Thalamus. The walls are white, with deep red dado. Ceiling coved, and
with a round aperture similar to the one in Thalamus. On the wall
opposite the door are two beautiful floating Bacchantes, one with
thyrsus and tympanum, the other dressed in pink and blue, holding a
thyrsus in her left hand, and a floating scarf with the other. They are
engraved in Mus. Bor., vol. ii., tav. 4, and in Zahn. vol. ii., pl. 13.
The Bacchante next the door is the same as in cubiculum 16; her dress
here is pale blue; she holds the tympanum and thyrsus; a nebris crosses
her breast.
On the left hand wall may be seen a most charming group, exquisitely
coloured, of a Faun supporting a Bacchante. The faun holds a bunch of
grapes in his right hand, and with the other encircles her waist; his
drapery is red, and her delicate form is surrounded by a transparent
veil, apparently of gauze. The drapery enveloping the lower part of her
figure is purple, heightened with white, shoes blue. The effect of the
painting of this group is perfectly fascinating, and entirely realises
the treatment required for cheerful subjects. The group is engraved in
Mus. Bor., vol. xiii., tav. 16, where the background is described as
yellow. The paintings in this room are copied from the House of the
Female Flute-player and the House of the Bacchantes. The group last
described is in the original of unusually large proportions for such
subjects, being three-fourths of life size.
Thus, then, we have completed the _gíro_ of the Pompeian house. The
ancients, although they have provided the graceful salutation for comers
on their threshold in the word SALVE, do not afford the corresponding
word VALE to “speed the parting guest.” Their manes, probably gratified
by the interest now manifested in these monuments of their habits,
requirements, and enjoyments, desire us to linger within these fairy
walls, and to indulge in the thoughts of those who would, ages ago, have
found nothing strange and nothing amiss here, excepting the appearance
of the thronging visitors, whose costume and manners could never have
been anticipated. The house, as we see it, is really a house such as the
excavations might reveal. We have already shown that every part has its
prototype at Pompeii.
The style of decorative painting during the earliest times of the empire
merits attention. It is here exhibited on a larger scale and in a much
more extensive series than ever before attempted in England; affording,
in fact, the sole method by which such decorations can be fully
understood. The subjects of the small central wall panels, and a few of
the grotesque devices, have been often published, and are familiar to us
through the medium both of prints and coloured copies; isolated
portions, however, cannot suffice to give an idea of the harmonious
effect that may be produced in mural decoration, by masses of even crude
colour, when conjoined in proper proportion with others equally
crude.[61] The eye at Pompeii is never offended by a want of balance in
arrangement; and the system of confining the heaviest colours to the
lower part of the room has been already noticed. Even copies of the same
picture that come to England, on comparison, exhibit variations which
destroy all feeling of confidence in their accuracy. They are for the
most part so small as to conceal many important peculiarities of style,
and can only serve as souvenirs. Here we see nothing on a reduced scale
(except in Thalamus, No. 27), the paintings are not only of the same
size as at Pompeii, but even the exactitude of the outlines is
guaranteed to us by the fact of their having been _traced_ from the
originals.
[61] These colours could not appear equally crude to the ancients on
account of the necessary darkness that pervaded their apartments. See
_ante_, p. 31.
The scale and finish of the patterns have to a great extent been
regulated by the size of the rooms which they adorn; and it will be seen
that in the smaller rooms patterns must necessarily be more minute, and
the form of the wall itself less regarded than in a larger apartment
where they are viewed at a greater distance. The lightness of the
architectural representations and their connection has been already
mentioned. The painters seem to have delighted in representing every
variety of pavilion, colonnade, balcony steps, rooms and corners, in
short, all the _ins and outs_ and _ups_ and _downs_ peculiar to
buildings erected to form upper floors. They are, in fact, at variance
with the ground stories actually remaining at Pompeii, where all columns
and piers of brick and stone are comparatively massive, without any
traces whatever of intermediate supports of wood or metal, such as are
represented in the paintings. The _arabesque_ devices which occupy so
much of the wall space of Pompeii are replete with imagination and
ingenious variety. There is, notwithstanding the censures of Vitruvius,
which are inserted in page 69, such a playfulness and elegance in the
combination of objects so unexpectedly brought together, that we
tolerate incongruities, and regard the whole as a dreamlike succession
of images, passing easily from one to the other, without any
consideration of that which has gone before. The children rising out of
flowers are charming; and the living lions, rushing through _scroll
work_ of the brightest hues, such as no living lions ever saw, are
purely ornamental conceits. Again, the reeds for columns, with all the
botanical details, of _nodes_ and _internodes_, are extremely graceful;
and with their rich colour and firm appearance, notwithstanding an
extreme slenderness, they should be very suggestive to our metal workers
as means of support. The monsters sometimes perched upon them, in
perfect illustration of the words of Vitruvius, excite our surprise, and
being frequently ugly in themselves, incline us to agree with the
illustrious architect in wishing them away; but at the same time,
without such paintings before us, how impossible it would be to
comprehend the passages in his book relating to such matters, and
depending for their effect upon the eye alone. The beautiful devices of
the _stanza nera_, cubiculum No. 1, are sufficient illustrations of the
grace with which incongruities may be combined, and how in a very small
apartment, where minute decorations are appropriately introduced, each
portion is to be read, as it were, by itself, or, if regarded generally,
to seem merely a playful arrangement of colours relieving the monotony
of the wall.
Landscapes as seen in cubicula 3 and 15 are said to be peculiarly the
invention of Ludius, who lived in the early period of the empire. His
conceits, as described by Pliny, have something almost Chinese about
them, and his chief desire seems to have been to amuse and occupy the
spectators. Extensive landscape views were found in the House of the
Dioscuri in the four cubicula on the extreme right, seen in plan (No. 8,
on page 39). An extensive painting of a sea-port was discovered in the
House of the Small Fountain (plan No. 6). Some very quaint coast scenes,
with enormous gallies, are engraved as vignettes in Pitture d’Ercolano,
vol. iii., pp. 7 and 13. An extensive scene of a crowded mole, adorned
with statues and arches, with a distant town and crowded boats on the
water, is engraved at page 47 of the same vol. At page 279 of the same,
is a curious representation of various figures on a wet, slippery
ground, as described by Pliny in the paintings of Ludius. An extensive
scene of a port, with shipping, numerous statues raised on columns,
houses, gardens, people in boats and angling on the shore, was found at
Stabiæ; it is engraved in vol. ii., page 295, of Pitture d’Ercolano.
Eight small circular views of land and sea, animated by numerous
figures, were also found at Stabiæ. They are engraved in the same volume
at pp. 277, 281, 285, and 289, and form very important illustrations of
ancient life and scenery. Curious buildings may be seen in vignettes on
page 105 of same volume. A remarkable painting of a creek with four
large ships filled with armed soldiers, with three rows of oars, is
engraved in vol i., page 243. The gallies filled with armed troops are
seen also in page 239. A curious latticed window in a landscape in page