treated in a bold, simple manner; upon it, at the front, stands a row of columns the lower portions of which show traces of latticework. The decoration of the walls, like that of the rest of the interior, imitates a veneering of colored marbles. The shape and comparatively narrow dimensions of the elevated room indicate that we have here a tribunal in the strict sense, a raised platform for the judge and his assistants; in the basilicas provided with apses the latter were large enough to make room both for the judicial body and for the litigants. Here the litigants stood on the floor in front of the tribunal, and when court was in session the general public must have been excluded from this part of the corridor. The arrangement in this respect was far from convenient, but seemingly convenience was sacrificed to aesthetic considerations; the builders wished to treat the projecting front of the tribunal as an ornament to the building.

Under the tribunal was a vaulted chamber half below the level of the ground; two round holes, indicated on the plan, opened into it from above. It could hardly have been designed as a place for the confinement of prisoners; escape would have been easy by means of two windows in the rear, especially when help was rendered from the outside. More likely it was used, in connection with the business of the court, as a storeroom, in which writing materials and the like, or even documents, might be kept; they could easily have been passed up through the holes when needed. The second story of the tribunal was not as completely open to the main hall as the first. Its front, the remains of which have for the most part been recovered, was divided off by half-columns corresponding in number and arrangement with the columns of the first story, but each half-column was flanked by narrow pilasters, while a parapet of moderate height occupied the intervening spaces. It was built apparently with a view to architectural effect rather than practical use (Fig. 27).

At the right and the left of the tribunal are places for stairways. Each of these contains a landing on the same level with the floor of the tribunal, from which it was cut off by a door; the steps connecting with these landings, being of wood, have disappeared. In both stair rooms, however, flights of stone steps lead down to the vaulted chamber below, so that this could not have been accessible if there were wooden steps on both sides connecting the tribunal with the floor of the Basilica. Probably on one side the wooden steps led from the tribunal down to the floor, but on the other ascended from the corresponding landing to the second story, thus leaving the stairway to the lower room unobstructed on that side. At some later time the door at the left between the tribunal and the landing was walled up, perhaps because the gallery was no longer used; if still in use it could to all appearances have been reached only by a ladder.

The two open rooms at the rear on either side of the tribunal agree in their decoration with the entrance court except that the base with its border is higher, and the white surface above is moulded in stucco so as to give the appearance of slabs of white marble. They were no higher than the first division of the wall; the windows seen in Fig. 27 above the broad entrances opened into the outer air. Perhaps they were used as waiting rooms for litigants.

Opposite the north entrance between two columns stood a curb like those over the mouths of cisterns; only the foundation stone with a circular opening is preserved. The remains of a lead pipe, which brought the water to it, show that it must have been connected with an aqueduct. At the further end of the main hall was an equestrian statue of which no trace has been found.

The arrangement of the roof is a problem of much difficulty. Without wearying the reader by presenting various possibilities, it will be sufficient for our purposes to suggest the explanation which, on the whole, has the most in its favor. As assumed in our restoration, the roof of the main hall was carried by the entablature of the twenty-eight large columns. Thus in general the arrangement corresponded fairly well with that of other basilicas except that, owing to the lack of a clerestory, the roof of the main hall was not much if any higher than that of the corridor. From the flat roof of the corridor, at least on the south side, the rain water flowed into the cistern near the front part of the building.

The five entrances opening from the Forum into the narrow court could be closed by latticed doors. Similar doors hung also on the wooden jambs of the north and south entrances. With such doors a complete safeguarding could not have been contemplated. Tradespeople using the Basilica must either have removed their wares at the close of business hours or have made the stalls sufficiently secure for protection. We can hardly doubt that ordinarily a night watchman was on duty about the building.

CHAPTER X
THE TEMPLE OF APOLLO

In some respects the study of the large temple on the west side of the Forum is especially satisfactory. The building had been completely restored after the earthquake of 63, and was in good order at the time of its destruction. Though ancient excavators removed many objects of value, including the statue of the divinity of the temple, much was left undisturbed, as the interesting series of statues in the court; in addition, a number of inscriptions have been recovered. On the whole, more complete information is at hand regarding this sanctuary than in reference to any other in Pompeii.

The identification of this as the temple of Apollo is certain. The accompanying illustration shows a corner of the floor laid over the greater part of the cella (3 on the plan); the parts along the inner walls were of white mosaic. This floor was composed of small, lozenge-shaped pieces of green and white marble and slate; of the two narrow stripes between the lozenge pattern and the bright mosaic fret along the border one is of slate, the other of red marble. In the slate stripe was an inscription. The letters were outlined by means of small holes filled with metal, every seven holes forming a vertical line, every four a horizontal. The inscription, which was in Oscan, stated that the quaestor O[ppius] Camp[anius], by order of the council and with money belonging to Apollo, had caused something to be made;[3] what this was cannot be determined, as the important word is missing, but apparently it was the floor. In the cella, moreover, stands a block of tufa, having the shape of half an egg; this is the Omphalos, the familiar symbol of Apollo. In the court on the first pilaster at the right as you enter a tripod is painted, too large for mere decoration, and explicable only as a symbol of the god. Lastly, in the design of the stucco ornamentation with which the entablature of the peristyle was adorned after the earthquake, the principal figures are griffins. The griffin was sacred to Apollo, and though it was often used as a purely decorative theme, in this case a reference to the divinity of the temple is unmistakable (Fig. 31).

As previously stated (p. 49), the deviation of the axis of this building from that of the Forum is undoubtedly due to the fact that it followed the direction of a street which bordered it on the east side before the colonnade of Popidius was built; this is therefore an evidence of the antiquity of the temple. The style of architecture, however, is in no essential particular different from that of the colonnade and of other buildings of the Tufa Period, and gives no indication of great age. The most probable explanation is that the temple was rebuilt in the Tufa Period on the site of an earlier structure, the orientation of which was preserved. The difference in direction is concealed by the increasing thickness, from south to north, of the pillars between the Forum and the court of the temple. The spaces between the pillars were originally left open. Later, at what time it is impossible to determine, they were all walled up except the three opposite the side of the temple; since the temple was excavated these also have been closed. In comparison with the entrances from the Forum, at first ten in number, the one on the south side, opening on the street leading from the Porta Marina, must have been considered unimportant. Otherwise pains would have been taken to give to the colonnade on that side an even number of columns, so that the door of the temple should face an intercolumniation; as it is the number is uneven and the entrance to the court had to be put a little to one side that it might not open upon a column.

The court is of oblong shape. The continuous colonnade about the sides, the peristyle, was originally in two stories. At the rear of the peristyle on the north side stood the small colonnade of the Doric order already mentioned (p. 62); one of the rooms into which in later times this was divided (6) was connected with the court of the temple, and was probably occupied by the sacristan (aedituus).

The temple stood upon a high podium, in front of which is a broad flight of steps. The small cella was evidently intended for but one statue. The columns at the sides of the deep portico, which in other respects follows the Etruscan plan (p. 63), are continued in a colonnade which is carried completely around the cella.

In Plate II and Fig. 30 we give a view of the ruins as they are to-day; in Fig. 32 a view of the temple as it appeared before the earthquake of 63. The height and diameter of the Corinthian columns seen in the restoration can be calculated with approximate correctness; of the entablature and parts above nothing has been found except a large waterspout of terra cotta in the form of a lion's head.

The colonnade about the court was built of tufa, and coated with white stucco. It presents an odd mixture of styles, of which other examples also are found at Pompeii; a Doric entablature with triglyphs was placed upon Ionic columns having the four-sided capital known as Roman Ionic. Here, as in the earlier colonnade about the Forum, the stone blocks of the entablature were set upon beams; and in the blocks now in place we may see the sockets made to receive the ends of the joists of the second story floor. Evidently with the purpose of supporting this second story, which was probably of the Corinthian order, the Ionic columns below were made relatively short. No remains of an upper gallery, however, have been found; and it is quite possible that when the colonnade was restored, after the earthquake, the second story was omitted. The upper floor could be reached from the second story of the small colonnade north of the court, which was accessible by means of a stairway leading from the Forum.

First the projecting portions of the Ionic and Corinthian capitals were cut off; then shaft and capital alike were covered with a thick layer of stucco. New capitals were moulded in the stucco, of a shape in general resembling the Corinthian, and were painted in red, blue, and yellow; the lower part of the shaft, unfluted, was also painted yellow. The entablature, at least in the case of the colonnade, was in like manner covered with stucco and ornamented with reliefs in the same colors. All this gaudy stucco has now fallen off; and our illustration (Fig. 31) is taken from Mazois, who made the drawing soon after the court was excavated. The later capitals and stucco ornamentation of the temple itself had wholly disappeared before the excavations were made.

The wall decoration of both the temple and the colonnade was originally in the first style; a remnant of it may still be seen in the cella. After 63 it was modernized. The walls of the temple both within and without were done over in stucco, so as to resemble ashlar work of white marble; apparently it was the intention to give the appearance of real marble. The walls of the colonnade were painted in the latest Pompeian style, in bright colors, on a white ground. The decorative designs, to judge from the remains and from sketches, were not of special interest. There was a series of pictures representing scenes from the Trojan War,—the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon, the embassy of the Greeks to Achilles, the battle between Achilles and Hector (the subject of this, however, is doubtful), the dragging of Hector's body about the walls of Troy, Priam making entreaty for the body of Hector, and the rape of the Palladium,—but they have long since perished and are known only from unsatisfactory drawings.

Long before this modernizing of the temple the west side of the court had undergone a complete transformation. The peculiar bend in the street at the northwest corner (shown in Plan II), the diagonal line with which the small colonnade north of the court ends, and the narrow, quite inaccessible space between the west wall of the court and the houses lying near it, cannot easily be explained as a part of an original plan, but must rather be the result of later changes. The north and south street which now ends abruptly at the northwest corner must originally have been continued through the west colonnade, the ends of which were left open; this colonnade was then a public thoroughfare, on which the windows of houses opened, and perhaps also doors.

We learn from an inscription that about the year 10 B.C. the city purchased from the residents whose property adjoined the colonnade, for the sum of 3000 sesterces (about $155), the right to build a wall in front of their windows; this explains how the narrow space between the wall on the north side of the court and the houses came to be cut off. The inscription reads: M. Holconius Rufus d[uum] v[ir] i[uri] d[icundo] tert[ium], C. Egnatius Postumus d. v. i. d. iter[um] ex d[ecurionum] d[ecreto] ius luminum opstruendorum 𐆘 ∞ ∞ ∞ redemerunt, parietemque privatum Col[oniae] Ven[eriae] Cor[neliae] usque ad tegulas faciundum coerarunt,—'Marcus Holconius Rufus, duumvir with judiciary authority for the third time, and Gaius Egnatius Postumus, duumvir with judiciary authority for the second time, in accordance with a decree of the city council purchased for 3000 sesterces the right to shut off light (from adjoining buildings) and caused to be constructed a wall belonging to the colony of Pompeii to the height of the tiles,' that is, as high as the roofs of the houses.

The wall referred to was no doubt that on the west side of the court of the temple; when it was built the ends of the colonnade on that side must have been closed, so that this ceased to be a thoroughfare. Marcus Holconius was duumvir for the fourth time in the year 3-2 B.C.; as an interval of at least five years must intervene between two duumvirates, his third duumvirate must have been not far from 10 B.C.

The pedestal in the cella, on which the statue of Apollo stood, still remains, but no trace of the statue itself has been found.

Near the foot of the steps in front is a large altar of travertine, having the same inscription on both sides: M. Porcius M. f., L. Sextilius L. f., Cn. Cornelius Cn. f., A. Cornelius A. f. IIII vir[i] d[e] d[ecurionum] s[ententia] f[aciundum] locar[unt],—'Marcus Porcius the son of Marcus, Lucius Sextilius the son of Lucius, Gnaeus Cornelius the son of Gnaeus, and Aulus Cornelius the son of Aulus, the Board of Four, in accordance with the vote of the city council let the contract (for building this altar).' The names of the four officials who erected the altar, the two duumvirs and two aediles (for the title see p. 12), appear without surnames; this points to a relatively early time, at the latest the age of Augustus.

At the left of the steps is an Ionic column with the inscription: L. Sepunius L. f. Sandilianus, M. Herennius A. f. Epidianus duovir[i] i[uri] d[icundo] d[e] s[ua] p[ecunia] f[aciundum] c[urarunt],—'Lucius Sepunius Sandilianus the son of Lucius, and Marcus Herennius Epidianus the son of Aulus, duumvirs with judiciary authority, caused (this) to be erected at their own expense.' Old sketches, made soon after the court was excavated, represent the column with a sundial on the top. The probability that a sundial belonging to the column was actually found is increased by the fact that these same men placed one on the circular bench in the Forum Triangulare. Here, in front of the temple of the Sun-god, such a dial would certainly have been in place. At the right of the steps are some blocks of lava containing holes, in which, undoubtedly, the supports of a votive offering were once set, but the holes give no clew to the size or character of the offering.

Other divinities besides Apollo were honored in this sanctuary, which in the earlier time was evidently the most important in the city; statues and altars for their worship were placed in the court. The pedestals of the statues still remain where they were originally placed, on the step in front of the stylobate of the colonnade; the statues themselves, with one exception, have been taken to Naples. There were in all six of them, grouped in three related pairs. In front of the third column at the left of the entrance, stood Venus, at the right was a hermaphrodite—both marble figures of about one half life size. They belong to the pre-Roman period and were originally of good workmanship, but even in antiquity they had been repeatedly restored and worked over. As a work of art, the hermaphrodite is the more important.

An altar stands before the statue of Venus. In pre-Roman times this may have been the only shrine in the city at which worship was offered to Herentas; for by that name the goddess of love was known in the native speech. Venus as goddess of the Roman colony (Fig. 4), was represented in an altogether different guise, and had a special place of worship elsewhere (see pp. 124-129).

Though the statues of Venus and of the hermaphrodite here form a pair, both artistically and in respect to arrangement, the latter belongs not to the cycle of Venus but to that of Bacchus; and in order to make this the more evident, the ears of a satyr were given to the figure. We may, perhaps, infer that the god of wine also was worshipped in this sanctuary. In the sacristan's room (6 on the plan) we find a painting in which Bacchus is represented as leaning upon Silenus who is playing the lyre, meanwhile allowing the panther to drink out of his cup. This seems strange enough in a temple of Apollo; still it cannot be considered conclusive evidence that Bacchus actually received worship here. Without doubt the Wine-god was honored in Pompeii, the region about which was rich in vines. He appears countless times in wall paintings, but no shrine dedicated to him has yet been found.

On the right side of the court, in front of the third column, was a statue of Apollo; on the left directly opposite stood Artemis, both life size figures in bronze. An altar stood before the statue of Artemis; the altar of Apollo was before the temple. Both statues were armed with the bow, and it is evident that they were not designed to stand facing each other, but side by side, or one behind the other; both may originally have belonged to a Niobe group. As works of art, they are not of high merit. We recognize a certain elegance and nicety of finish, but these qualities cannot compensate for superficiality in the treatment of the figure, want of expression in the faces, and lack of energy in the movement. We have no other evidence of the worship of Artemis in Pompeii.

Further on, in front of the fifth column on either side, was a marble herm. That on the right is still in place and is seen in Plate II. It is of fine workmanship, and clearly belongs to the pre-Roman period; it represents Hermes, or Mercury. The god appears as a youth standing with his mantle drawn over the back of his head; the face, with a placid, serious, mild expression, is inclined a little forward. In this form Mercury was honored as the presiding divinity of the palaestra, the god of gymnastic exercises; we shall find him in the same guise later in the court of the Stabian Baths (p. 200). How this type of Hermes came to be chosen for the place of honor in athletic courts is by no means clear; it was certainly designed originally to represent him as a god of death, the Psychopompus, conductor of souls to the Underworld. The worship of Mercury here as a god of gymnastic exercises would not be in harmony with the surroundings; we should rather believe that the Pompeians, having placed him in such close relation with Apollo, god of the death-dealing shaft, and the earth goddess, Maia, associated more serious ideas with his image.

The extant inscriptions of this series come down to the year 40 A.D. As an example, we give that of 2 B.C., in which the ministri Augusti first appear: N. Veius Phylax, N. Popidius Moschus, T. Mescinius Amphio, Primus Arrunti M. s., min. Aug., ex d. d. iussu M. Holconii Rufi IV, A. Clodi Flacci III d. v. i. d., P. Caeseti Postumi, N. Tintiri Rufi d. v. v. a. s. p. p. Imp. Caesare XIII, M. Plautio Silvano cos,—'Numerius Veius Phylax, Numerius Popidius Moschus, Titus Mescinius Amphio and Primus the slave of Marcus Arruntius, Servants of Augustus (set this up), in accordance with a decree of the city council, on the order of Marcus Holconius Rufus, duumvir with judiciary authority for the fourth time, Aulus Clodius Flaccus, duumvir for the third time, and of Publius Caesetius Postumus and Numerius Tintirius Rufus, duumvirs in charge of the streets, buildings, and public religious festivals (the official title of the aediles, p. 13) in the thirteenth consulship of the Emperor Caesar (Augustus), the other consul being Marcus Plautius Silvanus.'

It is not difficult to understand how the worship of Augustus came to have a place in this sanctuary. The divinities here honored stood in close relation to him. Apollo was his tutelary divinity, to whom he thought that he owed the victory at Actium, and in whose honor he built the magnificent temple on the Palatine. Venus, moreover, was revered as the ancestress of the Julian family; and finally Mercury was said to be incarnate in Augustus himself.

This last conception found expression in one of the finest of the odes of Horace, written in 28 B.C. Fearful portents, the poet says, are threatening Rome; Jupiter with flaming right hand has even struck his own temple on the Capitoline. To what god shall we turn for help—to Apollo, to Venus, or to Mars? or rather to thee, winged god, Maia's son, that even now doest walk the earth in the form of a youth, the avenger of Caesar:—

It is interesting to note that evidence of the worship of Augustus as Mercury has come to light also in Egypt. In an inscription from Denderah we find Helmîs Kaisar, 'beloved of Ptah and of Isis'; Helmîs Kaisar is apparently 'Hermes Caesar,' and in Egyptian inscriptions Augustus is elsewhere referred to as 'the beloved of Ptah and of Isis.'

CHAPTER XI
THE BUILDINGS AT THE NORTHWEST CORNER OF THE FORUM, AND THE TABLE OF STANDARD MEASURES

The large building at the northwest corner of the Forum (Fig. 33, 1, 2, 3) was erected after the earthquake of the year 63. We do not know whether at the time of the eruption it had yet been roofed; the inside at least was in an unfinished state.

This building is divided into three parts, one of which, that furthest north, at the corner, contains both lower and upper rooms. Below, at the level of the Forum, are two dark vaulted chambers, one at the rear of the other. The front chamber is dimly lighted by a slit in the ceiling and was entered from the Forum by a narrow door; there are traces of a strong iron grating in the doorway. It has been supposed, not without probability, that these were the vaults of the city treasury, the aerarium; if they had been built for prison cells, they would naturally have had separate entrances.

Above these chambers are two rooms which open not on the Forum, but on the street that runs past them on the north (1, 1). They resemble shops and would be classed as such without further question but for the fact that the level of the floor is nearly five feet above the sidewalk, so that they could have been reached only by means of steps. If the identification of the chambers below as the vaults of the city treasury is correct, these rooms must have been occupied by the treasury officials, who could here transact business with the public without admitting the latter to their offices.

The middle room (2) was a public closet, with a small anteroom. As the doors to and from the anteroom were not placed opposite each other, the interior was not visible from the street. The room was not entirely finished; nevertheless, we can see the water channel running along three sides, and above it the stones on which the woodwork was to be placed; the inlet pipe was in position, as well as the outlet for carrying the water off into a sewer at the rear.

The last of the three parts of the building (3) is by far the largest. It was a high and spacious hall, with numerous entrances from the Forum. It was divided into two rooms by two short sections of wall projecting from the sides, and was evidently a market house, perhaps for vegetables and farm products.

The rooms formed by enclosing the small colonnade at the rear of the court of Apollo have already been mentioned (p. 62). At the left of the stairway leading to the second story (shown in Plan II) is a small room which opens in its entire breadth upon the Forum (11). Close by is a recess (10), also open toward the Forum, in the side of the first of the thick pillars which separate the Forum from the court of the temple.

In this recess stood the table of standard measures, mensa ponderaria (Fig. 34), which is now in the Naples Museum, unfortunately not entire; a part of it has disappeared. The part remaining consists of a large slab of limestone (a little over 8 feet long and 1.8, or 2 Oscan feet, wide), in which are nine bowl-shaped cavities with holes at the bottom through which the contents could be drawn off; this slab rested on two stone supports, and similar supports above it carried another slab, which is now lost, with three cavities. The table thus contained twelve standards of capacity for liquid and dry measure, but only ten are shown in the illustration, as two are too far back.

It is evident that the table has come down from the pre-Roman period. The names of the measures were originally written in Oscan, beside the five largest cavities, and though the letters were later erased, they are still in part legible. Only one word, however, can be made out with certainty, beside the next to the smallest cavity; that is Kuiniks, plainly the same as the Greek Choinix. We naturally infer that in the pre-Roman time the Pompeians used Greek measures.

In the time of Augustus, about 20 B.C., the cavities were enlarged and made to conform to the Roman standard, but the new names were not put beside them. The inscription on the front of the larger slab has reference to these changes: 'Aulus Clodius Flaccus, the son of Aulus, and Numerius Arcaeus Arellianus Caledus, the son of Numerius, duumvirs with judiciary authority, in accordance with a decree of the city council, caused the measures to be made equal' to the Roman measures.

A similar adjustment of measures to the Roman standard is indicated by the use of the phrase metra exaequare on a table found at Minturnae. The adoption of a uniform standard was made a subject of imperial regulation by Augustus, who, by this means, sought to promote the unification of the Empire. Similar tables of measures have been found in various parts of the Roman world, as at Selinunto in Sicily, in the Greek islands, and at Bregenz on the Lake of Constance.

It is probable that an official charged with the oversight of the measures had his office in the small room next to the stairway (11).

CHAPTER XII
THE MACELLUM

The large building at the northeast corner of the Forum was a provision market, of the sort called Macellum. The name Pantheon, once applied to it, is now abandoned, and there is no longer the slightest doubt regarding its purpose, which is indicated by its general plan, the remains found in the course of the excavations, and the paintings upon the walls.

Such markets, where provisions, especially of the finer and more expensive kinds, were sold and in which a cook also might be secured, without doubt existed in the Greek cities after the time of Alexander; from the Greeks, as in the case of the basilica, the Romans took both the name and the architectural type.

The first macellum in Rome was built in 179 B.C. in connection with the enlargement of a fish market. In later times, as we learn from inscriptions, others were constructed in Rome and in various cities of Italy and the provinces.

A macellum built by Nero is shown on one of the coins of this emperor. It agrees in essential points with our building, having stalls or shops of more than one story in height, and at the middle of the court a structure with a dome-like roof. The central structure, the tholus, is mentioned by Varro as an essential part of a macellum, but its use is known to us only from the remains found at Pompeii.

The plan of our building is simple. A court in the shape of a rectangle, slightly longer than it is broad, is surrounded by a deep colonnade on the four sides. In the middle twelve bases, arranged so as to form a dodecagon, supported an equal number of columns on which a roof rested; underneath was a rectangular basin in the pavement, from which a covered drain led toward the southeast corner. Under this roof the fish that had been sold were scaled, the scales being thrown into the basin, where they were found in great quantity. Behind the colonnade on the south side, and opening into it, was a row of market stalls or small shops (3 on the plan). Above these were upper rooms, in front of which was a wooden gallery, but there was no stairway, and apparently the shopkeeper who wished to use his second story had to provide himself with a ladder.

There were shops also on the north side, but they opened upon the street bounding the Macellum on the north; a southern exposure for the shop fronts seems to have been avoided on account of the damage that the heat in summer might cause to the stock. In the shops on this street—whether in those belonging to the building or those on the opposite side is not stated—the excavators found charred figs, chestnuts, plums, grapes, fruit in glass vessels, lentils, grain, loaves of bread, and cakes. A few shops behind the portico in front faced toward the Forum.

A large market room (4) opened on the colonnade at the southeast corner, the entrance being divided by two columns. Along three sides runs a counter for meat and fish, the surface of which slopes toward the middle of the room. That fish were sold on the left side is plain from the special arrangement made to carry off the water; the floor behind the counter here was raised and sloped toward the rear, where a gutter connecting with it, and passing across the room, led under the counter on the south side into the street.

In the little room or pen at the northeast corner of the colonnade (8) remains of skeletons of sheep were found. Such animals, then, were sold here alive; instead of buying the flesh of slaughtered animals, many purchasers no doubt preferred to obtain a victim which could be sacrificed as an offering to the household gods before it was used for food.

The paintings on the walls of the colonnade are among the best examples of the latest Pompeian style. Above the base are large black panels with a broad red border; between them, in the vertical spaces separating the border of one panel from that of the next, are light and fantastic architectural designs in yellow on a white ground, the parts designed to appear furthest from the eye being in green and red. In this way a rich development of architectural forms is united, in a consistent and effective decorative scheme, with large panels suitable for paintings.

Along the edges of the black panels run conventional plant designs; in the middle are paintings symmetrically arranged in a series in which a pair of floating figures alternates with a mythological scene enclosed in a painted frame. Among the mythological pictures are Ulysses before Penelope, who does not recognize him, Io guarded by Argus, and Medea plotting the murder of her children. The whole arrangement is in excellent taste, while the execution is careful and delicate.

The treatment of the upper part of the wall is especially worthy of note. Generally in walls of the fourth style the portion above the large panels is filled with airy architectural designs upon a white or at least a bright ground. In this instance the fantastic architectural forms in the spaces between the black panels are continued upwards to the ceiling, and in the midst of each group a standing figure is painted on a blue ground—a girl with utensils for sacrifice, a satyr playing the flute; but the spaces above the panels are completely filled with representations of the things exposed for sale. Unfortunately only a few of these pictures remain. One contains birds, some alive, some killed and dressed; in another, different kinds of fish are seen; and a third presents a variety of vessels in which wine and other liquids could be kept. This departure from the usual style of decoration, strikingly suggestive, can be explained only as having a direct reference to the purpose of the building.