CHIAVARI, Italy - The Quintili
brothers, Sextus Quintilius Maximus and Sextus Quintilius Condianus, held
Rome’s highest political office, that of Consul. In 151 BC. they decided to build on the
foundation of an old Hadrian era villa and create what would become the largest
and grandest residence Rome had ever seen.
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| The Ruins of the Villa Quintile |
The villa of the Quintili, and the
adjoining farming complex of Santa Maria Nova, covered such a large area along
the old Appian Way, that when it was first discovered centuries later, everyone
thought they had found another Rome, an older Rome. It had to be a town, they
reasoned, for no villa could be so expansive. They even named the archeological
site Vecchia Roma.
But it wasn’t another Rome. Needless
to say a villa of such extraordinary size and beauty did not go unnoticed by
the Gladiator Emperor Commodus Antonius. At his first opportunity he declared
the villa Imperial property and had the brothers arrested for treason and put
to death. And then he moved in.
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| The Cryptoporticus |
He made some changes to the villa
including a private bath complex fed by its own aqueduct, and a separate steam room for the Emperor's Pretorian guards. The a hippodrome, a racetrack
for horse and chariot racing may have been the work of the Qunitili brothers,
but most certainly it was the Emperor who had added an additional training area
for gladiators.
Today the villa and S. Maria Nova
are part of the Appia Antica archaeological park, and what was found in the
most recent excavation has set Rome and the Romans buzzing. It is a work of
extraordinary engineering, a semi-subterranean gallery or passageway whose
vaulting supports portico structures above ground, lit from openings at the top
of its arches. It’s called a cryptoporticus.
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| Montanus, The Retianius |
The cryptoporticus may be a simple
brick structure but it bears the marks of an extraordinary history. The walls,
which were 6 to 7 ft. high were covered with white marble with blue-green veins
pulled from the Algerian quarries of Hippo, and accented with strips of red
marble taken from ancient quarries in Greece
Two perfectly preserved black and
white mosaic floors were found, one depicting a gladiator named Montanus, a
retiarius with net and trident. The other floor design shows horses tied
together in pairs around a tree. The horses were for the fationes, the teams
that vied for victory during the chariot races that were held at the racetrack
of the villa.
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| Signatures of Slaves and Consuls |
But perhaps the most amazing part of this new
discovery is the secret stash of bricks that was found, carved with
the names of the consuls who ordered the work – Petino and Aproniano (123 BC).
Even more amazing is that above the names of the consuls there is a series of
dots clustered together like Morse code, which is how workers and slaves signed
the bricks on projects they worked on. Even though we can’t decipher what the
dots actually say, they do tell us that these men were there and created this
structure.
The archeological site houses
a museum with marble friezes and sculptures that once adorned the villa. You
can also visit the nympheum, a natural grotto where local nymphs were thought
to reside. There is also the hall of the tepidarium, a warm room which was the
first stop after working up a sweat in the palaestra or gym and the
frigidarium, the cold pool.
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| The Frigidarium |
Opening Hours
Open
every day from 9.00 to 16.30. Closed Mondays (except Easter Monday), 25
December, 1 January.
Saturdays,
Sundays and national holidays: entrance is also from Via Appia Antica, n° 290.
Tickets
Single
ticket valid 7 days at 3 sites: Baths of Caracalla, Villa of the Quintilii,
Mausoleum of Caecilia Metella.
Full
Price: € 6.00.
Reduced:
€ 3.00 for citizens of the European Union 18 to 25 European Union teachers.
Free:
Visitors 17 and under.
Copyright © 2016 Phyllis Macchioni
