Because the practical and the ornamental intersect most often at the entrances to the forum the discussion begins with the most monumentalized entrance, the arch in the northeast corner, where new schemes of water supply and drainage were demonstrably inserted into the new monumental design. Spanning the gap between the Temple of Jupiter on its western side and the forum colonnade in the east, the (so-called) Arch of Nero afforded pedestrian access to the forum and framed a carefully choreographed view to the north, where the interplay of this arch and the (so-called) Arch of Caligula masked the awkward adjustments in alignment between the forum, Via del Foro, and Via di Mercurio. After the earthquake(s), the Arch of Nero was incorporated into the overall redesign of the forum. The Macellum’s new fapade and the forum colonnade were united here in the final phase of construction by a new archway clearly discernable in an 1825 lithograph by Jules Coignet (Fino 1988, 183; Fino 2006, 176), a drawing by Franpois Mazois (Mazois 1824 48; plate XXXI) and another lithograph by Frederic Horner (Fino 1988, fig. 165; Dobbins 1994, 680—681, n. 115). As part of what Dobbins (ibid) termed the Macellum’s “northwest corner project,” the eastern pier of the Arch of Nero was modified to accommodate this new archway, confirming that the Arch of Nero antedates the reconstruction. Ling (2007, 125) dates its original construction to AD 23—29.
Dobbins (1994, 681) summed up the constructions in this area by stating, “this project, then, is significant as it transcends the purely practical and illustrates the same broader urban concerns of the post-62 design”. The northwest corner project, however, also demonstrates that the purely practical elements of the forum’s unified design are equally important to and interwoven with Pompeii’s broader urban concerns. Indeed, these practical matters undergird the monumental, enhancing their evocations and mitigating their effects upon the urban landscape. In most instances this relates to the supply and removal of water and is well illustrated by the transformation of the Arch of Nero, especially the niches on its north face. Although part of the original arch’s design, the northern niches were transformed into fountain basins (Maiuri 1973, 123) after the arch’s attachment to the Macellum. The fabric forming the northern face of the water basin in the eastern pier overlies the modifications made to this pier in order to accept the new archway (Fig. 10.2). This observation extends the date of the northwest corner project to the water basin, making it later still. Both basins also received a treatment of waterproof plaster and were given a marble edging, turning them into both functional and ornamental fountains in the final period.
The change, while clearly part of the new forum’s design, might also be linked to the removal of the fountains at the base of the Arch of Caligula, which spans Via di Mercurio. Recesses cut into the south face of the lava foundation stones on each pier show the locations of the now absent fountains. Moreover, the vertical channels in the masonry, in which pipes and sinter deposits were found (Keenan-Jones, this volume), demonstrate the course of the piped water: up the north side of each pier then down the south side and into the fountains below (Larsen 1982, 65—67; figs. 14a—d). Lead piping for the new fountains at the Arch of Nero was seen by Dyer (1875, 100) in at least one of the basins. These pipes were still visible in 1884 when E. Rolf reported seeing the lead pipes of the “recesses and tanks for two fountains” contained in the arch (Rolf 1884, 14). When Maiuri (1973, 123; PPMVII, 331, fig. 11) excavated the southern sidewalk of Vicolo dei Soprastanti at the west edge of the arch he found these same pipes cut back and hammered closed (‘resecate e ribattute’). With the age of the new fountains in the arch established to be after the earthquake(s) it is best to interpret these pipes as the ends of the internal sections of piping, which were laid early in the construction of the basins in anticipation of a new source of pressurized water.
The entire northwestern corner of the forum saw a similar redevelopment, though considerably more practical in scope. Built together in a single unit of construction in the last decades before the eruption (Mau 1899, 91; Maiuri 1942, 30—31; Richardson 1988, 275; Dobbins 2007, 159—160), encompassing the (so-called) granary and the new forum latrine, the Northwest Building (NWB)
Fig. 10.2 — So-called Arch of Nero (Photo: Kevin Cole).
Completed the northwest fapade of the forum. That the latrine was a component of the original plan of the building, and not a later re-use of space, can be adduced from the two terracotta drains built into the room’s south wall. These drain-pipes were set into the wall at the time of construction, demonstrating that they were purpose-built, both for draining water from the roofing system, as well as for flushing the latrine into the large sewer line running along the western side of the Northwest building. This sewer line terminates in a deep (over eight meters) shaft to the north of the latrine. Because these pipes were placed in the south wall, however, only the latrine’s south and west trenches could be flushed, and then only when it rained (Cole 2009, 225-228).
The Pompeians, however, were also devising a more consistent source of water for the forum latrine. At the northwest entrance to the forum a fountain was set upon a masonry base built as part of the foundation for the north boundary wall. The deepest overflow channel for the fountain is cut through the top of basin’s southwest corner, which would have directed water into the space behind the fountain rather than into the street, which is the case with most fountains at Pompeii (Mau 1899, 224; Nishida 1991). The overflow was designed instead to carry runoff back to the west, through an opening in the north forum boundary wall, and into the latrine trough yet another aperture in its eastern wall (Fig. 10.1). Similarly, the hole on the west side of the fountain along with the raised curb here to bury the pipe indicates that the water supply, like that seen at the Arch of Nero, was meant to run under the southern sidewalk of Vicolo dei Soprastanti. Unfortunately, Maiuri (1973, 120: fig. 70) reported no trace of either a pipe or drain in his excavations in this area. Moreover, the fact that the fountain base was planned for at the time of the foundation of the forum’s northern boundary wall, a wall that is bonded to the masonry of the of the Northwest Building (and thus, its latrine) is further evidence for both the specific interconnection between the fountain and the latrine, as well as, at a more general level, for the attention to practical details within the monumental urban design.
World History
