House of Sallust

When the house was considered fully cleared in 1809, work turned to reproducing the remains and surviving frescoes with paintings and drawings.

[6] The treatment of the entrances to the tablinum and the alae, with pilasters joined by projecting entablatures, the severe and simple decoration, and the admission of light through the compluvium increased the apparent height of the room and gave it an aspect of dignity and reserve.

[7] Although emphasis on the vista from the front door to the tablinum on to the garden began to diminish in other atrium houses in the 1st century CE, this was not the case here.

[4] The Republican atrium-tablinum-peristyle matrix remained in place in the House of Sallust despite its conversion to a primarily public establishment, so patron-client relationships may have persisted for its owner into the early Empire.

On the left and right, two assistants dressed in white tunics with narrow red stripes pour a liquid from drinking horns into paterae.

Only a small part of the atrium's once sumptuous decoration, that included dentil cornices and fluted pilasters that framed the alae and tablinum, survived.

[8] Examinations between 1817 and 1902, (See 1902 floor plan above) attributed additional rooms to the lower right corner of the house including a caupona, a Roman tavern equipped with dolia to serve hot food.

[7] In the lower left corner of the structure, later archaeologists identified a bakery complex with a millroom with three mills, labeled (6) on the 1902 plan, with a stairway to an upper floor, an oven (7), a kneading room (8), and a kitchen (9).