Vaise - House with the Xenia
Location
Garden
House with Pilasters (Clos du Verbe Incarné)
Keywords
- domusAAT:300005506
- porticoesAAT:300004145
- courtyards (uncovered spaces)AAT:300004095
- drainsAAT:300052564
Garden Description
Xenia were gifts of game, fish, poultry, fruits or vegetables given by a host to a guest to be cooked to the guest's liking. Here, the name comes from the discovery of a pinax (a painted ceramic tablet) showing xenia. This house was discovered during excavation of the southern sector of the Saint-Pierre land management zone (ZAC) in a suburban quarter of Lyon. The building –one hesitates whether to call it a suburban villa or a domus–extends over 630 square meters. There are traces of occupation of the site in Augustan times, but the house (29 x 24 m) was built in the reign of Tiberius. It is organized in two perpendicular wings around a courtyard with porticos in a U. The galleries are 3.5 meters wide. In this first phase, nine rooms were placed around the court.
The limit of the court on the west is not certain [phase II, 1]. As a hypothesis, an original court of 17.74 meters by 16.40 meters –nearly square but with an extra, sixth, span on the west –has been proposed. The columns, with a maximum diameter of 37 centimeters, were made of semi-circular bricks cemented and covered with white plaster. They rested on limestone bases roughly squared off. A little later, around the end of the reign of Claudius, the house underwent several changes. Room [10] was built, which enlarged the eastern wing. A new room [3] was created, important enough in the eyes of the proprietor to sacrifice part of one of the porticos to fit it in. In the same period, the spaces between the columns were partly closed, while the courtyard was connected to a water supply network. The paintings were freshened up, and the house doubtless had a second floor. In this last phase, however, the house did not last long. It was destroyed at the beginning of the reign of Vespasian, and the site then remained vacant at least until the middle of the fourth century and probably into the fifth. In this final, Claudian phase, the courtyard represented more than 57 percent of the area. It enjoyed running water, which was not present in the houses of the Verbe incarnéquarter in Lugdunumat the same period. A wooden pipe, of which only the negative imprint can be seen, crossed the courtyard and porticos obliquely. A drain from room [5] was connected to it. The basin of a fountain that has disappeared was placed on the axis of room [9]; it was definitely there in the second phase and possibly in the first, though that has not been demonstrated.
The ground of the central part of the courtyard was topsoil and earth coming from under the porticos. Three samples have been studied palynolocially. The results leave no doubt that a garden grew in the center. We quote the abstract of the publication. "The pollen content is relatively poor, and the counts have been made for each sample separately. The spectrum of pollens includes a rather wide diversity of herbaceous plants of which certain families can include ornamental plants such as the tubuliflorous composites and the Caryophyllaceae (pink family). Ruderal plants, that is, those that grow in sites much transformed by man such as clearings or waste places near habitations, predominate: Chenopodiaceae (such as spinach, beets and their relatives –Tr.), gramineous plants, and the following genera: nettles, arnois (artemesia, tarragon –Tr.), and plantain (Plantago lanceolata). This last is often associated with the cultivation of cereals. There were also species of ferns. Walnuts (Juglans) and grapes (Vitis) may have been cultivated around the site. Finally, pine (Pinus) is relatively well represented, but the very high rate of pollenization of the pine and its capacity for dispersion of its pollens often lead to an over-representation of these species. Thus, this courtyard could have been cultivated as an ornamental garden." (E. Delaval et al., p. 89).
Maps
None Available
Plans
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Images
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Dates
Unspecified
Bibliography
- E. Delaval, C. Bellon, J. Chastel, E. Plassot, L. Tranoy, Vaise, un quartier de Lyon antique, Document d'archéologie en Rhône-Alpes n° 5, Lyon, 1995. E. Plassot, Le quartier Saint-Pierre, la maison aux xenia, p. 71-129. (worldcat)