The Hermathena, a double-headed bust of Hermes and Athena, mentioned in the letters to Atticus, was probably placed in the Lyceum, for the phrase he uses there seems to refer to Apollo as the patron of the gymnasium, in which it was placed. There were also some Hermæ of Pentelic marble, bronze busts, and Megarian statues placed in the gymnasia, and Atticus had a general commission to buy up anything which he might think suitable for these rooms.
Another part of the villa was called the atriolum. Nibby has shown from one of the letters to Quintus that the atriolum of a villa was a small courtyard surrounded with bedchambers and offices. The Tusculan atriolum was decorated with stucco reliefs on the walls, like those in the tombs on the Latin Road.
(C) GABII AND PRÆNESTE.
Tomb of Atta.
Villa Gordiana.
The road to Gabii and Præneste leaves Rome at the Porta Maggiore. The most conspicuous ruin, which it passes at about one mile from the walls of Rome, is a very large circular sepulchral monument more than a hundred feet in diameter, to which the name of Quintus Atta has been attached. Beyond this, at a distance of two miles and a half from Rome, we come to the remains of a vast villa, which has been identified with that spoken of by Julius Capitolinus in his history of the Gordian family. That historian says that their “country house was situated on the road to Præneste, and was remarkable for the magnificence of a portico with four ranges of columns, fifty of which were of Carystian, fifty of Claudian, fifty of Synnadan and fifty of Numidian marble. There were also three basilicas in it, each of a hundred feet in length, and other buildings of corresponding size, in particular some Thermæ more magnificent than any others in the world except those at Rome.” The ruins of this great imperial villa extend for nearly a mile along the road, consisting chiefly of some huge reservoirs for water, two spacious halls belonging to the Thermæ, a round temple or Heroon, and a stadium surrounded with arcades. The style of construction in most of these is the irregular brickwork with thick layers of mortar which is known to be characteristic of the third century. Gordian III. was killed in A.D. 244. The great reservoirs are close to the road, two on the left and two on the right-hand side, beyond the depression in which the stream called Acqua Bollicante runs, where the ground rises towards the hill of Torre de’ Schiavi. Some of them appear to be of an earlier date than the reigns of the Gordians, and are referred by Nibby to the Antonine epoch. The brickwork of these last is more regular, and they contain a good deal of reticulated work and layers of squared tufa stones. The two large halls which belonged to the Thermæ are to the east of the reservoirs. One of them was a spacious octagonal building with round windows. It was occupied as a fortress or watch-tower in the middle ages, and has been repaired in the style called Saracenesca. In the walls of this may be seen the earliest instances of a mode of construction afterwards, as in the Circus of Maxentius, very common, the introduction of jars of terra-cotta in the walls to make the work lighter. The interior is ornamented with niches alternately square and circular headed, and retaining some of their ancient stucco decorations.
The other hall of the Thermæ stands not far off, and is circular with a domed roof.
The Heroon, or circular temple, of which mention has been made, is similar to that near the Circus of Maxentius. The diameter of this is fifty-six feet, and it was lighted by four large round windows. The front was turned towards the road according to the rule laid down by the architect Vitruvius. Underneath, there is a crypt supported by a massive round pillar, and containing six niches. In this, Nibby thinks that the ashes of the dead were placed, as their statues were in the temple above, and that the building was the Heroon of the reigning family. In the middle ages this Heroon was used as a church, and some of the paintings then introduced are still visible on the interior walls. Not far from the Heroon are the ruins of the arcades which surrounded the stadium and bounded the domain of the villa on the east side.
Torre Pignatara.
In this district, but along the ancient Via Labicana which runs in the direction of Frascati, stands the conspicuous tower now called Torre Pignatara from its construction with pigne or earthen pots. It surmounts a large circular hall and a catacomb to which the titles of S. Helena’s Mausoleum and the Chapels of SS. Peter and Marcellinus have been given, but the real history of the building is unknown.
Ponte di Nono.