Roman villa

ARoman villawas typically afarmhouseorcountry housein the territory of theRoman Republicand theRoman Empire,sometimes reaching extravagant proportions.

Nevertheless, the term "Roman villa" generally covers buildings with the common features of being extra-urban (i.e. located outside urban settlements, unlike thedomuswhich was inside them) and residential, with accommodation for the owner. The definition also changed with time: the earliest examples are mostly humble farmhouses in Italy, while from theRepublicanperiod a range of larger building types are included.^[1]

Typology and distribution[edit]

The present meaning of "villa" is partially based on the fairly numerous ancient Roman written sources and on archaeological remains, though many of these are poorly preserved.^[2]

The most detailed ancient text on the meaning of "villa" is byVarro^[3](116–27 BC) dating from the end of the Republican period, which is used for most modern considerations.^[4]But Roman authors (e.g.Columella^[5][4-70 AD],Cato the Elder^[6][234-149 BC]) wrote in different times, with different objectives and for aristocratic readers and hence had specific interpretations ofvilla.^[7]

The Romans built many kinds of villas and any country house with some decorative features in the Roman style may be called a "villa" by modern scholars.^[8]^[9]

Two kinds of villas were generally described:

thevilla urbana(e.g. Pliny's villa atLaurentum),^[10]orvilla suburbana(according to Columella^[11]), an estate with little or no agriculture situated in the country, in the suburbs of a town or within close vicinity to a city; and
thevilla rustica(Pliny's villain Tuscis),^[12]afarmhouseestate usually associated with small-scale agriculture or viticulture.^[13]^[14]

Other examples ofvillae urbanaewere the middle and late Republican villas that encroached on theCampus Martius,at that time on the edge of Rome, the one at Rome'sParco della Musica^[15]or at Grottarossa in Rome, and those outside the city walls ofPompeiiwhich demonstrate the antiquity and heritage of thevilla urbanain Central Italy.^[16]

A third type of villa was a large commercial estate calledlatifundiumwhich produced and exported agricultural produce; such villas might lack luxuries (e.g. Cato) but many were very sumptuous (e.g. Varro).

The whole estate of a villa was also called apraedium,^[17]fundusor sometimes,rus.

Avilla rusticahad 2 or 3 parts:^[18]^[19]

pars urbana;residential part for the owner
pars rustica;service, farm personnel and livestock section run by avillicusor farm manager
sometimes a separatepars fructaria^[20]for production and storage of oil, wine, grain, grapes etc..

Under the Empire, manypatricianvillas were built on the coasts (villae maritimae^[21]) such as those on picturesque sites overlooking theBay of Napleslike theVilla of the PapyriatHerculaneum,or on the isle ofCapri,atCirceiiand atAntium.^{[citation needed]}Wealthy Romans also escaped the summer heat in the hills within easy reach ofRome,especially aroundFrascatiand including the imperialHadrian's Villa-palace atTivoli.Ciceroallegedly possessed no fewer than seven villas, the oldest of them, which he inherited, nearArpinumin Latium.Pliny the Youngerhad three or four which are well known from his descriptions.

By the 4th century, "villa" could simply connote an agricultural holding:Jerometranslated in theGospel of Mark(xiv, 32)chorion,describing the olive grove ofGethsemane,with villa, without an inference that there were any dwellings there at all.^[22]

Architecture of the villa complex[edit]

By the first century BC, the "classic" villa took many architectural forms, with many examples employing anatriumorperistylefor interior spaces open to light and air.

Villas were often furnished with heated bath suites (thermae) and many would have had under-floor heating known as thehypocaust.^[23]

Social history[edit]

The late Roman Republic witnessed an explosion of villa construction in central Italy (current regions of Toscana, Umbria, Lazio, and Campania), especially in the years following the dictatorship ofSulla(81 BC).^[24]

For example the villa atSettefinestrefrom the 1st century BC was the centre of one of thelatifundiainvolved in large-scale agricultural production inEtruria.^[25]

In the imperial period villas sometimes became quite palatial, such as the villas built on seaside slopes overlooking the Gulf of Naples atBaiaeand those atStabiaeand theVilla of the Papyriand its library atHerculaneumpreserved by the ashfall from the eruption ofMount Vesuviusin 79.

Areas within easy reach of Rome offered cool lodgings in the heat of summer.Hadrian's Villaat Tibur (Tivoli) was in an area popular with Romans of rank.Cicerohad several villas.Pliny the Youngerdescribed his villas in his letters. The Romans invented the seaside villa: a vignette in a frescoed wall at theHouse of Marcus Lucretius Fronto^[26]in Pompeii still shows a row of seafront villas, all with porticos along the front, some rising up in porticoed tiers to analtanaat the top that would catch a breeze.^[27]

Villas were centres of a variety of economic activity such as mining, pottery factories, or horse raising such as those found innorthwestern Gaul.^[28]Villas specialising in the seagoing export ofolive oiltoRoman legionsin Germany became a feature of the southern Iberian province ofHispania Baetica.^[29]

In some cases villas survived the fall of the Empire and into theEarly Middle Ages;large working villas were donated by aristocrats and territorial magnates to individual monks, often to become the nucleus of famousmonasteries.For example,Saint Benedictestablished a monastery in the ruins of a villa atSubiacothat had belonged toNero.^{[citation needed]}Around 590,Saint Eligiuswas born in a highly placed Gallo-Roman family at the 'villa' of Chaptelat nearLimoges,inAquitaine.^{[citation needed]}The abbey atStavelotwas founded ca 650 on the domain of a former villa nearLiègeand the abbey ofVézelayhad a similar founding.^{[citation needed]}As late as 698,Willibrordestablished an abbey at a Roman villa ofEchternach,inLuxembourgnearTrier,whichIrmina of Oeren,daughter ofDagobert II,king of theFranks,presented to him.^{[citation needed]}

Examples of Roman villas[edit]

Hadrian's Villain Tivoli, Italy
Villa Armira,near Ivaylovgrad, Bulgaria
Fishbourne Roman PalaceandBignor Roman Villain West Sussex, England
Lullingstone Roman Villain Kent, England
Villa Romana del Casalein Piazza Armerina, Sicily, Italy
Villa of the Quintilii,Rome, Italy
Chedworth Roman Villain Gloucestershire, England
Littlecote Roman Villain Wiltshire, England
Villa Rumana in Żejtun,Malta
Villa of the Mysteries,Pompeii
House of Menander,Pompeii
Pliny's Comedy and Tragedy villas,Lake Como,Italy
La Olmeda Roman Villa in Palencia, Spain
Roman Villa Borg,Germany
Gallo-Roman villa of Orbe-Boscéaz,Switzerland
Roman ruins of São Cucufate,Portugal

References[edit]

^"Roman domestic architecture (villa) (article)".Khan Academy.Retrieved2023-08-16.
^Eeva-Maria Viitanen: Locus Bonus – the relationship of the roman villa to its environment in thE vicinity of Rome. ISBN 978-952-10-6450-0 (PDF)http://ethesis.helsinki.i/ Helsinki University, 2010 p. 3
^Varro, de Rustica, 3,2,3–17
^Romizzi, L. 2001. Ville d’otium dell’Italia antica (II sec. a.C. – I sec. d.C.). Aucnus X. p 29–32
^Columella, de Re Rustica
^Cato, De Agri Cultura
^Laura Tedeschi. Ville romane tardoantiche della regione Marche, Master's thesis submitted to obtain the degree of Master in Archeology 2013-2014https:// academia.edu/19881526/Ville_romane_tardoantiche_della_regione_Marche
^Marzano, Annalisa. 2007. Roman Villas in Central Italy: A Social and Economic History. Leiden and Boston: Brill. p 3-5
^The Cambridge Ancient Historyvolume XIV. Late Antiquity: Empire and Successors A.D. 425-600. Edited by Averil Cameron, Bryan Ward-Perkins, and Michael Whitby. Cambridge University Press 2000.ISBN 978-0-521-32591-2.Part III East and West: Economy and Society. Chapter 12. Land, labour, and settlement, by Bryan Ward-Perkins. Page 333.
^Pliny epistulae 2.17
^Columella, 1.1.19
^Pliny epistulae 5.6
^"A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), VILLA".perseus.tufts.edu.Retrieved2023-08-16.
^"Roman domestic architecture (villa) (article)".Khan Academy.Retrieved2023-08-16.
^Andrea Carandini; Maria Teresa D'Alessio; Helga Di Giuseppe (2006).La fattoria e la villa dell'Auditorium nel quartiere Flaminio di Roma.L'ERMA di BRETSCHNEIDER.ISBN 978-88-8265-406-1.
^N. Terrenato, 2001, "The Auditorium site and the origins of the Roman villa",Journal of Roman Archaeology14, 5-32.
^Columella, 1.1.19
^Laura Tedeschi. Ville romane tardoantiche della regione Marche, Master's thesis submitted to obtain the degree of Master in Archeology 2013-2014https:// academia.edu/19881526/Ville_romane_tardoantiche_della_regione_Marchep 17
^Alexander G. McKay (1 May 1998).Houses, Villas, and Palaces in the Roman World.JHU Press. pp.246–.ISBN 978-0-8018-5904-5.
^Columella I.4 § 6
^Comelius Nepos, Atticus, 25.14.3.
^Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Gethsemane".Catholic Encyclopedia.New York: Robert Appleton Company.
^Jane Shuter (2004).Life in a Roman Villa.Heinemann Library. pp. 31–.ISBN 978-1-4034-5838-4.
^ Van Oyen, A. (2020). The Socio-Economics of Roman Storage: Agriculture, Trade, and Family (pp. 197–228). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108850216.010
^Andrea Carandini, M. Rossella Filippi, Settefinestre: una villa schiavistica nell'Etruria romana, 1985, Panini
^http://pompeiisites.org/en/archaeological-site/house-of-marco-lucretius-frontone/
^Veyne 1987 ill. p 152
^Dyson, Stephen L. (2003).The Roman Countryside.London: Gerald Duckworth and Company. pp. 49–53.ISBN 0-7156-3225-6.
^Numerous stampedamphorae,identifiable as from Baetica, have been found in Roman sites of northern Gaul.