House of the Figured Peristyle
About
A mosaic floor at this Pupput house painted an optical trick underfoot: the shadow cast by its own surrounding portico columns, ringed around a small lighthouse wishing sailors safe passage. Small private baths opened off its northeast corner. Archaeologists date the house to the 4th or 5th century AD, roughly three centuries after Trajan's death set this map's snapshot. Like its neighbors, it surfaced in 1960s rescue digs ahead of hotel development on the Hammamet coast.
What happened here
A working estate with a comfortable house attached, and the proportions vary with how rich the owner is and how often he visits. The farm side has presses for oil and wine, threshing floors, storage sunk into the ground, stables and quarters for the workforce. The residential side has baths, dining rooms sited for the view, mosaics, and a garden with water in it. A manager runs the place year-round and reports; the owner arrives for the vintage and for the summer. Produce goes to market or to the owner's town house, and the accounts are kept in detail. Some villas are pure retreat with no farm at all, built on a cliff or a lake specifically to be looked at from a boat.
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 →