Surgeons House
About
This seaside house did not yet exist in 117 CE; builders raised it in the second half of the 2nd century, decades after Trajan's death. Its last owner was a doctor whose toolkit of over 150 surgical instruments survived a fire that destroyed the house in the mid-3rd century. Excavators uncovered the site in 1989 under a modern piazza. Its mosaics and bronze scalpels now sit inside a glass-walled archaeological park.
What happened here
The front door opens onto a corridor and then a roofed hall with a pool under an opening in the roof, and that hall is a public room — clients arrive at dawn to greet the owner, and the whole plan is arranged so they can be received and impressed. Behind it, a colonnaded garden with a dining room off it, three couches around a low table, guests reclining on the left elbow. Rooms are small, dark and multi-purpose; furniture is moved as needed. Walls are painted to open the space out with fake architecture and landscapes. Windows are shuttered rather than glazed. Cooking, laundry and the slaves' quarters are pushed to the edges. Street frontage is let out as shops, because it is too valuable to waste.
Sources
Nearby
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →