The gleaming beasts of the Céii house roar again.
Located in the center of Pompeii, the house attributed - according to the electoral graffiti found on its facade - to the magistrate Lucius Ceius Secundus, regains the exotic brilliance of its beautiful wild fresco.
At the center of a meticulous intervention carried out since September, the few sections of the walls in question have revealed to the lasers and brushes of the team of restorers of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, all the original liveliness of the colors and shapes that had appeared. slowly faded over time.
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Located at the back of the house, in front of a small garden, the decoration of these frescoes played with the vegetal character of this space by displaying an idyllic and rural ornamentation which echoed the nature of the place.
By a play of perspective specific to the latest Pompeian styles, the trompe-l'oeil staging of the panels opened onto false painted landscapes, here populated by clusters of animals chased in an evocation of Egyptian nature.
The presence of hippos and crocodiles bathing in a delta on the side walls of the fresco attests to the nilotic situation of these scenes, also inhabited by wild beasts and Pygmies which, according to the ancients, existed in remote parts of Africa. .
1/5 - The main fresco, before the restoration.
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali e per il Turismo / Parco Archeologico di Pompei / Luigi Spina
2/5 - The main fresco, after the restoration.
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali e per il Turismo / Parco Archeologico di Pompei / Luigi Spina
3/5 - Detail of the hunting of animals.
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali e per il Turismo / Parco Archeologico di Pompei / Luigi Spina
4/5 - Detail of the pygmies.
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali e per il Turismo / Parco Archeologico di Pompei / Luigi Spina
5/5 - Detail of an attacking beast.
Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali e per il Turismo / Parco Archeologico di Pompei / Luigi Spina
"What makes the fresco so special is that it is complete - which is rare for such a large fresco in Pompeii,"
Massimo Osanna told The
Times
.
According to the outgoing director of the archaeological site, one could find a sacred motif in the exoticism of this luxurious ornamental program.
“The exotic, religious theme of the paintings testified to a link and a specific interest that the owner of the domus had for the Egyptian world and for the cult of Isis, present in Pompeii in the last years of the life of the city because of a very influential college in the city, ”
he told CNN.
Pompeii housed in fact in the 1st century AD.
AD a temple dedicated to Isis, whose cult had become quite popular when the city was buried by the ashes of Vesuvius in 79 AD.
J.-C .. Located in front of the house of Menander, the residence of Céii is indeed not very far from the site where the sanctuary in question was, at a time when the oriental cults - like Mithraism or Christianity - fruitfully spread throughout the Roman world.
Unearthed by archaeologists in 1913-1914, the Céii house is one of the oldest residences in Pompeii since it was built by the Samnites in the 2nd century BC.
AD, even before the city came under Roman rule.
Its frescoes are completely Roman and typical of the 1st century AD.
AD;
Abandoned in often bad conditions, attacked by humidity, they had deteriorated severely in the course of the century following their discovery.
In addition to the restoration of the frescoes of the house, the teams of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii made sure to put in place new arrangements in order to preserve the site as much as possible from the ravages of time.