Emily Chan
For five years, archaeologists have been conducting excavations into Rome’s Palatine Hill. Recently, they discovered some stunning treasures when they were able to unearth an ornate banquet hall featuring a large, decorative, brightly colored wall mosaic. The room was part of an aristocratic mansion that was estimated to be 2,300-years-old.
The magnificent discovery was made just a few hundred feet from the area that was once regarded as the heart of Rome.
In ancient times, the city’s center was lined with important government buildings and major temples. It is believed that the sizable house belonged to an upper-class family of a Roman senator.
The banquet hall was a vaulted room shaped like a cave. With its lead pipes that carried water to fountains, the room was most likely used as a space for residents to stay cool during the summer months.
It seemed to have been constructed in several phases between the first and second century B.C.
The place where the banquet hall and mosaic were found was also the location of the famous granary, Horrea Aggrippiana, built by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa. Agrippa was the friend and son-in-law of Augustus, the first Roman emperor.
Agrippa had the grain-storing warehouses constructed in 33 B.C., but archaeologists think the palatial home was erected about a century earlier in Rome’s Late Republican period.
During that era, the northwestern part of the Palatine Hill was reserved for the residences of political families.
The intricate and exceptionally well-preserved mosaic is studded with mother of pearl, seashells, coral, stones, shards of precious glass, flecks of marble, and Egyptian blue tile arranged in a style of art known as “rustic.”
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