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applications, even if on a limited basis and not without some criticism from
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contemporaries. Lucius Crassus for instance, consul in 95 B.C., did something so eccentric
and effeminate for a Roman of his time, installing in his house on the Palatine Hill six
small columns of Hymettian marble, each 12 Roman feet (3.55 m) tall, that Marcus Brutus
immediately nicknamed him Palatine Venus. 236 In 78 B.C., Marcus Lepidus went even
further, using Numidian marble “in the most sordid manner” (vilissimo uso): 237 to cover the
door sills of his house. Lepidus’ contemporary Lucius Lucullus was so passionate for
marble from Teos as to name it after himself, Luculleum. 238 When Marcus Scaurus, aedile
in 58 B.C., used 360 columns, each 38 Roman feet tall (11.25 m) to embellish the three-
level stage of a theater otherwise made of wood, it was a clear signal that the age of
Republican frugality was coming to an end. 239 In 44 B.C., Gaius Julius Caesar imposed a
tax on every single column shaft imported to Rome, 240 testifying to the remarkable
economic impact of the marble trade: a new era had begun.
The Early Empire: Roman Control over Marble Quarries
When Augustus emerged as emperor following the civil wars against Antony, he
236 Plin. H 36.2.7.
237 Plin. H 36.8.49. Numidian marble is known as giallo antico, yellow in color, and comes from modern
Tunisia. (Pensabene 1998a, 334).
238 Plin. H 36.8.49-50. Tean or Luculleum marble, also known as africano, is of a dark-greenish color and
comes from the quarries of Teos, close to modern Izmir in Turkey. (Ward-Perkins 1992f, 55).
239 Plin. H 36.24.114-5. Compared with the 70 column shafts from the Mahdia shipwreck, sunk off Tunisia
between 90 and 60 B.C., Scaurus’ 11.25 m-tall columns are, on average, three times taller. It is possible that
Pliny emphasized their size and number to impress the reader with this Late Republican example of
extravagance. Indeed, it is difficult to believe that wooden theaters with 360 columns in the façade ever
existed.
240 Cic. Att. 13.6.1.