La Domus tardoantica: forme e rappresentazioni dello spazio domestico nelle citta del Mediterraneo (review)

This reworked doctoral dissertation from the Department of Archaeology, University of Bologna, brings together an important set of materials not collected elsewhere, i.e., domestic architecture from the fourth to seventh centuries in the Mediterranean world, long neglected, as the author notes, because of the undue attention given to church architecture and a general assumption about artistic decline in this period. The first 115 pages of the book contain a general discussion of architectural features; the rest consists of a structural list of forty-one architectural features, a bibliography, an index, sixteen color plates, and an extensive catalog (205 pages) of plans and descriptions of the surviving evidence for domestic architecture (listed in alphabetical order) from throughout the Mediterranean world.

The inclusion of palaces under the rubric of "domestic" allows for a consideration of monumental architecture in this work, but the difference between the palatium and the aristocratic domus is very difficult if not impossible to define since there is architectural and decorative continuity from one to the other. The assumption of artistic decline during this period, an assumption the author does not share, results from the practice of studying individual elements, i.e., mosaic pavements, out of context. Nonethelsss, there are some definite shifts in design. The italic atrium has disappeared by the beginning of this period, but the peristyle remains until the middle of the sixth century. New forms evolve in the late third and early fourth centuries in both royal courts and aristocratic houses, employing courts as centers of discrete sections of houses which are connected to each other and used for various purposes. The Palatine complex at Rome and the villa at Piazza Armerina are good examples. Diocletian's palace at Spalato, built on the model of a military fort with four equal parts, still has within it the same complexity of arrangement. There is some indication that from the founding of Constantinople in the early fourth century, the new architecture of that city set the standard for the aristocracy all over the empire.

Sumptuous buildings with private areas and audience halls made for an increasing distance between the powerful and the populace and contributed to the sacralization of the reception area and the inclusion of private chapels in such houses. The basilical structure with apse appears in reception areas and audience halls in aristocratic houses at the same time that it is developing in church architecture. Even the Severan marble map of Rome from the early third century shows the development of this characteristic of apsed rooms with colonnades and niches in side walls. The entryway now becomes more ornamental and symbolic of the social status of the residents. The disappearance of the peristyle in late reconstructions gives way to multiple courtyards with different functions, indicating a change of lifestyle and social model. In later stages, surviving peristyles get closed off into a series of small rooms.

The reception room and dining area are often found together in apsidal, triapsidal, or even polyapsidal rooms for multiple configurations of dining in stibadium arrangements. Though the triapsidal structure is found as far back as the Villa Adriana in the early second century, it is unusual until about two centuries later. In wealthy houses private baths multiply most probably for several reasons including Christian teaching to avoid public baths as the haunt of devils, a different Christian understanding of care of the body, and the breakdown of public bath services with greater dependence on private benefaction. The kitchen remains on the ground floor until the seventh century, when it is often put upstairs, perhaps for better aeration. Latrines often appear near the entrance of the house for the benefit of visitors.

The appearance of Christian symbols is problematic in the midst of continuing...