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Classics 212 Spring 09.John Wynne

Lectures 16 & 17: Art, Architecture and engineering.

1. The Romans and the visual arts.

As with literature, Roman visual art was heavily and self-consciously indebted tothe Greeks. In fact, with art the distinction between Greek and Roman is lessthan clear, since unlike with literature elite Romans themselves did not take upvisual art as a hobby. Instead, they commissioned it, and for a long time thecommissioned artists would have been predominantly Greek.

We have already seen a lot of Roman sculpture, especially portrait sculpture. Sohere we will look at Roman painting (painting survives unusually well in theregion that was covered by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD).

The earliest paintings from the Vesuvius region date from the second centuryBC. The earliest paintings are understated and tend to replicate architecturalelements, like marble masonry, in sometimes rather abstract patterns (below anexample from Herculaneum, photo taken from the side).

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As time went on, though, in the first centuries BC and AD, the Romansdeveloped a taste for rich, illusionistic painting showing portraits, scenes ofdrama or domestic life, still lifes or landscapes.

Later still, towards the time of Vesuvius eruption, these two influences developedin to elaborate combinations of abstract architectural elements and realisticscenes. Some times the paintings seem designed to give an illusion of spaceand scenery in small rooms with few windows (see below from the villa atBoscoreale).

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2. The domus.

Wealthy Romans living in cities inhabited a family house ordomus. The houseconsisted of a (relatively) indoor area centered on an atrium, a large hall, and amore open area in the back centered on a garden and surrounded by store-rooms, slaves quarters, kitchens and the like. Off the atrium were the owningfamilys bedrooms, dining rooms, offices, etc.. The street front of the housewould be rented out as shops, with just a narrow doorway and passageconnecting to the atrium. But the atrium would have been a relatively publicspace, with the familys connections and dependants coming in to socialize anddo business. Most of our surviving paintings come from this type of house,although some come from rich country houses, called villas, which were largerand had a more elaborate plan.

The atrium of a domus from Herculaneum; note the rain-inlet in the roof and thehole to catch it. This would have been cooling in the summer.

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3. Architectural technology.

The Romans are noted for several key engineering innovations that contributed

greatly to their architectural style.

They produced the arch which allows a lot of weight to be supported by arelatively light structure. This allowed edifices like tall bridges or aqueductstructures and large, free-standing theaters to be built.

They had concrete; poured concrete was a strong, flexible material from which,for example, the dome of the Pantheon in Rome is built (see below for photo ofinterior of dome and diagram of cross-section; the domes height and the interiordiameter of the base of the dome are the same, 142 feet).

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They were excellent surveyors and civil engineers. The paved Roman roadnetwork extended over the whole empire and roads first planned by the Romansare still identifiable today for their uncompromising straightness.

4. Water supply.

Another well-known example of the Romans civil engineering skill is theirprovision of a running water supply for their cities, and indeed for many privatehouses.

Aqueducts essentially, very long and large pipes brought plentiful water from

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springs and reservoirs over distances of up to 60 miles. The Romans were veryfamiliar with siphoning principles, so they could negotiate (for example) steepvalleys by building pipes, strengthened at the bottom to withstand the extrapressure, down one side and up the other. More usually, and more practically forlarger pipes, they preferred to keep an even gradient over long distances; the 60

mile aqueduct to ancient Cologne drops one part in a thousand over most of itslength. This gradient could be maintained by burying the pipe or running it overbridges; some of these are very tall and impressive and provide familiar imagesof Roman expertise. Here, the Pont du Gard in France, a surviving aqueductbridge; the water flowed inside the section above the top set of arches, the top ofthe bridge being 160 feet above the river-bed and 300 yards long:

At the supply end, the water was delivered under pressure to a water-tower fromwhich it was distributed to its various uses. Most fundamental were publicfountains, which provided the basic water supply to the town. Owners of private

houses could then pay for a supply to their house (priced according to the cross-section of their pipe). Roman plumbers used lead pipes; this probably had publichealth consequences. Finally, water would be supplied in quantity to the publicbaths.