KITCHENS AND DINING ROOMS AT POMPEII ... - Get a Free Blog

From the end of the colonnade projects a dining room; through its folding doors
it looks on to the end of the terrace, the adjacent meadow, and the stretch of open
country beyond, while from its windows on one side can be seen part of the
terrace and the projecting wing of the house, on the other the tree-tops in the
enclosure of the adjoining riding-ground. 213
Down the side is a covered arcade for summer use which is built on higher
ground and seems not to look down on but be actually touching the vineyard
below; halfway along is a dining room which receives the fresh breezes blowing
down the Apennine valleys. Its broad windows at the back look on to the
vineyard, and so do its folding doors... 214
The views to the sea, forest or mountains are framed by large windows or folding doors that
present slightly different pictures to each of the banquet participants as they recline in their
appropriate positions. 215 Wealthy Romans artificially created natural landscapes for their urban
dining rooms, using statuary, fountains, trees and flowers as substitutes for natural topography,
bodies of water, and forests. 216 L. Bek argues that dining rooms were designed so that the most
advantageous view out of the room came from the back corner where the host and guest of honor
reclined:
"...the dinner-party and especially its two chief persons became the decisive
factor in the composition of the architectonic ensemble, hence the placing of the
couches as crucial to its design. As the balance of the composition had to take
account, primarily, of the host and guest of honour, its axis was directed along
their -- approximately parallel -- lines of vision, taking its departure from the lefthand
corner of the triclinium and oriented towards the left from there." 217
213 Plin. Ep. 5.6.19: A capite porticus triclinium excurrit; valvis xystum desinentem et protinus pratum multumque
ruris videt, fenestris hac latus xysti et quod prosilit villae, hac adiacentis hippodromi nemus comasque prospectat
(Teubner text, B. Radice translation).
214 Plin. Ep. 5.6.29: A latere aestiva cryptoporticus in edito posita, quae non adspicere vineas, sed tangere videtur. In
media triclinium saluberrimum adflatum ex Apenninis vallibus recipit; post latissimis fenestris vineas, valvis aeque
vineas (Teubner text, B. Radice translation).
215 See Förtsch 1993, 104-105; Clarke 1991, 19-23; Mielsch 1987, 45-9; Bek 1983, 99-101; Lafon 1981 for
discussions of the visual impact of framed natural views upon people in rooms of a villa. Bergmann 1991,
65 comments further: "The principle of structuring views in parts through windows and columns and over
the forms and edges of buildings was based on prevailing spatial concepts. The Romans had no inclusive
terms like the modern landscape. Ancient authors conceived of landscape in the plural, as the sum of natural
and man-made objects whose association forms one segment of the visual world. In the ancient concept of
landscape, the parts take precedence over the unified arrangement because each part has its topos, or
physical envelope, and it is the relation of one topos to another that creates a choros, or area." (author's
emphasis).
216 For artificial displays of water generated for dining, see Andersson 1990; Salza Prina Ricotti 1984; Salza
Prina Ricotti 1979; Jashemski 1979, 41-48. For examples in the archaeological sample, see dining rooms
I.4.5+25 (18), I.6.15 (d) and I.7.10-12 (17, 23).
217 Bek 1983, 86, and in general 82-88; see also Clarke 1991, 16-19; Wallace-Hadrill 1988, 75-77.
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