The eruption of Vesuvius preserved hundreds of wall paintings in Pompeii and the surrounding region — the important core of surviving Roman wall paintings. They date of course to the late Republic and early Empire only; to continue the story of Roman painting after AD 79, one needs to look elsewhere.
The wall paintings of Pompeii and neighboring towns and indeed of other contemporary towns (notably Rome) were classified into four groups by German scholar August Mau in 1882. The types overlap, both chronologically and even in style, but nonetheless remain a useful way to understand different approaches to the art of decorating walls. The first two styles, at least, originate in the wall painting tradition of the Greek East, in such places as Delos (First Style) and Alexandria (Second Style).
The First Style is the easiest to pick out, because it solely depicts well-cut stone masonry. Figures are absent. This style appears early, beginning in the early second century BC. The Second Style, from ca. 90 BC, introduces architecture and the illusion of three-dimensional space. Theatrical scenery and the architectural backdrops of stages influenced the development of this
Style. But in a famous variant at the Villa of the Mysteries outside Pompeii, human figures enact a dramatic cult ceremony in front of only a minimal architectural backdrop.
Villas, in the parlance of Classical archaeology, were large independent houses that stood in the countryside. Generally the centers of large estates, they combined living quarters with rooms devoted to farm activities. The Villa of the Mysteries has a complicated building history, unraveled in Italian excavations of 1909—10 and 1929—30. Construction began ca. 200 BC, with a cryp-toporticus (a high platform with plain arches framing a walkway) and, on top, an atrium. Additions in the late second century BC included the main peristyle, a small tetrastyle atrium, and baths. A semi-circular exedra was built on the podium terrace some time in the first century AD. Rooms now totaled over sixty. In the final years of Pompeii, agricultural installations were added right in the middle, as if the villa had become strictly a business center. Finds of a winepress, a heap of onions in the main bedroom, and farm tools (pruning hooks, hammers, picks, hoes, and shovels) have helped define the character of this villa in its final years.
The important paintings of Dionysiac Mysteries, after which the building is named, decorate the walls of a modestly sized room (7m x 5m) in the heart of the villa (Figure 22.9). They date to ca. 50 BC. The paintings are 3.3m high, with the figures 1.5m high. In front of a Second Style background of dark red panels divided by columns, a young woman of unknown identity undergoes an initiation rite into the Mysteries of the god Dionysos. The scenes unfold in a continuous narrative, like a comic strip, with figures realistically depicted in the finest Hellenistic—Roman manner. The story combines the real with the imaginary, for our initiate confronts a variety of personages, some of whom — satyrs, a winged female brandishing a whip, and Dionysos (Bacchus) and his consort Ariadne — step directly from Greco-Roman mythology. None of the
Figures are labeled, and surviving texts say nothing about these scenes. As a result, the precise meaning of the images and their presence in this country villa remain unexplained.
The Third Style of wall painting, the “ornamental” style, down plays architecture and instead emphasizes two-dimensional framed spaces, sometimes with small panels inserted in the large fields as if they were paintings hung separately on the walls. The frames themselves can be highly decorative. This style appears in Rome during the reign of Augustus and continued in use at Pompeii until the earthquake of 62. In the final years of the city, the Fourth Style held sway. This style combines characteristics of the two previous styles, by featuring large paintings of three-dimensional architecture and figures set inside complex frames. It is this style that has a prominent place in the House of the Vettii.
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