Roman villa

“ For a radius of a thousand feet around the gate, we meet with the typical remains of a Roman villa of the first century,—porticoes, water tanks, and substructions, from the platform of which there is a lovely view over the wooded plains of the Tiber and the Anio, the city, and the hills of the Vatican, and of the Janiculum, which frame the panorama. The site is pleasant, secluded, and quiet, so that it well fulfilled the wish for a secretior latetra expressed by Nero in his hopeless condition. ”

“ We may struggle against the spell, telling ourselves that the scope and limits of the present volume will not permit of a glance at the villas of ancient Rome, but they insidiously steal upon us through those of the Renaissance. Particularly is this true of the Villa d'Este and the Villa Albani, magic gateways both leading directly into that earlier, and only real, Rome.
For, though separated by the gulf of many centuries from the villa of the Emperor Hadrian at Tivoli, they are virtually ante-chambers to that once magnificent palace. ”

“ They have christened our friend in the garden of Lucullus, the 'Venus de' Medici,' ignorant of the prouder name she bore, and they call the relief in that new villa, 'The Antinous of Cardinal Albani,' not knowing that the portrait and its original were alike, Faustina's."
Shall we, indulgent reader, on some fair, future day, led by the lure of old Rome, together revisit our loved villas and win the confidences of these marble men and women who smile on us so inscrutably, and yet with such all-compelling fascination? ”

“ The hotels which line the summit of the cliff conceal the remnants of great Roman villas. The Hotel Vittoria is built over one of the finest. On that spot, in 1855, were found the remains of a small theatre, destroyed to make the terrace of the hotel. The tunnel by which one goes down to the sea is the same by which the Roman lord of the mansion descended to his boat. Beneath the Hotel Sirena there are large chambers which once formed part of such another villa. I cannot tell how many other traces of old days may be left scooped out of the black rock. ”

“ Oftentimes labourers unexpectedly meet with the buried walls and beautiful tesselated pavements of an ancient Roman dwelling-place. A few years ago at Chedworth, near Cirencester, a ferret was lost, and had to be dug out of the rabbit burrow. In doing this some Roman tesserae were dug up; and when further excavations were made a noble Roman villa with numerous rooms, artistic pavements, hypocausts, baths, carvings, and many beautiful relics of Roman art were brought to light. Possibly you may be equally successful in your own village and neighbourhood. ”

“ But his face is wreathed with smiles, for he genuinely loves his two beautiful nieces, Lucrezia, Duchess of Urbino, and the gentle Leonora, who are his guests, and he loves his villa, whose beauties he is pointing out to them.
"You do not see the garden at its best," he cavils. "Wait till the roses garland the balustrades. It is too early yet to enjoy Tivoli; the frost may have left the ground but it lingers still in the pavements of this great palace. The halls are damp as vaults; we would have done well, my nieces, to have remained another month in Rome. ”

“ A double flight of white marble steps led from a green lawn to a noble terrace, the balustrades of which were elaborately carved, and had at regular intervals square pedestals bearing each an enormous porphyry vase filled with flowers that diffused a delicious aroma. From the architecture of the villa, a large square mansion with wings, which rose from the plateau of this stately terrace, and by its Palladian style, many of the pediments, cornices, capitals, and especially the statues that adorned it, seemed to have been taken from the various Roman ruins in the vicinity. ”

“ As the young adventurer Brandilancia, who was to play the part of the true Essex, rode up the hill crowned by the Villa Medici he was struck by the resemblance of the massive retaining walls to those of some medieval fortress. As such they had served in ancient days, holding the villa safe in their protecting embrace from any uprising of the populace of Rome, while on the side toward the Campagna they had withstood more than one siege of the Goths. ”

“ A little off the Way, at the base of the hill, was discovered in 1867 a Roman villa, 215 situated thus (as at Walton Heath, at Colley Hill, at Bletchingly, as later on at Burham, or, to take a remote instance, as in the case of the Roman village on the Evenlode, or again, that at Bignor) not right on the road itself, but from a quarter to half a mile off it. So the heirs of the Roman owners, the feudal lords, built their manor-houses off the roads and led to them by short perpendicular ways and avenues such as you may still see approaching half the French chateaux to-day. ”

“ And, in fact, such mere vague traces and memorials as baths, bits of pavement, and dusty holes, with smouldering brick-basements, which people call "Roman villas,"—are not at all fitted, whatever would-be classicists may pretend, to stir up the strong tide of enthusiastic association. These are but miserable odds and ends of fragments, from which you can no more leap to the dignity and the grandeur of the Romans, than you could argue, never having seen a man, from finding a cast-away tooth-pick, up to the appearance and nature of the invisible owner. ”

“ Into this grotto one descends by a flight of nearly two hundred feet; he strolls among the ruins of the villa of Tiberius, where the very air is still vital and vocal with those strange and tragic chapters of Roman life. The Emperor Augustus first founded here palaces and aqueducts. Tiberius, who retired to Capri in the year 27 A.D., had his architects build twelve villas, in honor of the gods, the largest of these being for Jupiter and known as the Villa Jovis. ”

“ Snatch nature's graces from the hand of Time."
But it is the view afforded by the double arcade of loggias and by every window of the palace façade which was the crowning glory of the villa. The amethystine Sabine Hills and the immense Campagna encircle the Eternal City, from whose mists the dome of Saint Peter's seems to rise a buoyant, iridescent bubble.
It was Pirro Ligorio (architect also of the exquisite Villa Pia) who in 1545 accomplished the miracle of converting the savage cliff into a staircase of enchantment. ”

“ Allowing, however, that it should be nostra, it is quite impossible to extort from the fourth line any proof that the villa was 15 miles 200 paces from Rome. Translated verbatim, it is as follows:—“Furius, our (your) villa is not exposed or liable to the blasts of Auster or Favonius, or the sharp Boreas, or the Apeliot wind, but to fifteen thousand and two hundred—O horrible and pestilent wind!” Now, the question is, to what 15,000,200 is the villa exposed? (opposita) . Every commentator whom I have consulted, supplies sesterces, or other pieces of money ”

“ The heat is intense on these lava pavements; one keeps religiously to the shade. But Roman society is not rubbing its eyes,—at least, not in town,—for tout le monde is passing the annual villeggiatura at its villa in the hills or by the sea, economizing for the fashionable expenditure of the winter, and, incidentally, obliging the people who stay in town with that much more of elbow room on the Corso and other popular promenades. ”

“ Above all, there is a want of harmony between the landscape and its treatment. The baroque garden-architecture of Italy is not without charm, and even a touch of the grotesque has its attraction in the flat gardens of Lombardy or the sunny Euganeans; but the cypress-groves of the Villa d’Este are too solemn, and the Roman landscape is too august, to suffer the nearness of the trivial.
III
FRASCATI The most famous group of villas in the Roman country-side lies on the hill above Frascati. ”

“ The walls and ceilings of this villa are ornamented with paintings of very elegant design, all which have a relation to the uses of the apartments in which they are placed. In the middle of the garden there is a reservoir of water, surrounded by columns, and the ancient well still remains. Though we have many specimens of Roman glass in their drinking vessels, it has been doubted, whether they were acquainted with the use of it in the windows. Swinburne, however in describing Pompeii, says, ‘In the window of a bed-chamber some panes of glass are remaining. ”

“ It was built, as I have said, on some rocks jutting into the sea, just before coming to the Capo di Posilipo as you proceed from Naples. The earlier foundations were, I believe, originally Roman, and upon them a modern villa had been constructed in the eighteenth century, and to this again John had made important additions in the past two years. Looking down upon the sea from the windows of the villa, one could on calm days easily discern the remains of Roman piers and moles lying below the surface of the transparent water ”

“ It is impossible to speak too highly of the facilities afforded to strangers for seeing and enjoying everything, especially by the Roman nobility. The beautiful grounds of the Villa Borghese and the Villa Doria appear to be kept up at an enormous expense, solely for the use and pleasure of the public, and almost all the palaces and collections are thrown open on fixed days with unequalled liberality. ”

“ Private Houses.—The entire absence of the remains of the private houses of Rome, with the single exception of the house of Livia on the Palatine, would have left us with a very poor insight into their design were it not for the discovery of Pompeii (q.v.) and Herculaneum (q.v.) . The descriptions given by Pliny of the lavish extravagance in the Roman houses, and the employment of various Greek marbles in the shape of monolith columns and panelling of walls, are substantiated by those which are found in the Pantheon, in the palaces on the Palatine, and in Hadrian’s villa at Tivoli ”

“ Nature had given the villa its marvellous site and genius availed itself of all the resources of art and wealth to effect the wonder.
Cardinal Ippolito's orders to Ligorio were: "Surpass the work of Vignola in the villas of Caprarola and Lante. Restore the glory of Tivoli in the Augustan age."
Hydraulic Organ, Villa d'Este
Excavations in the neighbourhood were daily bringing to light masterpieces of classical sculpture, and for the "statues which whiten the shadow" of Villa d'Este, Ligorio was given carte blanche to despoil the gardens of Hadrian's palace. ”

“ Our next object is the Villa of Mæcenas, where the remains are more considerable than in any other, exhibiting, besides the usual substructions, part of a court surrounded by half columns and arches, and a long gallery, whence you command the valley below. The ancient Roman road passed under this villa, part of which was lately appropriated to a foundery for cannon, and an abundant stream of water still dashes through the deserted vaults. ”

“ But in the smaller villas the same plan of an open court, square, and built upon one, two, or more sides, prevailed. The walls were made of stone up to a certain height, when wood took the place of stone; the uprights were placed near together, and the interstices made air-tight and water-tight with clay and straw; the roof was of shingles or stone tiles. Wall paintings have been found everywhere, as we have already seen; the pavements were in many cases most elaborate mosaics.”
The construction of a villa for a wealthy Roman Briton is easy to be understood. ”

“ I am an historical painter by profession, and resided for some time in the family of a foreign prince, at his villa, about fifteen miles from Rome, among some of the most interesting scenery of Italy. It is situated on the heights of ancient Tusculum. In its neighborhood are the ruins of the villas of Cicero, Sulla, Lucullus, Rufinus, and other illustrious Romans, who sought refuge here occasionally, from their toils, in the bosom of a soft and luxurious repose. ”

“ The villa now belongs to the King, who has lodged his morganatic wife there. There is nothing so blissfully right in Rome, nothing more consummately consecrated to style. The grounds and gardens are immense, and the great rusty-red city wall stretches away behind them and makes the burden of the seven hills seem vast without making them seem small. There is everything--dusky avenues trimmed by the clippings of centuries, groves and dells and glades and glowing pastures and reedy fountains and great flowering meadows studded with enormous slanting pines. ”

“ The centuries have bestowed a certain pathetic beauty, they have also taken away much, and the sympathy which these ruined pleasure palaces evoke whets our curiosity to know what they were like in their heyday of joyous revelling.
If we run down the list of the nobler villas of Rome we will find that, with few exceptions, they were built by princes of the purple, and that the names they bear are not Roman but those of the ruling families of other Italian cities. ”

“ If he was not personally loud, however, he was deep, and during these closing days of the Roman May he knew a complacency that matched with slow irregular walks under the pines of the Villa Borghese, among the small sweet meadow-flowers and the mossy marbles. ”

“ You ascend by endless steps, and from the crowning belvedere on high you embrace all Rome at a glance as though by opening your arms you could seize it in its entirety. From the villa's dining-room, decorated with portraits of all the artists who have successfully sojourned there, and from the spacious peaceful library one beholds the same splendid, broad, all-conquering panorama, a panorama of unlimited ambition, whose infinite ought to set in the hearts of the young men dwelling there a determination to subjugate the world. ”