Of the numerous works of art discovered in the course of the excavations the statues and large works of sculpture, whether in marble or bronze, are inferior to those found at Herculaneum, but some of the bronze statuettes are of exquisite workmanship, while the profusion of ornamental works and objects in bronze and the elegance of their design, as well as the finished beauty of their execution, are such as to excite the utmost admiration—more especially when it is considered that these are the casual results of the examination of a second-rate provincial town, which had, further, been ransacked for valuables (as Herculaneum had not) after the eruption of 79. The same impression is produced in a still higher degree by the paintings with which the walls of the private houses, as well as those of the temples and other public buildings, are adorned, and which are not merely of a decorative character, but in many instances present us with elaborate com positions of figures, historical and mythological scenes, as well as representations of the ordinary life and manners of the people, which are full of interest to us, though often of inferior artistic execution. It has until lately been the practice to remove these to the museum at Naples ; but the present tendency is to leave them (and even the movable objects found in the houses) in situ with all due precautions as to their preservation, which adds immensely to the interest of the houses; indeed, with the help of careful restoration, their original condition is in large meas ure reproduced. In some cases it has even been possible to recover the original arrangement of the garden beds, and to replant them accordingly, thus giving an appropriate framework to the statues, etc., with which the gardens were decorated, and which have been found in situ. The same character of elaborate decoration, guided almost uniformly by good taste and artistic feeling, is dis played in the mosaic pavements, which in all but the humbler class of houses frequently form the ornament of their floors.
One of these, in the House of the Faun, well known as the battle of Alexander, presents us with the most striking specimen of artistic composition that has been preserved to us from antiquity. The architecture of Pompeii presents in general a transitional character from the pure Greek style to that of the Roman Em pire. The temples (as already observed) have always the Roman peculiarity of being raised on a podium of considerable elevation ; and the same characteristic is found in most of the other public buildings. All the three orders of Greek architecture—the Doric, Ionic and Corinthian—are found freely employed in the various edifices of the city, but rarely in strict accordance with the rules of art in their proportions and details ; while the private houses naturally exhibit still more deviation and irregularity. In many of these indeed we find varieties in the ornamentation, and even in such leading features as the capitals of the columns, which remind one rather of the vagaries of mediaeval architecture than of the strict rules of Vitruvius or the regularity of Greek edifices.
One practice which is especially prevalent, so as to strike every casual visitor, and dates from the early years of the empire, is that of filling up the flutings of the columns for about one-third of their height with a thick coat of stucco, so as to give them the appearance of being smooth columns without flutings below. The architecture of Pompeii suffers from the inferior quality of the materials generally employed. No good building stone was at hand; and the public as well as private edifices were constructed either of volcanic tufa, or lava, or Sarno limestone, or brick (the latter only used for the corners of walls). In the private houses even the columns are mostly of brick, covered merely with a coat of stucco. Marble was sparingly employed.
These materials are used in several different styles of con struction belonging to the six different periods which Mau traces in the architectural history of Pompeii.
I. That of the Doric temple in the Foro Triangolare (6th cen tury B.c.) and an old column built into a house in Region vi., Insula 5; also of the older parts of the city walls—date uncertain (Sarno limestone and grey tufa).
2. That of the limestone atriums (outer walls of the houses of ashlar-work of Sarno limestone, inner walls with framework of limestone blocks, filled in with small pieces of limestone). Date before 200 B.C.
3. Grey tufa period ; ashlar masonry of tufa, coated with fine white stucco ; rubble work of lava. The artistic character is still Greek, and the period coincides with the first (incrustation) style of mural decoration, which (coming from Asia Minor or Greece perhaps by way of Sicily) aimed at the imitation in stucco of the appearance of a wall veneered with coloured marbles. No wall paintings exist, but there are often fine floor mosaics. To this be long a number of private houses (e.g., the House of the Faun), and the colonnade round the forum, the basilica, the temples of Apollo and Jupiter, the large theatre with the colonnades of the Foro Triangolare, and the barracks of the gladiators, the Stabian baths, the Palaestra, the exterior of the Porta Marina, and the interior of the other gates—all the public buildings indeed (ex cept the Doric temple mentioned under [1], which do not belong to the time of the Roman colony). Date, end of 2nd century B.c.
4. The "quasi-reticulate" period—walling faced with masonry not yet quite so regular as opus reticulatum, and with brick quoins, coinciding with the second period of decoration (the architectural, partly imitating marble like the first style, but without relief, and by colour only, and partly making use of architectural designs framing pictorial scenes, which are conceived as seen through openings). It is represented by the small theatre and the amphitheatre, the baths near the forum, the temple of Zeus Milichius, the Comitium and the original temple of Isis, but only a few private houses. This style probably owes much to Hellenistic theatrical decoration. Date, from 8o B.C. until nearly the end of the Republic.