The villa of P. Fannius Sinister at Boscoreale

7/29/2019 The villa of P. Fannius Sinister at Boscoreale

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The frescoes from Boscoreale, an area about a mile north of Pompeii,are among the most important to be found anywhere in the Romanworld. Boscorealewas notable in antiquity or having numerous aristocraticcountry villas. This tradition endured into the time of the Bourbon kings,as is attested by the region's name, the "RoyalForest,"which implies thatBoscoreale was a hunting preserve. The villa was discovered in late 19()0and excavated by Vincenzo De Prisco on the property of Francesco Vona.The paintings were cut from the excavated ruins, framed in wood, andthen put up at auction; most of them went to the Metropolitan Museum,some remained in Naples, and others ended up in the Louvre and muse-ums in the Netherlands and Belgium.Like so many excavations of the period, this one was far from scientificand left much to be desired. The existing clues concerning the villa'sown-ership in antiquityare fragmentary ndeed, and it is riskyto base theories ofownership on brick stamps and graffiti, but all that survives points to thevilla having been built shortly after the middle of the first centuryB.C. Onepiece of evidence, a graffito, indicates that the first auction of the villa tookplace on May 9, A.D. 12. There were at least two owners during the firstcentury A.D. One was named Publius Fannius Synistor, as is known from

THEVILLA OF P. FANNIUS SYNISTOR

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23,24. BedroomM, thebest-preservedoomof thevilla, has beenreconstructedn theMet-ropolitanMuseum. The mosaic loor, couch,andfootstoolcome rom otherRoman villasand are of a laterdate. On thefacing page isa detailfromthe northwall, showingbirdsata fountain and garden architecture,all ofwhichmighthave been eenthrough heroom'swindow.

an inscriptionon a bronze vessel found in Room 24. The other owner bothe name LuciusHerenniusFlorus; this factwasdeterminedfrom a bronstamp found in the villa and now in the MetropolitanMuseum.Althouwe know the names of laterowners, no evidence enables us to identify tvilla'soriginalowner or the man who commissionedthe frescoes. For tsake of convenience, the villa is ordinarilyreferred to as that of FanniuThe survivingpaintings are extremely fine examples of the late SecoStyle, the mostrenownedexample of which is the Republicanperiod decration of the so-calledVilla of the Mysteries at Pompeii. Throughout tfrescoes from the villa at Boscoreale there are visual ambiguities to teathe eye, including architecturaldetails painted to resemble real ones, suas rusticatedmasonry,pillars,and columns thatcastshadows into the vieer'sspace,andmoreconventional rompe 'oeildevices ikethree-dimensiomeanders. In and aroundthe fancifularchitectureof the villa'sBedroom M

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for example, objects of daily life were depicted in such a way as to seemreal, with metal and glass vases on shelves and tables appearingto projectout from the wall. Cumulatively, hese trompe l'oeil devicesreveal the Re-publican owners' evident pleasure in impressing their guests at this com-fortable summer retreat.In 1964 excavationsbegan on the site of a villa known as Oplontis, in themodern town of Torre Annunziata, near Naples. The excavations,whichcontinue to this day, have shed much light on the school that is in all likeli-hood responsiblefor the villaof Fannius at Boscoreale. The frescoes at thevilla of Oplontis include fancifulcolonnades, rustic settings developed withimprobablycomplex architecture,and various other subjectsand decora-tive schemes also found at Boscoreale.Oplontis has much to teach us aboutthe decorativetraditionsof this period, since unlike the remainsof so manyother villas in the region, it is well preserved in its originalcontext.Oplontis is particularly lluminatingabout the decorationof Boscoreale'sRoom M, which was a bedroom (cubiculumocturnum)n the villa. This bed-room, which had a sitting room (cubiculum iurnum) o the south, is excep-tional for the degree of detail in its painted scenes, which are combinedwith actualarchitectural eatures to create a very playful atmosphere.Abovethe richly painted walls of imaginedrustic architecturewas a stucco ceiling.Oplontispresentsa useful parallelnot for the landscape cenesof Boscoreale'sCubiculum M, but for the peristyle that opens out to those scenes. Bothvillas share the scheme in which red Corinthian columns with floral vineswinding around them supporta narrowentablaturedecorated with shieldsemblazoned with the so-calledMacedonianstarburst.No less instructive is Pompeii'sCasa del Labirinto, which bears a veryclose relation to Boscoreale n scale as well as in decorativedetail.The land-scape scenes with villa architecture, n particular,are quite similarto thoseof Bedroom M at Boscoreale.Bedroom M is especiallyenlightening for modern viewersbecause it pro-vides a particularlyvivid picture of Roman luxury. The walls of the bed-room are painted in such a way as to conceal the fact that they are walls andto make them appear as viewsof the grounds of the villa or an idealizedversion of the villa. The centers of the east and west walls are divided fromthe side sectionsby the splendidred columns.Between he columnswe see, onthe left side, a shrine knownas a syzygia,which consistsof a short entablaturesupported by two pillars. In the shrine's center stands a goddess holdinga flaming torch in each hand (fig. 27). The shrine is walled off from us andshrouded below with a dark curtain, as if to keep us away.To either side of the shrine are views of the entrance to a fantasticcoun-try villa. The central portal, which is double-doored, is as ornate as theremainder of the architectureand is apparently inlaid with tortoiseshell.The architecture hat spreads out beyond it is vast and complex,and at thevery top the farthest extension of the villa's high enclosure wall is visible(cover). The complex is best understood as a pastiche of balconies,towers,and buildings rather than a literalimage of a particulararchitectural cene.Bedroom M exhibits an impulse to fantasy that is very telling about thetaste of the original owner.The Second Style, in general, and the paintedconfigurations of such walls as these, in particular,developed out of anearly Hellenistic painting style, as the Tomb of Lyson and KalliklesnearLefkadia n Macedoniademonstrates,but this room is verymuch the vision

25,26. Opposite:n thepaintingon theewall o+BedroomM, this ornatedoor taat theentranceo atantasticvilla (see ardetail, ront cover).The doorhas decoraof inlaidtortoiseshellnd bronze oorkners n thetorm f lions'heads.Above s a cparabledoortrom he atriumrhe villOplontis,whichwasprobably aintedbysameworkshop.

OVERLEAF

27,28. Lett:ThisdetailtromhewestwaBedroomM shows he entrance o a sanary with an archaistic tatuerhe godHekatebearing wo torches.The two-pstructurewithan entablatures laterechin the miniaturelandscape paintingsBoscotrecase.ight:On theeastwall of BroomM, a round emple, r tholos, standan open-air anctuary. n altar in thetoground s ladenwithan ortering rtrui


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of a late Republican landowner with grandiose pretensions who seeksimpress the viewer with the scope of his imagined grounds.There is little to be learned about ancient religion in this room, sindivinities serve chiefly as part of the landscape. Images of gods, satyrs, afishermen are not meaningfully distinct. An urban sophisticate ike our viowner was more concerned with displayingemblems of wealth than in apeasing gods in whom he may not have fully believed; the educated Rommiddle class was superstitious but agnostic.Ampler confirmationof this agnosticismmay be found in the villa's arest room, that described as H on the plan. (The elements preserved frothat room are divided among the Metropolitan, the Museo ArcheologNazionale n Naples, the Louvre,the MuseeRoyalet Domaine de Mariem24


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in Belgium,and the AllardPiersonMuseum n Amsterdam.) oomH waabout wenty-fiveeetsquare,withdecorationonsisting f eightmainpaintescenes hatshoweda figureor groupof figures.Eachscenewasseparatefromthe nextby a painted olumn,whichactedalmostas a frame.This sethe decorative chemeapart romthatof the Villaof the Mysteries f somyearsearlier, n which he columnsare behind he figuresand thus do nointerrupt narrativeontinuum.Here he artists referred o separate acmain panel,as indicatedalso by the separate hrine paintingsand archtecturalmotifs n the upper zone aboveeach panel.In the centerof the north wallwas an imageof Aphrodite oined by diminutive igureof Eros.To the left wasDionysos eclining n Ariadnelap, and on the right were the Three Graces, n their familiar ate Clasicalpose.On the westwallwere,from south to north,a false doorway, n elderbeardedman eaningon a walking tick,and a pair of figures,one seateand one standing,with a shield between them. The figures have beevariouslydentifiedand maybe either mythological r historical.The eastwall eatured hree paintingsnow n the careof the Metropotan. These are, from northto south (left to right),a citharist nd a girl, manand a woman bothseated),and a single mageof a womanbearingshield figs.34-36). As on the otherside of the room, he single igurewain the panel nterrupted ya doorway thisone not false,butactuallyeading out of the room,proving hatthe painteddecoration onformed o thexigenciesof the room'sarchitecture.

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The scenes in Boscoreale'sRoom H derive from the Greek tradition ofmegalographia,r large-scalepainting, about which so much was written inantiquity;Apollinariusof Sidon, Petroniusin the Satyricon, nd Vitruviusall shed light on the use of megalographia in a Roman villa. Copies offamous paintings of the past evidently appealed to the owners of thesehomes. Although it seems likelythat at least three of the panelsin Room Hallude to historical iguresor personifications ssociatedwith MacedoniaandAsia, the remaindercannot be brought togetherin a unified context. Thus,while thereare some undeniableassociationsamong three scenes,the othersare paintingsof divinitiesand what is probablya portraitof a philosopher.The illustratedreconstructionof the room, undertaken for an exhibitionin Essen at the Villa Hugel, gives a better idea of the relative mportanceofeach majorscene. The room may have served as the primarytriclinium, rdining room. This suggestion has met with criticism by some who arguethat diningrooms were usuallysmaller; he same scholarsbelieve that RoomH was reservedfor the celebrationof a cult, perhaps that of Aphrodite. Yetseveralof the painted figuresare open to interpretations hat diminish thepossibilityof an associationwith a cult. Forexample, the paintingof a man

31-33. The reconstructionf BoscorRoomH (opposite, elow)wasfirstassemfor an exhibitionn theVillaHugel n EsWestGermany,n 1979. Thepaintingsabnow in theMuseoArcheologico azioNaples,withpersonificationsperhaps f Aand Macedonia) nd an elderly hiloso(possibly picurus)aced thepaintingsin the Metropolitan,hat are illustratfigs. 34-36. The panels on the ar (nowall described ionysos nd Ariadne(lost),Aphroditend the nfantEros (MArcheologicoNazionale), and the TGraces now ost).Thepaintingof the TGraces opposite,bove;MuseoArcheoNazionale) erves o give an impressithe appearance f the missingversionthenorthwall.Above ach argepaintinga small triptychlike icture, two of wsurvive n theMetropolitannpoorcond


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34. The eated ithara layer ndthegirlbe-hindher maybe portraits f a Macedonianqueen nd herdaughterr maidservant. n-like hecycle f iguresdepictedn theVillaoftheMysteries,achpainting n RoomH is adistinctcene etbetween orinthianolumns;part of one is visibleat the right.Figures34-36 are rom the eastwall of the room.

leaningon a walkingstick s thought by some to be a portraitof the philospher Epicurusand therefore unrelatedto the worshipof Aphrodite.Othsuggestions have included the philosophers Zeno, Menedemos of Eretror Aratos of Soli, as well as King Kinyrasof Cyprus. Thus, the pictugallery n Room H revealsthe villaowner's nterestin the painterlyforms the late Classicaland Hellenistic periods, but the presence of unrelatfigures that appear to be adapted from historicaland mythologicalpainings in a room that was in all likelihood the focus of gastronomic,rath

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35. Thenudemanandhimation-cladomlookingo therightmaybea Macedonianand queenor a pairr ivinities.Thispaiing and thaton thetacingpageare perhcopiestromhe ame ostHellenistic ycle;other aintings n RoomH maybeunrela

than religious, ritualsuggests thatthere was no veiled meaning in the room'sdecoration,but rather an overt one: these are images that attest to the culti-vation of the man who entertained there.It was the custom of Campanian villas at this time to decorate the peri-style with copies of classicalstatuary,and we may assume that this villa atBoscorealewas no exception. Boscoreale'spaintings of gods, philosophers,and kings may have been arranged in the same somewhat haphazard waythat statues of such subjectsadorned the exterior of a villa, as in the caseof

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36-39.n thethirdpaintingromtheeastwallfRoomH, a woman olds shieldbear-inghe mageofa nudeman,whichmaybeadecorativeeviceor a refection.Unlike heotherwo figs.34,35), thispanelhasonlyasinglefigure,ecausetwasadjacentoa door-way.hecolumnwithbosseswasprobablyotheastof thesouthernntranceoRoomH.Thepperpartof a columnreproducednthisageisfromthesoutheastornerof theperistylendis theonly urviving xampleftheainted olumns fthatenclosure.Onthewallf theperistyleetween oomsN andOwashepaintingof thebronze aseabove.

theVillaof the Papiriat Herculaneum,which has very recently been re-opened or excavation.The messagewe receivefrom this late Republicanvillais thatdisplaysofwealthwere bestaccompaniedby symbolsof the Greekpast. By appealingto he formsof Hellenisticart,whichwere as much in vogue in lateRepub-licanvillasas were classicaltraditions,the Roman patron signaled his ap-preciation f a classicalheritageand, incidentally, nvited lengthy treatisesofmodernscholars n searchof his true decorative ntentionsand sources.Hisintentionswere almostcertainlynot complicated;Room H is a displayof eruditionratherthana halldevotedto worship.His sourceswere,at thispivotaltime in Romanhistory,near the time of Julius Caesar'sdeath andthe end of the Triumvirate,more firmlyanchoredin a pastcivilization hanin the present. This approachto interiordecorationstood in starkcontra-dictionto the politicalvaluesof the Republic,officiallysuspiciousas it wasof Greektradition,and wasto be upset in the succeedingreign of the em-peror Augustus. Under Rome'sfirst emperor was born the Third Style,best exemplifiedby the villaat Boscotrecase.


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40-42. The verticalpanels (oppositebelow)reproduced n thesepagesarefrBoscoreale's oomF, whichwas situatedtween hedining area to thenorthandbaths othesouth.The unctionofRoomFunknown.The elaborate pperzone oflargepanel includes aintingsof sirens uporting hecornice,multicolored arblelaand a tortoiseshell-inlaidilaster.Themagnificentrchitecturalanoramthe eft, imilarothosenBedroomM, is rRoomG, whichmayhavebeenthesumdiningroom.Like heviews n RoomM, thpanels, now in the Museo ArcheoloNazionale,Naples,are largelyderivedrpaintedHellenistic tagedesigns.

OVERLEAF

43. The uperbwestwallof theexedra,RoL, includesa snakecrawlingrom a basa satyr'smask, nd a cymbal, ll ofwhichsuspended elow massivearlandwithbuheads.Theupperzoneconsists f a delicegg-and-dartegister upportedya vegefrieze.Thepolychromedarblelabsbelowabove cyma fleaves, nd thecoloredaumarbrepanels areevenly pacedbelowhorizontal anelsof theupper one.

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44. ThevillaatBoscotrecase,ike hevillaat Boscoreale, asorganizedround cen-tralperistyleB) withpaintings f columnsbehind ctual olumns;hispartof thevillamayhavebeen ompletedhortly fter hatof Boscoreale. heservants' ntrancewasat the southeast art of the excavated e-mains.A lararium, or householdhrine,stood o the left of the entrance.The ser-vants'quartersay to the east. These n-cludedan atriumand ountain basin13. A kitchen toreroom ecoratedwithpaintingsdescribed y he excavator s intheFourthStyle; hese ncluded n imageof Apollo tringinghis Iyre14. Bathroom,ccessibley ampfrom 315. The Black Room, the easternmost

room, sfor themostpartpreserved t tMetropolitansee igs. 47-50)16. Preservedn theMuseoArcheoloNazionale,Naples1 7. Exedra18. This bedroomwas decoratedwithfrieze of garlands19. TheMythological oom.On thewwall was a panel with Polyphemus nGalatea;on the east wall were depicAndromedand Perseus see igs. 54,520. The WhiteRoom. Only two panfrom this bedroom re preserved n tMetropolitansee igs. 51-53)

45. Opposite:Mask of Medusa rom twestwallof theBlackRoom t Boscotre

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The villa of P. Fannius Sinister at Boscoreale