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

cenaculum DH◊{k}. One bronze finial for a bed/couch in the form of a mule's head was found at
the level of the second floor room over the front shop (b).
I) Decorative amenities, dining areas: Decoration from DH•(d) has largely disappeared;
Sutherland (118, n.15) describes faded traces of 3rd-4th style painting in the NE corner of the
room. No decoration survives from cenaculum DH◊{k} save its columns and mouldings
(Sutherland provisionally dates the former to after A.D. 62). The engaged columns are of tufa
with block capitals and Attic bases, with some finishing stucco work; the colonnade rests over a
cornice block finished with Ionicizing stucco mouldings.
J) Sanctity: No ritual finds or installations are reported from this property.
Synthesis
It is difficult to assess the nature of the cooking and dining arrangements at this property
at the time of the eruption, primarily because the state of occupation or use of the building is not
certain. The front of the house had clearly been opened up for commercial use after A.D. 62. The
concentration of ST (c') and storage vessels in the vicinity of the sales counter (b) to the N
suggests that this ST was constructed to serve the needs of customers from the street. Food or
heated wine prepared on ST (c') could have been sold and/or consumed at the counter. The fine
settings of DH•(d) or cenaculum DH◊{k} may have been available for rented dining space,
supported by either ST (c') or the ST• in (i). Both cooking areas were plainly visible from both
dining areas; such an open display of cooking is unusual in houses, but common in (work)shops,
lunch counters and diners.
I propose that turning this house into a diner was the intent of the new owner when he
added this property to (I.6.11). The venture seems to have failed. The entire insula I.6 witnesses
significant changes after A.D. 62; the large property I.6.2/4 is split, and the former part was
possibly turned into a commercial eating establishment. Changes were not due solely to the
earthquake. The implantation of a large-scale fullery at (I.6.7) with its work-basins at the very
center of the insula must have altered the living environment of the surrounding houses
significantly. The stench of processing and cleaning clothing was considerable, and the back
garden portions of the houses (I.6.4, I.6.8-9) closest to these facilities are accordingly in a notable
state of disrepair, as if they could no longer be used in their customary manners. The presence of
the fullery may eventually have caused the eating establishment at I.6.8-9 to fail. Allison
postulates that I.6.8-9 was closed and the property used for storage sometime before the eruption,
on the basis of a general lack of retail wares in area (a, b) and little habitation evidence at ST (c')
or in DH•(d). It seems fairly certain that the cooking and dining areas of this property were not
in working order in A.D. 79.
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