Though the Greek and the Roman house differed considerably in detail, in a general way the two were similar. For Americans the simplest comparison to make would be with the Spanish type of dwelling in California and other parts of the Southwest, since all three have the common characteristic of looking in, rather than out. The exterior presented a blank wall, usually of brick, broken by a door and a few windows. An open courtyard formed the center of the Greek house, and this manner of building was borrowed by the Romans as their wealth increased and larger and pleasanter houses were desired. The Roman house, which grew by the addition of rooms to the original single-room hut, had a large opening in the roof of the principal room or atrium, to provide light and allow the smoke from the hearth to escape. Under the opening was a basin, called impluvium, into which fell the rain-water from the roof. These features were retained even after the atrium was used only as a reception room, the household work and cooking being done in a separate kitchen.

Houses were usually built of sun-dried brick on a stone foundation. The roofs were often flat and were sometimes covered with hardened mud, but tile roofs were also common. Marble for columns and other decorative features was introduced into Rome in the later part of the Republican period and colored marbles were used freely by the rich Romans of the Empire. Walls were covered with stucco, which was frequently painted. There was no wall-paper, of course, and pictures were painted directly on the walls. Fashions in decoration changed as they do at present, though more slowly. The wall-paintings from a villa near Boscoreale, in the Eighth Room, illustrate several types in use in Italy in the first century A.D. The earliest style imitated columns, marble panels, or other ornamental features employed in buildings. Arabesques and fanciful combinations of foliage, birds, animals, and masks came into use later. Mythological and genre scenes, as the lady with the kithara (fig. 21) and the group of a man and a woman seated side by side, required a skilful painter and were naturally reserved for the principal rooms. In the cubiculum (fig. 22) another style has been employed, in which buildings, arches, porticoes, and gardens are combined in a way which, while of course somewhat fanciful, still probably represents the general appearance of the streets and houses of Pompeii and other cities of the time. Stucco reliefs, of which there are several graceful examples in the Museum, were used in Greek houses of the Hellenistic period as well as in Italy.

Floors in early times were of hardened earth, paving stones, or plaster. In the fifth century pebbles set in cement came into use in Greece, and from this kind of floor mosaic, plain and patterned, was derived. Pictures or decorative designs made of fine glass mosaic were also used as wall decorations. Three examples are on the tops of Cases 1 and 2 (fig. 23).

The Greek and Roman furniture which has come down to us is necessarily small in amount and fragmentary because, like most modern furniture, it was made of wood and consequently has been destroyed by damp. There remain, however, some fairly complete pieces, and a considerable number of metal fittings and casings, as well as some models and many illustrations from vases. Among the objects from Cyprus in wall-cases in the corridor are two bronze tripods, and three ornaments consisting of goats’ feet and bulls’ heads from another. The bronze lions’ paws were feet for a large chair or chest. We have also a little terracotta chair with a diminutive figure in it and a three-legged table of the kind used to set beside a dining-couch, both from Cyprus, as well as a round table on three legs, of much later date (Case 2). Two lekythoi in Case K in the Fourth Room, decorated with interior scenes, show chairs of a very graceful and comfortable type, the Greek klismos, and the same kind of chair is seen on the grave-monument of a lady in the Sculpture Gallery (No. 4), and on a large amphora on a pedestal in the Fifth Room (fig. 24). The lady playing a kithara in the wall-painting in the Eighth Room is seated in a large armchair, the thronos. In Case 5 is a bronze casing of beautiful work for a piece of furniture, and in Case 2 a bronze chair-leg and an ornament terminating in the head of a young bullock. Two tripods and some bronze mountings from Cyprus will be found in wall-cases in the corridor. In the cubiculum from Boscoreale is a table of marble and bronze. The bronze rim which surrounds the marble top is inlaid with silver and niello in a beautiful pattern of palmettes and rosette ornaments. A couch, probably for dining (wrongly restored as a seat), and a footstool stand in the corridor between the Eighth and Ninth Rooms. Bedsteads, which were similar to this couch in shape, were merely frames on which thongs were stretched, like the old-fashioned corded beds, the interlaced leather bands acting as springs. The wooden frames were frequently decorated with bronze fittings, and in the Hellenistic and Roman periods inlay and mountings of silver, gold, ivory, and tortoise-shell were employed for the rich. Couches and beds were usually supplied with a raised head-rest, often finished with bronze animal-heads, such as the mule-heads in Case A in the Seventh Room and Case L in the Eighth Room.

Clothing was kept in chests, which were well adapted to the large pieces of cloth composing a costume. A good illustration of a chest may be seen in Case W in the Fourth Room, on an amphora decorated with a scene from the story of Danaë and Perseus, and in Case 2 there is a miniature chest of white stone from which the cover has been lost.

Household utensils, since they were made of metal or pottery, exist in considerable numbers. Cooking was usually done over an open fire, though stoves of a simple type came into use in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. The bronze cauldrons used for boiling (Case S in the Third Room and wall-cases in-the corridor) were valued highly, and were offered frequently as prizes in athletic contests (fig. 25). At the funeral games of Patroklos (Iliad XXIII, vv. 267-268) Achilles gives a ‘bronze cauldron untouched by fire’ as a prize for the chariot race, and records of later contests prove that the custom was a common one. An amphora in Case Y in the Fourth Room is decorated with the figure of a youth, evidently a victor in the games, carrying away upon his shoulders a cauldron which he has won. The metal hook in Case N in the Seventh Room was used for drawing pieces of meat from the cauldron. Pails, finely made and decorated, especially as to the handles and their attachments, probably served some purpose at table, as, for example, to hold cold water or snow in which a vessel of wine was placed to cool.

The pottery in the various rooms of the collection shows the kinds of dishes in use in Greek and Italian houses. There are cups of different shapes, pitchers and jugs for water, wine, and other liquids, kraters (large bowls for mixing water and wine), plates for food, and lekythoi (oil-cruets) (fig. 26). The modern china, that is, high-fired pottery covered with a vitreous glaze, was not known, and glass did not become common until the Imperial period. In the Eighth Room and the corridor are many examples of the glass vessels of that time, some plain, others with ornaments in relief, and still others of colored glass in patterns of remarkable beauty (Cases N and O in the Eighth Room). Much of the plain glass has become iridescent owing to exposure to damp in graves. The pottery in museum collections is naturally the finer product of the workshop; receptacles for storing and for kitchen use were of undecorated clay and more carelessly made. In the Cesnola Collection on the tops of Cases 58-63 are some of the tall jars, called pithoi by the Greeks and dolia by the Romans, which were used for storing and exporting wine, grain, and many other articles, taking the place of the casks, barrels, and boxes, and the paper bags and cartons of modern times. The pointed ends were driven into earthen floors.

Another piece of table-ware which should be mentioned is a special plate for fish, made in Italy, which had a depression in the center for holding the sauce. These plates are decorated with interesting and surprisingly accurate drawings of fish (Case Q in the Sixth Room, tail-piece, p. 31).

In Case E in the Third Room is a bronze table service of Greek work from an Etruscan tomb, and in Case O in the same room are bronze jars and jugs of various fine shapes (figs. 27-30), and ladles for dipping wine (fig. 31). In Case A in the Fourth Room is a wine-strainer (fig. 32). The remarkably beautiful handles from vessels in these cases are a further proof of the taste and care expended upon household utensils. Silver table services were not common among the Greeks, but silver and even gold dishes were used by wealthy Romans. In Case C in the Eighth Room are four cups of Roman date (fig. 33) with a ladle and a little jug or cup with a spout.

Food was usually cut into convenient pieces in the kitchen and eaten with the fingers, but spoons were used to a considerable extent by the Romans. Several bronze spoons are exhibited in Case 5, and there are some silver spoons of various shapes in the case with the silver cups in the Eighth Room (fig. 34).

The habit of rising and going to bed early which prevailed in Greece and Italy is easily understood when we see the meagre arrangements for lighting which they possessed. In the street torches were carried, and they were also used in the house in early times. A bronze torch-holder of the late sixth century from Cyprus in the corridor and a terracotta example in Case 2 appear to have been made so that they could be set on a table. The Romans and Etruscans made candles of pitch and also wax ones very similar to our own, but the Greeks were not acquainted with them until they were introduced by the Romans. The iron candelabrum in Case S in the Third Room was designed to hold candles on the prickets around the top. Lamps were commonly of terracotta or bronze. Olive oil was burnt in them with a wick of flax, but at best the light must have been poor and flickering. Candelabra were commonly made of wood, but handsomer ones were of bronze. A fine Etruscan candelabrum stands in the Fifth Room. It was probably furnished with hooks or other attachments for hanging lamps, or with prickets for candles (fig. 35). A group of lamps of various shapes is shown in Case 2 (fig. 36).