page_title: House of the Prince of Naples
section_title: Late 2nd century BCE
hierarchical_section_title: House of the Prince of Naples / Construction chronology / Late 2nd century BCE
caption_attribution_description: English: Atrium of the House of the Prince of Naples in Pompeii watercolor by Luigi Bazzani. Italiano: Atrium nella casa del Principe di Napoli a Pompei; acquerello di Luigi Bazzani.
context_page_description: The House of the Prince of Naples is a Roman townhouse located in Region VI, Insula XV, entrances 7 and 8 in the archaeological site of Pompeii near Naples, Italy. The structure is so named because the Prince and Princess of Naples Joseph Bonapartes grandson Louis Joseph and his wife Laura, attended a ceremonial excavation of selected rooms there on March 22, 1898. The house is painted throughout in the Pompeian Fourth Style and is valued by scholars because its decoration is all of a single style and single period, unlike many surviving Roman structures that are found to be a hodgepodge of styles from different periods.
context_section_description: During the late 2nd century BCE, Pompeii experienced a major population expansion and the insulae of Region VI became dotted with establishments engaged in urban commerce. Furthermore, the upper floor of this structure, demolished in the 1970s, above (a), (b), (c) (e), (f), (i),(k) and (l) is thought to have contained rooms that were possibly rented out as apartments.
  German archaeologists date the construction of the impluvium to the early 1st century BCE in part because of the surrounding floor pavement of punteggiato regolare, a signinum featuring spaced travertine tesserae used widely in Pompeii beginning about 100 BCE. This improvement is thought to have been part of an overall renovation of the northern portion of the structure at that time.
  This activity may have been initiated to repair widespread damage and reflect a possible change of ownership that coincided with the aftermath of the Social War.  Pompeii was one of the Campanian cities that rebelled against Rome in this conflict.  In 89, BCE, the general, and later dictator, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, laid siege to Pompeii, bombarding Region VI's Porta Ercolano with his artillery, as evidenced by impact craters from thousands of sling bullets and ballistae bolts still visible on the ancient city wall.
  The nearly 4 foot-square impluvium is slightly south of the entrance axis to make it parallel to the room's south wall.  A large marble table (cartibulum) supported by winged griffins found at the site has been placed at the impluvium's west edge since 1977.
  The off-centered axis of the impluvium served to focus the attention of visitors to the left side of the atrium where doorways to public reception rooms were located.  This differentiation of space also guided attention away from the dimly illuminated utility areas of the house positioned in the right half of the atrium, the undecorated cubiculum of the ostiarius (a), with narrow stairs possibly leading to slave quarters on the upper floor, and the undecorated kitchen, latrine, and pantry (g) and (h).  The pantry or storage room could have also been used as an eating area for the household slaves as well.
  This off-centered arrangement reflects the influence of Greek architectural designs of Hellenistic  houses and palaces where visiting males were purposefully directed away from female-inhabited interior spaces.  But, where the Greeks used the arrangement to create privacy, the Romans used it to contrast space for invited as opposed to uninvited visitors.
caption: Atrium of the House of the Prince of Naples in Pompeii watercolor, 1898, by Luigi Bazzani
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