Atrium, Gallo-Roman villa of Montmaurin · Wikimedia Commons

Montmaurin Gallo-Roman Villa

VillaGallia Aquitania · Montmaurin, Haute-Garonne, FranceBuilt 50 CE

About

Montmaurin grew from modest mid-1st-century-CE beginnings into one of the largest villas ever discovered in Gaul, its later footprint sprawling across 19 hectares with roughly 200 rooms fitted with marble, mosaics, glazed windows, and running water. Archaeologist Georges Fouet uncovered the site by chance in 1946. The estate's grandest phase developed gradually until about 350 CE, but its first-century core already stood as a working residence in 117 CE.

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.