roman villas a study in social structure

ROMAN VILLAS

ROMAN VILLAS

A Study in Social Structure

J.T. Smith

Drawings by A.T. Adams

London and New York

First published 1997by Routledge

11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2002.

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canadaby Routledge

29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001

© 1997 J.T. Smith

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted orreproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic,mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter

invented, including photocopying and recording, or in anyinformation storage or retrieval system, without permission in

writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Smith, J.T. (John Thomas), 1922–Roman villas : a study in social structure / J.T. Smith ; drawings by A.T. Adams.

p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 0-415-16719-1 (hc)1. Architecture, Domestic—Rome. 2. Architecture, Roman—Europe.

3. Architecture and society—Rome. I. Title.NA335.E85S65 1997

728 '.09376—dc21 97–248

ISBN 0-415-16719-1 (Print Edition)ISBN 0-203-00405-1 Master e-book ISBNISBN 0-203-22010-2 (Glassbook Format)

For Heather

vii

C O N T E N T S

List of figures xiiiPreface xxviEditorial notes on drawings xxixGlossary xxxList of abbreviations of locations xxxii

PART I: AIMS AND METHODS

1 Aims and scope of the book 3Plan typology: some objections 4The terminology of social structure 5The history of villa classification 6Villa architecture 9What is a villa and what is its name? 10A representative sample? 11

2 Methods and assumptions 13What constitutes a type? 13Origins of plan analysis 13Relevance of vernacular architecture studies 14The principle of alternate development 15Room use 15House plans and social structure 16Classical canons: symmetry and axiality 18Matters ignored 19

PART II: TYPES OF PLAN

3 Hall houses 23Stahl and Mayen 24Classification and its problems 26Layout and functions of the hall 26

— Contents —

viii

The hearth/entrance relation 29The off-centre hearth 29The lower end 30Broad halls with more than one hearth 31Narrow halls 32Single-ended halls 33The inner room subdivided 35Double-ended halls 35Aisled houses 36Ridge-post halls 37Wide-nave halls 40Nave and aisles of equal width 40Hall or yard? The case of Inzigkofen 41Hall and porticus unified: Sinsheim and Kingsweston 43Divided halls 43Halls: a summary 45

4 Row-type houses 46Introduction 46Interconnecting rooms: Newport (I.o.W.) and Lamargelle 47Newport enlarged: Sparsholt 49Lamargelle enlarged: Downton 49The size and forms of units 51Houses entered at one end 54The longitudinal lobby 56Longitudinal lobbies and reverse symmetry 57Houses with two front entrances 59Four-cell houses 60The compact row type 62

5 Developed forms of row-house 65Kirchberg: three-room and lobby units 65The elaboration of units: Laufen-Müschag 67Bierbach: how many units in a row-type villa? 68Lobby types 70Room proportions and their implications 75Articulation or separate rooms? 76Blocks of small rooms 77Transformation of lobbies 78The significance of disparate units 79

6 Developed forms of hall houses 80Narrow end rooms 80End rooms as byres? 82End rooms organised around lobbies 83End rooms: Inzigkofen and its analogues 86

— Contents —

ix

Disproportion between the ends of the hall 88Larger apartments: Bocholtz-Vlengendaal 89Other large end apartments: Kinheim 90Social significance of room groupings 91Development of wide-nave houses 93

7 Problematic house types 94Bondorf: small house or large yard? 94Other villas of Bondorf type 97The problem of function 99Ranges of end rooms in broad halls 100Yard rather than hall? 101The smallest row-houses? 102One-room buildings: houses or what? 105Double-depth plans 106Back-to-back houses 109The interpretation of double-depth plans 110The axial corridor 112The social basis of axial-corridor plans 114Back-to-back halls 115

8 The porticus-with-pavilions: pavilions 117Pavilions: the classic form 117Where was the pavilion entered? 119Asymmetrical pavilions 120Practical asymmetry: the case of Rothselberg 120Asymmetry as an expression of status 121Small difference, significant social implication 123Oblong pavilions 123Pavilions not rectangular 124Minimal pavilions 125Pavilions in row-type houses 126Detached wings or quasi-pavilions 128One storey or two? 128Conclusion 129

9 The porticus-with-pavilions: porticuses 130Open-ended porticuses: an expression of social structure 130Hierarchy in porticuses open at one end 132The ultimate open-ended porticus: Csucshegy 132Tapering and splayed porticuses 134Two households: symmetrical entrances 136Two households: porticus-with-pavilions front and rear 137Porticus functions: recreation 139Recreation: ghost pavilions 140The porticus as living-space 141

— Contents —

x

Porticuses as workplace: wide or continuous porticuses 142

10 The elements and forms of villa complexes 144Irregular yards 144Divided yards 149Courtyards of geometrical shapes 151Tapering yards 152Fan-shaped yards 156Sub-triangular courtyards 157Rhomboidal courtyards and the problem of Hambach 512 158Long rectangular courtyards 159Domestic courtyards and courtyard houses 162Parallel ranges and detached facades 166Linear villas 167Rectangular farmyards 171Conclusion 171

11 Palaces, peristyle houses and luxury villas 172Palaces 173Villas as seats of lordship 178Peristyle villas 183Luxury villas 190Formality and luxury 193Lordship or joint proprietorship? 195

12 The villas of south-east Europe 199Hall-type villas 199Square halls 201Row-houses 202Row-house equivalents 202Houses with one cross-wing 205Houses with multiple small rooms 207The ways of grouping buildings 208L-shaped plans 211Forms of courtyard and farmyard 212Rectilinear yards 213Courtyard villas and peristyles 214Fortified villas? 215Conclusion 216

PART III: THE VILLA SYSTEM IN OPERATION: MODES OF CHANGE

13 The late pre-Roman Iron Age background 219The evidence: limitations and problems 219Two-aisled houses: forms and distribution 220Two-aisled houses: interpretation 222

— Contents —

xi

Three-aisled houses 226Squarish and trapezoidal buildings 227Monospan oblong buildings 229Round-houses 230Complex houses 231Conclusion 232

14 Modes of Romanisation 233Native to Roman by easy stages: Rijswijk and St Lythans-Whitton 233Romanisation by luxury 238Houses built over boundaries 239Collingham and Radley: continuity or discontinuity? 243Built on ditches: Kaisersteinbruch and Rudston 249Removal to a new site 250Romanised courtyards and wooden buildings 250An implied first phase in timber? 252Building in stone: early halls 253Building in stone: round-house or round pavilion? 254

15 Patterns of villa development 257The open hall: its rise 257The open hall: its decline 261The aisled house 263The social development of a villa 264Sudeley-Spoonley Wood 268Change in a row-house: Great Weldon 270A stable villa population 271Prosperity without social change: Schupfart-Betberg 274

16 A model of development 275The hypothesis 275Before the Romans 277The emergence of villas 278The consolidation of settlements 279The diffusion of villa types 282Development of the villa system 284Social change in lls and yards 285Shrines as a unifying device 288Freestanding shrines and temples 291Why do large villas differ so much? 292The problem of a stable villa population 293Courtyards for kin or slaves? 295The emergence of hereditary lordship 300The end of the villa system 301Conclusion 301

— Contents —

xii

Notes 303Abbreviations of periodicals 324Bibliography 330List of villas and other sites mentioned 340Index 360

xiii

FIGURES

1 Stahl and related villas: 25Bargen im HegauKoerich-Goeblingen 1 [I], [II]Ludwigsburg-PflugfeldenMayen im Brasil III–VI, VIIISaaraltdorf [I], [II]ServilleStahl [I], [II]Tiefenbach

2 Halls with evidence of use: 27Bollendorf I, IIIBörstingenBruchsal-Ober Grombach AKonkenMamer-Gaschtbierg

3 British halls: 28(a) with evidence of useFarmington-Clear Cupboard I/FSomerton-Bradley Hill 1 ISomerton-Catsgore 2.1Somerton-Catsgore 2.5Stowey Sutton-Chew Park(b) othersByfieldLangton Dwelling House I, II, IIILaugharne-CwmbrwynNorth-Stainley-Castle Dykes [I], [II]Wraxall I/F

— List of Figures —

xiv

4 Halls used for stalling animals: 30Blieskastell-AltheimBöchweilerCrain

5 French hall houses: 32Brain-sur-AllonnesGrémeceySaint-Pierre-la-Garenne

6 Single- and double-ended halls: 34BrückenHeppenheimOverasseltQuinton IIRothselberg

7 Aisled buildings: 38–9(a) aisled housesCarisbrookeDenton IIEast GrimsteadExning-Landwade I, IIMansfield WoodhousePetersfield – StroudWest Blatchington(b) wide-nave hallHölstein(c) nave and aisles of equal widthWinkel-Seeb A II, VIWinkel-Seeb B I, IIB(d) ridge-post hallFishtoft

8 Halls open to porticus: 43Sigmaringen-SteinäckerSinsheim-Sinsheimer-Wald

9 Divided halls: 44Bad HomburgHeerlen-Boventse CaumerHouthem-VogelsangLaperrière-sur-SaôneSaint-Aubin-sur-MerVoerendaal-Ten Hove I


xv

10 Row-houses: 47Ditchley I/II, IIIDowntonLamargelle-VersingueNewport I.o.W.

11 The varied positions of lobbies: 51Brixworth I–IIICléry-sur-SommeEllesborough-TerrickFaversham IMansfield Woodhouse [I], [F]St Stephens-Park Street VIWelwyn-Lockleys I, II/III

12 Unit-system villas: 52Cenero-Murias de BelonoGargrave-Kirk Sink

13 Row-houses with two entrances: 53Hemel Hempstead-Gadebridge Park IIIMaulévrierNorth Cerney-The DitchesRomegoux-La Vergnée

14 Virtually identical units: 53Boos-Le Bois FlahautHérouville-Lébisey

15 End entrances: 54Farningham-Manor House IOrmalingen

16 Longitudinal lobbies: 56Eaton by TarporleyHuntsham NWellow

17 Reverse symmetry: 58Beadlam I, IIHigh Wycombe

18 Compact row houses: 61Civray-Le Poirier MoletHummetroth – row house equivalentLussas-et-NontronneauPrimelles-Champ Chiron


xvi

19 Lobbies and room groupings: 66Anthée, detailBierbachCartagena-El CastilletL’Ecluse LeckboschKüttigen-Kirchberg [I], [II]Laufen-Müschag [I], [F]

20 Lobbies and related forms: 71(a) longitudinal lobbies and elongated roomsHaccourt ILiestal-Munzach, detailPuig de CebollaVouneuil-sous-Biard(b) L-lobbiesFontoy-Moderwiese, aediculeNorth Leigh-Shakenoak B IIa/b, IIIaStadtbergen I(c) widened lobbyLa Roche-Maurice

21 Unit variations in row-houses: 78Les MesnulsSarmentsdorf

22 Halls with long end rooms: 81Courcelles-UrvilleGrenchen I–IIIMundelsheimWahlen

23 Halls with complex end blocks: 84BuchtenEveletteMaurenNuth-VaasradeRheinbach-FlerzheimTholey-Sotzweiler II/III

24 Halls with double-depth end blocks: 85Bocholtz-Vlengendaal [I], [F]Kinheim [F]Newel II, III, IV

25 Halls or yards? 96Alpnach-Dorf


xvii

Bad Rappenau-ZimmerhofBondorfEckartsbrunnMesskirchNiedereschach-Fischbach 3RemmingsheimSigmaringen-Laiz A

26 Halls with freestanding corner posts: 97BilsdorfLudwigsburg-Hoheneck

27 Halls with rear columns: 98Hechingen-Stein I, FInzigkofenNeckarzimmern-Stockbronner-HofSchambachStuttgart-Stammheim

28 Halls subdivided by timber partitions: 99Lörrach-Brombach

29 The smallest row houses: 103BouchoirDuryL’EtoileHarbonnièresKempten-Loja 1 IIKempten-Loja 2 I/II, IIINiedereschach-Fischbach 2Plouneventer-Kerilien IIRheinfelden-Herten-WarmbachVauxWancourt

30 One-room houses: 104Biberist-SpitalhofKoerich-Goeblingen 2 I–VMonreal I–IIIPin-IzelSontheim an der Brenz 2, I–V

31 Adjoining parallel ranges and back-to-back halls: 108–9(a) parallel rangesAmbresinBasse-Wavre [I], [F]


xviii

FrilfordGünzenheim-Staatsforst-SulzKernen-RommelshausenLendinMunzenberg-Gambach I/FVillers-Bretonneux(b) back-to-back hallWalsbetz-Hemerijk

32 Anomalous double-depth houses: 111AshteadFrankfurt-Bornheim

33 Houses with internal corridor or yard? 113Bad Dürkheim-UngsteinGeislingen-Heidegger HofHohenfelsMézières-en-Santerre/La Croix-Saint-JacquesNeuburg a.d. Donau

34 Pavilion details: 122Bristol-Kingsweston, detailHüfingenStahl, detailTitelberg, aediculaWhittington

35 Minimal and quasi-pavilions: 126Langenau-OsterstettenStratford-upon-Avon-Tiddington

36 Terminal rooms: 127BachenauBeckingenBrighstone-RockBroichweidenRainecourt

37 Open-ended porticuses: 133Budapest III-CsúcshegyDémuinMainz-Kastel, aediculeShipham-Star II A

38 Tapering and splayed porticuses: 135Laufenburg


xix

39 Houses with two porticuses or two porches: 137(a) hallsDirlewangDoische-VodeléeHerschwerler-PettersheimManderscheid (and detail)(b) row-houseGayton Thorpe

40 Ghost pavilions and porticuses as living-space: 141Bergen-Auf-dem-KellerGreat StaughtonOvillers

41 Irregular and divided yards: 145–7(a) irregularLudwigsburg-Hoheneck I/II, IIIRegensburg-Burgweinting(b) divided yardsBruchsal-Ober GrombachEwhurst-RapsleyFriedberg-Pfingstweide, yard planFriedberg-Pfingstweide 1, 2Lauffen am NeckarMesskirchOlfermont

42 Yards not rectangular: 153–5(a) taperingCachyEcoust-Saint-MienNiederzier-Hambach 69Mansfield WoodhouseMayenLe Mesge(b) fan-shaped and sub-triangularDarenthHambleden-Yewden ManorRockbourne II–IV, VI, VIII(c) development of yardsBignor IIANorth Leigh I, IV, V

43 Rectangular courtyards: 160–1AthiesFliessem


xx

Hungen-BellersheimMarchelepotWarfusée-Nord, Abancourt

44 Rectangular courtyards with hints of rebuilding: 164–5Belleuse-les MureauxDavenescourtMarboué-MienneMarboué-Mienne, west rangeNorth WraxallSudeley-Spoonley WoodWiesbaden Höfchen

45 Parallel ranges and detached facades: 168–9Arradon-LodoLeutersdorf I–IIIOrton Longueville-Orton Hall FarmPlomelin-PerennouPulboroughWintertonWinterton G, I–III

46 Linear villas: 170Bocholtz-VlengendaalHalstock IIJemelle-NeufchâteauMaillen-al Sauvenière

47 Palaces: 174–5Budapest-AquincumBudapest III-Aquincum, officers’ lodgingsFishbourne PalaceFishbourne Palace, officers’ lodgingsRome, Flavian Palace, administrative partRome, Flavian Palace, general planWoodchester

48 Seats of lordship: 180–1Almenara de AdajaBadajoz-la Cocosa, general planBadajoz-la Cocosa, peristyleBignor, detailBignor, general planBoxNorth LeighRielves


xxi

49 Spanish peristyles: 184Cuevas de SoriaJumilla-Los CipresesSanta Colomba de Somoza

50 Lalonquette I–V 186–7

51 Montmaurin I, II 188

52 Luxurious formal villas: 192–3Graz-ThalerhofHaccourt IIMontrozier-Argentelle

53 Joint proprietorship – grandeur, not luxury: 196–7FliessemFliessem, detailFliessem, interpretationHaut Clocher-Saint Ulrich

54 End-entrance halls: 200BistricaBudakalászGyulafirátótMajdanTelita

55 Square halls: 201Bihác-Zalo�jeLisi�icí IIMali Mo�unjStolac 2

56 Row-house equivalents: 203Dra�evica I–IVKeszthely-Fenékpuszta 8Travnik-RankovicSarmizgetusaWinden am See II, III

57 Houses essentially of two cells: 205CincisFischamend-KatharinenhofMaria Ellend-Ellender WeingärtenSarajevo-StupSarica


xxii

58 Houses with one cross-wing: 206ProbojRegelsbrunnStolac 3Stolac 5

59 Houses with multiple small rooms: 207ApahidaCiumafaia [II]Keszthely-Fenékpuszta 7

60 Ways of grouping buildings: 210–11(a) linear plansIskar-GaraKonskaKralev Dol(b) block plansHobita-GradisteIzolaManerauNovi Saher(c) yardsHobita-GradisteKaisersteinbruch-Königshof C, DLisi�ici IIILju�inaOrlandovtsiPanik

61 Aisled buildings: 222(a) two-aisled or ring-postBeegdenEching-AutobahnHaps THaunstettenOss-UssenZijderveld(b) two-/three-aisledBefort-AleburgHeuneburgKönigsbrunnVerberie

62 Square buildings: 227(a) largerBraughing-Skeleton Green


xxiii

DaneburyHornchurchLandshut-Salmansberg(b) the smallest square housesCroft AmbreyMailhac-CaylaMartigues-L’ArquetThe Wrekin

63 Monospan halls: 229Babworth-Dunston’s ClumpKaalheide-KrichelbergNiederzier Hambach 59Radley-Barton Court Farm 3

64 Grouping of houses: 231DraughtonPilsdon PenSt Michael-GorhamburySigean-Pech-MahoVilleneuve-St-Germain

65 Stages of Romanisation: 235–7Barnsley Park, I, III, V/VI, VIIIHartfield-Garden Hill II–IVRijswijk IA–D, IIA–B, IIIA–BSt Lythans-Whitton I–VI, VIII

66 Building over boundaries: 242–3Aylesford-Eccles ICondé-Folie I, IIKingsweston, BristolLaugharne-CwmbrwynMarshfield II, IIIBUplyme-Holcombe IIA

67 Building along or over ditches: 244–5Hamblain-les-PrésHemel Hempstead-Gadebridge ParkJublains-La BoissièreKaisersteinbruch-KönigshofMilton Keynes-Bancroft II, VRudston

68 Problems of continuity: 246–8(a) discontinuity?


xxiv

Collingham-Dalton ParloursRadley-Barton Court Farm I–III(b) moving to a new sitePort-le-GrandSparsholt I–III(c) timber predecessors of stone housesBedburg-GarsdorfBellikonBözenHemel Hempstead-Boxmoor INeumagen-Dhron-PapiermühleOsterfingen I, II(d) the significance of round-housesManfield-Holme House II–IVRingstead I, II

69 Rise and decline of the open hall: 258–60(a) riseFrancolise-San Rocco I, IA(b) declineBad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler [I], [F]Bristol-Kingsweston [I], alternative [II]Bruckneudorf-Parndorf [I], [II], [F]Friedberg-Fladerlach [I], [III]Frocester Court I–III, alternative [II]Frocester Court, alternative IIGrauxMaidenhead-Cox Green, I, IIMehring I, FSchleitheimWeitersbach I, II

70 The social development of villas: 266–7Blankenheim IA, IIA, IIIAGreat Weldon I–IV, V/VISt Stephen-Park Street VII, VIIISudeley-Spoonley Wood

71 Social stability in villas: 272Köln-Mungersdorf I, II/III, VISchupfart-Betburg II, III

72 Second-phase enlargement: 280–1Leiwen-Bohnengarten I–IIINoyers-sur-Serein [II], [F]Winkel-Seeb, Switzerland


xxv

73 Diffusion of a type: 283Deva [I]Schaanwald, Grabungen ITholey-Sotzweiler I

74 Yards as indicators of social relations: 286–7BondorfChedworth IKatzenbachKoerich-GoeblingenKöngenPforzheim-HagenschiessSt-Germain-lès-CorbeilSontheim a.d. BrenzVierherrenborn-Irsch

75 Unit-system villas of the Late Empire: 294–5Anthée, main houseAylesford-Eccles [F]Köln-MungersdorfMilton Keynes-Bancroft VNorton Disney

76 Courtyards for kin or slaves? 296–8Anthée-yardAnthée, buildings 2, 3, 10, 15Levroux-TrégonceLiédenaLiestal-MunzachNoyers-sur-SereinOberentfelden

KEY TO FIGURES

� = certain doorway H = Hypocaust� = conjectured doorway he = hearthM = Mosaic

xxvi

PREFACE

This book is the culmination of an interest which began nearly fifty years ago whenthe late Sir Ian Richmond urged me, on the slender basis of attendance for twoweeks at his Corbridge training excavation, to accept an invitation from the thenMinistry of Works to dig the villa at Denton (Lincs.), at that time threatened byironstone mining. Parallel interests in the history of houses, which entailed study ofroom function and of timber construction, soon revealed problems hardly consideredhitherto by students of Roman Britain; and the potentially fruitful interaction of thethree strands of my life’s work, conducted at considerable intervals and at veryvarying intensity, has at last produced the ideas set out in the following chapters.

The approach here adopted, which is founded on the assumption that houseplans reflect accurately the relations within and between the various groups or classescomprising a society, gives rise to a difficulty of presentation. Few people engagedin these studies have analysed plans in any depth and consequently few are familiarwith more than a small proportion of villas in their own country – and here I refer tothe major countries, Britain, France and Germany; the point applies with less forcewhere there are fewer villas or where analytical gazetteers or summaries exist.Furthermore, hardly anyone has looked at plans from a functional standpoint, sothat points of that kind made about even the few villas reproduced internationally,such as Köln-Mungersdorf, Montmaurin or Welwyn-Lockleys, require illustration forthe present purpose. Because the approach is unfamiliar, all villa plans mentionedshould, ideally, be illustrated, and generous aid from several bodies has enabled aconsiderable proportion of them to be presented. Nevertheless, every reader willdeplore the omission of this or that plan, and to one and all I can only say that I havedone my best.

One hoped-for result of this work is the internationalisation of villa studies,something already done splendidly in a general way by John Percival’s The RomanVilla, but now in greater detail. Archaeologists presented with an unfamiliar kind ofpottery or brooch will scour excavation reports and museum catalogues for thewhole of the Empire until they find a parallel; it is time they did the same for villaplans. The attitude of many of them was summed up by a member of the regrettablyshort-lived Roman Villas Research Group who remarked to me: ‘I regard your functionin the Group as that of gadfly.’ I hope this book will secure my promotion, in theeyes of that person and others like-minded, to the status of hornet.

— Preface —

xxvii

A few words are necessary to explain how the book was written. As the collectionof villa plans proceeded, a thematic index of elements was compiled, commonlyaccompanied by very brief remarks scribbled – the word is used advisedly – on thephotocopy itself. No separate notes were made on individual sites. When a newelement was perceived, memory often brought to mind other examples whosesignificance had gone unnoticed, and from time to time the whole corpus of planswas combed for omissions. To interpret the many details in any one plan requiredrepeated examination over a long time and, since the text was written directly fromindex and plans, constantly taking new material into account, some inconsistencyarising from new ideas or changed opinions is inevitable. Even now, revision of thetext with all the plans would sometimes produce a better example to make a pointor permit interpretation of some overlooked feature.

A book with roots as distant as this demands numerous acknowledgements, someto persons long dead. Foremost among the latter are my former history tutor andfriend at Birmingham University, Philip Styles, an inspiring teacher to whom I owean awareness of the use of architecture as historical evidence; K.D.M. Dauncey, alsothen of Birmingham University, for a stimulating introduction to Roman Britain; SirIan Richmond, who provided an opportunity far beyond reasonable expectation;Gerald Dunning, who encouraged me at Denton and was invariably helpful in Romanmatters; and Edith Wightman, who sent offprints and drafts of articles and whosediscussion of villa problems was enlightening. Among the living I am indebted tothree people who, unlike so many scholars in the field, did not dismiss out of handearly outlines of my ideas. At the first presentation, to the Society of Antiquaries ofLondon, Rosamond Hanworth and Richard Reece gave immediate support and havecontinued their encouragement. In the discussion following the Antiquaries paperRichard remarked: ‘I think we may be seeing the beginning of a new way of lookingat villas.’ I hope the long-delayed result does not fall too far below that optimisticexpectation. After the second presentation, delivered at a conference at NottinghamUniversity, Malcolm Todd urged me to put into print, under his editorship, a paperwhich an eminent scholar had instantly dismissed as unbelievable (Todd 1978).Among others who since then have lent welcome support are Cary Carson (of ColonialWilliamsburg, but with academic roots in Roman Britain), Simon James, Martin Millett,John Percival and Tim Potter.

I have special reason to be grateful to Richard Reece for reading drafts of thewhole of Parts II and III, and to John Wilkes for reading certain chapters. AdrianHavercroft also read and commented extensively on a few chapters, and providedvaluable assistance in photocopying the whole of the text. Several other peoplehave helped me over the years through discussion, the exchange of letters and thegift of offprints, notably Roger Agache, V.H. Baumann, Ernest Black, Wolfgang Gaitzsch,Herman Hinz, Fridolin Reutti and Franz Schubert. I am profoundly grateful to afriend and former colleague in the Royal Commission, Allan Adams, who undertookall the drawings at short notice after an initial setback. Sarah Brown and AnneNeville laboured to remove inconsistencies and obscurities in a complicated textdrafted and revised over several years; I thank them warmly for their meticulouswork. Any defects and mistakes that remain in text and drawings alike are my soleresponsibility.

— Preface —

xxviii

Several foundations, institutions and libraries have aided my studies. On myretirement from the staff of the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments ofEngland, University College London very kindly conferred on me an HonoraryResearch Fellowship. The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars atWashington DC granted a six months’ Fellowship to write much of the first draft.During that time occurred the only public presentation of the essential ideas, towhich Professor A.G. McKay of McMaster University proved a kindly and helpfulrespondent. The Römisch-Germanisch Kommission at Frankfurt a.M. several timesprovided hospitality and access to an incomparable library of periodicals; I amespecially grateful to Dr Eckehart Schubert for assistance of many kinds. At differenttimes the British Academy awarded a personal research grant for travel and theLeverhulme Trust a Research Fellowship; and the Academy, the Marc Fitch Fund andthe Robert Kiln Charitable Trust all made generous grants towards the cost ofillustrations. The library of the Society of Antiquaries of London has been an invaluableresource; I thank two Librarians, John Hopkins and Bernard Nurse, and their staffsfor much help.

Other people too numerous to mention individually have provided information:some are thanked in notes; all, I hope, will accept this grateful acknowledgement oftheir help. Finally, I give most heartfelt thanks to my wife, Heather, for creating theconditions which made my work possible, for her interest in it over many years, andfor helping me through discouragements; without her assistance and understandingthis book would not have been finished.

xxix

EDITORIAL NOTES ONDRAWINGS

Names of villas are those of the commune, parish, etc., followed as necessary by thelocal name and by the country or an administrative division of a country. For Germanythe villa names given in RiBad-Württ, etc., are used, supplemented by reference toMüllers Grosses Deutsches Ortsbuch, 1982–3.

Phases of villas are shown in Roman numerals, e.g. I, II, . . . where they follow theexcavation report, and [I], [II], . . . where the phases represent the author’s opinion.[F] = final state.

A phase preceding the first Roman villa is designated [pre-I] except where asuccession of pre-Roman buildings follows the numerical sequence of the report.

Houses on villa sites are designated by compass points or, where the original reportis followed, by a number or letter, followed by a phase, e.g., Beadlam N I.

Rooms retain any numbers given in the report or are numbered following thesequence of letters, hence Blankenheim 33.

Drawings of houses are reproduced to a scale of 1:1000 except for a few particularlylarge ones which have a drawn scale.

Courtyards and farmyards are generally reproduced to a scale of 1:3000. Exceptionshave a drawn scale.

xxx

GLOSSARY

The following entries define only how terms are used in this book and may in someinstances be additional to the senses given in OED.Aisled house: combines domestic accommodation at one end with working spaceor a byre in the remainder.Anteroom: a larger lobby; a room in its own right giving access to a moreimportant one.Apartment: two or more rooms interpreted as forming a self-contained suite; analternative to unit.Cell: a spatial unit of the plan defined by load-bearing (usually external) walls andtransverse walls or partitions; the term takes no account of axial partitions.Corridor: a passage with rooms (one of which may be a porticus) on both sides.Courtyard plan: having buildings, not necessarily continuous, on three or foursides of a large open yard.Cross-wing: see Wing.Farm: used as the equivalent of the German Ackergut, Gutshof, Herrenhof, Meierhofand the French exploitation.Farmer: used as the equivalent of Bauer, Grossbauer.Galerie-facade: see Porticus-with-pavilions.Houseful: all the persons, of whatever status, inhabiting a house, which may be asingle structure or comprise two or more structures.Household: a unit of consumption and reproduction corresponding to an elementary(or nuclear) family and its dependants, both relatives and servants.Hypocauston: a small hypocausted room heating adjoining rooms.Living-room: any room not serving a special purpose such as kitchen or dining-room; probably multi-purpose, providing for work, storage, eating and sleeping.Lobby: a room through which a larger one is entered; a means of approach withouta major function of its own.

Transverse lobby: a corridor closed at one end.Square (or small) lobby: a room about half the width of a cell in a row-house.

Pavilion (tour d’angle, Eckrisalit): a squarish room at the end of a porticus.Porch: a squarish room, commonly within a porticus, giving entry to a building.Porticus (galerie, Portikus): a neutral term for a comparatively narrow roofed

— Glossary —

xxxi

space adjoining an external elevation which in plan looks like and often is a passageor loggia but can function as a room or balcony.Porticus-with-pavilions: equivalent to Portikus-mit-Eckrisaliten, galerie-façade,maison à tours d’angles; intended to replace winged corridor.Representational room: assumed to have been used by a kin-group for feastswhich reinforced group solidarity and had a religious element, as demonstrated bythe presence of a shrine in the room (Newport) or in a smaller adjoining room(Kinheim); also an imposing room for ceremonies of mutual obligation, accompaniedby feasting, between a grandee and his dependants.Row-type house (Reihentyp, linear-aufgereihten Haus): comprises a series ofrooms, usually squarish, often interspersed with lobbies.Veranda (Laubengang): an open earthfast timber porticus.Villa: (1) the principal house(s) of a country estate or farm (= Herrensitz); (2) farm(Herrenhof, Meierhof, Gutshof).Wing: a long room or row of rooms assumed to be roofed at right-angles to and infront of the main range of a building.

Cross-wing: one roofed transversely to the end of a building.Winged corridor: see Porticus-with-pavilions.Workhall (Wirtschaftshalle): a domestic hall, presumed to be for either a familyforming part of a kin-group or farm servants, in which work, commonly smithing, isan important function.

xxxii

ABBREVIATIONS OF LOCATIONS

Aus. AustriaBad.-Württ. Baden-WürttembergBay. BayernBelg. BelgiumBerks. BerkshireBucks. BuckinghamshireBulg. BulgariaCambs. CambridgeshireFin. FinistèreGlam. GlamorganGlos. GloucestershireHants. HampshireHerefs. HerefordshireHerts. HertfordshireHung. HungaryI.o.W. Isle of WightLincs. LincolnshireLoire-Atl. Loire-AtlantiqueLux. LuxembourgNeth. NetherlandsNordrh.-Westf. Nordrhein-WestfalenNorthants. NorthamptonshireNotts. NottinghamshireOxon. OxfordshirePembs. PembrokeshirePyr.-Atl. Pyrénées-AtlantiquesPyr.-Or. Pyrénées-OrientalesRhld-Pf. Rheinland-PfalzRom. RomaniaSaarld SaarlandSeine-Mar. Seine-MaritimeSom. Somerset

— Abbreviations of Locations —

xxxiii

Staffs. StaffordshireSwitz. SwitzerlandWar. WarwickshireWilts. WiltshireYorks. YorkshireYugosl. Yugoslavia

PART I

AIMS AND METHODS

3

CHAPTER ONE

AIMS AND SCOPE OF THE BOOK

Anyone confronted with a new book on Roman villas must ask whether anythingnew can be said, given that two Empire-wide studies exist, one by A.G. McKay

of every kind of house and another by John Percival of the villa as a social andeconomic institution;1 and these are supplemented by innumerable regional surveys.Yet the question can be answered positively, for this book has an entirely differentpurpose and method.

Its primary aim is to classify and make intelligible the innumerable andextraordinarily varied villa plans excavated over the past two hundred years.Villas form a large body of evidence which at present is either misused or totallyneglected: a failure unwittingly revealed in Webster’s remark that ‘most villaexcavations have been very scrappily recorded . . . short of physical re-excavationthere is little that can be done significantly to increase our knowledge’.2 Thisunwarranted pessimism, founded in ignorance of the history of villa studies,provided a spur to prove the contrary.

A second aim, to understand the structure of rural society in the Roman Empire, was,like the first, limited initially to the provinces of north-west Europe. As villa plans werecollected for comparative purposes, it became apparent that sufficient resemblancesexisted over the whole length of the Empire from Wales to Bulgaria to make somecomment on social structure possible for those areas peripheral to the main theme.

The evidence is plentiful for Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Holland andSwitzerland, and in these countries sufficient sites have been dug to their lower levelsto establish broadly how villas developed in that large part of the Empire. Plans are notlacking for Spain, Austria and Hungary, although phases other than the latest haverarely been explored. The sparser evidence for Romania and the former Yugoslavia,taken overall, reveals a different pattern which, nevertheless, contains a few links withthat of the north-west provinces, and even Bulgarian villas have some connections.Brief enquiry into the villas of Italy and Greece suggested that they add little to thetheme, although the former country will certainly be enlightening when more villasare properly dug. Throughout, villas are dealt with by modern countries becauseneither villa types nor their modes of development are limited to particular provincesand consequently it is less tendentious as well as less demanding of geographicalknowledge of the Roman world if they are kept in a modern framework.

— Chapter One —

4

The analysis of ground plans, which will be described in the following chapter, isstrongly influenced by the study of medieval and early modern houses as it hasdeveloped in Britain during the past forty years. In that field, recognition of thestructural complexity of old houses arising from their successive adaptation andenlargement has led to a strong emphasis on forms of plan and has produced subtleways of determining and interpreting their development. In vernacular architecturethis has resulted in the establishment of a series of types characteristic of particularperiods and capable of correlation with social classes or groups; the intention is todevise a typology for the Roman Empire though without periodisation.

Links of this kind enable historians to add architecture to the sources forsocial history rather than using it as a mere backcloth to a narrative based ondocumentary and literary evidence; this is proving to be true of periods forwhich the written sources are far more abundant than they are for the RomanEmpire. Since the vast majority of villas can only be known through excavationreports, the application of the methods used in vernacular studies is limited tocertain kinds of inference and particularly to the recognition of plan types. In ahistorical period in which hardly more than the foundations of houses remainit may be hoped that an awareness of types will lead to more sophisticatedanalysis of villas, not only by historians interpreting them but also by thearchaeologists who dig them and who need hypotheses to test in the course ofexcavation.

PLAN TYPOLOGY: SOME OBJECTIONS

Plan, it has been asserted, is not the only determinant of a building’s historicalsignificance – which is self-evidently true – nor even the most important,3 which iscertainly untrue. It goes without saying that style, ornament and decoration havemuch to tell us about the social position of the person who commissioned a house,yet archaeologists rarely realise how closely their interpretation is bound up withplan; the study of mosaics, for example, which has been so largely concerned withdating, technique and schools of craftsmen, has a strong bearing on the uses andrelative importance of rooms and the understanding of how villas functioned. Littlewill be said about mosaics because I am not sure what the social as opposed to theiconographic significance of individual examples is, although their more obviousimplications are sometimes used to elucidate a plan.

An objection sometimes made to house typology as social history is that a richman might choose to build a comparatively small house or a poor man build beyondhis means, so invalidating any close correlation between size or form of house andsocial class. Clearly, exceptions to that rule did occur, and indeed an instance fromseventeenth-century England establishes the truth of the general proposition that aman’s wealth and social position and the size of his house were closely linked. Thusthe Nonconformist divine Richard Baxter records admiringly how his friend the LordChief Justice Sir Matthew Hale refused to conform to this social norm: ‘His garb andhouse and attendance so very mean and low . . . that he was herein the marvel of hisage.’ Roger North put a different gloss on this situation:

— Aims and Scope of the Book —

5

I shall not forgett a relation I heard the Duke of Beaufort make of the advice hiscountry-man the Chief Justice Hales gave him when he was building atBadmanton, to have but one door to his house, and that in the ey of hisordinary dining room, or study where he past his time. This shews how all menmeasure things by their owne education and circumstances, and expect othersshould governe their actions accordingly, tho farr from the like engagements.

North was in tune with his times, Baxter not, as one of Samuel Pepys’s observationsconfirms: ‘all men do blame him [Clarendon] for having built so great a house,till he had got a better estate’; this of the great Lord Chancellor, the dominantpolitical figure of the early Restoration period, to whose downfall pride in whatanother diarist called his ‘new built Palace’ contributed much.4 Exactly the sameattitudes governed building in every age prior to the late twentieth century. Ahouse was one of three kinds of display or conspicuous consumption, the othertwo being dress and entertainment (Baxter’s ‘garb’ and ‘attendance’), whichtogether provided the means whereby a man established his power and rank inthe eyes of his contemporaries.

THE TERMINOLOGY OF SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Whether the model of society proposed here finds acceptance or not, it can hardlybe doubted that something better than the present one is needed. Most scholars whohave studied villas have implicitly equated Roman society with their own as it was inthe heyday of the country house or château or Schloss about a hundred years ago. Itis a society dominated by landowners great and small operating a market in whichland is freely bought and sold without reference to any constraint of law and customand whose lives mirror those of late nineteenth-century country gentlemen. Beneaththem is a class of farmers whose more prosperous members aspire to the higherstatus of gentleman landowner, whilst the others are tenants;5 and an insular aberrationsees many British houses occupied by bailiffs with, below them, the ultimate absurdityof the cottager in the ‘cottage house’.

One notable proposal has been made to reform this inadequate framework. AFrench scholar has suggested that if reference is made to such categories as countryor manor house it should be systematic, using the whole range of terms describingthe houses of the society selected as analogous – implicitly, that of the EuropeanMiddle Ages or early modern period.6 The idea is attractive; the difficulty is to applyit. It assumes, first, that the later society is comparable in detail to its Roman predecessor,yet it cannot be taken for granted that such terms as manor house, farmhouse andcottage correspond to the social reality of Roman houses. Second and morefundamentally, it assumes that the structure of the medieval or early modern societyin question has been correctly understood from purely documentary evidence,something that, for England and Wales at least, is open to question.7 Even what isoften taken to be the perfectly neutral term ‘farmhouse’ has historical connotations:what kind of farmer do we envisage – a peasant farmer, a tenant analogous to ahusbandman or yeoman (and if so, on what terms), or a freeholder? These are only

— Chapter One —

6

the British problems; a German would interpret a farmhouse as a combined shelterfor family and animals. As far as possible the word ‘farmhouse’ will not be usedbelow and when it appears will have only the minimal sense of the dwelling placeof a person engaged in agriculture.

Any deductions about social structure rest on three principal categories of evidence.The first comprises classical texts: the problems of reconciling them with archaeologicalevidence have been encapsulated in the felicitous phrase ‘text-hindered archaeology’and are exemplified by the endless argument about the reliability of Julius Caesar’sdescription of British and Gaulish society. Inscriptions form a subdivision of thiscategory – a more reliable one but of limited scope. A second comprises the objectsfound in the course of excavation. Few illuminate the use of rooms, and the difficultyof interpreting them is illustrated by the contrast between fine objects, especiallythose connected with feasting or dress, and the simple houses in which they aresometimes found.8 The third is provided by villas or contemporary indigenous houses,all of them requiring interpretation.

My own view is that those house plans where the grouping and intercommunicationof rooms is known or can be inferred provide objective evidence of social organisation,showing how people actually lived and how social relations changed. It is a view basedon research over the past fifty years into Welsh and English houses. First, in 1942, certaingentry seats in west Wales were found to comprise three or more independent housesinstead of the one that would normally be expected. The existence of a seventeenth-century kin-group thus implied was taken up a decade later to account for the presencein some farmyards in south-east Wales of two houses. Subsequent fieldwork establishedthat the same phenomena are widespread in England at various social levels.9

Now joint habitation by kin-groups in these two countries at so late a date hadnever been suspected by historians despite intensive research, nor even by genealogistsworking in Wales where family and descent have been studied as keenly as anywhere.If house plans can produce surprises of this kind in a period incomparably betterdocumented than the Roman Empire at any time, their primacy as a source of socialinformation ought to be accepted over the uncertain weight of literary evidence; andthat is the line taken throughout this book.

THE HISTORY OF VILLA CLASSIFICATION

Most historians recognise that villas form a potentially important source ofinformation; the problem is how to use the material in bulk, rather than pickingout particular villas to make an impressionistic point. Classifying villas into typesmakes this possible, provided always that the typology has a definable social oreconomic significance. Thirty or more scholars in several countries have attemptedclassification and it might be expected that their cumulative efforts over more thana hundred years would by now have achieved a satisfactory conclusion. Far fromit, as a brief review will show.

Arcisse de Caumont appears to have been the first person to study villas as adistinct class of building, bringing together many French and English examples andrelating them to classical texts. Many were large and, since nobody could divide


7

them into structural phases, they were too diverse for types to be recognisable.German scholars took the first tentative steps in that direction, beginning with theenergetic first director of the Trier museum, Felix Hettner, who, in 1883, in thecourse of a wider survey, divided villas into two classes: those with an internalcourtyard, including Fliessem and most of the smaller villas; and the pleasure orluxury house (Lusthaus), such as Nennig and Oberweis. Hettner, though, like deCaumont, was hampered by treating complicated plans of large buildings – as manyvillas then known were – as a single building campaign.10

Towards the end of the nineteenth century the establishment of the Reichs-Limes-Kommission resulted in a number of villa excavations in the Roman frontier areas ofGermany which produced mostly simple, little-altered plans. Using four of them,Schumacher recognised a type defined by two common elements, a gallery or portico(Halle) and, behind it (following Hettner), an open yard flanked by rooms. A fewyears later Haverfield, summarising current knowledge of Roman Hampshire for theVictoria County History, coined the term ‘corridor house’ to denote a range of roomsjoined by a front corridor or portico. He also recognised a kind of rectangular buildingdivided internally by two rows of columns which, a few years later, was named byWard, not altogether happily, the basilican type. Otherwise Ward took over fromHaverfield ‘the ordinary or “corridor” type’ and the courtyard type of villa builtaround three or four sides of a large courtyard. Indigenous houses persisting in theRoman period he called ‘cottages’.11

Meanwhile, two more German scholars addressed the problem of villa typology.Anthes, seeking the origins of villas in Germany, found the direct Italian inspirationhe expected in the north-western provinces only in a peristyle ‘house’ at Caerwent –a building which subsequently elicited the qualification ‘if a private residence at all’.His almost incidental comment on the great villa of Haut Clocher-St Ulrich, that itwas of three distinct parts and gradual growth, was a key to progress not otherwiseused. Kropatscheck went further in the same ultimately sterile directions as Anthes,dealing with a large number of villas in neighbouring countries as well as Germanyand attempting to relate them all to Italian models and the writings of Vitruvius. In abrief summary of Ward’s book he rejected the idea of the basilican building in favourof an elongated internal yard gradually built over, thereby assimilating the type tothe many German villas then invariably interpreted, following Schumacher, as acourtyard with rooms on two or three sides and a gallery at the front.12

Kropatscheck’s article is the culmination of many years’ work in Germany, Englandand elsewhere. A decade later much of it was obsolete. The first step towards aclearer understanding came in 1918 with a remarkable book by the young Austrianart historian Karl Swoboda which proclaimed itself to be, not altogether accurately,about Roman and Romanesque palaces. This was the first study to embrace thewhole of the Roman Empire and its importance for the present purpose lies, first, inits singling out the porticus-with-pavilions (Portikus-mit-Eckrisaliten) as an architecturalfeature common to villas everywhere; and, second, in the recognition that this elementwas a display feature, at once a mark of status and a proclamation of Roman values.The second and even more important step was taken by a German archaeologist inwhom an incomparable knowledge of the architecture of the ancient world wasapplied to an understanding of the complexity of buildings and an interest in how

— Chapter One —

8

they functioned. Franz Oelmann’s mind is the keenest that has ever been applied tovillas and in his paper on the villa of Stahl and its analogues he achieved an astonishingfeat of pure typological study, one which transformed the subject in Germany andHolland. His analytical method is considered in detail below (Chapter 3, p. 24); by ithe established that what had been thought of as a yard behind the porticus was alarge hall. Within six years this hypothesis was fully confirmed by his own classicexcavation of the villa at Mayen.13 In these two publications Oelmann provided forthe first time a method of analysing villas and an effective way of using them asdocuments of social history.

A few years later Fremersdorf put the study of villas as agricultural enterprises ona firm footing at Köln-Mungersdorf with the total excavation of a house and itsoutbuildings; it was the culmination of a long-standing interest among his countrymenand marks the high point of German villa research. At the same time Paret, incomments on Remmingsheim and other villas, applied Oelmann’s ideas briefly butfailed to develop them systematically.14 No progress has since been made with typologyin Germany, although some brief remarks by Samesreuther suggest that the SecondWorld War deprived us of a scholar willing to tackle the fundamental problems ofvillas and keen to follow the lead given by Oelmann and Fremersdorf.15

Not that scholars elsewhere have done any better. In Britain Collingwood, awareof Swoboda’s book and the Mayen report, ignored their implications in producing apurely formal classification of no historical significance. Calling the porticus a corridorand the pavilions (Eckrisaliten) wings – both names misrepresent the architecturalform and function of these elements – he created two types, the bipartite corridorhouse with only a front corridor and the tripartite with one at the back as well.Courtyard and basilican houses he took over from Ward. Meanwhile, in France,Albert Grenier summarised Oelmann’s articles and also his earlier report on theBlankenheim villa. Awareness is one thing, understanding another: the two pagesreproducing the plans of Stahl and its analogues fail to grasp their significance andthe accompanying comments reflect Swoboda’s conclusions rather than Oelmann’s.Regrettably, neither Collingwood nor Grenier understood sufficiently the method sobrilliantly expounded by Oelmann to apply it themselves. That was left to de Maeyer,who analysed a few hall-type villas on the lines of Mayen, something he couldhardly avoid doing since the Belgian villa of Serville figured in the 1921 paper.16

Since 1945 several British archaeologists have endeavoured to improve theclassification of villas, confining their attentions to insular sites; the results aredeplorable. Nash-Williams’ schematic ‘evolution of the Roman villa-plan’ was futile.Hawkes, going flat contrary to Harmand’s view that modern terminology should beapplied consistently, misapplied the term ‘cottage’ at much the same time as Richmonddid in his revision of Collingwood. This was particularly depressing in the light ofRichmond’s keen understanding and appreciation of many other kinds of architecture,not only Roman, as is his failure to develop a few tentative remarks about hall-typevillas and their resemblance to those in Germany. Worse was to come. In the mid-1970s Branigan stepped smartly backwards in interpreting several British villas ashaving what he called intra-mural yards, a point he clinched without further argumentby reproducing several of the plans from which Oelmann had drawn precisely theopposite conclusion.17 No further attempt has been made to classify plans.


9

Europe outside Germany was more fortunate in these years. Drack, in assemblingall known plans of Swiss villas, coined the term ‘row type’ to describe what Britisharchaeologists call a corridor house, thereby recognising that the significant part of ahouse is what lies behind the façade. He applied Oelmann’s method, unargued, tovirtually all reasonably complete plans and, had the conclusions been published witha commentary, they would have had the impact they deserved and have affected forthe better the course of both Swiss and German villa research. Agache, who appears tohave been unaware of Oelmann’s Stahl article, analysed plans of villas in the Sommebasin comparatively, the first time anyone had done this from air photographs and notthe least noteworthy aspect of a very remarkable achievement.

This sunny picture had a dark side. The study of Spanish villas, many of themonly partially excavated, produced in typological terms one step forward and oneback. Maria Cruz Fernando Castro took the step forward in putting them into moreor less convincing groups. Three years earlier J.-G. Gorges had produced a pretentiousclassification which deserves to be widely known as an awful warning and whichmars an otherwise informative and well-organised book. Lumping together into onetable several typologies – those of Swoboda, Richmond, Grenier, Agache – andadding to them the notions, for they hardly amount to typologies, of E. Thomas, M.Biro and G.A. Mansuelli, then decorating the columns with schematic plans of varyingdegrees of improbability, Gorges produced a result best described in words onceapplied to a work of Latin scholarship: ‘What it most resembles is a magpie’s nest.’18

In the light of the author’s all too briefly expressed insights into the spatial organisationof peristyle villas he should have been equally independent in classifying plans.Elsewhere, Vasic failed to find types in Yugoslav villas; three authors commissionedto survey Germania and Gallia Belgica did no more than heap up materials; and withNikolov’s opinion that ‘no meaningful classification of villas is really possible’19

Webster’s know-nothing attitude finds its continental match.I would not be so scornful of some of these performances if Oelmann’s penetration

and insight had remained confined to the comparatively obscure 1921 paper, but mostemphatically they did not. For many years past no archaeologist concerned with villasanywhere can have failed to become aware of Mayen and, once the report is consulted(even via Grenier), the plans there reproduced from the earlier paper establish thatOelmann’s theoretical approach had that rare attribute, the power of prediction. Thiswas surely one of the greatest triumphs of typological reasoning and must have apowerful impact on anyone who reflects on its implications. Going back to that seminalarticle, which parallels the ways developed by architectural historians to interpretchurch and house plans alike, is an inspiration few have found.

VILLA ARCHITECTURE

It may be asked why so little attention is given in this book to the villa as architecture.The reason is simple: too little is known about the matter, for all that a large numberof drawn reconstructions have appeared in print. Those of Pannonian villas formwhat may be the largest group so far published; most are fantasy. At least onefamous reconstruction, Mylius’ of Blankenheim I, defies the specific evidence of

— Chapter One —

10

excavation adduced by Oelmann without, apparently, any realisation of the fact onthe part of those who have reproduced the drawing subsequently.20 Hardly anyreconstructions take account of the precise form of foundations, their authors takingrefuge in drawings which ignore problems of variation in width and construction. Asfor roofs, the appearance of the cladding, whether of tile, stone slates or thatch, isthe only aspect considered; how they were supported, who knows or cares? Indrawn reconstructions of timber buildings archaeologists have solved the problemof continuity from Roman to medieval many times: villa houses in Sussex, Franche-Comté or the Rhineland have exposed framing looking exactly like that of theirrespective sixteenth-century counterparts.

The current vogue in Britain is for villas of two or more storeys. So strongly is thisidea canvassed that in conversation one eminent Romano-British archaeologist offeredthe luxury villa of Oplontis on the Bay of Naples as reason for thinking that Britishvillas too might have had upper storeys. In fact, no evidence of an upper storey hasyet been found in any of the many villas of the province except over the odd roomand, indeed, not a scrap of positive evidence for the necessary staircase has beenfound anywhere except Spain, Italy and North Africa. The structure and appearanceof villas need much detailed study before generalisation for one country is possible,let alone Europe generally. For Britain some recent papers21 give hope that thesematters may one day be tackled with authority, but until then I prefer to stick to asubject on which it may be possible to make some progress.

If exclusion of every aspect of villas but the plan needs more justification thanthis, the reader should consider the crushing burdens further work would impose.22

To deal systematically with their topographical setting and the light it throws on theform of the buildings, or with their economic function – that is, to go beyond thevaluable generalisations made for so many parts of the Empire by Rostovtzeff, Percivaland many other writers – would require local research so detailed as to impose animpossible burden on an individual. Similarly, to relate them to particular kinds ofagricultural production may be thought important. Whether plans are much affectedby considerations of this kind, apart from the presence of animals in some part of thehouse or the ‘agricultural factory run by slaves’,23 is quite uncertain; the many corndriersalleged to have existed in British villas did not noticeably affect their planning,which can be explained on purely domestic lines. Storage of crops, notably wheaton the stalk, is a possibility suggested by early modern German and Dutch farmhousesbut one that does not seem to have left recognisable archaeological traces. Only inolive-growing regions have the presses required for production of the oil-modifiedhouse plans in a distinctive way and only a handful of the villas noticed below comeinto this category.

WHAT IS A VILLA AND WHAT IS ITS NAME?

Every effort has been made to discover villa plans. Villa in that context correspondsgenerally to Edith Wightman’s sensible definition: ‘all farms or country-houses builtat least partly in stone’.24 In the light of recent discoveries, though, even that may notbe quite wide enough. What do we call the group of rectangular timber buildings


11

laid out on three sides of a courtyard at Druten in Holland? This pre-eminentlyRoman form of planning is common in French and British villas and is quite unlikenative farmsteads. And what about those settlements acquiring the beginnings ofRoman buildings and manners such as Harting-Garden Hill or Barnsley Park IV,where bath buildings appear among round or rectangular timber structures? Theyhardly qualify even under Wightman’s broad definition and, since the main house isnot of stone, may be referred to, like Druten, as proto-villas. In the end it hardlymatters; an historical approach must treat pre-Roman and Roman buildings andsettlements as a continuum.

Even in the context of provincial-Roman societies the word ‘villa’ presentsdifficulties, meaning at different times the house of a farm or other establishment;the house and the adjoining buildings within an enclosure or courtyard; and theentire establishment, land and buildings. Here ‘villa’ is used principally in the secondsense and houses are called just that. Complete consistency of usage has certainlynot been achieved because so often the house is the only thing excavated on a villasite and it is hard to avoid referring to it simply as the villa of ——.

Then there is the question of nomenclature. How should a site be referred to: byits most localised name, that of the field or hill on which it stands, or by the name ofthe commune or parish? British archaeologists tend to prefer the first option and sothe reader is confronted with names like Spoonley Wood, Wadfield, Lockleys andDicket Mead, whose geographical location someone working at a distance – I havein mind an archaeologist working in the Danube delta – may find difficult to discover.The general rule, though, is that the city, commune or parish name prefaces the localone, hence that has been taken as the appropriate standard form.25 The advantagesof this system have been demonstrated in Roger Agache’s many publications on theSomme villas. It is useful, on seeing a plan of Warfusée-Sud (or -les Terres Noires)which is about 370 m long, to be reminded by the name that another villa almost aslarge, Warfusée-Nord (or -le Petit Chêne et le Chaufour), is not far away. That someparts of Britain may have been almost as densely covered with villas as the Sommebasin is now generally recognised, but for some British and all continental studentsof the subject the question will the more readily be called to mind by Sudeley-Spoonley Wood and Sudeley-Wadfield or Welwyn-Lockleys and Welwyn-Dicket Mead,not to mention the greater ease of finding where they are. Although the preciselocation of villas is not important for the present study, the occasional need to learnthe whereabouts of one in, for example, Germany, has brought an appreciation ofthe merits of continental nomenclature and awareness of the difficulties the Britishway of doing things must sometimes present to scholars in other countries.

A REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLE?

How firmly based is this work in terms of the numbers of villas considered? The totalnumber of plans reviewed is roughly 1,100, including some fragmentary and uncertainexamples. Many plans must have been overlooked but their involuntary omission isnot likely to have affected the conclusions drawn. Probably a reasonable proportionof the villa plans in every one of the various countries has been looked at, especially

— Chapter One —

12

those where a fairly recent descriptive catalogue of all known plans exists. Such areSpain and Portugal, Switzerland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary – more precisely, theprovince of Pannonia – and Holland, to which may be added a fifty-year-old workon Belgium and a more recent but unimportant catalogue for Luxembourg. ForAustria and former Yugoslavia it is hoped that a reasonable proportion has beenfound. These countries account for about a quarter of all the plans examined. Britain,Germany and France have more or less equal shares in the remainder, probably inascending order, although the difference – and it is only in the number of usableplans – is comparatively small. Regrettably, but hardly surprisingly in view of themagnitude of the task, no publications with plans and commentary cover thesecountries, although for the first two they exist in unpublished form. Britain now hasa comprehensive catalogue of all published and many probable, possible and doubtfulsites. For France the Carte archéologique de la Gaule is rapidly providingcomprehensive departmental lists, often accompanied by plans, and for northernGaul as a whole the situation is redeemed by a recent study dealing with the ruralsites of Late Antiquity.26

Every plan has been considered carefully, most several times. At first many wereunintelligible but, as understanding grew, the number put aside diminished untilmost of those now remaining are simply too fragmentary to make any sense of.Ideally a catalogue should list all plans examined, with a summary interpretation ofeach. Space prohibits that but a full list of all those mentioned, with the source ofeach plan, is appended (pp. 340–59).

How representative are they and what proportion do they form of the total numberof villas at present known to have existed? The second point could be calculatedlaboriously from the gazetteers accompanying more recent sheets of the InternationalMap of the Roman Empire. Only for Britain is it easy. The latest edition of the OrdnanceSurvey Map of Roman Britain lists 275 villas and 285 ‘other substantial buildings’, atotal of 560. Of these about 200, or rather more than a third, have plans sufficientlyintelligible to be assigned to one or other category of house plan, even if sometimesthe detail is obscure. It can reasonably be regarded as a representative sample of thewhole. There is little point in guessing the corresponding fraction of German villas;although certainly considerably smaller, it is probably large enough to berepresentative. France, with its innumerable villas, presents the real problem, especiallysouthern France, corresponding approximately to the provinces of Aquitania andNarbonnensis, to which can be added Spain and Portugal. In these countries bigvillas of great complexity are common and in Spain are the norm. Until several ofthem have been thoroughly explored down to the lowest levels the course of theirdevelopment will remain obscure; consequently their treatment in this book is boundto be unsatisfactory.

13

CHAPTER TWO

METHODS AND ASSUMPTIONS

WHAT CONSTITUTES A TYPE?

In dealing with so large a body of plans, hardly any two of which are alike in theirfinal form – and it is only the final form that is known in most instances – the first

requisite is to establish types and the second is to recognise that a typology is not aseries of pigeon-holes in which to place identical examples. Here experience in thevernacular field, where exactly the same problem has been faced, can offer a solution.It appears that English houses both great and small are usually the product of successivepartial rebuildings, with the frequent consequence that they do not conform closelyto a type but rather resemble it in the number and relative size of the various rooms:a consideration likely to apply to all domestic buildings that survive for a hundredyears or more. Viewed in these terms a house type is an aggregation of functions,largely inferred, which approximates to a particular form of plan; a latitude permittinghouses varying in detail to be grouped together, whether of several building phasesor only one.

ORIGINS OF PLAN ANALYSIS

An approach of this kind is implicit in Swoboda’s demonstration that the porticus –the architectural term he preferred to the earlier Halle and here used in its fairlygeneral Latin sense – was a standard form of architectural display added to manykinds of house plan. Oelmann developed this line of argument to different purposein relation to villas which have in the middle a sizeable space which was at that timeregarded as a yard.1 By stripping away rooms which appear to have been addedaround the central space or to intrude upon it he demonstrated that the middlespace must have been roofed and was therefore a hall.2 Now this is a mode ofreasoning applicable to any kind of villa, because what really matters in a house iswhat lies behind the formal front; and it follows that the expression of Romanculture, the porticus-with-pavilions, ought not to form part of a plan typology. Thepavilions (Eckrisaliten) themselves present more problems than a reading of theliterature might suggest, and they will be considered separately.3

— Chapter Two —

14

In his classic paper of 1921 Oelmann opened the way to a radical new approachto villas of all kinds, one in which the basic elements of facade, baths and corerooms (Kernbau) could be treated separately and more fruitfully, yet the methodcontinued to be applied only to halls. This was certainly due to the lack of a conceptcapable of establishing the core of complex groupings of comparatively small rooms;and in Germany political considerations probably deterred some.4 Nevertheless, atleast one attempt was made to analyse a villa in terms of its room groupings, anattempt which owes nothing overtly to Swoboda’s or Oelmann’s ideas. This is Koethe’sanalysis of Oberweis, in the course of which he pointed out that like groupingsoccur on both sides of the central axis of this large villa, which thus combined ameasure of symmetry in plan with that of the elevation.5

RELEVANCE OF VERNACULAR ARCHITECTURE STUDIES

With these observations Koethe provided a foretaste of a kind of analysis notundertaken again until the late 1970s, when attempts were made to discover recurrentdistinctive room groups in row-type villas (defined in chapter 4), of which Oberweismay be regarded as a very grand example. They rested on a different basis, that ofvernacular architecture. Two papers by the present author made a modest beginningto the enterprise; they were succeeded by Drury’s bolder demonstration of how thismight be done, although he failed to find clinching arguments in favour of thevarious possibilities.6

Recurrence of distinctive room groupings is one key to the social analysis ofvillas. A second is the relation of principal elements of an open hall or of a room toone another. By this is meant, for example, how the open hearth in a hall or thefireplace in a room is positioned relative to the entrance, and how it relates to thewhole floor space; is it in the middle or near one end, and if the latter, what are theimplications for the use of that end which receives little warmth? And where theposition of fireplace or hearth is known, its position relative to any inner room andparticularly to the doorway leading into it are important. This way of looking atplans comes directly from the study of medieval and early modern houses, in whichcharacteristic lines of movement can be discerned. To the corresponding patterns invillas can be added the evidence of domestic religion, which can reveal, through theposition of shrines, the ways in which rooms were used and approached.

To many people those remarks will appear excessively optimistic, for the mostserious difficulty in studying villa plans is ignorance of the positions of doorwaysand fireplaces or hearths. It goes without saying that intercommunication betweenrooms is the single most important key to the way they were used, a point recognisedunhelpfully in reconstructions bespattered with doorways arbitrarily, withoutsupporting argument, such as Basse-Wavre (Belg.). Students of villas, faced with nomore than footings, have tended to despair of ever knowing how they functioned.This, though, is a matter on which comparative study can throw light, because somevillas in France, Germany and Switzerland, of types found also in other parts ofEurope, remained to a sufficient height to reveal a few doorways and in a few casesnearly all of them.

— Methods and Assumptions —

15

THE PRINCIPLE OF ALTERNATE DEVELOPMENT

All villas occupied for any considerable length of time were altered and enlarged,often several times. Archaeologists take this for granted and indeed the process maybe regarded as a natural response to changing social needs, so that a little-alteredvilla of long duration presents a serious problem of historical explanation. Nevertheless,the implications of rebuilding or addition merit more discussion than they commonlyget, and again a concept drawn from the study of vernacular houses is useful.

Farmhouses of any considerable age are almost invariably of two or more buildingphases, as has been observed in several European countries. One process by which suchchange takes place is called ‘alternate development’, meaning that only part of an existinghouse is rebuilt at any one time. This often results from a change of function in one partor end of the house, especially where a part devoted to farm purposes is converted todomestic use.7 Romano-British aisled houses, which appear to have begun as a form oflong-house – a combined shelter for family, stock and crops – are a generally recognisedinstance of such change. Alternate development can also occur when, through theaddition of a wing or other form of extension, the older part declines in importance, aftera while appears old-fashioned, and is then altered if not rebuilt. This phenomenon isobservable in the smaller country houses where rebuilding begins with the domestic orupper end and only later is the lower, service end rebuilt – sometimes not at all. Thedivision of medieval open halls into smaller rooms is also well known; it can be paralleledin Roman times, though not with the insertion of an upper floor such as is usual in earlymodern England, and so can the total rebuilding of the hall. It is not that changes ofthese kinds have gone unnoticed by archaeologists, simply that no underlying principlehas been recognised and commonly no explanation is offered.

In drawing on parallels from late medieval and early modern England it is not theparticular historical period that matters but rather the architectural forms, the ways inwhich they were used and were changed, and their social implications. It is notintended to suggest that English society was closely comparable to Roman Britain inits social structure, though it may be added that the two had more in common thanRoman Britain has with the all too frequent model of Victorian England.

ROOM USE

Buildings in the Roman period were often enlarged without undergoing substantialalteration to the core; this is a process observable in English country houses andfarmhouses too, and in both cases houses often grew to a very large size. What wereall the extra rooms used for?

Two related concepts may sharpen the analysis of houses in an era for whichdocumentation is confined to a few inscriptions. One is the observation made inconnection with the English gentry in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,that they needed an irreducible minimum of living-space comprising an entrance-hall, four living-rooms, bedrooms and accommodation for servants; any more roomsthan these were intended for the hospitality and display essential to maintainingsocial position among peers – ‘parade’ in the vocabulary of the day.8

— Chapter Two —

16

This notion that only a certain number of rooms are necessary to maintain differentfacets of a way of life can be applied to villas to see if anything of the kind can beinferred in the very different circumstances of provincial Roman life. The secondconcept is that a social hierarchy is reflected not only in the size of buildings, frompalace to cottage, but also within the buildings themselves, whether by a hierarchyof rooms graduated by size and appointments or by the disposition of fittings andfurnishings within rooms. This may appear self-evident but the corollary, that asociety whose buildings do not display marked differences is more egalitarian, israrely recognised. Taken in conjunction with the notion of minimum room needs forany given level of society at any particular period, it may help to distinguish betweenchanges which correspond to those in the social structure and those reflecting increasedprosperity.

HOUSE PLANS AND SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Running through all that has been said so far is the assumption that house plans,provided they are interpreted correctly, reflect the reality of social structure, irrespectiveof whether this goes counter to contemporary laws or descriptions. The point,adumbrated in chapter 1, can be amplified from early modern Wales, where the lawsimposed after the Acts of Union of 1536 and 1542 abolished partible inheritance,otherwise known as ‘gavelkind’. Theoretically, the equal division of estate and goodsamong heirs ceased, yet the houses suggest that sharing continued without theparcelling out of the land into ever smaller and less economically viable farms thatmade the practice so ruinous. Two examples show the conflict between the letter ofthe law and the custom of the country. Thus in north Wales, at Park, Llanfrothen,where documentary evidence suggested an orthodox gentry family headed by sheriffsand justices of the peace, something like a kin-group existed in the late seventeenthand early eighteenth centuries, occupying both the great house and several smallones close by.9 The second example is from south Wales:

For a long time the whereabouts of Edwinsford-uchaf had puzzled studentsof Carmarthenshire documents. The wretched house simply could not befound . . . a . . . survey of Edwinsford . . . revealed there were two houseson the site embedded in a mass of Victorian accretions which enclosedthem both. Edwinsford-uchaf was in fact next door to Edwinsford-isaf; atone corner the two houses touched.10

These examples of apparent conflict between the written and the architectural recordare particularly significant for Roman villas because parallels exist in the Romanprovinces for both the architectural solutions adopted to tackle the inheritance problem– the problem of conflict between fairness towards all descendants – and the overridingneed to preserve the economic viability of the family land. That does not precludeother interpretations of the same architectural phenomena, provided equallyinformative historical circumstances occur in conjunction with them. Yet if sofundamental an aspect of family organisation remained undetected in the written


17

sources, and indeed remains so even now, as a structure in the Braudelian sense –something taken for granted, not needing comment or explanation – how muchmore likely that it and others are undetectable in the scanty information we have forthe Roman provinces.

So far I have suggested that sixteenth- and seventeenth-century house plans inEngland and Wales or, more specifically, elements of plan, may help to explainanalogous (but not identical) features in Roman villas. To this it has been objectedthat comparative interpretations of this kind ought to be tied down reasonably closelyto one period of time: that

a plan of part of a medieval hall-house means something quite differentabout social structure from a similar plan which is part of an eighteenth-century stately home. This raises the spectre of uniformitarian assumptionsabout which people really must be more explicit.11

It is, of course, true that a medieval hall, open to the roof, heated by an openhearth, and forming the focus of household life as well as the point of entrance,was very different in function and social significance from the similar-sized andequally lofty space, heated by a wall fireplace and with an elaborate ceiling, whichlikewise served as an entrance and point of reception for strangers in an eighteenth-century ducal mansion; but the relation between the two rooms and the rest of therespective houses is so utterly different that confusion of function, in any reasonablysubtle analysis, is impossible. With some plan elements such as lobbies or innerrooms, the problem does not arise; they reveal their function by their relation tolarger rooms or entrances, even where lines of movement can only be discerned ina general way. Moreover, if sufficient examples can be found, one or more arelikely to have archaeological evidence of function which, used judiciously, canthrow light on the others.

In fact, as indicated earlier, no overall comparison between provincial-Romanand early modern Anglo-Welsh society is intended. Given that house plans at bothperiods are essentially a series of rectangular blocks subdivided in various ways, theoccurrence of similar features in a comparable relation to one another at both periodssuggests a similar mode of use. Two front entrances where one would normally beexpected is an example; and, although that may be thought too obvious to beignored, archaeologists nevertheless managed to avoid discussing its implications atMaulévrier (Normandy), Sinsheim (Bad.-Württ.) and Chedworth (Glos.) for all theyears since they were published in 1836, 1846 and 1868 respectively, and architecturalhistorians have been equally blind.12

The occurrence of the same kind of architectural change taking place in theRoman provinces and early modern England argues that similar forms of changetook place in both societies. In fifteenth-century England a house incorporated aprincipal room or hall heated by an open hearth and open to the roof. During thesixteenth and seventeenth centuries the principal room of a new house had a ceilingand a chimney-stack, and old houses were either replaced or altered to conform tothe new pattern; only a few survived for hundreds of years in their original form. Aswill be shown below, a comparable process is observable in the Roman world.

— Chapter Two —

18

Some villas which began with open halls were later subdivided into severalcomparatively small rooms; others were demolished to be replaced by larger housesof different plan; a few persisted for a long time beside those of more advancedtype. These changes were by no means identical with what happened in earlymodern England but are close enough to provide clues to the nature of the socialchanges represented by the transformations of house plan.

All these general points about the interpretation of plans have to be related to thesituation in the Roman provinces, where indigenous populations, after the initialconquest, gradually adopted the architectural trappings of the conquerors; this theydid because, as had been the case with Roman imports before the conquest, suchforms carried prestigious associations with political power, both the Roman conquerors’and their own, and also with social status. Luxury spending – conspicuous consumption– was an essential element, as is borne out by sites like Hartfield-Garden Hill orBarnsley Park, where the first element of Roman architecture to be built was, orincluded, a bath house. On other sites the first consideration was to build a recognisablyRoman house, more in the sense that it was different from any indigenous buildingthan that it was truly a piece of classical architecture. The many finds of painted andsometimes moulded plasterwork from the demolished earliest phases of villas suggestthat ornament and decoration were as important as the form of the building itself inproclaiming that its owners had made the social transition to the ways of the newmasters. Only slowly did the canons of classical architecture gain ground; axialityand symmetry had to be adapted to the reality of social life. How far, though, arethose classical canons bound up with public architecture, and to what extent werethey modified or ignored in private houses?

CLASSICAL CANONS: SYMMETRY AND AXIALITY

In the grandest houses, those of a size approaching that of public buildings, symmetryand axiality were combined in a genuinely classical composition. Nennig, which hasone of the most frequently reproduced plans, and Oberweis, which is not as wellknown as it deserves to be, are among the best examples. Even there, though, notevery function could be accommodated in a single unified composition; a bathhouse at Nennig was placed at what seems like an inordinate distance away, perhapsin order not to detract from the house, perhaps for deeper social reasons; and atOberweis a long porticus linked the house to an otherwise detached minor block.These examples show that total symmetry, embracing all the parts of a house largeenough to lend itself to the application of classical canons on the grand scale, wasrarely achieved and may well not often have been sought. Unified British courtyardhouses, however big, lacked such monumental classicism; symmetry was much morein the eye of the beholder. Many villas were like some eighteenth-century Englishcountry houses in having a perfectly symmetrical front elevation flanked by verydifferent-looking service quarters. From the latter, an unavoidable blemish, thearchitectural critic averted his eye.

This consideration makes symmetry an ambiguous quality, requiring fairly subtleevaluation of its representational significance. To take two examples, both on a


19

large scale; Echternach in Luxembourg is as symmetrical as can possibly be, bothhouse and subsidiary buildings, whereas Winkel–Seeb, even larger overall, displaysperfect symmetry in the subsidiary buildings but not, surprisingly, in the greathouse. Much smaller houses present the same kind of contrast. Most have a generallysymmetrical front formed by a porticus and its two balancing pavilions, yet thelatter are often of slightly unequal size. Similarly with house plans: often whatwere evidently intended to be balancing rooms or pairs of rooms around a centralaxis differ slightly in size. Such partial or imperfect symmetry will form a recurringtheme of the book.

A caution is necessary here. Late nineteenth-century architects of the Beaux Artsschool sought perfect symmetry in neo-classical and classical buildings alike, andthis led Mylius, for example, in his well-known reconstruction of Blankenheim, todisregard the archaeological evidence which showed the building was asymmetrical.Acceptance of this turn-of-the-century outlook and the restorations it gave rise to hasled many archaeologists to complete partially excavated houses with perfectlysymmetrical plans, as was done for Rivenhall, Cenero-Murias de Belono andSarmizegetusa.

MATTERS IGNORED

Any attempt to found an account of social structure on a typology of plans runs intoa problem of chronology. It has often been said that a typology does not necessarilyhave chronological implications, yet it can be disconcerting to find a house planrecurring a century or more after its first appearance. In fact it implies no more thanthe continued usefulness of a particular kind of plan for purposes which changedlittle over a long period, or for social groups of similar composition. The phenomenondoes, nevertheless, require a specific and not merely a general explanation, and oneis offered below (chapter 16).

Many villas, including some of those excavated with proper attention to stratigraphyin the 1930s and even later, present problems concerning the chronology of theirvarious phases, while for most of those dug before then the dates of their beginningand end are very uncertain. The nature of the problem is revealed by a reassessmentof the Welwyn-Lockleys villa, in the course of which the commencement of theRomanised stone building was revised from c. AD 60–70 to c. AD 300 on the basis,principally, of pottery, of which ‘not a single piece is illustrated of the first andsecond centuries’ apart from an early group and a few samian fragments. This soundsconvincing, yet Ward-Perkins thought the new dating ill founded because he hadcaused many of the early sherds then considered uninformative to be thrown away.13

Just as archaeologists in the 1930s improved greatly on their predecessors’ study offinds, so a later generation made a further advance, and in doing so tended to forgetthat strong continuities of excavation technique masked their own different and farless selective attitude to pottery and other small finds. Thus, despite more refineddating of pottery forms which permits building phases to be reassessed, uncertaintyremains about how reliable the surviving sample is, whether only drawn and publishedor available for re-examination in a museum.

— Chapter Two —

20

For many villas the most that is to be had is a coin list, commonly extending overtwo or three hundred years, with a considerable number (in Britain) of fourth-century coins. While a comparative profusion of coins can be taken to indicateactivity on the site, the old assumption that the earlier coins indicated when the villabegan cannot. Often a thin scatter of late first- and second-century coins has beentaken to date the early occupation of a villa but greater awareness of monetaryhistory, following the work of Richard Reece, has made such simple deductionsunacceptable without corroboration from pottery.14 No account has been taken ofthese changed views; it would have been impossible to do so systematically and inany case the theoretical basis of this book sidesteps the need for a precise chronology.Nowhere does the main thrust of the argument stand or fall by dates.

Finally, no account is taken of the surroundings of villas apart from the occasionalmention of that most characteristic siting on a hill slope overlooking a river orstream. This is because the aim of the book is to establish the significance of types ofhouse and of variations of those types, not to elucidate why a given villa developedin a particular way. To embark on the latter course would have been an impossibletask. If the argument about types has any validity, others can apply it to the villas ofa locality, bringing in revised chronologies, topography, field systems, pollen andbone analyses and much else besides.

Agricultural buildings are hardly mentioned. To understand their architecturalsimplicity needs specialist knowledge, preferably of the practical kind whichApplebaum has brought to the subject. An author who lacks that understanding hadbetter leave it alone.

PART II

TYPES OF PLAN

23

CHAPTER THREE

HALL HOUSES

When the inhabitants of a native community, of whatever size or socialcomposition, decided to adopt a Romanised way of life in an appropriate

architectural setting, what kind of house did they choose to build? Essentially theyhad a choice between what may be called from their plan forms the hall type – thesimpler of the two – and the row type. It was not necessary to begin with the simplestversion of the simpler type; a more developed one might correspond better to theneeds of a particular community. The implications of this will be dealt with later butthe first step is to establish the existence of the two types and their variants, beginningwith halls.

The simplest kind of house to be built wholly or partly of stone comprised asingle large room open from ground to roof and heated by a central hearth. It musthave had a general resemblance to the medieval open halls which survive – most ofthem much altered – in considerable numbers in England, so that when Oelmannwanted a comparison for the villa he excavated at Mayen, the first of its kind to berecognised as such in the course of excavation, he chose Penshurst Place in Kent.England was the only country where so elementary a form of purely domestic buildingcould still be found, and although no hall survived with its open hearth in use,whereas not a few north German aisled farmhouses of the same structural type did,the house with the higher social status – rather too high, as Oelmann implied – wasthought more appropriate.

‘Simple’ and ‘elementary’ here refer only to the plan, since buildings of thiskind were commonly quite wide and consequently their roof construction andits supporting walls presented greater technical problems than those of smallerstructures of more complicated plan; some, especially in Germany, must havehad sophisticated forms of roof construction. Commonly such halls had, at oneend or both, subsidiary rooms which, in most cases, were under onecontinuous roof. In the course of time the number and size of the end roomstended to grow but provided the hall remains the principal room and is bigenough to dominate the rest, the term ‘hall house’ remains appropriate. Thesedeveloped examples were all that Oelmann had to work with when he firstestablished the existence of the hall type, and it is necessary at this point to setout his method more fully.

— Chapter Three —

24

STAHL AND MAYEN

In 1921 the prevailing opinion was that many villas had an open courtyard in themiddle. In seeking to controvert it Oelmann1 took as his prime example the villa ofStahl (Rhld-Pf.) which had been carefully dug and recorded some forty years earlier(II, Fig. 1). He observed, first, that the facade corresponds to the type of porticus-and-pavilions lately identified by Swoboda and that it is not joined organically to thebuilding behind; they form two distinct parts, and whether of one build or two isimmaterial to identifying the core elements of the house. Second, the middle spacecontained a hearth which formed the only source of warmth in the building, andcellar steps which required protection from the weather; and the hearth in particularargues for an enclosed room, not a mere shelter. Third, on the east side five roomsform a bath suite which, like so many others of the kind, has the appearance ofhaving been added to an existing building, as do the rooms on the north side andthe internal porch which are hardly separable from the bath block; these are alladditions. On these grounds Oelmann concluded that a yard interpretation was ‘asgood as impossible’ and that the middle space was a large hall open to the roof, witha smaller room partitioned off it ([I], Fig. 1). The latter, he thought, might have had alow upper storey reached by a staircase rising above the one to the cellar – almostthe only sensible suggestion ever to have been made (without prejudice as to itscorrectness) about access to the many upper storeys alleged to have existed, and notthe least notable aspect of this brilliant demonstration. Analysis of eight analogousvillas, of which two at least, Serville (Belg.) (Fig. 1) and Saaraltdorf (Moselle) (Fig. 1),were built as simple halls with only a porticus-and-pavilions additionally, confirmedthis conclusion.

This logical demonstration began to change the interpretation of German andDutch villas immediately but the argument was clinched by Oelmann’s own excavationof what was undeniably an open hall at Mayen (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 1), one which haddeveloped in exactly the ways he had envisaged. A theory with the power of predictionis irresistible; henceforth what had gained currency as the Stahl type became theMayen type and the high quality of the excavation has caused its conclusions to bewidely quoted, to the neglect of the feat of deduction behind it.

Subsequent excavations and re-examination of other long-known villas haveprovided more evidence of halls. Ludwigsburg-Pflugfelden (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 1)and Konz-Lummelwies (Rhld-Pf.) are recent discoveries. Bargen im Hegau (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 1), dug in 1925 and published three years later, has a ‘yard’ in which theonly two rooms had straight joints to the outer wall and which is fronted by porticus-and-pavilions; it must be a hall. But the closest parallel for Stahl [I] may be Koerich-Goeblingen 1 [I] (Fig. 1), which is somewhat more advanced in detail but illustratesalmost the same stage of hall development. So common are halls like these thatGerman archaeologists can refer to them as villas of the normal type.

— Hall Houses —

25

Figure 1 Stahl and related villas


26

CLASSIFICATION AND ITS PROBLEMS

Hall houses can be divided into categories based on several criteria: proportions anddimensions, notably breadth; forms of roof support; whether shelter is provided foranimals as well as a family; the position of the entrance; and the forms whichdevelopment of the basic type took.

Two classes of plan stand out by their proportions. The first and by far the morenumerous is commonly 9 m or more wide and often has proportions of length tobreadth ranging between about 5:3 and square, although they can be 2:1; this is thebroad hall type. The other is often no more than 6 m wide and commonly has moreelongated proportions, often 2:1, sometimes even 3:1; this is the narrow hall type. Itgoes without saying that this classification is bound to be somewhat arbitrary. Forthe purposes of social interpretation aisled houses provide a useful category which isbased partly on the form of roof support and partly on the combination of houseand byre. Forms of roof support provide two more types, the ridge-post hall and thewide-nave hall. The various types have characteristic possibilities and limitations ofdevelopment and in these derivatives additional rooms can increase until they finallydominate the hall.

With the chosen method of analysis it is not difficult to discover broad halls in oldpublications, though harder with narrow. To understand the halls themselves ismuch harder, even from recent reports of high quality, because the vast majorityhave undergone changes which add to or subtract from the functions for which theywere originally designed, and it is difficult to be certain how far the internal dispositionscorrespond to the original ones. Halls surviving with a little-changed plan tend to bethe humbler ones, hence their internal arrangements may not be altogether typicalof the type as a whole, and those found under houses of different type have usuallylost all internal detail.

LAYOUT AND FUNCTIONS OF THE HALL

What was a hall like? What functions, domestic, craft or agricultural, were carried onwithin it? No single example is sufficiently well preserved to answer these questions;the evidence has to be assembled from several, including those in the poorersettlements which were little altered and which are commonly referred to as cottagesor craftsmen’s workshops. Nevertheless, they belong to the same generic type andthrow light on their grander cousins.

A rudimentary and well-recorded British example, Somerton-Bradley Hill 1 I(Som.) (Fig. 3), adds detail to the impression drawn from Mayen III. It was asmall hall house entered in the middle of the south side, and facing the doorwaywas a cluster of three hearths, only two of which, probably, were in use at anyone time. The two biggest were very close, one of them being the equivalent ofthe central hearth at Serville. The other, almost abutting it, was fired from anelongated pit on the north side and resembles what is sometimes described as abat-shaped ‘oven’. A third hearth was placed a little way to the left of theentrance, corresponding, perhaps, to what is called in medieval halls the upper

— Hall Houses —

27

or socially superior end, so that at some time the hall may have had two focalpoints rather than one. Otherwise there was little indication of use except fortwo enigmatic shallow pits, one of them quite large (over 2 m long), at theputative lower end, and there was no drainage or other provision for cattle.Houses like this must have been common but are hard to recover on sites whichpersisted for centuries. Chastres (Belg.) and Dragonby are structurally superiorforms of the Bradley Hill house.

For halls at any social level, one of Oelmann’s observations about Mayen is relevant:that throughout the villa’s existence the open hearth was used for cooking as well asheating,2 the nearby drain serving for the disposal of waste water. This raises thequestion of just what the ‘ovens’ at Bradley Hill I/1 and elsewhere were for; in factthey may have served essentially the same purposes – warmth, cooking – as theopen hearth at Mayen.

In some of the humblest British halls a social differentiation between the upperand lower ends is apparent, as was certainly true in the much grander Köln-Braunsfeld,3

whereas others with three hearths or ovens, none of which is of special importance,imply a different pattern of living. Generally the British and continental halls reflectsimilar ways of life.

Figure 2 Halls with evidence of use


28

Figure 3 British halls

— Hall Houses —

29

THE HEARTH/ENTRANCE RELATION

Broad halls provide evidence for the relation between the two most fundamentalelements, the principal or domestic entrance and the principal or only hearth. Mostfall into two groups with many minor variations. In the first a central hearth standsmore or less opposite an entrance in the middle of one of the long walls, so that thehearth was the first thing seen by anyone coming in; Mayen, Serville and Courcelles-sur-Nied-Urville are like that. This position for a hearth, where its warmth had mostchance of being dissipated by draughts and without any screen to alleviate them,must be determined socially, and the likely explanation is that the hearth was sharedwithout sharp distinction between upper and lower ends.

Villas of the Mayen/Serville type, a hall with porticus and pavilions, can be paralleledwith minor differences at Neuss [I], Tiefenbach (Fig. 1) and many other places. Mostprobably had a central hearth. Not infrequently, though, the hearth was slightlytowards the rear of the hall and nearer one end than the other – often the left-handend – so that the person entering was able to orientate himself and go to the upperend, where the hearth was, or the lower end, whichever befitted his station.

This disposition of hearth relative to entrance suggests, by analogy with medievalEnglish halls, some distinction between the part nearer the doorway and thatbeyond the hearth, the place of honour being at the point furthest from the entrance.Persons entering would see, on the other side of the fire, the place reserved forthose on whom authority or seniority conferred privilege, and they themselveswould be noticed and their deportment observed. A pattern like this can be inferredin a hall as simple as that at Lavans-les-Dole (Jura), where one corner is shieldedby the hearth from the rest of the hall to create a privileged area equivalent to themedieval dais.

THE OFF-CENTRE HEARTH

In the second group the fire is near the end of the hall and often in the far corner toleft of the entrance. Sometimes a well-built stone fireplace is set against a wall nearthe corner, as at Stahl (Fig. 1) and Bollendorf (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 2); sometimes a hearthis actually in the corner, as at Börstingen (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 2) or, after a doorwayinto the adjoining pavilion was blocked, at Neumagen-Dhron-Papiermühle [II] (Fig.68). Since these were the only hearths discovered, they were presumably just asmuch the place of privilege as a central hearth, yet they imply somewhat differentsocial relations: the persons around a corner hearth were not well placed to observethose entering, nor did the hearth itself form a visual and social barrier between theentrance and an inner, private room. Evidently it no longer mattered: this category ofhearth/ entrance relation implies a different order of importance as between the halland other rooms. Some difference of function is apparent within the hall, so that atStahl, for instance, entrance to an inner room was quite divorced from the hearth,and the removal of the latter from a dominant central position may be bound upwith the transfer of the representational function which went with privilege to one ofthe unusually large pavilions.


30

THE LOWER END

These tentative interpretations of the socially superior part of the hall leave thelower end to be explained. Where the hearth is central, domestic or agriculture-related work may have been carried on anywhere within the hall except around thehearth and dais. If the household were large, a division can be envisaged in whichthe right-hand side on entering was occupied by servants both indoor and outdoor,or by dependants of some kind. Steiner made the point about Bollendorf that ‘Thelack of work-rooms permits the belief that the building – at least in its last manifestation– was less a farm than a villa in our modern sense’;4 yet in this particular house theoff-centre hearth makes craft-related use of the rest of the hall likely. Various kindsof domestic, non-agricultural work are conceivable: spinning, weaving, makingwooden tools and equipment for farm use – any or all of these occupations couldhave been carried on in the lower end of the hall.

An obvious alternative function suggested by the north German aisledfarmhouse of the sixteenth to twentieth centuries and its Iron Age counterpartsat Ezinge (Neth.) and Feddersen Wierde (NiederSachsen) is the stalling of cattlein winter. Mayen provides a widely accepted interpretation on these lines,although one not applicable to the whole of the lower end. It had in III and IVa doorway in the gable-end which must have provided access from the farmyardto the working end of the hall and to the narrow partitioned-off L-shaped roomrunning round two sides. Whether this oddly shaped space was for cattle, aswas suggested by the architect Mylius, is not absolutely certain. In acceptingthe idea Oelmann was influenced by north German farmhouses, yet the absenceof any drain at the rear of the hall, which was built into the hillside, is surprising.Moreover, the space in question, only 2 m wide, is not enough for fully grownbeasts, only small cattle or sheep.5 Nevertheless the gable-end doorway pointsto a close connection between the lower end and the farmyard and it is hard tothink of it as anything other than a byre. Just such a doorway at Crain (Yonne)(Fig. 4) leads to a quite narrow undrained space marked off by a light partition,and here, too, the farmyard access implies a byre.6 At Blieskastell-Altheim (Saarld)(Fig. 4), where no doorways were traceable, interpretation of a lightly partitioned-off room at the east end as a byre is bolstered by the presence of a fodder trough.The absence of drainage is nevertheless remarkable but is explicable if enough

Figure 4 Halls used for stalling animals

— Hall Houses —

31

straw were available to absorb the urine of stalled cattle.7 Despite doubts on thisscore, it appears that some simple halls, lacking any other domestic room, shelteredcattle as well as the owning family.

BROAD HALLS WITH MORE THAN ONE HEARTH

Larger halls frequently have two or three hearths, one of them conspicuously moreimportant than the others. Thus Mamer-Gaschtbierg (Lux.) (Fig. 2) has a well-builthearth at the west end of the hall close to the inner room (later divided), whilst inthe corners at the inferior end are two large areas of burning. This is a socialdifferentiation between the hearth around which the privileged congregated andtwo used by other people for the dual purposes of work – including, probably,blacksmithing and cooking – and warmth. In past ages the practice of living awayfrom one’s workplace did not apply, and those who worked at the hearths are likelyto have eaten and slept near them.8

At the villa of Bruchsal-Ober Grombach (Bad.-Württ.) one of two or perhapsthree halls (1; Fig. 2) had two certain hearths and a third which is neither located onthe published plan nor described. One was in the middle of the hall – in 1911, a yard– in a position comparable to that at Serville. A second, of tile and stone, lay nearerthe west end and backed on to what is described as a Halle, that is to say an open-sided room with a ceiling or roof carried on posts and interpreted as an entrance-hallwithin the ‘yard’. Although no details of the post structure were published, therelation of hearth to upper end suggests it resembled the dais of a medieval house,even to having a ceiling or canopy; and something comparable appears to haveexisted at Konken (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 2). So the Ober-Grombach hall had two principalfocal points and a third less important one somewhere in the east end or near thenorth-east corner, an arrangement reflecting a more stratified houseful than those atMayen and Serville, or Mamer-Gaschtbierg with its functional distinction.

Outside Germany broad halls are not very common. France has a scatter representedby Grémecey (Moselle) (Fig. 5), Saint-Pierre-la-Garenne (Eure) (Fig. 5) and Clinchamps(Calvados); also the enigmatic Brain-sur-Allonnes (Main-et-Loire) (Fig. 5) which lookslike a villa but had three bronze cauldrons containing votive deposits.9 Hall derivativesfound at Izernore (Ain) and Lalonquette (Pyr.-Atl.) (Fig. 50) show that halls maycome to light anywhere.

Broad halls are rare in Britain. Byfield (Northants.) (Fig. 3) resembles continentalhalls as closely as any but lacks all internal detail. Its true classification, though, isuncertain following the excavation of a villa similar in size and general appearanceat Stratford-upon-Avon-Tiddington (War.), which proved to have an unusual kind ofaisled construction (Fig. 35). Swindon-Okus (Wilts.) (19×11.2 m) is very broad for aBritish hall yet lacks any sign of being aisled. Farmington-Clear Cupboard (Glos.)(Fig. 3) is smaller (21×8.5 m), and has, like Byfield, the characteristic elongatedBritish proportions and preserved informative detail. Here the principal ‘hearth/oven’ stood nearly opposite to and just a little to the left of the entrance, and beyondit, further into the hall and next to the inner room, was a paved area equivalent tothe ‘open-sided room’ of Ober-Grombach A; though not raised like a dais above the


32

general floor level, its treatment demonstrated superiority in a less literal way. Beyondthe paving was an inner room. At this end ‘shallow fire pits’ near the hearth wereperhaps places where the fire had once been. To the right of the entrance and nearthe south-east corner was a second hearth, thought to be a working area. Whateverthe truth of this – and the building of a bath suite must have distorted the originalarrangements to some degree – there was less paving hereabouts, so the hall providedfor two social foci of unequal importance. How many people this implies is quiteuncertain, but at all events the space available was intended for considerably morethan a conjugal or even a stem family.

A second hall of comparable size to Farmington may be discernible in theincompletely recovered plan of North Stainley-Castle Dykes [II] (Fig. 3).

NARROW HALLS

Stowey Sutton-Chew Park (Avon, formerly Som.) (Fig. 3) is a good example of thenarrow-hall type. The hall area is 114 sq. m, about the same as Stahl and bigger thanServille (101 sq. m); Mayen is not much bigger (135 sq. m), Bollendorf and Grémecey(both 220 sq. m) are twice as big. As with Stahl, the idea that the central space ‘wasprobably not roofed’10 can be dismissed. It sheltered three ovens, one at each endand one near the middle of the rear wall; and there was also a ‘rough fireplace’ orhearth, probably secondary and in an unusual place, tucked away in the near left-hand corner on entering.11 This seems usually to be the upper end of a hall, and thiswas where the best-built oven – ‘really more in the nature of a furnace’ – stood.Since no animal bones were found in the vicinity ‘it is not quite certain . . . whether[the oven] was in fact for cooking’,12 yet there was no evidence of industrial activityeither. That point applies to all three ‘ovens’ none of which showed traces of any

Figure 5 French hall houses

— Hall Houses —

33

activity other than generating heat; could that have been their principal purpose?The lack of a fireplace in the middle of the hall and of a dais are significant in thelight of Farmington and other villas. Presumably three groups of people or householdsused the hearths in a communal hall – it is quite big enough. The dominance of onehousehold, if it existed to any considerable degree, must have been expressed interms of access to the inner room or pavilions.

Another British hall interpreted by its excavators as a yard is Wraxall (Som.) (Fig.3), which appears to have had a flagged stone floor throughout. Its hall had theproportions of Stowey Sutton and about the same overall area as Mayen IV. A fewbarely Romanised halls were even more elongated, one of the most rudimentary –not a villa – being building 2.5 in the Somerton-Catsgore settlement (Fig. 3). Itsproportions were nearly 4.5:1 and although described as a barn it had two builthearths/ovens and two other hearths. A building so provided cannot have beensolely for storage;13 it must be a house in which ancillary farming activities werecarried on. It is not surprising that the proportions of the remote and barely Romanisedhouse at Laugharne-Cwmbrwyn (Fig. 3) in west Wales (Pembs., now Dyfed), theone most distant from an urban centre, should resemble those of the hardly moreRoman hall Somerton-Catsgore 2.5. A much smaller hall, the ‘Dwelling House’ at thewell-known villa of Langton (Yorks.), began in I (Fig. 3) as a simple hall, to which,as at Cwmbrwyn, a small room was added at one end.

A few narrow halls are known outside Britain. The most notable is Schimmert-opden Billich, commonly called Ravensbosch (Neth.), which is part of a villa or perhapsa small town (vicus).14 It has proportions of 4:1 and porticuses front and rear; that atthe front has pavilions, one being recessed into the hall; that at the rear is wide, asif for some work purpose.

A broad hall like Mayen IV and a narrow one like Stowey Sutton, despite theircomparatively small difference of size, carry quite different social connotations. Thesingle large central hearth so characteristic of the broad hall implies a unity withinthe houseful not demonstrated by the three ‘ovens’ of the narrow one or the twohearths of the elongated broad hall at Farmington. If, as these examples show,elongated broad halls have much in common with narrow halls, their proportionsensure different possibilities of development. Neither class shows much sign ofstalling cattle; Blieskastell-Altheim and Mayen III are exceptions and the building atBöckweiler (Saarld) (Fig. 4) called the Wirtschaftshof or work-yard may be another.Most have no definite evidence of accommodation for cattle.

SINGLE-ENDED HALLS

Improvement of the basic hall could take several forms. A room of equal breadth ortwo small rooms might be added; or a porticus-with-pavilions; or a small room at therear; or a cellar; or a combination of these.

The simplest development was to add a room at one end of the hall. Parallelsfrom medieval England are called single-ended halls, an illogical but convenientexpression which will be adopted here. The new room may serve some completelynew requirement or accommodate a function previously performed in the body of


34

the hall and, since evidence on which to form an opinion is usually lacking, thequestion remains open.

Maidenhead-Cox Green I (Berks.) (Fig. 69) was a narrow hall with aninner room entered, it is reasonable to suppose, from the hall. Thecorresponding room at Farmington had a hearth and well-made floor andprovided space enough for a family. Some indication of the social relationsbetween the inhabitants of the villa is provided by the position of the doorwaybetween hall and inner room. Sometimes this can be inferred from thelimitations imposed by other features, as at Farmington, but in most cases,as at Stahl or Doische-Vodelée (Belg.) (Fig. 39) it is guesswork. At Uplyme-Holcombe IIA (Fig. 66), a house of the same plan-type as Maidenhead, thethreshold between the two rooms was recovered; it was in the middle of thepartition and implies a different relationship between the rooms from thatat Farmington. Instead of the inner room being reached by a doorway behindthe hearth, access to it was less removed from the body of the hall andmore open to general view.

Both houses are assumed to have had the inner room at the upper end.This may not always have been the case; just as single-ended medieval hallscould have the extra room at the lower end so, perhaps, might provincialRoman halls such as Stowey Sutton, and as Somerton-Catsgore 2.1. certainlydid (Fig. 3).

Another form of improvement was to build a cellar in the hall. Sometimes itwas in a corner, as at Dreieich-Götzenhain (Hessen), Stein (Neth.) and Voerendaal-Ubachsberg (Neth.), sometimes clear of one, as at Overasselt (Neth.) (Fig. 6).Whether, in such cases, a room stood above the cellar is impossible to knowfrom the published evidence.

Figure 6 Single- and double-ended halls

— Hall Houses —

35

THE INNER ROOM SUBDIVIDED

An alternative way of providing special-purpose space was to have a pair of roomsat one end of the hall, as at Rothselberg (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 6), Frankfurt-Bergen-Enkheim[I] (Fig. 40) and Michelstadt-Steinbach (both Hessen). In all three one room waslarger than the other, with a cellar beneath the smaller. The location of the cellarentrance at Rothselberg does not preclude the possibility of a doorway from hall tosmaller room but may indicate that this room was an inner, private room enteredthrough the larger one and overseeing access to the cellar. At Bergen-Enkheim thehigh status of this part of the house is underlined by the hypocaust in the largerroom.15

The best British parallel, a much smaller narrow hall at Quinton (Northants.) (Fig. 6),had a hearth nearer the west end of the hall where there are two rooms, one of whichwas enlarged at the expense of the other. A doorway opened from the hall into thelarger room. In the hall a raised and better-surfaced floor was marked off by a simplekerb on the side nearest the doorway – a dais. Friendship-Taylor, who excavated thesite, considered a light partition might have stood on the line of the kerb, rather like thataround the dais at Ober-Grombach A. Whether the end rooms formed a suite, thesmaller reached through the larger, or were entered separately, is unknown, but thewhole conveys the same impression as the upper end of a medieval domestic hall.

The larger hall house at Overasselt (Fig. 6), with proportions of about 3:1, has,besides the cellar already mentioned, two rooms at the south end of not quite equalsize, one of which had a hypocaust. The presence of important domestic rooms atboth ends of this building supports the negative evidence of Quinton, that cattlewere not stalled within the hall.

In broad halls the paired rooms are sometimes separated by a space that lookslike a through passage leading out of doors; but it often became so through alterationand was not necessarily so originally. In its simplest form this disposition appears inMehring I (Fig. 69) and at the east end of Grémecey, and raises the question of whythe rooms should be separated. Implicitly they were not connected functionally, asmight be expected with two service rooms or two rooms of a suite; possibly the‘passage’ was a lobby with two doorways shielded from the hall.

DOUBLE-ENDED HALLS

A double-ended hall (another term from vernacular architecture) has rooms atboth ends, like the German halls of Brücken (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 6) and Heppenheim(Hessen) (Fig. 6), which have two small rooms at one end and an undivided full-width room at the other. Great Staughton (Cambs.) (Fig. 40) has only one room ateach end. In houses of 10 m span and upwards such a room might be very narrowin proportion to its length.

Larger groupings of rooms occur, differing very much in detail and complicatedby the presence of the pavilions at each end of the porticus. In trying to understandhow the hall itself functioned it has been possible, so far, to ignore pavilions, somethingthe more easily done when the pavilions stand largely or wholly beyond the ends of


36

the hall, as at Serville; but in analysing the more highly developed houses, wherethe pavilions are integrated architecturally with other rooms at the ends of the hall,the possibility that they intercommunicated with them cannot be ignored. Two Dutchvillas, Nuth-Vaasrade and Buchten (Fig. 23), illustrate the point, which will be takenup later (chapter 8).

AISLED HOUSES

Broad halls may be divided by roof-supporting posts set either axially as ridge-postsand forming two aisles, or in two rows forming, in the customary English terms,nave and aisles.16 In Britain one large group in the latter category has a distinctivebipartite character consistent with its accommodating, in its early forms, a family andlivestock under one roof; originally called the basilican house,17 it has been giventhe name aisled house to distinguish it from aisled buildings devoted almost entirelyto agricultural or industrial purposes, and from the aisleless house-and-byre.18 Contraryto expectation, the enormous amount of villa excavation and aerial photographyduring the past thirty years has produced only a handful of possible examples inmainland Europe.19

In its simplest form the aisled house is a long timber building with two internalrows of earthfast posts and no structural partitions from end to end of the middle span.Functional divisions were marked by the position of the hearth or by no more thandifferent kinds of floor – hard-rammed and swept clay in the domestic part, a roughercattle-trodden surface in the rest. Many such have been excavated in the coastal regionsof Holland and north-west Germany and within the Empire it was the dominant typeat Rijswijk (Fig. 65). In Britain, Exning-Landwade I (Suffolk) (Fig. 7), Denton I (Lincs.)and Lechlade-Claydon Pike (Oxon.) may have been like this, for although positiveevidence of cattle is hard to find, an agricultural use for one end is established withsome probability by a doorway in the gable-end wall wide enough for animals orcarts. In the aisles, though, especially at the family end where alteration is always moredestructive, light partitions may have been entirely lost; for whereas in the nave thedivision between living and work parts seems to have been customary rather thanstructural, elsewhere some separation of family space from cattle is likely.

With aisled houses as with monospan halls, original form and function have to beinferred from such evidence as remains after extensive alteration. It seems that half thelength of the nave or a little less was living-space. Denton had a large hearth, the onlyone in the building, about half-way down its eight-bay length. To one side of it, afterpartial rebuilding in stone (Fig. 7), were domestic rooms, and it can reasonably beassumed they perpetuated earlier usage. How much of the nave beyond the fire, ifany, was living-space? Since the hearth is the only cooking place, the area around itmust have been domestic, and similarly, when the day’s work was done, people willhave congregated around it. A much bigger aisled house, Winterton D I (Lincs.) (Fig.45), had a hearth in the nave at a comparable point, about where the aisle roomsended; the large open space beyond did not have a wide doorway at the end andrevealed no trace of cattle, only a hearth, five trench-furnaces and some paving slabs.A smaller building B I was similar; both acquired rooms at the end of the nave.

— Hall Houses —

37

Other aisled houses hint at a similar division. West Blatchington (Sussex) (Fig. 7)looks as if it was entered, by analogy with Denton III (Fig 7) and halls such asServille, through a doorway opposite a hearth, and so into the domestic part whichwas cut off from the rest in [II].20 Carisbrooke (I.o.W.), Norton Disney (Lincs.) (Fig.75), Petersfield-Stroud (Glos.) (Fig. 7) and West Dean (Wilts.) are similarlyproportioned. Exning II, East Grimstead (Wilts.), Mansfield Woodhouse (Notts.) (allFig. 7) and Weyhill-Clanville (Hants.) all acquired domestic rooms at both ends andin much of the aisles, leaving a large irregular-shaped space in the middle: essentiallythe same process of development as occurred in many a German broad hall.

Clearly many aisled houses, especially the large ones built with stone footings,never sheltered cattle, whereas Denton and Stroud, which retained their wide endentrances throughout, may possibly have done so, although some doubt exists.21

Only those which were minor elements of a villa, such as the one outside thecourtyard at Sudeley-Spoonley Wood (Fig. 70), are likely to have been part house,part byre. Moreover, Winterton D and the aisled house at Darenth (Kent) (Fig. 42)were both preceded by aisleless buildings lacking any positive evidence of stallingcattle, so that the apparently obvious link between aisled houses in Britain and thoseat Rijswijk and the Friesian coast must now be questioned. Phosphate analysis isneeded on a suitable site.

An aisled house at Odiham-Lodge Farm (Hants.), which seems from its plan tohave developed in much the same way as Winterton D, has been interpreted in amore detailed way than any other villa through the artefacts found in the rooms.22

Certain rooms are assigned to men, others to women, a small one to both. A wing atwhat is conventionally regarded as the upper end of a house of this type comprisestwo ox-byres and a stable and perhaps a second small stable. This west part of thehouse did not communicate directly with the rest. A raised granary occupying oneaisle adjoined that part of the nave used for threshing.

How much weight should be attached to these attributions? Some aspects are veryodd: the animal stalls did not communicate with the house, yet those who lookedafter valuable livestock surely slept close to it so as to respond quickly if a beast fellsick; there is no wide doorway for waggons to deliver corn on the stalk for threshingand take away grain; and the removal of one of the two major functions of thishouse type to the opposite end, confusing upper and lower ends, is hard to parallelin any house type – indeed, hardly conceivable.

Odiham needs reassessment from the excavation archive and from an architecturalstandpoint.

All the examples quoted so far are British. A building likely to be of this type atVilleneuve-sur-Cher/les Augerets (Cher) is exceptionally long, the aisles have stonefootings throughout, and the ends are less differentiated than is usual, but it has amuch closer resemblance to a British aisled house than most in France.

RIDGE-POST HALLS

A second category classified by structure comprises halls having, on the long axis, a rowof posts rising to the apex to support the ridge-piece, to which the rafters are affixed.


38

— Hall Houses —

39

Two buildings of this type were excavated at Bedburg-Garsdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 68). The smaller, the principal house, with proportions of 5:2,combined in II stone footings for the hall and end room with earthfast ridge-posts. On one side of the yard was a larger building of the same type, aworkhall with four hearths set slightly off the long axis, probably because itwas easier to contrive some kind of smoke vent to one side of the ridge-piece than across it. Nor surprisingly, major villa buildings of this primitivetype are rare and it is to be expected that derivatives in which some of theinconvenient middle posts have been replaced by monospan trusses will befound; Saaraltdorf (Fig. 1) and Heidelsheim (Bad.-Württ.), each with a singleaxial post-hole, may be two such.

Rudston 3/II, of the same structural type, occupied the same positionrelative to the main house and no doubt served the same purpose; Fishtoft maybe a minor British example (Fig. 7). A less fully reported example at Verneuil-en-Halatte II (Oise) is likely, from its position in a large courtyard, to havebeen a workhall, for all that the main house of that phase was not discovered.Less certain is the function of a well-built structure at Bocholtz-Vlengendaal(Neth.) (Fig. 46), the middle one of three sizeable buildings set out in line.Neither of the suggested uses, barn or storehouse (possibly of two storeys), iscompelling.

Halls of this kind are related to the wide-nave type.

Figure 7 Aisled buildings


40

WIDE-NAVE HALLS

This category of hall is more instructive than the fewness of examples mightsuggest. The only one excavated to modern standards, Hölstein (Switz.) (Fig. 7)has a nave to aisles proportion of approximately 3:1 instead of the 2:1 of theaisled house. Structurally the type is linked to the previous one by the use of oneor two ridge-posts or some equivalent support; most pairs of posts carried aking-post construction on tie beams.

Hölstein began as a hall open from end to end and with a porticus, perhapsentered at the end, along most of the north side. In II, two rooms at the upper (east)end, occupying two bays of the colonnades, were partitioned off, one being providedwith a hypocaust, and a small square room was created at that end of the porticus;these rooms may have replaced a similarly used but structurally undivided space inI. A bath suite was added at the opposite end in [III]. No evidence of the stalling ofcattle was found at the lower end of the nave, only agricultural and cooking equipmentand horse-trappings. Hölstein evidently developed and was used in much the sameway as Winterton D.

Kaisersteinbruch (Aus.) (Fig. 67) has comparable nave–aisle proportions. Lackingridge-posts, it must have had king-post trusses throughout except at the north end,where lengthwise stability for the roof appears to have been provided by an axialwall. Rooms were partitioned off, probably in [II], to make a unit or apartment, andnear it the only entrance discovered may, by analogy, have been opposite theprincipal hearth.

It has frequently been claimed that these two buildings belong to the class of‘basilican’ or aisled houses, whereas their proportions speak against any directconnection. Others like them have a thin but wide distribution: they include Neerharen-Rekem (Belg.), Wollersheim-Am Hostert (Rhld-Pf.), a building at Liestal-Munzach(Switz.) (Fig. 76) and possibly the strange building at Ash (Kent), to judge solely byits proportions; and from aerial photographs, Saint-Aubin le Mazaret E. Perhaps thealleged peristyle villa at Bennwil (Switz.) belongs to this class.

NAVE AND AISLES OF EQUAL WIDTH

Differences in nave–aisle proportions are primarily structural matters, yet they alsogovern the conditions of use. Winkel-Seeb (Switz.) raises questions of this kindmore acutely than any other.

The principal building (A, Herrenhaus; Fig. 7) incorporates a hall 31 m long butonly 9 m wide and open to the roof which was divided up by two rows of thirteencolumns into three spans of about 3 m. What were they intended to support? Anupper storey carrying heavy loads is the only reason that comes to mind for so manycolumns so close together, yet few loads except bulk grain needed that much support.Furthermore, in VI–VIII, when only the middle third of the hall retained columns, anupper storey is scarcely possible. In VI a ‘roundish-concave’ wall about 8 m long andoccupying the whole of the south ‘aisle’ was built, and in front of it was ‘exceptionallyheavily burnt earth’: an installation described as a ‘chimney-like hearth with a roundish

— Hall Houses —

41

heat-radiating wall’.23 It is hard to envisage a chimney or smoke hood of the requisitesize rising above this through an upper storey; an open hearth is more likely. On theother hand, columns so closely spaced are unnecessary for any kind of roof.

A second building at Winkel-Seeb presents the same problem. In the innercourtyard, B IIB (Fig. 7) has two rows of poorly aligned columns forming three moreor less equal aisles in an overall breadth of 8 m. It is described simply as a hall andhas open hearths, yet is reconstructed with an upper storey because, as in A, thereare so many columns;24 but no explanation is offered for their number or spacing. Infact, both A and B present such contradictions that no solution can be offered. It isan odd situation because building E (Fig. 72) has more usual proportions like thoseof Hölstein.

A few other buildings with three equal aisles are known. A large one occupiesthe north side of the domestic peristyle at Liédena (Spain) and a much smallerBritish example is East Dean-Holbury (Hants.). In France there are two at Saint-Aubin le Mazaret and two subsidiary agricultural (?) buildings at Maulévrier andChâtillon-sur-Seiche.25 Although the Maulévrier hall is so much less important thanthe Seeb buildings, it is over twice as wide (19 m) and can perhaps be comparedto a granary at Rome-Via Gabina with equal aisles and nave (also 19 m). The Saint-Aubin buildings are wider still – one about 28 m – so that they may have hadthree parallel roofs. And in that unsatisfactory state the problem of Seeb A and itsanalogues must be left.

HALL OR YARD? THE CASE OF INZIGKOFEN

For half a century Oelmann’s interpretation of Stahl and its analogues held undisputedsway until, in the 1970s and 1980s, a number of archaeologists working in centraland southern Germany have asserted, without challenging Oelmann’s conclusionformally, that this or that villa had an open yard more or less surrounded by rooms,while ignoring the problems thus created. Discussion will be divided between probablehalls which are dealt with here and more problematic examples which are reservedfor chapter 7.

The argument, insofar as any is advanced, is that the width of the central space istoo great for a monospan roof, therefore it must have been a yard, and the occasionalpresence of a hearth or a staircase to a cellar is taken to imply partial roofing. Anddespite the demonstration that the plans of Stahl and Mayen make good sense as anumber of rooms subordinate to and opening off a hall, nobody has attempted toshow the relation between the rows of rooms on two or more sides of a yard; howthey functioned as a house, that is. Nor, since the idea that the porticus-with-pavilionsis a characteristic of provincial Roman culture is not specifically rejected, is it explainedwhy so distinctive a facade should have been thought appropriate in front of anopen yard. And whereas a hall makes the central space intelligible, the purpose of acomparatively small, enclosed and usually undrained yard requires explanation notso far offered.

Inzigkofen (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 27) is a key site in this debate. Reim, arguing thatthe space in the middle (16.60 m overall; 13.50 m clear) is too wide for a roof


42

without posts, and that the foundations of the inner porticus wall are not only tooslight to support the weight of tiles but are slightly narrower than the outer wall,concluded that the inner space can only be a yard. This justification of a courtyard,in a footnote listing hall interpretations, makes a veiled challenge to orthodoxy;26 itstands or falls by the roof arguments, which will now be assessed.

First, the foundations. They were of limestone fragments, only partly held togetherby mortar.27 It is hard to know just what ‘partly’ signifies, but provided the rear wallof the porticus, of which nothing remained, was well built, its 0.90 m thicknessneed not preclude a roof of wide span. Given a roof which did not exert a strongoutward thrust and was not subject to heavy lateral wind pressure – and a Romanroof of low pitch with king-posts in tension would meet both conditions – thesupport afforded by a masonry wall would suffice. Moreover, the wall could havebeen of mixed construction, incorporating posts at the truss ends. As for the span,the row of bases on the west side are larger than needed for a lean-to;28 freestandingposts supporting roof trusses would reduce the span to 13.5 m. Oelmann anticipatedthe objection about wide roof spans and his demonstration that Roman technologywas capable of roofing impressively wide spans need not be recapitulated. It issufficient to add a few examples from villas. Blankenheim I (Fig. 70) had a hall 12m wide, Bruckneudorf (Aus.) [I] (Fig. 69) one of 14.5 m, while that at Laufenburg(Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 38) was yet wider at 17 m.29 Clearly wide spans were perfectlyfeasible in villas of high status. How far such technical feats can be envisagedlower down the scale is an open question, but spans of 12–13 m were not exceptionaland can be assumed in all the villas in Rheinland-Pfalz in respect of which doubtshave been raised, few of which exceed 12 m in the clear. If 13.50 m is thoughtimpossible, that has to be argued.

That leaves unanswered the point that cellar steps need a roof.30 Unfortunately,nothing is said about the surface of the interior space; whether yard or hall, surelysome part of it was paved? If a yard, were there drains? Nor is it explained whatactivities took place within it. A kitchen garden is a possibility, an ornamental gardenmore appropriate between the domestic ranges, yet no paths were found. We arenot told what was found in this space; the evidence is not given; the question seemsnot to have been asked.

Inzigkofen prompts another question: how did the two rows of rooms flankingthe yard function as a house, and why are they set out so differently from those inother villas with a Romanised frontispiece? At only some 4 m wide they are narrowcompared with British row-houses, which themselves tend to be narrower than theirEuropean counterparts. They have no room of particular importance. More important,no veranda or gallery links them with the porticus and one another, yetintercommunication, producing a series of passage-rooms, is inconceivable. As roomsopening off a large open hall they are credible; regarded as two separate blocks ofrooms (houses? apartments?) fronting a yard, the way they functioned needsexplanation.

In the light of these remarks the uncertainty expressed about the 9.5 m wideinterior space of Hirschberg-GrossSachsen I (Bad.-Württ.)31 is unnecessary, and indeedfor any span less than 13 m. It may even make intelligible such oddities as Lörrach-Brombach (Fig. 28).

— Hall Houses —

43

HALL AND PORTICUS UNIFIED: SINSHEIM ANDKINGSWESTON

A rare plan-form occurs at Sinsheim-Wald (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 8). It has a four-baycolonnade familiar in southern Germany and another, quite differently spaced, formingthe rear wall of the porticus. All the column bases both front and rear are 0.60 msquare and have in the top surface a mortise intended to receive the tenon at thefoot of a timber post of large cross-section.

Now the rear of the porticus – the front wall of the hall – comprises several close-spaced posts interrupted by a length of wall and was thus well capable of supportinga very considerable roof weight. So was the rear colonnade, which is of four baysvarying in length between 3 and 5 m. Given posts of dimensions appropriate to thebases, a roof is perfectly feasible;32 and such large bases and posts would beunnecessary for lean-to roofs.

Sinsheim is without parallel in Germany, although Sigmaringen-Steinäcker (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 8) resembled it if any of the four bays of the colonnade or arcade facingthe porticus were open. A British villa, Bristol-Kingsweston, provides a more certainparallel with its open arcade separating hall from porticus. The underlying intentionwas to obtain, in effect, a wider hall than the customary British proportions allowedby adding to it the partly separated-off porticus; it follows that the porticus wasenclosed, not arcaded, at the front.

DIVIDED HALLS

A few villas in which the hall is divided structurally into two parts tend to bear outthe idea that such houses could be occupied by more than one household. AtVoerendaal-Ten Hove I (Neth.) (Fig. 9), a transverse wall divides the hall into twoequal parts, each about 13.5×8 m. A greater number of additional rooms on one sideis balanced by larger ones on the other, resulting in approximate equality; and anoblong room is shared unequally. Heerlen-Boventse Caumer (Neth.) [I] (Fig. 9) mayhave been a bipartite hall with porticus-and-pavilions. At Vesqueville (Belg.) the hall

Figure 8 Halls open to porticus


44

appears to have proclaimed division very simply by opposite pilasters forming anintangible boundary, one respected by all that could be crossed as occasion warranted;and that idea is supported by the presence of a hearth in one corner. Vesquevillerepresents a half-way stage between an open and a part-structurally divided hall.33

The simplest bipartite division occurs at Laperrière-sur-Saône (Côte-d’Or) (Fig. 9)and Bad Homburg (Hessen) (Fig. 9), and at the latter is matched by an oblique walldividing the yard.34 Such walls can occur indoors too, as at Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer (Fig.9), where the hall is divided by a wall running obliquely across it into two not quiteequal parts.

Division is not always equal. In several houses a square hall adjoins a smallerroom of the same depth which is bigger than any ordinary end or inner room; bothare under one roof. One such is Nünschweiler (Rhld-Pf.), where the hall (13×10 m)is larger than the second room, which is approximately square, but the latter is so bigthat it must be a second hall. Both were subdivided, the principal hall structurally bya cellar with – perhaps – a room above, the smaller hall functionally by an L-shapedpaving of rubble stone.35 One of the analogues for Stahl, Neckarrems (Bad.-Württ.),has two only partially separated hall-like rooms; a wide opening (4.5 m) in the wallbetween them permitted intercommunication, so that here, as at Vesqueville, thehypothetical two households were closely linked in their daily lives. A final example

Figure 9 Divided halls

— Hall Houses —

45

is Houthem-Vogelsang (Neth.) (Fig. 9): phase [I] is a large bipartite block fronted byporticus and pavilions; the two rooms in the south hall may belong to [II].

HALLS: A SUMMARY

Halls with a remarkable variety of structure and plan are found over a wide area ofEurope and in more regions than those mentioned. The categories used above maymake the diversity intelligible by using the fragmentary evidence of individual housesand a multitude of examples to establish a coherent type having many variants.Viewed as a whole, they have much in common.

All are good-sized buildings and some are very large; all are capable ofaccommodating more than a nuclear family. To suppose such a family living at oneend of, for example, Farmington, and working at the other would be an inconceivablywasteful use of so large a space. If an owning family and its servants, both indoorand outdoor, be thought of as occupying the upper and lower ends respectively,there is little sign of the spatial differentiation that might be expected in a situationwhere there is great disparity of wealth; for Farmington, and still more some of thebigger broad halls, must have been quite costly to build.

In a very few instances there is definite evidence of dual occupation, the moststriking being Sinsheim, which has two entrances into the porticus. That villa, like somany, has lesser rooms at both ends of the hall, and these are sometimes the productof a single building campaign, sometimes of gradual growth; the tendency is towardsduality, even if it is only manifested in the two pavilions at the ends of a porticus.

Then there is the question of the extent to which cattle were stalled in a hall. Evenaisled houses in their Romanised forms are doubtful as combined shelters for familyand animals. As for other halls, the claims made for many are dubious and can oftenbe dismissed out of hand. The indoor crafts necessary to keep agrarian productiongoing are a much more likely use of the space in most instances. More will be saidof this in discussing how hall houses developed (chapter 6) but before that thesecond fundamental type, the row-house, has to be considered.

46

CHAPTER FOUR

ROW-TYPE HOUSES

INTRODUCTION

Scattered throughout the northern provinces are many houses which lack adominant room in the sense that the open hall at Mayen dominates the whole

house throughout its history. They take the form of a row of two to five rooms –larger houses will be treated separately as far as possible – which are interspersedwith smaller squarish or corridor-like rooms, and will be designated the row type.The underlying concept was first used by Drack in classifying Swiss houses, andwas devised independently, though not given that name, to meet the somewhatdifferent houses in Britain.1 At the outset other problems of terminology have to betackled. The first arises from the presence in the row of rooms, especially wherethere are five or more, of one somewhat larger than the rest: what to call it? Roomuse in villas is mostly unknown and the designations given to rooms by Romansare uncertain in their provincial application. In medieval and early modernarchitectural history nomenclature is just as much a problem, the same name beingused by contemporaries for an enormous single-room building open to the roofsuch as Westminster Hall, for the 5 m-square principal room, lofted over, of asixteenth-century two-room peasant house, and for the splendid point of entry ofan eighteenth-century country house; the continuity of the old name reflects thegradualness of change in room use and the consequent lack of urgency at anygiven time to devise a new and appropriate one.2 Not only are the uses to whichsuch a principal room was put uncertain, they can often be inferred to changeeven where the room stays the same size. In this situation ‘hall’ must often servefor want of a better term but consistency is unattainable; where a more definite usecan be inferred, living-room or representational room will be employed.

A second problem emerges from considering the implications of row-houses forsocial structure. The recognition that they may provide accommodation for morethan one household has led to the borrowing from vernacular architecture studies ofthe term ‘unit system’; hence ‘unit’ refers to one component element of two or morein a row-type house, each of which corresponds to a household.3 The neutral termis useful in making comparisons, although alternatives will be used, but the realproblem is to decide the number of rooms in a unit; different interpretations group

— Row-Type Houses —

47

rooms differently.4 A further complication stems from the marked variations of roomsize – essentially, depth – which can be found in this kind of house.

INTERCONNECTING ROOMS: NEWPORT (I.o.W.) ANDLAMARGELLE

The first task is to establish the forms that these domestic units might take. Newport(I.o.W.) (Fig. 10) is unusual in retaining evidence of doorway positions and is one ofthe few row-houses where intercommunication between rooms can be known almostcompletely and their uses, to a lesser extent, inferred. If porticus-and-pavilions are setaside, it comprises a range of rooms that can be matched at many other sites.5 In themiddle the largest room is entered by a wide opening (2.4 m), just inside which,buried in the floor, were two boulders. The larger had a flattened top and the smallerone a hole for a metal pin; both probably had something to do with a shrine.6 At theback of the room, which did not intercommunicate with those on either side, was ahearth. It was hardly a living-room but rather a place, open to view from the porticus,where the household gods were venerated and ceremonial feasts held: arepresentational room, a place where those symbolic acts were performed, no doubtoften reciprocally, which were designed to bind the whole household together. Oneither side of this, the principal room by size but not ornament, is a suite of two rooms

Figure 10 Row houses

— Chapter Four —

48

entered from a lobby, each room in the suite to the left being smaller than itscounterpart to the right and probably better finished. From the first the house had aporticus and it is possible that the bath block and right-hand pavilion are both partof the original design, whereas an identical plan at Gargrave-Kirk Sink A (Fig. 12)lacks the baths.

Yet another simple version of the Newport plan appears at Lamargelle-Versingue2 (Côte-d’Or) (Fig. 10). A square middle room, having only a doorway to the porticus– not found, though it certainly existed – is flanked by simpler suites, each comprisinga passage leading to a doorway near its blind end, from which an adjoining squareroom was reached. These passages,7 members of a numerous class, had no otherfunction and will therefore be called transverse lobbies. Newport has rooms whichperform a similar function: one is only half the depth of the range, hence smalllobby; its elongated counterpart will be called a longitudinal lobby; and obviouslythese two may vary in their proportions. A lobby of whatever kind ensures privacyin the room it serves by shielding the entrance from the gaze of the curious, whetherstrangers or servants whose business lay elsewhere.

It thus appears that at both Newport and Lamargelle the flanking suites werecompletely separate; one, perhaps both, had access to a pavilion, and in both villasthe underlying concept of a middle room between and independent of two units ofhabitation, and implicitly in common use, is clear. At Lamargelle the flanking roomsare the same size, at Newport not, so the two suites could be equal or slightlydifferentiated. Which was the more important, the larger (to the east) or the smaller,is not quite certain at Newport because total destruction of floors in the larger oneprecludes comparison with the mosaics of the smaller; yet the complete absence oftesserae in the east part of the house argues that there never were any mosaic floorsthere and that the smaller rooms were the better finished. This contrast between sizeand finish recurs in other villas, Chedworth, for example.

Such sets of rooms may be described by the seventeenth-century English term‘apartments’, that is to say they provided for two persons or, far more likely here,two households (and their personal servants),8 leading separate lives in manyrespects but sharing some common activities. Among the latter were some carriedon in the large middle room, which, if the shrine is conjectured correctly, was thefocus of domestic religious observances and, no doubt, of the feasts accompanyingthem. This room, entered by a wide opening which was not necessarily closed bydoors, and open to the view not only of the households but also, being the firstpart seen by them, of strangers, contrasts strongly with the seclusion of theapartments. Here all made offering to the household gods before receiving hospitalityor transacting business.

An alternative to the occupation of each apartment by a household is by anindividual – husband in one, wife in the other, each with at least one personalservant. No evidence of such a division of the sexes has been advanced in a Romano-British context, so henceforth it will be assumed that an apartment corresponds to ahousehold. In that case Lamargelle and Newport show the number of roomsappropriate to a nuclear family of a certain social position at the time they werebuilt: fewer in the French villa than the English, only one large room and access(presumably) to the nearer pavilion. Since pavilions are, typologically, additions to


49

the basic plan, it appears that the minimal requirement of a household may havebeen only a single sizeable room, with access to other facilities.

NEWPORT ENLARGED: SPARSHOLT

This form of interpretation can be applied to other row-type villas, most of whichhave not revealed doorways. Sparsholt (Hants.) (Fig. 68), though, has several. Thefive middle cells of the principal house [I] are identical to Newport save that they arenot a mirror-image pair flanking the middle room (as Newport nearly is); the right-hand lobby and large room are interchanged. This illustrates an important principlegoverning the planning of row-houses, that the rooms of the individual unitscomprising them can be arranged in any order. But Sparsholt is larger than Newport,having at each end a narrow room of the same width as the adjoining small pavilion,itself no wider than the porticus. These rooms may, indeed, be additions to theoriginal core and are shown as such in the hypothetical development. Fortunately,doorways were preserved in this part. Entrance to the new room at the south endwas from the porticus through what may have been in formal architectural terms apavilion and this doubtless applied at the north end too. A new unit was thus addedat each end, doubling the number of households.

A feature of Sparsholt requiring explanation, and it is one found in most row-houses, is the variation of room size. The principal rooms of the two original apartmentsdiffer slightly, the one to the south being bigger than its fellow to the north, yet itslobby and adjoining room are smaller: an apparent inconsistency in making therelative importance of the two units clear and one not found at Newport, where allthree rooms of the better finished apartment to the left are smaller than theircounterparts to the right. In fact, differences of size between units are common,indeed normal, in row-houses, and are observable in the biggest of the kind. Thisasymmetrical disposition of the two apartments at Sparsholt no doubt had a socialbasis, a desire to remove the entrance to the inferior, workaday apartment awayfrom the front entrance, and this in turn had an architectural consequence; the threedoorways facing the porticus could not be symmetrically placed, as they often were,and as reconstructions of villas almost invariably show them.

LAMARGELLE ENLARGED: DOWNTON

A seven-cell plan of comparable size to Sparsholt and with equally instructive detailoccurs at Downton (Wilts.) (Fig. 10). A middle room with mosaic pavement is flankedby two equal-sized blocks, each with what looks like a wide transverse lobby betweentwo square rooms. The greater than usual width probably denotes some commonuse, not simply circulation; hence it can be assumed that the two rooms it serveswere used by the same household.

This two-unit villa was built with a porticus. By comparison with Newport orSparsholt the most striking element is a small architectural feature blocking directaccess from porticus to middle room; it stands at the back of an internal porch, with


50

doorways on either side, through which the two apartments had to be reached, andwas probably a water shrine of some kind, the modest counterpart of the well-known and more elaborate structure at Darenth (Kent) (below, p. 156). If the smallmiddle cell of three is viewed as a transverse lobby, each apartment is a morespacious version of the major apartments in the previous villas, yet the better-preservedpart of the porticus to the south reveals a complication. At the end is a pavilion-likeroom serving the very humble and unpavilion-like function of furnace room, so thatit may never have had an internal doorway. Between it and the porch is a smallroom that appears to have functioned as an anteroom to the lobby proper, as if toshield the porticus from the disagreeable sight of a menial task. That hardly affectsthe general sense of a plan comprising two apartments, each having access to amiddle room of common use which was furnished with a mosaic pavement andopened on to a little nymphaeum.

Classification is further simplified by recognising that the small lobby, though arefinement of the transverse lobby, performs fundamentally the same function and isinterchangeable with it. These considerations applied to the core of the plan makeintelligible other houses with a big middle room and symmetrical or near-symmetricalflanking suites.

The best known is Ditchley (Oxon.) (Fig. 10). It must have been an imposingexample of its kind, having two good-sized wing rooms in addition to the mainrange. Little Milton (Oxon.), Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor II (Herts.) and Maidstone-Loose Road (Kent) have exactly the same core rooms as Ditchley although the smalland transverse lobbies change places; whilst, at Walton on the Hill-The Heath, asmall lobby leading to one of the two apartments stands at the end of the buildinginstead of flanking the middle room. In houses without a large middle room such asFaversham I (Kent) (Fig. 11) and Gargrave-Kirk Sink D (Fig. 12) transverse andsquare lobbies stand back to back. These variations reinforce the point made earlier,that the rooms of the individual units comprising a house can be arranged in anyorder. The principal house at Mansfield Woodhouse (Notts.) (Fig. 11) differs only inthat the supposed transverse lobby is wide enough to be virtually a room in its ownright; Cobham Park (Kent), destroyed at one end, is certainly of this class; Pangbourne-Maidenhatch (Berks.) and Deanshanger (Northants.) are variants of Lamargelle. Inshort, five-cell plans of several variant forms are common in Britain.

No conclusive evidence has yet come to light to confirm the idea that houses ofthis kind were for two households but one tantalising hint that the idea may becorrect appeared at North Cerney-The Ditches (Glos.) (Fig. 13). There partial excavationof the first stone building revealed what looks like half of a five-cell plan – a simplestraight range – and it has, leading up to the one transverse lobby that was uncovered,a stone-lined path. It may be that a second lobby and path are waiting to be found,analogous to the two parallel approaches found in some much larger villas such asRomegoux-La Vergnée (Charente-Mar.) (Fig. 13) and Winkel-Seeb (Fig. 72). If thissuggestion is correct, it confirms the impression given by lobbies that unitsystemvillas were the norm in Britain.


51

THE SIZE AND FORMS OF UNITS

Row-houses could consist of several virtually identical units: Hérouville-Lébisey(Calvados) (Fig. 14), Boos-Le Bois Flahaut [I] (Seine-Mar.) (Fig. 14) and RockbourneW Bldg III (Hants.) (Fig. 42) all have three rooms, each with a transverse lobby.Bramdean [I] (Hants.), where one of three lobbies is small and square, shows thebeginnings of differentiation by form; Newton St Loe W [I] carries this further inhaving three lobbies, all different. Analysis is easy where each room has an obviouslobby, but in many villas at least one living-room stands next to what is either a wide

Figure 11 The varied positions of lobbies


52

Figure 12 Unit-system villas


53

Figure 13 Row houses with two entrances

Figure 14 Virtually identical units


54

lobby or a narrow room, and the difficulty is the greater where no large middle roomdivides the range into apartments.

It is hard, in all but the simplest houses, to decide how many rooms constitute aunit – changes over time are likely – and how many units (or households) comprisedthe houseful. Romegoux (Fig. 13) is an interesting case. It has a large courtyardscreened by a porticus, in front of which are two square porches and, between themin the middle, a little open-fronted building that can only be a shrine. Across thecourtyard two paths ran to two more porches within a porticus; and it is observablethat, whereas the outer porches are placed perfectly symmetrically, the inner right-hand porch is slightly nearer the east side than its counterpart. In a villa as rectilinearas this an apparently trifling difference cannot be dismissed as carelessness in settingout; in fact it conforms to the different importance of the rooms – entrance-hall andliving-room combined, probably – into which the porches lead, the west one beingtwice the size of the east. That may imply four units each comprising one room anda transverse lobby – a larger Hérouville-Lébisey: four units of living-space groupedin pairs of not quite equal importance beside a common living-room/entrance.

HOUSES ENTERED AT ONE END

Romegoux and Downton show that no simple correlation exists between villa sizeand unit size, and Farningham-Manor House I bears that out (Fig. 15). As built, itwas a series of units on an L-shaped plan, entered at the south end of the wing andso along the porticus; only in II did it acquire an impressively wide entrance in themiddle. In the way it was approached Farningham resembles Blankenheim I (Fig.70), and it has, at the end of the wing, a wide doorway opening into a shallowroom which may have an equivalent in the shallow unexplained structure in theGerman villa. It is inconceivable that this was the entrance9 because, unless it wereitself a passage-room with other such behind it, it can only have led to one room.How many units there were is open to argument, as in most other villas of thissize. Two parts of the house can be interpreted with reasonable confidence. Thewing is a hall-like room 13 with a lobby 12 and was probably a workhall like the

Figure 15 End entrances


55

comparable room in Blankenheim I. At the other end of the porticus, furthest fromthe entrance, is the largest and most private apartment, comprising a transverselobby and two rooms 1, 3,10 like the Downton units or Ewhurst-Rapsley 6 V (Fig. 41).Probably the rest comprised three units. Two units which were, functionally, a mirror-image pair with square lobbies, had intercommunicating living rooms 6 and 7, thedoorway between them being well established, and a third, in the corner, had atransverse lobby.

If the suggestion of intercommunication between units be thought to invalidatethe whole mode of interpretation, early modern houses show this need not be so.Where units form two detached houses they could be joined corner to corner topermit intercommunication, and where they form a single range a doorway may befound linking different units, exactly as at Farningham.11 Whatever the truth of this,an important aspect of Farningham is that the accommodation it provides mightelsewhere have been divided between several buildings, as at St Lythans-Whitton(Fig. 65) or Gargrave-Kirk Sink.

Upchurch-Boxted (Kent) has points of resemblance to Farningham-Manor Housebut the report has too little detail to allow the comparison to be pursued. Anothermember of the same class may be Alresford (Essex); in [I] it appears to have beenentered at the end of the left-hand wing and so along the porticus, and in [II]acquired a second wing, like Farningham. Reach (Cambs.) and Ridgewell (Essex)may have developed in a similar way.

Once variation in the number of cells in units within the same house is recognised,the way is open to interpret other villas, particularly those entered along the porticusrather than at right angles to it. Aylesford-Eccles I (Kent) (Fig. 66) becomes moreintelligible if the unusual open-ended room at the south end, like that at FarninghamI or its simpler version at Blankenheim I, is seen as a shrine, and to give some ideaof what it may have looked like, the shrine (aedicula) from the fort at Mainz (Fig.37)12 has been modified with a king-post roof (Fig. 66); and the ornament would besimpler, achieved with plasterwork and paint. There, the person entering paid hisrespects before proceeding towards the two transverse-lobby units and the largerone with superior floors beyond. But did all five rooms with tessellated floors belongto that unit? The transverse lobby and adjoining rooms certainly, by analogy: thenarrow north end room presumably; the biggest room in the house, between thesuperior unit and the rest, perhaps not. That may have been common to all the unitsbecause a number of villas seem to have one room additional to those which adjoinlobbies, as at Box (Fig. 48), Compton Dando-Littleton (Som.) and St Michael-Gorhambury. Even if the five end rooms prove to have been wrongly divided up,the unit system offers the only reasonable interpretation of so long a range.

Continental examples are less easy to find. Generally, end-entrance plans havemore complex forms of lobby and will be discussed later (chapter 5). One particularlyrelevant house which deserves mention here is Ormalingen (Switz.) (Fig. 15), whichwas recognised from the first as having been entered at the south end of the porticus.It differs from the British houses in having, at about a third of its length from theentrance, a wall in which stood a doorway of large dimensions; tufa voussoirs of itsround-arch head were found.13 Its purpose is clear, to form a social barrier betweenthe room at the south end – a workhall? – and the three apartments, although its


56

placing hints that the south apartment may have been of slightly lower status thanthe other two.

THE LONGITUDINAL LOBBY

A lobby of one form or another is an essential component of all but the simplestrow-houses. Besides the two already mentioned, a third kind lies parallel to the frontwall of a house and provides access from the entrance – usually the porticus – to aprincipal room at each end, while directly in front of the entrance is a third inferiorroom – or sometimes two – that may have been reached either from the lobby orfrom the major rooms. Entry into the house in this way is so unimpressive bycomparison with entry into a hall or even into any good-sized room that it must haveconnoted some important aspect of social structure – taken here to be duality ofpower or ownership. Houses of this type demonstrate as clearly as any the jointoccupation implicit in a particular architectural concept, despite the small size andrestricted development of many of the examples.

In its simplest form the type occurs at St Lythans-Whitton VIII W (Glam.) (Fig. 65),in a house comprising an elongated lobby serving two rooms, that to the left beinglarger than the one to the right. How the room behind the lobby was used, whetherin common or in connection with only one of the large rooms, is unknowable. Inthe light of Huntsham N (Herefs.) (Fig. 16) – the misnamed ‘cottage-house’ – wherethe corresponding space is divided into two unequal rooms, the former may be themore likely. Huntsham, though, has its own problem, for it was not divided simplyinto major and minor units; instead, the larger major room (1) adjoins the smallerminor room (3). As with other small distinctions of this kind, the social nuancesunderlying them must have been of considerable importance to be worth botheringabout. This is precisely the kind of counterpoise of rooms found in quite differentcircumstances, whether in the conjunction of the larger pavilion with the smaller endchamber of a hall or, in a row-type house, that of the larger lobby with the smallermain room. Although difficult to understand, this very common balancing ofcomponent parts of a house must correspond to some aspect of provincial Romansocial structure that required concrete expression; and it provides a contrast to thosehouses where the larger major and minor rooms go together, such as Gargrave-KirkSink C [I] and (excluding the wings) Eaton-by-Tarporley (Cheshire) (Fig. 16). It is

Figure 16 Longitudinal lobbies


57

precisely the smallness, variation and repetition of these architectural differencesthat shows how important they were. Some subtler model of society is needed toexplain them than the current ones of a quasi-manorial lord or capitalist farmer oreven a farmer operating with little more than his family’s labour.

Where the room behind the lobby was structurally undivided, it may have been acommon workhall, as the Dwelling House II at Langton (Yorks) (Fig. 3) implies. Itbegan as a superior version of St Lythans-Whitton W, the big room to the left havinga hypocaust and its fellow to the right another occupying only half of the room. Inthe narrow room behind the lobby were a small plunge bath – presumably used incommon – and a furnace serving the right-hand room. The use of the rear spaceseems to have varied between a workaday service room and two high-quality rooms,but probably it was always shared between the apartments.

The most ambitious application of the longitudinal lobby in a British villa is atWellow (Som.) (Fig. 16), where, despite the lack of doorway positions, the impliedpattern of circulation is clear. An unusually large middle room with a mosaic floor isflanked by transverse lobbies which may have connected the porticuses; moreimportantly, each led to a longitudinal lobby at the rear, from which opened twosquare rooms. The purpose of this was to ensure the upmost privacy for the two-room apartments. A further point of interest is that, in a large and well-appointedhouse, the accommodation deemed necessary for the personal use of those personsoccupying the most important suites was no more than two rooms – exactly thesame as in Downton and many others. It exemplifies the truth of Laurence Stone’sobservation that a certain minimum number of rooms were required for daily livingby members of a given social class or order, and this deserves to be kept in mindwhen alternatives to the unit system are put forward.

In a few instances the longitudinal lobby is wider than appears necessary for itsprimary function. Cenero-Murias de Belono (Oviedo) N (Fig. 12) is one such. It is asthough the lobby were used as work- or living-space for the family occupying thisunit. Similar conjunctions of three rooms are widespread, occurring in Belgium andGermany, for example.

LONGITUDINAL LOBBIES AND REVERSE SYMMETRY

Architectural duality is a constant theme in the houses of the Roman provinces andtakes a great variety of forms. One of them, very obvious once remarked, is reversesymmetry, that is to say the provision of two like rooms or sets of accommodationfacing in opposite directions, a peculiarity which has been noted occasionally inindividual buildings14 but has never been examined as a recurrent phenomenon. Ofthe several forms it takes, only those including a longitudinal lobby will be consideredhere and of these the most easily explicable is Beadlam N I (Yorks.) (Fig. 17). It hadthree doorways at the front, an imposing one 2.3 m wide in the middle and one neareach end, sited as near symmetrically as the plan allows. Their placing and associatedfeatures demonstrate how closely architecture mirrors social relations.

In I, access is principally by the two side doorways. The left-hand one opens intoa longitudinal lobby 5 and so to the west unit, comprising rooms 7 and 8 and also a


58

little workhall (6) in which was the furnace for 7 and two sets of iron tools. At theeast end, where the porticus terminated,15 the doorway opened into a general-purposeliving-room heated by an ‘oven’, and just inside is a doorway into what became in IIthe best-appointed room in the whole house, embellished with a tessellated floor;thus the external doorway and the best-room doorway stand in exactly the samerelation as does the doorway from the lobby and that into the pavilion (8). The twoapartments shared a common middle room like the one at Newport and, like it, wereentered by a wide doorway. A shrine might have been expected about here in I,something a little more elaborate than the pot (for a votive offering) just beside thewest doorway.

The plan is in effect a rearrangement of a row-house with a middle room flankedby two two-room units, into neither of which does an additional room (6) fit easily:a situation resembling that in several other villas except that in them the extra roomeither always was, or developed into, something far superior to a workhall. BeadlamN suggests that the middle room (4) – a modest representational room – and theworkhall (6) were held in common by the two households. The two rooms wereeasy of access for both, and the reason for cutting off the workhall by a doorwaymay be because it was in the inferior part of the house rather than for any utilitarianconsiderations of the smoke and smells arising from its use.

Beadlam is the most intelligible example of a mode of planning found in much ofthe Empire and over several centuries, the reverse symmetry of the side-by-side hallsat Francolise-San Rocco [I] (Italy) (Fig. 69) being the earliest example. Howeverclose the formal likeness of the two sets of rooms, they were rarely identical, acondition paralleling the small differences between the units of row-houses.

High Wycombe (Fig. 17) is another British house organised on this principle. As atBeadlam, the longitudinal lobby at the front is cut off by a wall and doorway from themiddle room and the one at the rear is open to it, and since no menial or dirty task wasperformed here the difference must have a social explanation. More difficult to understand

Figure 17 Reverse symmetry


59

is the function of such elongated and at the same time so extraordinarily narrow (6×2.5 m)rooms. The proportions can be matched in continental row-houses but there the greaterwidth of the main range, usually 8–10 m, makes it earlier to envisage a use.16 Bedroomswere the excavator’s suggestion, but whether rooms were specialised to that extent is opento doubt, and if they were, why were they the closest to the public space of the entrance-hall? Whatever they were for, this house is one of the few which do not have the principalrooms in the main range. But of its bipartite character there can be no doubt.

HOUSES WITH TWO FRONT ENTRANCES

The idea of joint occupancy aroused instant hostility when first mooted. Two defenceswere erected against such unwelcome thoughts.17 Thus Ferdière dismissed thehypothesis of collective property as the result of (among other things) ‘erroneousinterpretations of plans of the living-quarters of villas’, and ‘adventurous hypotheseson the symmetry of villa plans’; yet he, like his compatriots, has never explained theplan of the little villa at Maulévrier (Fig. 13), first published in 1836 and republishedin 1934 by the man he acknowledges as ‘the great specialist on Roman Gaul’, AlbertGrenier,18 or even that of Romegoux, well excavated in the late 1930s.

Almost everyone takes it for granted that a country house or a farmhouse has aconspicuous main entrance, with a minor one at the back for servants or farm-handsand, probably, a doorway into the garden: only archaeologists and architecturalhistorians can take two front doorways for granted. Yet two doorways can only beintended for two sets of persons – who must surely correspond to two households,not family and servants – to enter separately; and Maulévrier can be interpreted inthese terms without straining the evidence. It is divided internally by a cross-wallmidway between the two front entrances into two parts of equal size but with adifferent disposition of rooms. The wider entrance leads to a unit like the equivalentpart of Sparsholt, the narrower to a Downton-type unit, and the different kinds oflobby show that each carried a social meaning.

Romegoux (Fig. 13) tells a similar story on a larger scale; it is important for theinformative detail lacking at Maulévrier. Two porches in front of the outer porticusmatch two within the inner porticus; parallel paths like those at Winkel-Seeb connectedthem. The house comprised, on the west side, what appears to have been a commonhall, the largest room in the building, which was flanked by two units, each with atransverse lobby and living-room. A third such unit lay to east, followed by a somewhatenigmatic room in which was a sunken structure of squared masonry; this containeda considerable quantity of cinders and put the excavators in mind of a vasarium orwash-house.19 Last came a unit identical to the three preceding ones but superior tothem in having, in part of the lobby, a hypocauston20 giving indirect heat to thelarger room. In all this, only the alleged wash-house causes surprise, its lowly functionsitting uneasily with the porch in front of it. A more likely analogy for a room soapproached is Downton, with its nymphaeum in front of the common middle room.Viewed in this light Romegoux has two rooms of common use – a representationalroom and a larger hall (workhall?) – each standing between two domestic units. It isa grander cousin of Ormalingen (Switz.) or Aylesford-Eccles (Kent).


60

Hemel Hempstead-Gadebridge Park (Herts.) (Fig. 13) is more easily understoodin a general way than in detail. On the north side, from which the villa must havebeen approached in III and IV and probably throughout, are two small projectingporches21 proclaiming two points of entry and two apartments behind them. Thewest porch stands opposite what looks like the central lobby of a two-room unit, theeast porch does not relate to anything in particular, and all that can be said is that thefive rooms broken by two lobbies constitute a row-house to which two entranceswould be appropriate.

FOUR-CELL HOUSES

Houses comprising four cells are common and typologically they precede the five-cell category with a middle representational room. One group has back-to-backlobbies, usually one transverse and one small, for example Faversham I.22 The differentkinds of lobby reveal that some social distinction, some difference in status andauthority, existed in the kin-group. How big a change this represents from the earliersituation, where villas like Hérouville-Lébisey [I] or Boos [I] had three unitsdifferentiated only by size, is hard to say, but probably the effect on those whoentered such houses was as great as must have been the contrast in the storeyedhouses of post-medieval England between a cross- (or through-) passage and alobby entrance.23

Faversham I (Fig. 11) was entered from the south by a timber veranda not coveringthe full length of the building. Verandas coupled with differently placed lobbiesoccur in other four-cell row-houses such as Welwyn-Lockleys I (Herts.), Brixworth I(Northants.) (both Fig. 11) and Chilgrove 2/II (Sussex) and there too they do notextend the whole length.24 The reason must be that it was not needed; a utilitarianshelter went only as far as the final point of entrance, that being the extent to whichprotection from dripping eaves was needed. In that case the north unit of FavershamI had a doorway either into the transverse lobby (for otherwise the lobby had noconceivable purpose) or, as the logic of the veranda dictates, into the hall-like living-room (1), where it was opposite a hearth, as in many hall houses.

Brixworth I (Fig. 11) lacks the transverse lobby but is otherwise like Faversham I;the point where the veranda ends suggests that the doorway into the unit furtherfrom the house entrance was in room 2. The different placing of the square lobby inWelwyn-Lockleys I makes it impossible, strictly speaking, to be sure that it comprisedtwo units. Only its general likeness to the others suggests that is so, in which casethe veranda terminated exactly as at Brixworth, at the entrance to the bigger room(4) of the far unit. If that were so, the doorway faced a hearth, and there may havebeen another doorway into the end room (5) placed comparably to that at BeadlamN I into room 2.

The general type, irrespective of the position of lobbies, is common. At Gargrave D [I],Cléry-sur-Somme (Fig. 11) and possibly Hartlip W [I] (Kent) the lobbies are back to back,at Ellesborough-Terrick (Bucks.) (Fig. 11) they are at the ends, and Combe St Nicholas-Wadeford W (Som.) is probably the same but with two transverse lobbies. As far as theirprimary purpose is concerned, the two kinds of lobby are interchangeable.25


61

Four-cell houses with a single lobby are thought to comprise two units becausethose with two lobbies do, but it is conceivable that the two rooms extra to theobvious unit were a common hall and a one-room apartment. One corollary of therow-house style of life, that entry into a living-room should be through another andusually smaller one, makes it unlikely that a unit of whatever size would be reachedthrough a common hall. Thus consideration argues in favour of a second two-roomunit at Welwyn, and in other adequately excavated and fully published examples thesame conclusion is probably justified, but one French villa with a comparable plancertainly incorporated a common hall. Civray-Le Poirier Molet (Cher) (Fig. 18)comprises three square cells and a transverse lobby at the end, and, since the middlecell of the three is open to the porticus, that part must have been public spacecommon to all. It was roofed over, no doubt, so that apart from its having a frontopening of full width instead of a wide doorway, this room is the counterpart of themiddle room at Newport.

One further example, one of the most frequently quoted British villas, deservesdiscussion – St Stephens-Park Street (Fig. 11). In VI (the first Roman phase) it was afour-cell building, including what was either a narrow room or a wide transverse

Figure 18 Compact row houses


62

lobby (2.4 m) over a cellar.26 It had a porticus on the west side which is likely to havebeen continuous around the south end; and if, as is generally assumed, the housewas approached in VI from the east, as it certainly was later, a porticus existed theretoo. That assumption is compatible with the longitudinal lobby (2) on that sideserving the big room (1), and from it opened a second lobby leading to a small roomwith a hearth (3). The whole is the equivalent of one of the apartments at Newport,which leaves the putative narrow room over the cellar looking like a lobby to thesecond large room.

THE COMPACT ROW TYPE

In central and south-west France many houses, most of them known from aerialphotographs, have a more compact plan than those so far described. From five toseven rooms are arranged within a rectangle having proportions of about 5:2 or 5:3and at first sight these houses, which are mostly of symmetrical plan, can haveabsolutely no relation to the row type. On closer examination the rooms vary in sizein much the same way as do row-houses, so that comparison between the twocategories is enlightening. This kind of plan is obviously unrelated to the hall type,and because its elements correspond to those of the row type and could just as wellhave been strung out in a line, it will here be called the compact row type. Therelation between the orthodox type in its several variations and the compact versioncan be demonstrated by some examples, all in the department of Cher.

It may be appropriate to begin with an unquestionably orthodox villa. La Guerche-Le Grand Chausseroi W comprises a porticus and three cells, the middle one with awide opening to the middle room, Newport-style. The right-hand cell is like one ofthose at Maulévrier, the left-hand one an undivided elongated room; each is assumedto be a unit or apartment. A kind of plan not diverging much from this appears in thevillas of Primelles-Champ Chiron (Fig. 18) and Morthommiers-Le Crot; both have aporticus, a middle space completely open to it, and a room on either side. But themiddle space, which must have been roofed, is subdivided, and here is the onlydifference between the two houses. Morthommiers has, partitioned off at the back,a narrow room looking like a lobby giving access to one or other flanking room.Primelles has in the corresponding position a chamber wide enough to be either ananteroom serving the same purpose or an inner room to the hall/porticus; similarlytransformed, it, too, would not look amiss.

A still simpler combination of the basic three rooms is found at Lazenay-Les Sales.There the porticus as an architectural entity is suppressed, to be replaced, for thetwo rooms beside the hall, by front lobbies like the one on the right-hand side ofMaulévrier; the person entering presumably came into the hall by a doorway in themiddle, to be received there or to proceed through a lobby to one of the apartments.This is not so different from Lamargelle except that entry at Lazenay is into a publicspace which is also living space. And with Vallenay-Patureau Fourneau the conceptof transformation within the row type is complete: it is like a poorer version of Boosor Hérouville-Lébisey with each unit turned on its side so that the lobby is at thefront, thus eliminating the need for an orthodox porticus. In such a case the middle


63

lobby, being at the front, may rather have been a short porticus giving access to theadjoining lobbies. Again a comparison with orthodox row-type houses comes tomind between this arrangement and the quasi-pavilions at Sparsholt through whichthe end rooms were presumably entered; the difference lies in the proportions ofporticus to lobbies.

Sparsholt has a bearing on another house, one known through aerial photography,at Fromentières (Mayenne). The core comprises three square cells separated by twotransverse lobbies; but the middle cell, which has a transverse lobby-like room at therear, is open to the porticus, which terminates, like the British villa, in two smallsquare rooms. Only one British house, at Brislington (Avon), probably, but notdefinitely, had a middle room completely open to the porticus. Both these villas areminor variants of the row type.

Two general observations can be made about the compact row type. The firstconcerns the porticus which, where it formed an undivided space with the commonmiddle room, must have been part of the common living-space, and to that extentresembles the porticus of other villas where the porticus was in all probability enclosed,such as Great Staughton (Cambs.) (Fig. 40). That leaves unresolved the purpose ofthe narrow room at the rear of the hall and, since it appears in four houses of thesmall sample available, it must be important. Its lobby-like appearance may bemisleading; the presence at Vallenay of such a room, in addition to the three at thefront, argues for some other function than an aid to circulation. One possibility,suggested by the position of this small room, is that it accommodated a shrine.Uncertainties of this kind, though, may be held to matter less than the overallresemblance of the variant forms to the row type proper; if so, a general likenesspermits a linkage with more complicated versions of these houses which can befound in other parts of France.

At what point do divergences from the concept of a row-house demand thecreation of a new type? The question arises with a villa in Aquitaine, Lussas-et-Nontronneau (Fig. 18), where the principal house, though composed entirely offeatures found in row-type villas, looks very different from any other so far discussed.It is entered from a colonnaded porticus through a quite large porch – large enoughto provide a waiting space for servants – and so into the rear living-quarters. Besidethe porch to the left is the exact counterpart of the middle room at Newport, with itsfront walls reduced to pilasters to give an opening the full width of the room – likeBrislington, perhaps. It no doubt served as a representational room and perhapscontained a shrine. The smaller room on the other side of the porch, which also hasa wide doorway, may have been a small workhall/kitchen. In the rear part of thehouse the most notable feature is the unequal size and reverse symmetry of the twoapartments to the left and right; both preserve a fireplace backing on to the partitionbetween room and lobby and situated in a characteristic relation to the doorway.Between them is what is described as a court, although it must have been roofed.These dispositions afforded maximum privacy for the apartments, divorcing themfrom the public spaces of the house to a degree impossible in all but the largest row-houses such as Bierbach (chapter 5 and Fig. 19).

The reverse symmetry of Lussas-et-Nontronneau finds not a parallel but an echoin the mirror-image pair of rooms of the only German example of the compact row


64

type. Hummetroth-Haselburg (Hessen) (Fig. 18) has, in its two principal rooms, thethickened walls found in Jemelle-Neufchâteau (Fig. 46) or Bierbach; they mark offthe most important inner part of the room and are the equivalent of a dais in a hallor the apsidal termination of some grand rooms in other villas. The pair of rooms oneach side of the middle hall-like room and the little apsidal room could be strungout in line like an orthodox row-house.

Looking at Lussas-et-Nontronneau and Hummetroth as row-type derivatives maybe thought to strain classification to its limits. Nevertheless, it is useful to regard themthus on the grounds that the transformation of component parts, of which thesevillas are such striking examples, is merely done in a more radical way than in mostforms of the type, while the whole retains the underlying concept. That is importantfor social history.

65

CHAPTER FIVE

DEVELOPED FORMS OFROW-HOUSE

Many houses comprise a string of rooms of various sizes that do not relate one toanother in any clearly discernible way. They have two features in common, one being

the absence of anything that could be described as a dominant hall, the other that a numberof usually squarish rooms are separated by cells divided into anything from two to fiverooms. That is enough to put them into the row type, and, as before, only the main range,the essential core of the building, will be considered. At the outset, though, it has to beadmitted that many of the larger villas can be interpreted in more than one way in detail;the forms which lobbies take vary greatly and only the additive principle underlying theplanning of this kind of house is insisted on. Two comparatively uncomplicated exampleswill show a line of development from the row-houses described earlier.

KIRCHBERG: THREE-ROOM AND LOBBY UNITS

Küttigen-Kirchberg [I] and [II] (Switz.) (Fig. 19) began as a house of seven cells, theends of the first build being marked, as Drack observed,1 by thicker walls. Beingsited on the edge of a fairly steep slope to a river, it was necessarily entered by a rearporticus, very little of which remained. A middle room (5) has on each side twoformally identical units, each a more advanced form of those at Downton (Wilts.)and virtually identical with the domestic end of Schupfart II (Switz.) (Fig. 71) orFerpicloz [I] (Switz.).2 The result can only be described as symmetrical, yet the twosmaller rooms (3 and 4) in the west unit are very slightly narrower than thecorresponding ones (6 and 7) in the east, and this, in a building set out withcharacteristic Roman accuracy, is certainly intended to express some difference.

So slight a difference of size must be a matter of status rather than function; it canhardly have been perceptible even to those living there, although it may have beenemphasised by equally small differences in architectural ornament or decoration. Itis not easy to appreciate the significance of such small distinctions between one partof a house and another from a plan alone, yet they must have been thought veryimportant to be so carefully made.

Again, a comparison with seventeenth-century English houses may help. A minormanor house in Hertfordshire, Aston Bury, has two staircases, to all intents and

— Chapter Five —

66

Figure 19 Lobbies and room groupings

— Developed Forms of Row-House —

67

purposes identical, serving a not very large straight range of rooms. The details arenot exactly the same but only someone very familiar with both could distinguish onefrom the other in photographs. Yet the staircase projection at the upper end is veryslightly wider than its fellow at the lower end and projects slightly more – somethingthat is only appreciated at the rear of the house, and more apparent to the moderneye after looking at a plan, so used are we to accepting near-symmetry as truesymmetry. So, too, in a farmhouse at Pirton, Walnut Tree Farm, which has twoformally identical porches: yet the one at the upper end is just a little wider than theother at the lower end.3 To people lacking the printed material through which mostknowledge is acquired today, these small differences no doubt leapt to the eye andconveyed an instant social meaning, as they certainly did in Roman Britain.

To return to Kirchberg, like many continental row-houses it has, not the squarishrooms that were the rule in Britain, but oblong ones: 1 and 10 are half as long againas they are wide. If they were entered at one end, the first third of the length musthave been, to some extent, a passage-room; if near the middle, the room was effectivelydivided into two parts. In either case the superior end was probably at the displayfront of the house (south). Further differentiation is provided by the front porticus,embellished with pilasters to give the house an imposing appearance when seenfrom the valley below. It is wider at the west end where the very slightly inferior unitis; and that the narrowing is intended to proclaim the superiority of that end isconfirmed by the nature of the additions in [II]: service rooms, including a kitchen,to west, a suite of rooms with hypocausts and mosaics to east.

Kirchberg, larger and more complicated than Downton or Newport (I.o.W.) showshow architectural features apparently without significance are given meaning wheninterpreted in a social sense. A further point is that the two smaller rooms reachedoff each of the transverse lobbies, though formally similar to the square lobby andadjoining room of Newport, in fact perform a different function. These considerationsare observable in other villas like Kirchberg.

Another Swiss villa, Vicques [I], though more pretentious, with the porticusextending forwards to pavilions totally unconnected with the main domesticactivities, is otherwise almost identical in the body of the house except for thedifferent sizes of the smaller rooms in the two units; and here the existence of arear porticus, which Kirchberg [I] must have had, is well established. A largerversion appears at Landen-Betzveld [I] (Belg.). It has the same plan as Kirchberg [I]with the addition at each end of a smaller unit comprising a large room enteredfrom a transverse lobby.4

THE ELABORATION OF UNITS: LAUFEN-MÜSCHAG

As provincial Roman society developed, more varied and complex kinds of householdrequired the elaboration of the lobby-and-three-rooms type. It is easier to point tothe new forms than to explain them, as Laufen-Müschag (Switz.) (Fig. 19) shows.There phase [I], excluding the porticus-and-pavilions, resembles Kirchberg [I] in ageneral way, with two units, each with a transverse lobby, flanking a middle room(6),5 yet on closer examination much is different.


68

The north unit has a room (2) twice as long as wide, so it must have been usedsomewhat differently from the corresponding room in Kirchberg and still more sofrom that at Landen. The lobby (3) is awkwardly shaped because the other rooms offit are of unequal width. It must have been important to make room 5 wider and toenter it at the far end, not at what could have been the easiest point architecturally,where it adjoins 4; and from these assumptions it follows that the important part of5 is likely to have been at the east end.6 Doorways into the lobbies and middle roomwould give the symmetry normally sought.7

An oblong shape for the middle room (6), assuming it had a commonrepresentational function, is appropriate. At the far end, no doubt, was a shrine orseat of honour to be used on formal occasions, including ceremonial dining, andapproached with the degree of respect the occasion required.

The south unit comprised, on one side of the lobby (9), two rooms (7 and 8),much like those at Kirchberg, and on the other the largest room of all (10/11), half asbig again as its counterpart (2) and looking like a domestic hall. The large pavilion(15) which adjoins it has three hearths of various periods and is probably the workhall.8

This analysis shows that the two units of Vicques had acquired different functionsand that the house had lost the near equality of the two parts of Kirchberg. Clearlywe are dealing with a different kind of houseful. Rooms 3–5 are important indicatorsof a new style of life not so far observed in row-houses and present a conjunction ofshapes reminiscent of the block of rooms in the middle of Köln-Mungersdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 71). Laufen appears to represent rather different styles of life in the twohouseholds, one of them markedly superior. It is still a row-house but has lost theethos of earlier ones.

One other Swiss villa deserves mention in this connection. Zofingen has two cellssubdivided in the same way as rooms 3–5 at Laufen, but they are extraordinarilyelongated and in inverse symmetry. I do not accept Drack’s view that this arrangementand that at Laufen are the result of alteration.9

BIERBACH: HOW MANY UNITS IN A ROW-TYPE VILLA?

Row-houses develop in size as well as in the variety of their lobbies and some are solarge that they must consist of more than two units; thus, even if the interrelation oflobbies and rooms is hard to explain in detail, their general significance may be clearenough. At Bierbach (Saarld) (Fig. 19) the essentials of the latest phase are simple:excluding the middle room, five large rooms are served by four lobbies.10

The front elevation of this stately house was dominated by a wide portal leadinginto the porticus and on to the wide doorway of a very grand hall. At the ends of theporticus two lesser entrances appear originally to have led directly to lobbies: to theleft a transverse one (between 18 and 20), to the right a half-depth one (between 2and 5) for although no doorway from porticus to 3 was found, the major room 2 isunlikely to have been reached only through two lobbies and another large room.The different forms of lobby, paralleled in so many row-type houses, evidentlyconnoted a social difference in the eyes of anyone entering the house; the smallerlobby led to the most important private room and the most important household.


69

To demonstrate the importance of rooms 2 and 20 each has, at the end furthestfrom the doorway, a thickening of the walls, whose purpose was probably tosupport a vault or canopy of timber over the socially important end of the room,on which the narrowing would focus attention; and standing in opposite relationto the porticus, these rooms provide an instance of reverse symmetry. At Bierbachthis arrangement appears to be secondary if, as the report argued on the basis ofmasonry joints, the west end room (20) originally intercommunicated with theadjoining pavilion;11 but that leaves the wall thickenings incomprehensible. A largeand imposing villa with two social focal points so carefully balanced in importancecannot be the residence of a single proprietor and his immediate family: it mustcorrespond to some larger kin-group.

There are two more lobbies. As Kolling, reporting on excavations of thirty yearsearlier, noted, the block of four rooms 6–9 to the west of the narrow corridor connectingthe porticus to a rear doorway stand in close relation to one another; in fact they and5 look remarkably like St Stephen-Park Street VI (Fig. 11). In this little block Bierbachreveals another manifestation of reverse symmetry: one of the two large rooms, 5, isentered at the south end, the other, 9, from the north, a point which may have abearing on the British house. At the other end of Bierbach the relation of the remainingrooms to one another is less clear. The large room 16, a workhall and kitchen, wasentered from the porticus through a square lobby (14). Opening off it were tworooms (15 and 17) which were probably both service rooms and places where thoseresponsible for food and cooking slept. The function and point of entry of theremaining room (13) are unknown.

What emerges from this analysis is that a villa as large and architecturally impressiveas Bierbach was far from the conventional interpretation offered for it as the houseof a great proprietor – a wealthy man who built, near the country town ofSchwarzenäcker, a summer seat appropriate to his style of life.12 The wealth is allright, and quite likely the town connection too, but it was as much the seat of a kin-group as of the person who was its head and representative for the time being;certainly not just a summer residence. It can be interpreted as a houseful comprisingtwo major households centred on 2 and 20; two lesser ones in 5 and 9; and asizeable fifth one in the service block (12–17) which is centred on 16. In this lastgroup of rooms, 13 may have been ancillary to the great hall, perhaps a shrine roomlike the comparable room at Kinheim (Fig. 24).13 That leaves rooms 18–20, which donot intercommunicate with 15–17, as a separate household.

It is all a far cry from a luxury villa like Mayen-Allenz (Rhld-Pf.) or even thesophisticated Blankenheim III (Fig. 70) with its dining-room and baths. The sameproblems appear, commonly with far inferior evidence on which to base discussion,in many other elongated houses and also in a few unusually complex row-houses. Aremarkable example of the latter kind is Cartagena (or Cabo de Palos)-El Castillet(Murcia) (Fig. 19), which is divided by two transverse lobbies into three units. Thoseto the west and east are nearly identical, with three rooms and a longitudinal lobby;the middle one is simpler, with four rooms; all are somewhat more developed formsof the Bierbach units. The key to understanding such villas is to break up hithertounintelligible ranges by describing and classifying the several types of lobby used toarticulate them.


70

LOBBY TYPES

The Longitudinal Lobby: a Variant Form

This distinctive room grouping, comprising a room or rooms opening off a lobbyparallel to the porticus, was described earlier: Wellow (Som.) is a good example (Fig.16). Functionally it is equivalent to a transverse lobby off which two rooms arereached, as at Kirchberg.

It has a variant form in which the two rooms opening off the corridor are ofunequal size, so that the smaller one has the appearance of one lobby opening offanother; in effect, an L-shaped lobby, the smaller part of which is separated by awall, in which (it is here assumed) was a doorway from the larger. St Stephen-ParkStreet VI (Fig. 11) is an example, where the smaller lobby may have provided a waythrough to the rear (west) porticus without the need for an outside doorway in theadjoining large room. It has a French parallel. Hombleux (Somme) has the moreelongated rooms characteristic of so many continental villas and an unusually wideporticus facing away from the courtyard. If entry be assumed on that side, the planis exactly like Park Street.

Sometimes longitudinal lobbies appear in pairs, set in reverse symmetry on eitherside of a transverse lobby from which, it is reasonable to deduce, they were reached;but that deduction awaits confirmation from the discovery of doorways. Vouneuil-sous-Biard (Fig. 20) has a group of rooms like this on the north side of the main block,so that the longitudinal lobby further from the porticus formed, with the transverselobby, an L-shaped approach to the room it served. At Sainte-Solange (Cher) a similargrouping incorporates two principal rooms of unequal size. In such a plan the narrownessof the spaces in question tends to confirm them as being lobbies, since any other use,given their proportions, is hard to imagine apart from fantasies about staircases. HaccourtI (Belg.) (Fig. 20) has this kind of room disposition in a modified form, the longitudinallobby (5) being wider and more like an ante-room. In the light of earlier commentsabout lobbies as expressions of social difference it is worth noting that Haccourt hasthree kinds of lobby and that the south end (rooms 7–11) resembles Faversham I orRidgewell (Essex) adapted to the greater width of a continental house.

The L-Lobby

A variant of the quasi-L-shaped lobby has no doorway between the two parts and sowraps unbrokenly round two sides of a room. To understand how such an arrangementfunctioned requires positive evidence of where the doorways were and, equallyimportant, negative evidence showing where they could not have been, because theseveral positions possible imply different ways of use: whether the doorways wereat the ends of the lobby or near the corner of the room matters a good deal.Unfortunately such evidence is scarce.

A striking example of the L-lobby occurs at North Leigh-Shakenoak B IIA (Oxon.)(Fig. 20) where, assuming the porticus to have an entrance in the middle, anotherdoorway opposite it would have led straight into the lobby. What was the


71

Figure 20 Lobbies and related forms


72

purpose of guiding those entering the house into a minor space rather than, as inmany villas, an important room? Two factors may have produced this situation. Thefirst is that the house is essentially like Maulévrier in being divided into two notquite equal parts, but differs from it in that the two units have been moved sidewaysto accommodate a lobby; and the second is an unusual degree of concern for theprivacy of the superior unit in a house of this size. The lobby may well have givenaccess to the other room of the middle range which had a hearth and appears tohave been given over to workaday activities including, perhaps, cooking. That leavesthe porticus providing access to the cellar and what were structurally wings, notpavilions; the general appearance of the house is conveyed by the model fromFontoy-Moderwiese (Lorraine) (Fig. 20).

Lobbies like that at Shakenoak occur at North Wraxall (Fig. 44) and in the littlehouse at Hales (Staffs.); both lead to the principal room, whereas a similar lobby atFolkestone B does not.

The L-lobby could be used to achieve somewhat different purposes, as appearsfrom the two ways it could be situated. At Shakenoak and its like the room approachedfrom the L-lobby is at the rear of the house, whereas at Latimer (Bucks.),14 Piddington(Northants.) and Selongey (Côte d’Or) it was at the front; the former looked out overa garden or fields, the latter over the farmyard. Selongey is different again; the roomreached from the L-lobby may in [I] have been the principal of two units.

This difference of detail is important and may be compared to the way the twolongitudinal lobbies at Beadlam N (Yorks.) (Fig. 17) and High Wycombe (Bucks.)(Fig. 17) are approached. In all three instances it has to be presumed that one lobbywas entered by a normal-sized doorway and the other by a much larger opening ofthe same size as the structural members framing it; and it was itself framed, perhaps,by pilasters of wood or plaster. This was one of the many ways the variations in thestatus of the units accommodating households were distinguished.

Many houses have two lobbies but comparatively few have two of the same type,so that, in Britain, a transverse lobby in one unit is commonly matched by a squareone in the other. L-shaped lobbies are much less common but Upchurch-Boxted(Kent) – a villa remarkable for the variety of ways in which rooms are articulated –has two, albeit with unusual proportions because the lobbies are so wide that one ofthe rooms is reduced almost to insignificance. Piddington resembles Boxted to theextent that it combines an L-shaped lobby15 with a quasi-L-shaped one, that is, alongitudinal lobby opening off a transverse one.

L-shaped lobbies, on present showing, are rarer in continental villas, althoughdiscoveries in recent years suggest that more will appear. One such, Selongey, hasalready been mentioned and Hamblain-les-Prés (Pas-de-Calais) (Fig. 67) appears tobe another. It has, in the largest structurally undivided cell, an unexplained L-shapedspace which encloses and, so far as the plan indicates, is not partitioned off fromwhat is called a floor (aire); this must be an L-lobby.16 Champagnole (Jura), in thepart excavated, has one cell similarly subdivided. In Germany at Stadtbergen I (Bay.)(Fig. 20), an L-lobby may have existed from the first or it may have been addedshortly afterwards.

In making comparisons between continental and British villas their respectivesizes should be remembered; Champagnole has, adjoining the L-lobby, a hall-like


73

room some 15×8 m which is not far different in size from the open hall of an Englishvilla. The formal approach adopted in this book takes little account of such matters,important as they are, because they cannot be considered systematically until thegroundwork for comparison has been laid.

Lobby, Room or Both?

Lobbies vary in width relative to the rooms they serve or enclose. Sometimes what isformally a lobby is too wide to be a mere passage and in a few cases is clearly asimportant as the room itself. At Zofingen two rather narrow elongated cells aredescribed as having ‘small enclosures’17 within them, or a room within a room; yet,that said, the inner rooms are so small and so elongated – one is 4.8×2.4 m, the other6×2.1 m – that they must surely be service rooms, but to what? Puzzling though thesetwo subdivided cells are, they must have been of some importance because they arein reverse symmetry.

Fremersdorf, discussing the Köln-Mungersdorf villa, drew attention to a comparable,though not identical, grouping of three rooms (13/14, 15, 16) at the middle of thehouse (Fig. 71); the undivided space 13/14 may be called a widened lobby. Henoted the lack of a doorway between 13 and 14 as something unusual but certain,there being no foundation for a threshold between them,18 and explained the roomsthus: entrance by 14 from the front porticus led to the passage (room) (13) and oneither to the rear porticus or through the service room (15) to the kitchen (17);19 thestructural block or bay is completed by the dining-room (16). This is the onlyexplanation that has been offered of how such a lobby/passage might have functionedand virtually the only attempt to emulate Oelmann on Blankenheim. It is notsatisfactory insofar as it involves two passage rooms (13 and 15), and 17 is anunlikely kitchen, but Fremersdorf deserves credit for this all too rare essay ininterpretation.

Blankenheim in phase IIIA (Fig. 70) acquired a group of rooms closely resemblingthose at Mungersdorf. A new and much smaller principal room (35) was created and,because of its wide doorway, was interpreted as having the same representationalrole as its much larger predecessor (33/38) but also as the oecus or dining-room. Noexplanation of the adjoining rooms, a corridor (34) widening at the rear into 33 fromwhich 36 – a ?service room – was reached, appears in Oelmann’s report. The spaceat the end of the corridor (33) may have been what was known in English countryhouses of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as a waiting-place, where servantscongregated after a task was done to await their next instructions. In those housesanother requirement is recorded that may have had a counterpart in the betterhouses of the Roman provinces, that of a surveying-place where a supervisor couldmonitor movements between kitchen, food stores and dining-room in order to ensureefficient service and, no doubt, deter theft.20 That cannot have applied at this particularspot but such a function should be borne in mind.

An Italian ancestry might be expected for an element of the plan far removedfrom the comparatively simple, though subtly expressed, requirements of earliervillas in the north-western provinces. Although no systematic search has been made,


74

the villa of Orazio has an arrangement comparable with that at Mungersdorf, in thecell to the east of the large middle reception room.

La Roche-Maurice

Widened lobbies of any kind are not common. They appear in two very muchsmaller French villas, La Roche-Maurice/Valy-Cloistre (Fin.) (Fig. 20), which is theonly one fully published, and Saint Acheul W (Somme). Its plan, which is said to be‘perfectly logical’,21 has been equated, in a misuse of terminology remarkable evenby the customary standards of archaeologists, with the British ‘cottage-house’. Infact, La Roche-Maurice is instructive about why L-shaped and widened lobbies areas they are, and about the close link between their shape and the ways in whichrooms were distinguished to make their relative importance clear. Furthermore, becausedoorway positions are so rarely found, the plan deserves discussion for the light itthrows on much larger row-houses.

As in so many houses, the middle room has a wide entrance; here 5, unusual byits shallowness and smallness, is dominated by a 4 m-wide opening to the porticusand must have served some representational purpose. The doorways into the lobbies4 and 7 were close to the wide middle opening and carefully differentiated by width– 1.2 m and 0.8 m respectively – so that anyone approaching knew at a glance whichone it was appropriate to use. The narrower of the two led into the lobby (7) and sothrough another wide doorway (2.2 m) into the hall (8), which was a kitchen andmay have had something of the character of a workhall. Facing its entrance was thenext widest doorway into a smaller room (6) which was no doubt the most importantin the house from a social standpoint. Beside the doorway is space enough forservants to stand or sit as they awaited summons.

On the less important side of the house the lobby (4) apparently led only to thenarrowest of the internal doorways and the smaller of two rooms, 3. Restrictions onexcavation precluded discovery of the doorway into the remaining room (2), whichwas assumed to have had an external entrance in the south wall.22 If this is correct ithas functional consequences; it suggests some use connected with the farm, ratheras one pavilion at Marshfield (Glos) was used as a smithy. Nothing was found toshow how room 2 was used and it may have been a workhall having the samerelation to 3 as the hall (8) had to the innermost room (6).

The villa of La Roche-Maurice was interpreted very differently by its excavators.In their opinion the open-fronted middle room was where a landed proprietorperiodically sat behind a table to collect rents in kind from tenants waiting in thecorridor, who then made their way out by a kind of ‘one-way system’:23 anastonishingly explicit equation of Roman villa and nineteenth-century country ormanor house, and at the same time a confusion of functions as between ownerand bailiff. But when far-fetched comparisons are set aside, what was thecomposition of the houseful?

It was obviously far removed from any hypothetical kin-group comprising more orless equal households. Fundamental to any interpretation is the way the lobbies dividethe house into two parts, leaving the shallow room 5 with its inordinately wide opening


75

as part shrine to the household gods, part representational room, in common use.Beyond that, much depends on whether the rooms are envisaged as being eitherliving-rooms or bedrooms or as having a dual purpose. Room 8 is the easiest tointerpret. To judge by its size and open hearth – in both respects it is much like the hallof the Frocester Court (Glos.) villa (Fig. 69) – it is more than a living-room for theoccupants of the principal private room opposite; rather, it can be envisaged as a hallfor a household living and working there. Across the lobby, room 6 provided for asomewhat superior household which may well have shared the hall. At the lower endare, again, two rooms, 3 being for a household of lower status and 2 given overentirely to work except, probably, for housing the persons whose work it was; and ifthis room had only an external entrance, theirs was a menial position.

All that can be said about Saint-Acheul (Somme), given an inadequate report andsmall-scale plan, is that it appears to have at the south end two rooms and a lobbyresembling rooms 5-7 of La Roche-Maurice, and, forming a near-mirror-image to it,three more rooms.

ROOM PROPORTIONS AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS

Lobbies in their various forms occur throughout the western provinces and thehouses in which they appear are recognisably of the same generic type. Nevertheless,as between British and other row-houses, a difference is apparent: in the former,rooms are mostly squarish; in the latter they are commonly oblong and sometimesalmost passage-like, as in Haccourt I and Puig de Cebolla (Valencia) (Fig. 20). Roomsso different in shape cannot have been used in the same way. An oblong roomentered in the middle of a long side is thereby divided to some degree into twoparts; entry at one end automatically creates lower and upper ends, the former beingto some degree a passage space to reach the latter, the more private inner part.These considerations are less true of a square room. Entry near a corner can beaided by the position of a hearth or fireplace, by furniture or by a mosaic to createan upper end or superior part, but such effect does not stem naturally from theshape of the room; in an oblong room it is unavoidable.

Where an oblong room appears to be a representational room, like that at themiddle of Laufen-Müschhag (Switz.), it can reasonably be assumed that the far endfrom the porticus was the point of importance where there was a place of honour forthe household deities or the head of the houseful. It is not easy to see how a roommeasuring 4×9 m could be used for feasting and entertainment of a rather formalkind, although its proportions are not very different from the middle room atHummetroth. Conceivably some non-structural distinction of function existed, as, forexample, between an area where offerings were made and the remainder which wasused for ceremonial dining on religious or social occasions. Dual use is possible andto some degree likely in any oblong room.

The shapes and conjunctions of rooms will have conformed to their intended use,even where, as must often have been the case when buildings were altered,architectural considerations limited the possibilities. To understand room use at allseveral assumptions have to be made, the most important of which is that each unit


76

or apartment was occupied by a separate household. A household, which varied innumbers according to the life cycle, is here taken to be a group of persons occupyingan apartment by virtue of status within a kin-group; it might be a conjugal family oran elderly couple or even a single person, according to circumstances. A furtherassumption is that at least one personal servant slept in each apartment. In provincial-Roman society under-employment is likely to have been endemic and servantscorrespondingly plentiful; and before the introduction of bells operated from adistance, servants necessarily had to be close at hand at all times. In many, perhapsmost, households, both master and mistress will have had valet or maidservant inattendance at all times and one or two more servants available on call. Room andlobby shapes all had to provide for families in the early modern sense of the word,which included servants.

ARTICULATION OR SEPARATE ROOMS?

The subdivided cells punctuating the rows of large ones are of very varied kinds andit can be hard to tell room from lobby. One guiding principle is that passage-roomsare unlikely to have found favour. A particular pitfall in the present approach is howto distinguish a narrow space leading to a room – a lobby – from a not much widerone which served some other purpose in addition to intercommunication, or wasnot a passage at all but a narrow inner room.

In villas of considerable depth from front to rear the division of a cell into twocompartments by a longitudinal wall need not imply that the smaller one was alobby. The point is illustrated by Liestal-Munzach (Switz.), where unusually detailedevidence is available (Fig. 20). A transverse mosaic-floored lobby (4) leads to a roomwith a hypocaust and mosaic (1) – a well-appointed and comfortable room,approached in suitably dignified fashion and shielded from the curious at the frontof the house. Between it and the porticus was, not a lobby, as might be argued froma less detailed plan, but a small room entered only from the porticus.

To some extent proportions provide a safeguard against wrong interpretation,and only where the small room is quite narrow is it virtually certain to have been alobby. Even then, the alternative of a passage from one flanking cell to anotherremains a possibility, provided some plausible need for it can be suggested. This,incidentally, is the objection to the common interpretation of transverse lobbies aspassages, in houses with no rear porticus like Frocester Court I: what is the point ofan enclosed way from front to back? Where the rear space of a subdivided cell iswider, it may not have been limited to transit but be best described by the term‘anteroom’, a place where people wait before entering a superior’s room or wheresome business is first transacted; but since those purposes cannot be discoveredarchaeologically the word will rarely be used. These considerations explain why asimple form of lobby may be hard to identify, as some examples show.

In the north half of Anthée (Belg.) (Fig. 19) the cell comprising rooms 40/41 looksexactly like a room and longitudinal lobby, yet the doorway positions show this tobe wrong. Room 41 is entered from the west porticus, and doorways into 40 werenot found, so that even if the two rooms intercommunicated they cannot have been


77

related as lobby and inner room. Nor is 41, as its position might suggest, a superiorroom reached from the transverse corridor and so placed for privacy, like the one atLiestal. On the other side of the corridor, room 46 looks as if, with 40 and 41, itformed a unit comparable to the domestic end of Schupfart I; yet it was entered atboth ends and cannot have been used in the same way.

Although villas of the size and, particularly, the complexity of Anthée present unusualdifficulties, the articulation of simpler plans only one room in depth is not always easyto understand, as Stadtbergen I (Fig. 20) shows. It had two rooms, 5 and 11, whichmight be considered longtudinal lobbies to the adjoining larger compartments (6 and12) of their respective cells and which were approached by the transverse lobbies 7and 13; and, although 7 is uncomfortably wide for a lobby, the two blocks of roomscan be seen as two units or apartments. A third comprises the lobby (3) and room 4.That leaves 8, 9, 10 in the middle, bearing some resemblance to the core of NorthLeigh-Shakenoak IIA, to account for. But an alternative interpretation is possible if Reutti’sopinion, that 7, 8, 9 were originally one room, be accepted. That provides a hall-likeroom fronted by a portico of four columns in the middle of the house, and two three-cell apartments entered at the ends by 3 and 13.24 So far, an appropriately classical,symmetrical exterior; to go beyond that and interpret the apartments presents difficulties.The north end is easy: entrance by lobby 3 into the living-room 4 at the west end andthence to the lobby 5 and inner room 6. This pattern is not repeated to south, wherethe lobby 13 leads to the longitudinal lobby 11 and so to the inner room 12, butleaving the large living-room 10 approached by 11, which is something it would behard to parallel.

Neither solution is wholly satisfactory, and only further evidence of doorwaypositions will bring certainty. Stadtbergen is an instance of the problem posed byDrury with reference to simpler plans,25 and Farningham-Manor House I (Kent)would be another if no doorways were known.

BLOCKS OF SMALL ROOMS

A number of villas incorporate a group of four small rooms of different sizes at oneend or, occasionally, both ends. Köln-Mungersdorf and Newel (Fig. 24) are examplesin hall derivatives. A rare instance where such a configuration produced evidence ofdoorways is Les Mesnuls (Yvelines) (Fig. 21), where a block of four rooms (1–4) wasquite separate from three larger rooms, all linked by doorways, which form the restof the house. A strange feature of the plan is that the sole room with a hypocaust isonly 3.5×2.8 m, so small that it ought to be what Black has distinguished as ahypocauston – a small room giving indirect heat to the adjoining rooms;26 yet itswarmth benefited only two lobbies and the porticus. This oddity apart, the fourrooms look like an apartment for a household of superior status to whoever occupiedthe ?representational hall 5 and the unit comprising 6 and the workhall 7.27

Similar groupings of rooms, bigger than those at Les Mesnuls but small by comparisonwith the three very large principal rooms, occur at both ends of the Swiss villa ofKulm. At the west end are four intercommunicating rooms reached from atransverse lobby. A group of five rooms at the east end is better articulated by a


78

transverse lobby giving independent access to four of the five rooms; perhaps onedid not belong. In this group only two rooms intercommunicate. Although these twoblocks are not easy to explain in detail, the differences between them, despite theirsimilar size, and their siting at opposite ends of the house, must correspond to theexistence of two households of high status. Kulm is a highly developed row-houseon the grand scale, suitably enriched with mosaic floors and marble panelling. For avilla published as long ago as 1761 we know a good deal about it.28

The end blocks at Kulm are unequal. Other villas have somewhat simpler variationson the same theme, notably Olfermont (Haut-Rhin) (Fig 41), where four small roomsare grouped together at what looks like the east end of the original main range.

TRANSFORMATION OF LOBBIES

The idea of transformation has already been used to create the compact variant ofthe row-type house; it is applicable to lobbies too, as has already been implied witha comparison of Wellow and Kirchberg (above, p. 70).

A very simple case is the lobby off which opens a second, shorter lobby fromwhich the room within it is reached. The first lobby can be either transverse orlongitudinal; assuming that the room is entered by a doorway at the far end of thecombined lobby and that the focus of attention is in a constant relation to it, the onlydifference made by turning the lobbies through 90 degrees is to the lighting of theroom. In a room of some importance, that will affect how those entering will seeanyone occupying a place of authority, whether in direct light from a window oragainst a small amount of indirect light from the porticus.

Something comparable can be envisaged with the small square lobby of the typefound at Newport. There it and its adjacent small room are set transversely to themain body of the house – they had to be, because the range in which they stand isnarrow. In a larger continental villa it was possible to turn the lobby-and-roomaround to lie parallel with the porticus, although no villa so far has revealed wherethe doorways were. But such a transformation would make a small part of Anthée(Fig. 19; rooms 55, 56, 59) intelligible, and also Saint-Julien and Aubigny (Somme),known only from aerial photographs, may be susceptible of the same explanation.

Caution is necessary in applying this kind of interpretation to pairs of small roomsat the rear of a cell, at the far end from the porticus. Only if there is also a rear porticus,

Figure 21 Unit variations in row-houses


79

or a transverse lobby gives access to it, can one of the rear rooms be regarded as alobby; in Switzerland, Sarmentsdorf (Fig. 21) is an example. It is not obvious that thelobby-and-room are secondary, as Drack supposes,29 but even if they are, theinterpretation may stand. Otherwise, and this is the usual situation, they must be a pairof inner rooms at the end of a comparatively large living-room facing either a porticus,as at Trouey (Cher), or a peristyle, as at La Roquebrousanne (Var). In that position thetwo little rooms stand in the same formal relation to the larger room as do those atQuinton (Northants.) or Rothselberg (Rhld-Pf.) to large open halls.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DISPARATE UNITS

Row-houses comprising two units with identical lobbies occur fairly frequently, Boos,Downton I, Lamargelle (Côte-d’Or) and Kirchberg [I] being examples.30 Many, though,are like Faversham I or Ditchley I in having two lobbies of different form, placed inseries or back to back. In houses with a large middle room, like Ditchley, there iscomparable variation. And size makes a difference: in the bigger continental villas aBritish square lobby and its accompanying room could be placed parallel to theporticus, not at right angles, while functioning in exactly the same way.

If that is the situation in a simple villa it is hardly surprising that the lesser roomsin a large elongated one should show the variety of size and shape they do, nor thatthey are not symmetrical. Moreover, if the preceding classification of lobbies andtheir association with other rooms as household units is anything like correct, itbreaks up long rows of rooms into intelligible groups and provides a reason whythey invariably differ. That general explanation by no means accounts for every bigrow-house fully, for in each case there are likely to be uncertainties concerning thesize of units and the purpose of particular rooms – whether lobbies, anterooms,waiting-rooms or what were called in the eighteenth century closets, which weresmall rooms opening off larger ones and adaptable for many purposes. It also leavesopen a question about certain rooms slightly bigger than the normal cell which arenot necessarily linked to lobbies and have something of the appearance of a workhall.

In the kin-group hypothesis adopted here to explain the additive nature of villaplanning, attention has several times been drawn to slight variations in size of theprincipal rooms. Different forms of lobby were another expression of those variations,one which is likely to have been enhanced by treating the doorways facing theporticus somewhat differently. These ways of displaying status were, in all likelihood,primarily for the benefit of members of the group. Strangers must occasionally havevisited a villa and when they did they are likely to have been shown to the appropriateroom or apartment by an inferior member of the houseful; then they, too, will haveunderstood the code of ornament and position which expressed the relative statusof the two or more households. A plan such as that of Bierbach permits the appreciationof all these points except for the ornament.31

A few long villas show little distinction between the superior and inferior ends,for example L’Ecluse-Leckbosch (Belg.) (Fig. 19) and some fairly large villas such asFitten (Saarld), which lack any clear articulation by lobbies, are incomprehensible indetail yet certainly belong to the category of row-type villas.

80

CHAPTER SIX

DEVELOPED FORMS OF HALLHOUSE

Hall houses grew from simple beginnings in ways which reduced the importanceof the hall itself to the point where the typological connection is almost lost. In

taking up the story from the elementary forms of addition mentioned earlier, it has tobe recognised that, as with row-houses, the many variables make a tidy account oftheir further development impossible.

A hall house could gain additional accommodation by the addition of rooms atboth ends of the hall, at the rear, in wings or by encroachment within it, and all ofthese might be accompanied by removal of a function to another building. An almostinvariable addition is the porticus-with-pavilions, combining architectural displaywith extra rooms whose relation to the adjoining rooms in the main range is usuallyuncertain; and it needs to be emphasised that addition is used in a typological senseand does not refer exclusively to a later phase of construction.

End additions could take the form of a single narrow room; a number of rooms,from two to four, of uniform width, sometimes with a passage-like room as well; twoor three rooms of different width, sometimes separated into two blocks by a passage-like room or entrance; three or four rooms, uniform or not, similarly separated; andall these may be present at either end of the hall in almost any combination. Virtuallyevery villa excavation report treats them simply as a collection of rooms withoutmeaning or significance beyond their number and the quality of their decoration.Since little attempt has been made hitherto to understand them in social or functionalterms, several houses will be examined in order to reveal common elements underlyingtheir diversity. They will be treated, not in typological order from simple to complex,but by discussion of their possible purpose.

NARROW END ROOMS

The simplest kind of addition is the narrow undivided room extending the full depthof the hall from front to back. Few such rooms have produced evidence of flooringor fittings. Köngen I (ex-A) (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 74), exceptionally, revealed what wasthought to be a stone cistern, 2.5 m in internal diameter and 3 m deep.1 Although itspurpose is unknown, it implies some utilitarian or service purpose. Evidently this

— Developed Forms of Hall House —

81

was the lower end of the hall, a point confirmed if we assume that the cellar was inits customary position near the upper end. Weitersbach (Bad.-Württ.) I (Fig. 69) isanother house with a narrow room at each end. The one to south is entered from thehall, that to north perhaps in the same way2 but with doorways also into both apavilion and the rear porticus; it can scarcely have been more than a wide passage.As usual, the cellar was at the upper end of the house, being placed beneath a smallroom which opened off the hall and did not communicate with the porticus.3

Although there can be little doubt that one end room in Weitersbach I served asa passage, the need for the function is not obvious. As will appear later, longnarrow rooms are so common in German villas that other purposes must beenvisaged, however difficult it is to discover them. At Manderscheid (Bad.-Württ.)(Fig. 39) the narrow room (8) could only have linked two pavilions and it wascertainly not a porticus of any kind, so storage related to activities in the hallappears to be its most likely use. Similar considerations apply to Weitersbach I(Fig. 69) and Heppenheim (Fig. 6).

Mundelsheim (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 22) has a plan resembling Manderscheid. Paret,

Figure 22 Halls with long end rooms

— Chapter Six —

82

who dug it, was clearly troubled by the long room 5 and sought to explain it asbeing ‘probably divided by two cross-walls into three rooms (bedrooms?) accessiblefrom the middle hall’;4 but no evidence of such division is recorded and parallelsargue the contrary. Moreover, he does not mention an element of the plan whichmay relate to the end room, namely, that the pavilion 6 does not relate to the end ofthe hall in the usual way, like 7, but is reached by a small oblong space. It looks likea lobby, but why there? Not simply to shield the doorway into the pavilion; thatwould normally be achieved by the little square projection from the porticus foundin some houses, as at Gayton Thorpe [F] (Fig. 39). This lobby may have been enteredfrom the porticus by a doorway on the side nearer the hall, then a turn to the rightled to the end and the pavilion doorway and one immediately to the left into thenarrow room. Whatever the true situation, it suggests a fairly close connection betweenporticus and end room but one stopping short of the intercommunication found atWeitersbach I; and if that be accepted, a domestic or service use is far more likelythan the agricultural ones sometimes proposed.

Two Swiss houses have a long narrow room at both ends of the hall.5 Grenchen(Fig. 22) has a room (3) at the upper end which is about 12×4 m and one at thelower end (7) which is marginally narrower, both being devoid of floors or finds. Alittle privy entered only from 7 may imply a domestic use for the latter.6 The endrooms at Wahlen (Fig. 22) have similar proportions, and their description as ‘porticus-like annexes’ or ‘side-porticuses’7 does not advance understanding; it argues adisproportion between living space and circulation space that requires explanation –a problem recurring in villas like Hemel Hempstead-Gadebridge Park III (Herts.)(Fig. 13). A further description of these extraordinarily proportioned rooms as‘decorated living-rooms’8 is reinforced by the way the house was entered; a reardoorway is diagonally opposite another into the north room, so that they stand inmuch the same relation to one another as the hall and inner-room doorways at, forexample, Frocester Court (Glos.) (Fig. 69). This likeness is the stronger for the absence,first, of a middle doorway into the hall from the porticus and, second, of a hearth, foralthough one was looked for in the centre of the hall and not found, that may bebecause it stood nearer the north (or inner) room doorway.

On the available evidence the long rooms in both villas appear to have beendomestic and that must influence interpretation elsewhere.

END ROOMS AS BYRES?

The longest of these end rooms, at the end of the hall-house at Betzingen (Bad.-Württ.), is five times as long as it is wide (20×4 m) and was regarded from the first asa cattle-byre, ‘not only on account of its elongated form’ but also because its positionconforms to Vitruvian precept.9 Since it has been presented by Applebaum in thestandard history of English and Welsh agriculture as one of a number of housesincorporating rooms which are claimed, largely on the evidence of proportions andposition, as byres,10 his argument requires discussion, irrespective of how closelyother examples conform to Betzingen.

Applebaum’s interpretation is founded on an ‘especially close correspondence’


83

of plan detected by de Maeyer11 between an eighteenth-century farmhouse at Limerlé(Belg.) and the hall-type villa of Sauvenière (Belg.) which had been interpreted ina largely agricultural sense on its publication in 1900.12 De Maeyer, remarking thatthe ‘porticus-type’ did not wholly go out of fashion in later times – in other words,that it survived for a millennium and a half – assimilated the Limerlé house to theRoman one and accepted nearly all the room uses first proposed for the latterexcept that the central yard, in deference to Oelmann, became a barn flanked bystables.13 Applebaum accepted this, balking only at the idea that the porticus shelteredcarts and farm implements.

Chance likenesses between whole plans of houses built some fifteen hundredyears apart are not likely to add to understanding, nor is another of Applebaum’ssuggested byres, at Gerpinnes, convincing. There an apartment is said to be dividedby ‘internal masonry counterforts’ into six stalls, one of which had painted plasterwalls and which the excavators thought of as stores or lodgings for domestic servants.14

Then follows a string of British villas – Cherington, Colerne, Rodmarton, Titsey –with long compartments at the end of the hall: ‘their dimensions as well as theirpositions correspond so closely to the examples at Gerpinnes and Betzingen thattheir identity as accommodation for livestock can hardly be doubted’.15

In the end, all that remains of this particular argument is Sontheimer’s belief thatthe long room he excavated at Betzingen in 1905 was a byre. So it may be, for it ishard to think of any more likely use, but it has to be recognised as the conjecture,unsupported by evidence, that it is. Nor do parallels help, since they too show noclear signs of cattle being stalled in them: for although drains are not essential tobyres16 it might be expected that one or two would have them, or a mucking-outhole as in Welsh long-houses, or two or three doorways to avoid the inconvenienceand waste of space caused by cattle moving along them.

Among the parallels for this feature of Betzingen is Neckarzimmern-StockbronnerHof (Bad.-Württ.)17 (Fig. 27), where a long narrow room (7) on the south side of thehall was entered by a full-width opening next to a probable doorway in the westend of the south wall. The width of the opening into the room implies some non-domestic function, perhaps a cart-shed.18 A similar room (8) seems to have existedon the other side of the hall. Another example at Niederzier-Hambach 403 (Nordrh.-West.), though producing no evidence of use, faces the working side of the farmyardand away from the secondary domestic building.

Given the uncertainty of the evidence, it might be wise not to interpret the endrooms cited by Applebaum and others like them such as Courcelles-Urville (Fig.22)19 as cattle-stalls until some positive indication appears.

END ROOMS ORGANISED AROUND LOBBIES

Halls having two rooms at one end, or sometimes two rooms flanking a lobby, havealready been touched on (chapter 3). There are more complex groupings.

In hall houses, as in row-houses, any articulation of rooms is achieved by lobbiesof one form or another. Thus Mayen VI (Fig. 1) included a rebuilding of the east endto provide a passage from the lower end of the hall to the garden(?), off which

— Chapter Six —

opened an oblong space possibly divided into two rooms by a timber-framed(?) wallof which there were only scanty remains.20 No mention is made in the report of thetwo doorways shown on the plan which, since they would have proved the rooms’existence, are presumably an interpretation rather than a factual record of the excavatedremains. Oelmann’s judgement was not influenced by any comparisons, yet nowEvelette (Belg.) (Fig. 23), a house where the hall is less dominant than at Mayen, hasexactly the same combination of lobby and two narrow rooms at the lower end; acombination also seen in a different context at High Wycombe (Bucks.) (Fig. 17) inthe two pairs of rooms of unusual proportions, each reached from a lobby or passage.

A more striking likeness between halls and row-houses appears in the domesticend of Schupfart (Fig. 71) and the apartments of Küttigen-Kirchberg [I] (Fig. 19) orVicques [I] (all Switz.), all of them having groups of three rooms organised arounda transverse lobby; and it has been suggested that the incompletely explored eastend of Tholey-Sotzweiler (Saarld) (Fig. 23) was like this.21 This kind of plan wasdeveloped at Newel (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 24) by replacing the largest room with twosquarish ones (5 and 6) and having a short lobby (8) branching off the main one(4).22 Schupfart III (Fig. 71) turns this arrangement through 90 degrees, reduces the lobbies

Figure 23 Halls with complex end blocks


85

to an L-plan and adds a small fifth room, a hypocauston, providing indirect heat tothe adjoining rooms. Those who lived in the end blocks of Schupfart and Newelmust have organised family relations in much the same way as their counterparts atKirchberg and Vicques.

Yet another hall house with rooms looking like a row-house is Koerich-Goeblingen1 I (Lux.) (Fig. 1), where at the east end, a lobby like that at Newport (Fig. 10) isflanked by two square rooms. The result looks exactly like the principal part of thelittle house at Drax (Yorks.) and is no different in principle from the more elongatedLangton Dwelling House II (Yorks.) (Fig. 3).

Figure 24 Halls with double-depth end blocks

— Chapter Six —

86

END ROOMS: INZIGKOFEN AND ITS ANALOGUES

A cursory glance at German hall house plans reveals that few have the same numberor size of rooms at each end. One explanation could be that the two ends weregiven over to different functions, the obvious analogy being the parlour and servicequarters at opposite ends of the medieval English hall – not that even that distinctionis clear in every instance. Another is that their occupants differed in status: familyand servants, parents and children, are possible divisions of the household, orfunctional and social components could be combined in different ways in the twoends. These considerations underlie the following analysis.

The most elementary division is between houses where the two ends are more orless equal and those where they are conspicuously unequal. In the first category, ifthe simpler ones with only two rooms such as Leutersdorf [I] (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 45) beexcluded, Inzigkofen (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 27) is the best example. It was not enteredin the same way as the similar house at Stuttgart-Stammheim (Fig. 27), at the end ofthe rear aisle; rooms line the hall from front to back. At the west end the narrowroom 5 is probably an annexe to 6 and entered from it, because there is insufficientclearance to allow a ‘bridge’ like that which appears to have existed at Stammheim(below, pp. 100–1). At the south end the square room 11 and the smaller one 10 maycorrespond to the room and annexe 6, 5 opposite, while the third room (9) is ofquite different proportions, more than twice as long as wide.

A feature these rooms have in common with those of row-houses is that hardlyany two are the same size, and the difference between them is so small that somesocial purpose must underlie it; and the exception, 9, is so much bigger than anyother that it must have been used for common activities, forming public rather thanprivate space. Since this room cannot have been entered at the porticus end, and anentrance in the middle would be uncomfortably close to the cellar staircase, thedoorway is likely to have been at the west end and, like that to 6, facing the middleof the hall. Which was the superior end of the hall, north or south, is not obviousfrom the plan alone, and the unusual feature of two ramps implies either a partitiondividing the exceptionally large cellar into two parts, which was not found, or commonuse of the whole. Using the analogy of row-houses, Inzigkofen provided for at leasttwo households, north and south, but more likely three with a further one of unknownsize, and of lower status, in the hall.

A measure of equality between two sets of rooms is expressed differently at theend-entrance hall of Mauren (Bay.) (Fig. 23): a hall, that is, with porticus-and-pavilionson one of the shorter sides. The hall is flanked by two ranges of rooms identical indepth but of markedly different width. Presumably each set fulfilled very similarpurposes for different numbers of people or, more likely, for people whose differentstatus was expressed in terms of space and comfort. Entrance to the house properwas by three openings of graduated size between columns, the widest into the hall,a narrower one to the right-hand rooms23 and the narrowest – the most restrictiveand exclusive – to the bigger left-hand rooms. The right-hand range is like itscounterpart at Inzigkofen, first a lobby-and-room unit, then one of two rooms, apattern repeated opposite. Whatever functions were performed in room 9 at Inzigkofenwere either carried out in the hall at Mauren or not at all. The differentiation so


87

carefully observed in the rest of the building did not, curiously enough, extend tothe pavilions, which, unlike those in many villas, are of equal size. Despite this,Mauren reinforces the impression of duality so commonly found in villas.

No two houses of any size are really alike. The most that can be expected isthat they show resemblances, as Schambach [I] (Bay.) (Fig. 27) does to thosejust discussed. One feature which sets it apart from similar broad German villasis the slope from rear to front, so sharp that it is said to have been terraced –something which is very hard to envisage.24 It has a probable row of threecolumns and two responds at the rear of the hall, their positions being markedby gaps in a stone kerb or foundation, and at each end is a row of rooms, fourto north, three bigger ones to south. The latter are interrupted by a passagefrom the south porticus by which the house was entered; the west porticusprobably stood over an undercroft, like Stammheim, or a crypto-porticus likethat at Buchs (Switz.). Surprisingly, the west side lacks pavilions; perhaps adoorway can be envisaged to separate the two porticuses on the lines of thearched opening at Ormalingen. Even though Schambach is different from Maurenin several ways, they have a family resemblance in the width and number ofrooms in their respective ranges, and in their large halls. Whatever kind ofownership be envisaged for the inhabitants, it can hardly be the conventionallanded proprietorship proposed here as at other villas as unlike it as La Roche-Maurice (Fin.) or Aylesford-Eccles.

The social implications of these houses can be carried further. Inzigkofen, Maurenand Schambach all have two sets of rooms which can properly be called apartmentsand are separated by a room of common use so large that they are appendages to it.This resembles the situation in row-houses with a large middle room except thatthere the work element is transferred to a separate workhall. There is nothing tosuggest that either row in Inzigkofen and its like was devoted solely to service orstorage or work purposes unless the relative width of those at Schambach beinterpreted that way. At Mauren inequality of the two sets of living accommodationis obvious enough in a plan yet in the building itself only the graduated entrancesrevealed it; within the hall they are likely to have presented, if not a symmetricalappearance, at least a uniform spacing of openings.

The dual activities of the occupying group, however shared, were so important asto find expression in the cellars: two staircases at Inzigkofen, a division into twoparts at Schambach. Although dual use is apparent in all of them, the three housesreveal the direction of change, from near-equality of status at Inzigkofen to thepredominance of one unit at Schambach. When all three houses are compared withsimpler hall-house plans like Serville (Belg.), Quinton (Northants.) or Ludwigsburg-Pflugfelden (Bad.-Württ.), it is apparent that an altogether more complex andpotentially more stratified society is emerging.

Very few house plans, excluding the simplest, show true symmetry. Among thesmall number of villas in the Netherlands are several which come near it, and one,Buchten (Fig. 23), was built symmetrical and never altered. At each end of the largehall a passage between two square rooms leads to a sizeable hall-like room (7×4.5m), the whole forming a three-room unit essentially like those at Kirchberg butentered differently. Just what that difference signifies is not clear but for the present

— Chapter Six —

88

the likeness, bringing together elements of plan not hitherto thought to be connected,is sufficient.

DISPROPORTION BETWEEN THE ENDS OF THE HALL

In many houses inequality between the ends is apparent even in the first buildingphase. Nuth-Vaasrade (Fig. 23) is a Dutch example; Manderscheid (Fig. 39) is perhapsan extreme case, having at one end three small rooms, two with hypocausts, and atthe other the undivided room mentioned earlier. Otherwise it was symmetrical, withporticus-and-pavilions on both display front and entrance front, and two doorwayson the north side. This unusual degree of symmetry makes doubtful the assumptionthat the simpler end was no more than a service room or servants’ accommodation.The two doorways might, at a pinch, be thought to provide for family and servants,but if that were so, two external doorways would be even more necessary. In fact,here as much as at Inzigkofen, everything speaks of equality except the long narrowroom, which was perhaps living-space, as was conjectured at Wahlen or Grenchen,though here markedly inferior.

Stuttgart-Stammheim (Fig. 27) shows less discrepancy between the two blocks ofsmall rooms. At the north end of the east row (the upper end) 3 has, surprisingly forso small a room, a doorway in the middle. To south the largest room (5), linked tothe hall only (on the archaeological evidence) by a narrow walkway, surely had abetter approach from the hall by a bridge over the cellar staircase to a doorway inthe corner. Annexe 4 may form a unit with 5, leaving 3 as a room with some quasi-public function. These arrangements are superior to those of the west end, whereonly two square rooms – 10 with painted plaster – were domestic. Access to 9 isrestricted, as with its counterpart to the east, by a cellar staircase. A room at the northend, next to the entrance and open to the rear aisle, served some work purpose andconfirms the inferiority of this range to that opposite.

Although a long narrow room is probably inferior to several smaller rooms at theother end of a hall, it is not always easy to be sure. At Mundelsheim (Fig. 22) anundivided room (5), already argued to be domestic, faces a row of three, of which 2and 3 form part of a bath suite, respectively hot room and warm bath. Room 1, saidto be a cold bath, is entered from the pavilion,25 which can thus be inferred to bepart of the bath suite (dressing room?) or a passage-room leading to it. It thusappears that either room 5 was the only apartment or the pavilion (7) and room 1 inreality form a superior one.

Some villas with principal houses having the same general disposition ofrooms as Mundelsheim show other clear signs of two households. Rheinbach-Flerzheim (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 23) has at one end of an elongated hall whatlook like two apartments with adjoining lobbies, and at the other end tworooms perhaps forming a third apartment. More important than their details isthe small ornamental basin blocking the conventional point of entry in themiddle of the porticus. Its placing implies that there were two entrances, andthe only possible point of that is to provide separate access for the twohouseholds (at least) which comprised the houseful.26


89

LARGER APARTMENTS: BOCHOLTZ-VLENGENDAAL

Those houses so far mentioned are all recognisably of hall type, in the sense that thehall dominates the rest. That is less true of a few German and Dutch houses whichhave sufficient other rooms to reduce the comparative importance of a large squarehall. Not all the additions are living-rooms; a bath suite is usually included, sometimesalso a workhall, and the presence of the latter raises difficult questions concerningthe division of function between it and the hall. First, though, the living-rooms willbe analysed to see how their grouping relates to the dispositions observed in thepreceding sections.

The Dutch villa of Bocholtz-Vlengendaal [I] (Fig. 24) accommodated twohouseholds, as the two entrances into the porticus and the large pool blocking directaccess to the hall demonstrate. To west is a block of three rooms and a fourth withone intruded corner which is the key to the circulation pattern. It is, in fact, a largelobby, almost an entrance-hall, of the same shape and serving the same purpose asroom 22/25 in the five- or six-room south block at Blankenheim IA (Fig. 70). And ifthe Rhenish villa provides an analogy, room 16 opened off the hall, like 30 atBlankenheim, and is connected with the representational function of the hall; andremoving 16 from the west block removes the need for a second passage-room. Inthe hall (19) two projections look like bases for pilasters beside a grand entrance.27

They would not be at all surprising in that position if the hall were entered from therear; although if that were so, external pilasters might be expected on that side too,as at Friedberg-Pfingstweide 1 (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 41), and as occurs in more elaborateform at Köln-Braunsfeld (Nordrh.-Westf.) and Hartlip K (Kent). They presumablyformed an impressive frame to the doorway into the porticus, but the purpose of thatby itself is obscure.

At the other end of the hall is a simpler, more public group of rooms reached fromthe east end of the porticus, not by a doorway but a wide opening which, no doubt,was carefully differentiated by timber and plaster ornament from the more privateand probably smaller doorway at the west end. It led into a large, hall-like living-room (23) off which opened two good-sized rooms (20 and 21), larger than the endrooms of Inzigkofen and its like; they were, perhaps, independent living-roomscomparable to the rooms opening off transverse lobbies at Hérouville-Lébisey(Calvados) and other simple row-houses.

The social basis of Bocholtz changed very considerably by [F]. The two doorwaysinto the porticus were blocked; the pool was filled in; a new and impressive approachwas created and was presumably lined with columns of timber or brick; and on thenorth side a porticus (18) and the pavilion (22) were built. A bath suite was added tothe west rooms, including the large room 11 which may have had something of thecharacter of a recreational room where the social aspect of bathing was enjoyed; itmay be compared to a room with hypocaust added to the villa of Leiwen (Fig. 72).Under the west end of the new porticus is a cellar entered by a staircase in room 16.This may well have necessitated closing the doorway into the middle room andbeen accompanied by some change of use.28

Interpreted in this way, Bocholtz reveals the same kind of change as some othervillas discussed earlier, away from an original division of occupancy into two distinct

— Chapter Six —

90

and more or less equal parts to one in which one part was clearly superior. Anaesthetic consequence of the original dual character of the house is a symmetricaldisposition of doorways facing the porticus, something which recurs in a number ofthe grander houses such as Blankenheim, Oberweis (Rhld-Pf.) and Bierbach (Saarld).

OTHER LARGE END APARTMENTS: KINHEIM

The addition of rooms at the ends and rear of a house, whether due to anincrease in the number of people living there or to improved living standards,diminishes the importance of the hall. Kinheim (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 24) illustrates thisprocess in some detail.

The hall, no more than about one-third of the total living space and smaller thanthe block of five rooms to east, shows how far that room had declined in importance.The lesser rooms present the problem encountered earlier, of how they were enteredwithout making two of them passage-rooms. Bocholtz and Blankenheim point to thesolution: 9 was a large lobby from which three rooms, 6, 7 and 10, were reached; theremaining room (8) has a doorway into the hall and there is good reason to think itdid not intercommunicate with 7 or 10. The hall itself is no longer reached from theporticus (and from outside) by a doorway in the middle, and if there was a centralhearth it did not relate to an inner room; the social significance of its placing hasgone. Instead, the lower end is occupied entirely by the cellar stairway and twofurnaces for hypocausts and neither the south nor the west wall is suitable for a dais.

Although the hall has evidently lost much of its importance as a focus of daily life,it provides the only access to 8, a room central in every sense to the life of the villa.Here, in the middle of the room, was found a large stone sculpture of the godSucellus; here, not the hall, was where religious observances were conducted. Thisexplains the function of the corresponding rooms in other villas, such as 30 atBlankenheim I/II (Fig. 70)29 and 16 at Bocholtz; all stand in the same relation to thehall and the entrance to it.

Given that 9 is a lobby and 8 did not form part of the principal suite of rooms,what of the remainder? The end room (6) was presumably a domestic hall or workhallserving some of the functions once carried on in the main hall. Room 7 presentsproblems as to how it was lit, being entirely surrounded by other rooms. Theexplanation, which has a much wider bearing than Kinheim, must be that in theRoman Empire, as in seventeenth-century England, the general need for light was farless than it is now, and the ability to move easily about fairly dark spaces general, forotherwise lobbies would not have been as common as they were at both periods. Inall houses of complex plan much use was made of borrowed light, and a window ortwo, not necessarily glazed, in the workhall (6), set opposite grilles in 7, would havebeen sufficient to meet most needs. This applies to rooms at Bocholtz, Raversbeuren(Rhld-Pf.) and other big hall-derivative houses. As for the function of 7, it wasprobably a living-room serving, as such rooms no doubt usually did, as a bedroom;10 was probably the same.

What of the west end? Mostly it is taken up by a bath suite, leaving only 14, over thecellar, for any other purpose. That may have been where the equivalent of a butler or


91

major-domo, who need not be envisaged as an employee, lived. The bath attendantsand other indoor servants are likely to have slept in the hall. So whereas Kinheim [I]was a large hall with few smaller rooms, [F] saw a concentration of private rooms atone end of the house, with rooms 6, 7, 9 and 10 forming one suite and the two better-appointed rooms with hypocausts another. Its religious aspect was the only importantfunction associated with the hall; all services were grouped at the far end, where livedthe inferior members of the houseful who performed them.

Schuld, a house with a complicated architectural history not elucidated duringexcavation and virtually impossible to sort out now, has, as the east end of the hall,a complex block of rooms including two with hypocausts, and two more are at theopposite, severely eroded lower end. The process observable at Bocholtz and Kinheimis not particularly evident here; the hall has lost some of its importance and nothinglike a shrine room is identifiable, but the two elements of a kin-group which arepresumed to have been the origin of the double-ended hall are still discernible.30

Social development was uneven.

SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF ROOM GROUPINGS

In villas like Kinheim, Bocholtz and Blankenheim I the blocks of end rooms arearticulated by different kinds of lobby from those employed in row-houses. Two ofthese houses have the stubby L-shaped lobby which needed a complementary smallishoblong room, 4 at Bocholtz, 18 at Blankenheim. There is no obvious need to intrudethe pavilion or the workhall into the body of the house; why this complication? Thatit was felt necessary arises, on the one hand, from careful assessment of roomrequirements in the various units comprising the end blocks and, on the other, fromthe constraints imposed by the canons of classical architecture. Blankenheim I, wheresome of the relevant doorways were uncovered, illustrates the clash between theseconflicting demands.

Division of the functions carried on in the putative pre-I hall between a workhalland a representational hall, coupled with the wish to introduce a religious function atthe heart of the house, required, if ceremonial dignity were to be achieved, that somedistance be put between the two rooms. Putting the workhall in a wing ensured thateveryday business and the callers connected with it were away from the main residentialrooms and the hall; the convenience of this arrangement is demonstrated by its adoptionin the very different kind of plan at Farningham-Manor House I (Fig. 15). That waseasy. How to reconcile the presence of so large a room with a symmetrical classicalfront? The solution was to put into the north wing the largest and most importantdomestic room (60/62) of the house. It is oblong, comprising the square living-spaceusual in such a room with circulation and service space opposite the doorway. Thatcustomary square form was one limitation of the possible length of the wing; anotherwas the implied need for an impressive doorway facing the porticus. Together theydictated the length of the major wing, and the point at which the room was enteredmade a return of the porticus unnecessary – it may even have been thought to precludeit.31 So, if the workhall had to be a particular size to perform its functions, identicalwing length could only be had by pushing the workhall back into the body of the

— Chapter Six —

92

house. That in itself did not require an L-shaped room but, given the width of theworkhall and the need for some smallish rooms of customary rather than oblongproportions, the shape of the lobby/entrance-hall became inevitable.

The lobby (22/25) was circulation space and nothing more. Whether the divisionbetween it and 21 amounted to their being separate rooms or was only a wideopening is not known because the evidence had disappeared, but since 21 providedthe only way into 19, some wider opening than a doorway may have existed. I aminclined to think that two interlinked spaces formed one hall-like room, off whichthree others opened; the largest was superior to two equal smaller ones and,appropriately, was reached almost directly from the porticus. Had it been more of anappendage to 22/25, a large inner room, the doorway would have been well inside.If room 28/29 were of inferior status to the apartment adjoining the hall to north thedemands of symmetry could be met by providing the latter with its own doorwayfrom the porticus, the former not.

If this conjectural design process is correct, it explains why neither symmetry nora wholly convenient plan could be achieved within the constraints imposed by thesocial structure of the houseful.

Bocholtz is another house with an L-shaped room. Here the intrusion of a pavilionproduced this effect and the necessity for such a design solution is harder tounderstand. It must be bound up with the need for sizeable pavilions which arelarger than any other rooms but the hall, the desire for the entrance to be in themiddle of the room, and the avoidance of strong projection and a wing-likeappearance. The result may have been a quite convenient pattern of circulation,with only the small square space next to the porticus effectively acting as a lobby,leaving most of the room free for other use. Perhaps lobby-room and 12 stood in asimilar functional relation to one another as 22/25 to an inner room at Blankenheim.Kinheim avoided this kind of complication completely, perhaps because its socialstructure was less complicated, perhaps because it was more sharply differentiated.

The principal difference between the end rooms in these villas and those atNewel (Fig. 24) or Schupfart III (Fig. 71) is that the latter are more sharply divided bylobbies into separate rooms, a pair and two singles. Substitution of a passage andlobbies for a room that is part passage, part in common use implies a looser associationbetween the occupants. In the light of that observation, the west end of Bocholtzand the south end of Blankenheim I look like an equivalent version of the small hallwith rooms off it, such as Frocester Court (Fig. 69), whereas the equivalent parts ofNewel and Schupfart II are coming closer to the row-house concept.

What kind of social organisation does the second alternative imply? One possibilityat, for example, Newel is that each of the end rooms 5, 6, 7, 9 is for a separate family,in the sense of a unit of consumption within the varied size range of the conjugalfamily’s life-cycle. Another is that the rooms are paired. Living-room and bedroom,the usual reaction to this idea, is anachronistic and hard to reconcile with the placingof the doorways, and the same applies to any family activities; why should they beseparated so awkwardly? A third is that a single owner, a farmer or proprietor and hisfamily, occupied all the rooms; in fact, in the currently favoured model, they andservants (number unspecified) had the whole house – and hey presto! we have thenineteenth-century bourgeois household in togas.


93

The last of the three possibilities is the most unsatisfactory, the first the least, butit leaves a problem of comparative interpretation in similarly planned villas; for ifdoorway positions were unavailable, room 8 would be interpreted as a lobby. In thereport, that room is said to be for a staircase on the grounds of its position andnarrowness and a reconstruction defies the evidence of the doorway at the southend and has the stair approached from the hall.32 It is hard, though, to suggest analternative for 8 or a use for the west end of the passage (4), beyond the doorways.

Other important differences appear in the halls of these buildings. The square hallat Blankenheim I/II is an imposing room with a wide entrance from the porticus;menial tasks were conducted elsewhere. So too at Raversbeuren; the long flight ofsteps providing a stately approach for formal occasions is sufficient indication ofthat, and Schuld [I] may not have been so different even though neither the southporticus nor steps were found. Newel and Kinheim have halls of different shape,slightly oblong and entered, not in the middle but at or near one end. At Newelcareful excavation showed that this was a utilitarian hall, representational on occasion,probably, but also needed for workaday functions – quite unlike the Bocholtz hallwith its broad pilasters proclaiming a stately entrance. At Kinheim the two oppositedoorways at one end of the hall and the two hypocaust furnaces at the other makeit difficult to envisage the kind of grand use that can so easily be imagined atBocholtz or Ravensbeuren; nor can upper and lower end have meant much. The hallis in manifest decline, lacking the social importance retained to the end by halls insmaller villas such as Mayen.

DEVELOPMENT OF WIDE-NAVE HOUSES

Only two houses are worth mention under this head. Hölstein I (Switz.) (Fig.7) wasopen throughout its length but divided functionally. The east end was always theprincipal living area, entered from a porticus which terminated short of the west endin order to clear a wide entrance to the part devoted to work. In II two rooms, 12square, 13 a double square, were cut out of the upper end. Entry was perhaps pastwhat may have been a porter’s lodge into the larger room, and on into the innerroom. Presumably they formed an apartment. In III a block of eight rooms wasadded at the opposite end of the hall; some formed a bath suite but it is impossibleto fit them all into the conventional sequence, so Fellmann suggested that two werewinter living-rooms.33

An interesting aspect of the changes within the nave at Hölstein is that the onlylongitudinal partition ignores the structure of the building, both aisles and axial post,in contrast to British houses, where new walls invariably utilise the rows of posts.That is true of another wide-nave house, Kaisersteinbruch (Aus.) (Fig. 67), where thethree rooms at the north end, which may belong to [II], respect the aisles.

94

CHAPTER SEVEN

PROBLEMATIC HOUSE TYPES

Many villas clearly belong to the types or their derivatives discussed in the foregoingchapters. Among the remainder are two kinds of plan whose relation to them is

arguable. The first comprises some left over from the hall type; they are like a largerInzigkofen, either yards flanked by one or two small houses, each equivalent to arow-type unit, or inordinately wide halls with a few rooms at the ends. Structure andfunction alike require discussion. The second comprises simple houses, mostly ofthree-room plan, which do not easily fit the row type and are of similar size to thehouses or units of the first group.

Next, coming to light in increasing numbers, are one-room buildings whichsometimes stood alone and were sometimes the first phase of a sizeable house.Commonly they reveal little or no indication of use so that the status of some ofthem as houses may be uncertain. The same is true of a considerable number ofhouse plans, large and small, whose diversity masks whatever they may have incommon. It is hoped to make these unusual buildings sufficiently comprehensible tofit into a general discussion of villas.

BONDORF: SMALL HOUSE OR LARGE YARD?

The matter of yard or hall was discussed earlier with the emphasis on halls and thepurposes they served. Now the widest of such villas will be looked at from theopposite standpoint by assuming that they were yards and considering how therooms around them might have functioned. This is more than a debate about ahandful of rather exceptional buildings; some of the yard claims implicitly cast doubton Oelmann’s demonstration that Stahl was a hall. The reaction against this almostuniversally accepted view appears to have begun with Reim’s opinion that Inzigkofen(Bad.–Württ.) had a central yard1 and was heightened by unease about the problematicvilla of Starzach-Bierlingen, which Baatz thought had an atrium and impluvium. Somany archaeologists now adopt the yard interpretation, even for quite small buildings,2

that it is now the prevailing orthodoxy in southern Germany. More important, though,was Baatz’s awareness, in discussing Starzach-Bierlingen (Bad.– Württ.), of the needfor complete excavation of the central spaces, about which little was known.3

— Problematic House Types —

95

Baatz practised what he preached, with the result that his work at Bondorf (Bad.–Württ.) in 1975, written up by Gaubatz-Sattler, provided fuller detail on these problemsthan ever before. It has to be said, though, that despite its high quality, the report doesnot match those of Mayen and Rijswijk for depth of treatment of such fundamental issuesas reconstruction, ownership and social structure, nor Blanken-heim for analysis of roomfunction. In consequence, the hall/yard debate is not advanced beyond the position inthe early 1920s, when some accepted the ‘Stahl type’ and others favoured yards.

The arguments in favour of the yard interpretation at Bondorf (Fig. 25) are these:(1) The clear span of 22 m precludes a roof without supporting posts and the wallsare in any case inadequate for the weight; (2) one of the cellar drains begins at thefoot of the stairs leading down from the internal space, from which it is inferred thatthe cellar steps were intended to carry away water from an open yard; (3) the lightshaft in the east wall of the roofed-over cellar stair gave light from an open yard, theunstated implication being that it would be useless in a hall; (4) a stone footing(feature 58) argues a roof over the south-west part of the hall and the cellar staircase,thereby providing a windshield for the furnace and storage for the fuel supply. Allthat is said about the hearth is that its position shows that the internal yard belongedto the household part of the building; significantly, neither hearth nor cookingequipment was found elsewhere.

Of these arguments, the third appears the most convincing but, if the internal yardwere really a hall, entered by the customary wide doorway in the middle of thesouth wall, the light from the open doors would be adequate. Point 2, drainage of acourtyard through a cellar, is inherently unlikely and would have more force if therewere drains to direct water to the cellar steps. Point 4 satisfies the obvious need toprotect the cellar from rain but a roof is totally superfluous if the steps act as a drain.And it is odd to provide a roof over the fuel supply while leaving the hearth it wasdestined for unprotected and unusable in inclement weather, the more so if thefurnace opening was sheltered from the wind. Given the lack of positive evidencefor a kitchen, the big open hearth is the obvious place for cooking, as Oelmannargued very cogently at Mayen; but if not for that, and bearing in mind that itbelonged to the household part, what? Moreover, a yard brings other problems. Thefour rooms at the west end can hardly have included two passage-rooms if theywere all one residence; and if they faced a yard, why no trace of posts for a veranda,as in a row-house? And what was the eastern half of the internal space, parts ofwhich were paved, used for if not domestic purposes? What conceivable purposecan a small yard beside a part-roofed, part-open domestic area, and behind a frontwhich was the emblem of Roman civilisation, have served?

The arguments that the span is excessively wide for a roof and the walls incapableof bearing its weight are the only ones which can neither be refuted directly nordismissed as improbable. Considering first the width, 22 m is a not impossible clearspan with the hanging king- and queen-posts familiar to Roman carpenters,4 perhapsusing a built (jointed) tie-beam, and if it were of the low pitches common in Swabiasuch a roof would not exert much outward thrust or be endangered by wind pressureor the weight of snow – that is proved by the survival of old roofs.5 Whether thewalls were capable of supporting such a roof depends quite largely on theirconstruction.

— Chapter Seven —

96

Figure 25 Halls or yards?


97

Were they wholly of stone? Did posts set in the masonry carry the roof trusses? Andif so, were the posts braced in any way to the tie-beams?

These matters are virtually impossible to decide on the published evidence. Ajudgement has to be made between two situations. On the one hand is the lack ofpost-holes and the dubious strength of the walls; on the other, the lack of drainagein an enclosed yard, the improbability of a hearth (probably used for cooking) in theopen air, and the difficulty of finding any conceivable purpose for half of an openyard. In any case, what is such a yard doing as part of the principal building of afarmyard? Any reconstruction incorporating one has a very extraordinary appearance.6

Thus far the problem has been discussed solely on the basis of published detailsand plans. A further possibility to be considered is that evidence for internal postslike those long known at Bilsdorf (Lux.) (Fig. 26) or discovered more recently atLudwigsburg-Hoheneck (Fig. 26) has been overlooked or has long been removed. Itis very hard to believe that this could be so at Bondorf, whatever may apply elsewhere,and consequently the case of that particular villa has to be decided in the light of thepoints made above.

OTHER VILLAS OF BONDORF TYPE

All villas of this kind having a porticus-with-pavilions raise the question of why sucha front is needed for a yard.

All, too, present the problem of roofing a wide span. Thus Reim, in challengingorthodoxy,7 but without attempting to counter every point made in connection withStahl, argued, from the absence of roof supports in an overall width of 16.6 m and theinsufficiency of the walls to carry a tiled roof, that Inzigkofen was a yard, not a hall.Yet the span need not have been so wide, for the post bases on the west side are ofa size more suited to heavy trusses than a lean-to roof; they leave a manageable clearspan of 13.5 m, which is not excessive in the light of Blankenheim and Bruckneudorf(Aus.), 12 m and 14.5 m respectively, let alone Laufenburg (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 38) at17 m. The importance to be attached to the slightness of the inner porticus wall and

Figure 26 Halls with freestanding corner posts


98

the alleged inadequacy of its footings depends on the form of construction: a wallpartly or wholly of timber would provide adequate support with only a slightfoundation.

Sigmaringen-Laiz A (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 25) is one of the few villas of this type (or

Figure 27 Halls with rear columns


99

sub-type) to have been excavated and published to modern standards. An admirablyobjective analysis left the hall/yard question open8 but failed to recognise that thehouse had, above the two cellars (4, 5), a porticus between quasi-pavilions (2, 6) orterminal rooms9 which overlooked a valley in the way characteristic of so manycontinental villas. That of itself makes a hall more likely than a yard, even with aspan of 17 m; moreover, a second porticus, defined internally by a timber structure,could reduce the span to 15 m.10

Other houses in Baden-Württemberg are as broad as Bondorf, two such beingMesskirch (Fig. 25) and Tengen-Büsslingen, but the broadest is Remmingsheim(Fig. 25) which, from its size, has every appearance of a rectangular yard some33×28 m. In front is the usual porticus-with-pavilions; one pavilion has a smallroom adjoining, the other two or three. Within, two larger structures (2, 6) faceeach other. The front rooms at least were domestic accommodation, but divided soclearly into two blocks as to have been in effect two apartments forming onehouse; and each of the internal structures adjoins one of these blocks. Here theyard is believable insofar as the two groups of rooms do not depend upon it butcan be reached from the porticus; yet, since they are not linked in any coherentway and neither resembles any other kind of provincial Roman house, acceptanceof a yard rather than a hall brings its own problems.

In discussing Remmingsheim, Paret did not shrink from the implications of Stahland Mayen; the formal front, he said, had been added to the dwelling house,11 thusimplying a hall within which rooms were subsequently built; he did not suggest howso wide a space was roofed. Without special reference to Remmingsheim he recognisedthat posts not discovered by excavation would have been needed to support the widerroofs, and did not consider the alternative of three or four parallel rows, as in some bigFrench barns. Nevertheless, he meets the point about the porticus-with-pavilions.

THE PROBLEM OF FUNCTION

The matter of wide halls or small yards can be approached in two ways not dependenton detail. First is the point that several German villas where the whole walled farmyardhas been examined have, more or less in the middle, a house of the kind underdiscussion. Messkirch, Bondorf and Tengen-Büsslingen are claimed to have a courtyard

Figure 28 Halls subdivided by timber partitions


100

complete with cellar staircase and a hearth, like Mayen. But is it really credible thatthe most important building should be, essentially, a small courtyard partly surroundedby lean-to structures? As for its purpose, no suggestion has been advanced. Untilthose questions are answered the probability must remain that we are dealing withlarge open halls.

A second approach relates to those houses where the central space is surroundedby rooms. Messkirch was like this,12 with rooms on two sides and two porticuses;there is no way of entering a small farmyard. Bad Rappenau (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 25)also has a completely enclosed middle space with no direct access from outside; sodo Harburg-Gross Sorheim and GrossSachsenheim. Inzigkofen, Bondorf and otherswhere access from outside is possible are to that extent credible as yards; where not,a use for the space is hard to envisage, and no trace of a garden has yet been found.

The problem of function arises in connection with the domestic rooms in andaround the yards as well as the yards themselves. Alpnach (Switz.) (Fig. 25) whichhas been variously regarded as a villa or a posting station,13 is wide for a roof of anykind – 19.5 m – but no less troubling is the idea of four rooms, not interconnectingand without porticus or veranda, opening on to a yard.14 The principal and largestroom stands alone in a corner and at the other end are three rooms of varying size.Hechingen-Stein (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 27) is comparable in this respect. On balanceAlpnach was a villa like Hechingen-Stein and each had a large open hall.

RANGES OF END ROOMS IN BROAD HALLS

In southern Germany a number of the villas wide enough to prompt the questionwhether they are halls or yards have, at one end (and occasionally at both ends), arow of four rooms in which one is narrower than the others. Thus a range of foursmall rooms only about 4.5 m wide at Eckartsbrunn (Bay.) (Fig. 25) includes whatlooks like a lobby between two equal-sized rooms (7, 8) and between them and theporticus is a larger room (9); the whole resembles a row-house on a small scale.15

What must surely be a very large hall at Olfermont north building (Haut-Rhin) (Fig.41) has a row of four rooms of the same width as those at Eckartsbrunn. No orthodoxrow-house is as narrow as these but an approximate parallel can be found in what isperhaps the smallest independent house so far found in Germany, Kirkel-Forst (Saarld),where the rooms are of the same average width. Better set out but with fewer roomsis Kempten-Loja 1 II (Bay.) (Fig. 29), and with the same number of even smallerrooms, Kempten-Loja 2 (Fig. 29).

Bondorf is generally similar to Eckartsbrunn16 and confirms the impression thatone end of the house was much more important than the other; the west or left-handend, where the row of rooms is, also contained the hearth, the cellar entrance andthe only two hypocausts; and adjoining the rear corner was the bath block. A Bavarianvilla, Treuchtlingen-Weinbergshof, though double-ended, shows a clear emphasison the east end compared with the simpler arrangements at the west end.

Some of the passage-like rooms were definitely not lobbies. Stuttgart-Stammheimhas just such a one (4) on the east side which illustrates the complexities ofinterpretation. Access to the hall is much restricted by the ramp to the cellar and a


101

narrow ledge-like walk17 that can only have been a service approach to room 5 andperhaps the porticus, hence this small room is likely to be an annexe to, and enteredfrom, one or both of the flanking rooms. It cannot possibly be a lobby, yet if not,how was the largest room of this block entered? Not, probably, from the front of thebuilding because that would make the pavilion (6) a passage-room. The suggestionthat the decayed wood found in the ramp may have been a floor or a roofing overof it18 allows for a wooden floor over the south part of the ramp to give access fromeither the hall or (by a small porch or lobby) the porticus. It appears in the reconstructedground-floor plan.

Not all lobby-like spaces are properly explained as such, as Wollersheim (Nordrh.-Westf.) shows, for there the space in question is a staircase leading to the cellar under acorner room. Yet the existence of the cellar and of a hypocaust in the room at theopposite end make a different point about these end ranges, that despite their narrowness,they could be as well appointed as a small row-house. As for the overall plan of therange, it too bears a considerable resemblance to Kempten-Lojakapelle 2 I.

YARD RATHER THAN HALL?

Finally, halls or yards without a porticus are still more problematic; of all the southGerman buildings so far discussed, these are unquestionably the ones most susceptibleof a yard interpretation. A Bavarian building, Niedereschach-Fischbach 3 (Fig. 25),has, at the corner of a space 17.5 m wide, an L-shaped block of eight small rooms,the biggest only 4.25×3 m, and in the corner are three bath rooms, a furnace roomand an oven. That leaves at each end two rooms equivalent to a unit at Brixworth;and it is hard to see how the whole functioned as a house without some considerablebuilding adjacent or a veranda extended to cover the oven. The baths do not absolutelyrequire an adjoining room of considerable size but, like those in the similarly dividedrow of small rooms in the aisled house IIIB at Collingham-Dalton Parlours (Fig. 68),make better sense with one. Wagner described Niedereschach 3 as a farmyard, whilenoting the large number of (roof) nails inside and outside; and he observed that ‘theroof must have sloped outwards’.19 A simpler example is Westheim-Hüssingen (Bay.),a structure about 19×17.5 m with an open hearth and two rooms inside it and threemore adjoining them outside. The hearth is evidence that the walls enclosed a hall;otherwise, its placing towards the middle is hard to understand.20

It is rare in disputable buildings of this kind to find rooms built outside thehall or yard, but one villa at least is much harder to explain as a hall than as ayard. Reimlingen (Bay.) comprises three rooms of different sizes, two of whichhave hypocausts fired from a trapezial walled enclosure (to use a neutral term).Rooms could not be identified inside this space but wall plaster and a stretch oflime mortar floor were found. Reimlingen may therefore have resembled Hüssingenand the argument for that building’s being a yard would apply equally, were itnot for the difficulty of explaining why such an eccentric plan was adopted andhow it was roofed. Here, too, no veranda existed to link the rooms if theyflanked a yard; indeed, it was precluded by the two furnaces which cut throughthe surrounding wall.


102

All the villas analysed in this section have living-rooms no bigger than those of aBritish row-house, hence smaller than continental buildings generally, and some areremarkably small. Two factors may operate here: first, some of the activities carriedon in a row-house were performed in the hall; and second, the households weresmaller, with some separation of the modestly privileged from those who lived andworked in the yards and fields.

In a historical context the wide yard/hall houses are interesting for their distribution,which on current showing is restricted to southern Germany and the adjoining German-speaking parts of Switzerland. Although that may under-estimate their connectionwith halls not so much smaller which have a wider distribution, the limited spread ofthis sub-type suggests some distinctive regional form of either agriculture or socialorganisation or a combination of both.

THE SMALLEST ROW-HOUSES?

One of the most informative collections of villa plans ever published is Agache’spage of rural houses in northern France21 which illustrates, among other things, themany variations found in three-room houses. A striking aspect is the lack of truesymmetry in all but two of the thirteen there depicted;22 six more convey an impressionof symmetry;23 the rest are conspicuously asymmetrical.

Taking the group of six, we find that all resemble one of the units at Downton(Fig. 10) in having a middle room or cell narrower than the others. The largest,Wancourt (Fig. 29), has an informative parallel at Plouneventer-Kerilien II (Fin.) (Fig.29), which differs only in the detail of the porticus and shows how the flankingrooms relate to the transverse entrance lobby; their respective doorways were atopposite ends to protect privacy, the better room being entered further from theporticus. This kind of arrangement is intended to separate two sets of occupants, notunite them; they were two distinct households. It is reasonable to assume, in theabsence of evidence to the contrary, that all six houses in the group were entered inthe same way as, probably, was Hucclecote (Glos.), and all are thereby differentiatedfrom houses where the middle room is as large as the other two or the largest.Bouchoir (Fig. 29), with veranda and pavilions, must have been entered in themiddle of the front elevation so that the middle room which, by its proportions, wasthe minor element of the plan, is likely to have been held in common. In that respectit was like Lamargelle-Versingues without the transverse lobbies.

It follows from what has just been said that houses formally of the same typemight be very different in social composition. The two large rooms of Wancourt areeach somewhat larger in area than the one-room house Sontheim, a.d. Brenz 2 III(Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 30); those of Dury (Somme) (Fig. 29), than Sontheim II (Fig. 74).And a room at Wancourt, which is much the same size as one of the core rooms ofNiedereschach-Fischbach 2 (Fig. 29), is almost four times as big as its counterparts atDury. The conventional British view regards a house such as Dury as the residenceof a conjugal family having a total living-space not much more that a quarter of thatat Wancourt; even allowing for possible different densities of occupation, the lattermust qualify as a row-house with two families, and probably extended families.


103

H.O. Wagner drew another conclusion from Niedereschach-Fischbach 2, that it was‘a representational dwelling, without an area of intimate family life’.24 No argument isoffered in support of the idea, which may have resulted in part from the position ofthe building as the dominant middle one in a line of three. However it was reached,the conclusion depends, in the absence of evidence of non-domestic use, onassumptions about household size and composition, and where the doorways were;Plouneventer shows this and Vouneuil-sous-Biard (Fig. 20), for example, providesfor a different relation between the parts of a kin-group.

Asymmetrical houses with no obvious division into two parts are harderto interpret and make any idea of two families difficult to sustain. L’Etoile and

Figure 29 The smallest row houses


104

Figure 30 One-room houses


105

Harbonnières (Somme) (Fig. 29), each with three progressively larger rooms, illustratethe problem: was the largest room used for some common purpose such as a workhall?And if so, can we, bearing in mind that complete separation of domestic life andwork is unlikely, envisage its being occupied by part of an extended family? If so,Ovillers (Fig. 40), for example, might divide into two parts, one comprising an end-lobby and living-room, the other a workhall/living-room.25 The questions raisedcannot be answered until one or two such plans have been elucidated by excavation.

Three-room row-houses are hardly to be found in Germany. One may beRheinfelden-Herten/Warmbach 2 I (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 29) for, despite being describedas an agricultural building, it is of a size and has the porticus and terminal roomappropriate to a domestic structure. It is true that the north room has a wide doorwaysuitable for bringing in produce but the two other rooms have, respectively, a hearthand the foundation of an oven. Perhaps other three-room buildings also served adual purpose, part domestic, part agricultural.

ONE-ROOM BUILDINGS: HOUSES OR WHAT?

Little attention has been paid to the simplest villa buildings. Not surprisingly, mosthouses which are simply a hall with either no other rooms or only a porticus wereenlarged subsequently. Noyers-sur-Serein I (Yonne) was no more than hall and porticusand was in a poor state of preservation following the building of a much largerestablishment. A rare survival and in some ways a more certain one is Pin-Izel (Belg.)(Fig. 30), its title to be a villa, however modest, being established by its porticus andcellar. For the more numerous villas where [I] can be inferred to be a simple squarehall, a suitable starting-point is provided by what may be the only instance establishedby excavation: Sontheim a.d. Brenz-Beim kleinen See (Bad.Württ.) is one of severalunspectacular sites reported on by Eduard Neuffer with exemplary clarity.

Two of the three buildings comprising the villa were halls, 1 apparently undivided,3 with porticus-and-pavilions and of more than one building phase. The third, 2,had a complicated history (Fig. 30). 2/I was a plain structure only 4.6×4.2 m internally,producing no associated finds. It was replaced by 2/II, about one-third larger, in onecorner of which was a hearth. That gave way to 2/III, an undivided hall nearly fourtimes as large. Its successor, 2/IIIB, acquired two hypocausts, one of them no lessthan 14.5×3.8m26 and one of many such elongated rooms whose use is difficult tounderstand. By V 2 was the best appointed, though the smallest, of the three buildingscomprising the farm. So, leaving aside the problematic 2/I, what was 2/II? The presenceof a hearth rules out a temple; it must have been a dwelling, but for whom?Understandably, no explanation was offered.

A one-room family house can certainly be envisaged in a provincial Roman context.Plouneventer and its analogues are pairs of one-room houses, and at Lamargelle-Versingues two apartments each comprised only one room and a lobby; and the twolargest rooms at Alpnach, although each may have been linked by usage to thenearer pavilion, appear to have been essentially one-room dwellings. Even in moresophisticated houses like Newport an apartment might comprise no more than onelarge and one small room. The problem is not so much whether so small a house is


106

credible but why it coexisted with two halls several times as large. This problem isbound up with another equally intractable one: why did the smallest of three buildingsbecome the most comfortable?

A few other sites have produced squarish buildings with stone footings or walls.Vierherrenborn-Irsch [I] (Rhld-Pf.), so far as it was discovered, was only a hall 10×9m with hearths.27 A similar building appears to form the core of Koerich-Goeblingen2/[II] (Lux.) (Fig. 30); although not mentioned in the report, its existence is establishedby straight joints and changes in wall thickness. The smallest building of this kind, aminor one in the villa of Biberist-Spitalhof (Switz.), is B IA (Fig. 30). It is described asa workshop for washing either freshly woven cloth or – in the country-house model– the laundry for the whole villa. Only in the nature of the work performed there canit have differed much from, say, Sontheim a.d. Brenz 2II.

A comparable building, Gargrave-Kirk Sink E (Fig. 12),28 was twice replaced, and,though larger than Sontheim 2 II (c. 9×7.5 m internally), lacked any partitions. Atone stage it is said to have been linked by a covered walk to the house D. As to itspurpose, ‘the best interpretation is that [such buildings] served as the farm offices,where bailiff or owner would issue orders, receive tenants and their rents, and keepthe estate records’ – just like a late nineteenth-century farm except for thedisproportionately large size of the office and its unsuitable position at the innermostpart of the enclosure. ‘Alternatively, extra accommodation for the owner’s sons andtheir families or the equivalent of dower houses may sometimes have been in questionwith these additions.’29 How suitable a single large room might be for either office ordower house is not considered, nor how appropriate its location for the latter;significantly, early modern English dower houses are at a considerable distance fromthe family seat. Some domestic use is hinted at by the covered walk.

Such undivided buildings are the most rudimentary kind of hall and can usuallybe distinguished from shrines or temples either by their greater size relative to thevilla or by a different kind of location. The type persists with the addition of aporticus or a narrow inner room but may be disguised by rebuilding. Thus Monreal[I] (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 30) is a nearly square hall entered by an unusually wide doorway(3.4 m) almost in the middle of the east wall; it had an inner room.30 Larger, and ofone building phase, Neuhausen auf den Fildern-Horb (Bad.-Württ.) is a rudimentaryhall on the way to becoming, with its porticus and cellar, a villa, and may perhaps becompared with Noyers-sur-Serein [I] or Ober-Ramstadt-Pfingstweide [I] (Hessen).The latter comprised a hall of much the same size as Neuhausen, 12×7m, with ahearth and a porticus.31

DOUBLE-DEPTH PLANS

The history of villa houses is, for the most part, one of increasing complexity of plan.Usually this is expressed by extension in line or by wings and courtyards, or aroundan open hall; as a general rule, rooms are in single file. A small minority of houseshas two parallel ranges of rooms side by side or separated by a corridor. They havenever been subjected to serious analysis.


107

Basse-Wavre (Brabant) (Fig. 31), mentioned frequently and confidently in theliterature as a ‘corridor’ villa on a lavish scale comparable to Haccourt III or theyounger Pliny’s Tuscan villa,32 is hard to understand for those who read a plan.Except for the great room in the middle the house is characterised by two rows ofrooms – a block of square ones to the east, oblong ones interspersed with what arealleged to be courtyards elsewhere. The smallness of these rooms, only about 4 mwide – narrower than a British row-house, or the rooms at the ends of Stuttgart-Stammheim – is as remarkable as the number of them. To what extent the tworows intercommunicated is unknown; perhaps hardly or not at all because, as thelegend of the published plan says, most of the doorways are assumed. Mostextraordinary are the nine or ten oblong rooms, every one of which was enteredeither at one end and thus necessarily a passage to the other end, or in the middleand so comprising two distinct parts. Yet Basse-Wavre shares this curiouscharacteristic with just one other villa, that of Villers-Bretonneux (Somme) (Fig.31), even to having a rear porticus considerably wider than the front one. Possiblythe former served utilitarian purposes, as is suggested at Basse-Wavre by its beinginterrupted by inserted rooms and incorporating a hypocaust furnace. Some roomsof the Belgian house were certainly altered, as the excavator noticed, and a largewing room was added to east and baths to west; but the original form of the housewill be discussed later in the light of other double-depth houses.

Some are quite small. Frilford (Berks.) (Fig. 31) has the two rows of rooms,squarish and oblong mixed, but all extraordinarily narrow (2.75 m); and there is alarger room with hypocaust. The most inexplicable feature is the tapering of thefront rooms; it looks like a clumsy way of emphasising the dominant room 14, to theleft of the point of entrance. Smaller still, and uncertain in detail, is Günzenheim-Staatsforst-Sulz (Fig. 31).33 Nevertheless, it has parallel narrow rooms, perhaps tworows of three,34 and the marked tapering found at Frilford, although here to oppositeeffect; the larger pavilion adjoins the narrow end. These two houses give someplausibility to an improbable-looking tapering squarish building at Chiddingfold(Surrey) which has nine small rooms.

A few quite small double-depth houses are known. They include Kernen-Rommelshausen (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 31), which had four rooms, a workhall and acellar; and it is of some interest that this very minor villa has at the rear a room-and-workhall unit not dissimilar to those at Basse-Wavre. A Hungarian villa, Smarje-Grobelce 1, has, essentially, six square rooms, one with a mosaic and another withgood wall-paintings; and even the tiny Somerton-Catsgore 3.14 belongs in this category.The first two especially present some of the same problems as the much largerhouses.

Before I discuss these very curious plans it will be worth considering one or twowhich are formally indistinguishable from them but are more susceptible ofexplanation.


108

Figure 31


109

BACK-TO-BACK HOUSES

One of the most instructive double-depth houses, Munzenberg-Gambach (Hessen)(Fig. 31), appears, on analysis, to be a highly developed row-house. In I it had tworanges of rooms of equal width, each having in the west half a lobby flanked by tworooms; they look like the two units of Downton (Fig. 10) placed back to back. Oneroom (9) had an open hearth. In the north range a larger room with a wide doorwayat the east end is a workhall forming, with a lobby and a square room to the west, aseparate unit. On the south side the remaining space is occupied by two unequalrooms, one of which may also have had some work function. That was the superiorside, with the largest pavilion, which had a hypocaust of some kind, and a cellar. Ineffect each of the two ranges is intelligible as a row-house of two units and wouldbe so regarded if they had been built separately, like two of the houses at Gargrave.

A comparable plan was excavated in the early nineteenth century at Lendin (Seine-Mar.) (Fig. 31). There the double-depth block comprises principally two four-cellranges, the one facing the courtyard looking much like Northchurch IIA, the otherlike Welwyn-Lockleys I (Fig. 11). Some rooms had painted plaster and at least onehad a hypocaust. At one end are three small rooms of unknown purpose; a bathsuite, possibly. Where, though, are the larger rooms corresponding to the one or twoworkhalls of Gambach?

They may be on the opposite side of the courtyard, in a building which comprisesa square room at the inner end and a long one divided by an oblique wall into two notquite equal parts. It is a strange way to divide a building yet it occurs in early modernEngland. At Ashwell (Herts.), Ducklake Farmhouse is divided into two parts, each ofwhich is a house, by a skewed timber-framed partition standing at about 80 degrees to

Figure 31 Adjoining parallel ranges and back-to-back halls


110

the long walls: a manifestation of the unit system. Why the partition was set outobliquely is unclear; it must have had a significance now lost.35 By analogy the obliquewall at Lendin is taken as a sign of joint proprietorship, however obscure the reasonsfor making the division that way. Another such oblique division appears in the villa ofAnthée (Fig. 75), and in so prominent a position in so grand a house cannot be theresult of careless setting-out; it may be secondary, but I cannot properly explain it. Amore recent example, and the closest to the Ashwell house in its domestic purpose, isthe oblique wall dividing the hall at Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer (Fig. 9).

THE INTERPRETATION OF DOUBLE-DEPTH PLANS

Since this kind of plan brings more problems of lighting and ventilation than singleranges it must have had some important advantages over the commoner row-typeplans. Gambach is the easiest to understand; it is two row-houses, each comprisingtwo unequal units, set back to back rather than end to end like Romegoux orAylesford-Eccles I (Figs. 13, 66), and the two face in opposite directions like Marshfield(Fig. 66) or the slightly separate houses at Collingham-Dalton Parlours (Fig. 68).Approaches from different directions were important in this kind of grouping, as canbe seen where there are two architecturally unrelated houses, for example Koerich-Goeblingen (Fig. 74). Perhaps the principal advantage of a unified block of buildingwas its more imposing appearance at a time when villas generally were growing insize, and this is very obvious at Gambach, especially after the addition of the pavilions.A single-span roof over the whole would have produced a massive bulk comparableto that of the biggest halls but without the technical problems of a wide clear span,so providing an impressive appearance relatively inexpensively. Another benefitmust have been a reduction in building costs; what a seventeenth-century Englisharchitectural writer called ‘spare of walling’36 mattered, and use of a spine wall savedthe cost of another of equal length.

This analysis may help to explain Villers-Bretonneux and Basse-Wavre. At Villers-Bretonneux all the rooms are either small and square, appropriate to a living-room,or long and narrow, like a workroom. Each row can be divided into three living-room and workhall units, the best, with the largest living-room and workroom,being to the south, and two others of equal size; but the latter have an extra living-room between them. And those three are doubled, making six units in all. Self-evidently the narrowness of the rooms was fundamental to the design; given that, aone-room-deep house would either have been preposterously elongated or necessarilygrouped around a courtyard, and the latter would perhaps have produced problemsof relative status among so many equal units. A double-depth house resolved thesedifficulties with great economy of walling.

This helps to explain Basse-Wavre. Starting at the east end, the distinctive block ofsix square rooms flanked by pairs of workrooms matches Villers-Bretonneux exactly:four units and two uncertain living-rooms.37 How the remainder was divided up in [I]is matter of argument but an attempt has been made (Fig. 31) on the assumption thatits walls are likely to have been incorporated in [II] wherever possible.38 Even ifthese guesses are wrong in detail, the shape of the rooms demonstrates a general


111

likeness to Villers-Bretonneux and so makes a unit-system interpretation with severalapartments likely.

Frilford finds a place here. The long room 13 stands out in the same way as thebiggest room at Munzenberg-Gambach and may have had the same purpose, that ofa workhall. The smaller rooms resemble the many such at Basse-Wavre and Villers-Bretonneux, though differently proportioned; 10+11, 4+5, 7+8, 3+2 all combine asmall room with a slightly larger one; 6 and 12 are like those extra rooms not easilyallocated in the continental villas. Whatever argument there may be over details,Frilford’s points of resemblance to Gambach may denote a division on the samegeneral lines.

The most puzzling aspect of Basse-Wavre and its analogues is why the roomsshould be so narrow compared with those of Gambach or nearly all row-houses, yetthe consistency in this respect shows it must have been fundamental to this form ofplan. The problem is analogous to that presented by the end rooms in German halls,which can resemble closely a three- or four-room row-house but are invariablynarrower, and by the pairs of two-room units in some row-houses, for examplethose at the south end of Towcester-Mileoak (Northants.) which could come fromVillers-Bretonneux. Differences of this nature may arise from differences in householdsize or the purposes the rooms served; did each household at Basse-Wavre, forexample, conduct in the oblong room some work operations which elsewhere werecarried on communally or severally in a workhall or hall? Excavation is the onlyhope of solving this problem.

Something must be said about three houses with partial or quasi-double-depthplans. Frankfurt-Bornheim (formerly Gunthersburg Park) (Fig. 32) and Ashtead (Surrey)(Fig. 32) are linked tenuously to Villers-Bretonneux by the unusual characteristic ofhaving the narrower rooms at the front; also unusual in houses of this size is theabsence of pavilions or terminal rooms. In other respects they depart entirely fromthe pattern in having rooms or groups of rooms which ignore the spine wall, Frankfurtat the north, Ashtead, perhaps by alteration, at the north-east end (rooms 1, 2, 2a).Ashtead also has what is interpreted as a reception room (9) serving as an anteroomto a dining-room (8);39 their unusual proportions relative to one another are notexplained. A related Belgian villa, Ambresin (Fig. 31, scale uncertain), with tworows of rooms of markedly different width, is like Frankfurt and Ashtead inhaving one larger room 12 which cuts across the spine wall; the recurrence of this

Figure 32 Anomolous double-depth houses


112

feature may represent a stage in the development of the type towards the dominantmiddle room found at Basse-Wavre.

Frankfurt-Bornheim becomes intelligible if entered by the rear porticus (10) and ifthe middle room (6) was a passage-room to 8 and 7; and it certainly led to the bathsuite. That leaves a block of four rooms (7, 9, 12, 13) as a domestic suite, and thelargest room (3) as a place for leisure and recreation closely connected with bathing.The accommodation provided by Frankfurt is equivalent to two blocks of roomseach comparable to the one at the end of a hall such as Kinheim (Fig. 24), butwithout the hall itself, and it leaves the porticus as a place of recreation. This meansthat any resemblance to Ashtead is purely formal; consequently the Surrey villaremains, for the present, unique.

THE AXIAL CORRIDOR

Allied to the double-depth type is one characterised by an axial corridor with roomson both sides. Two such have been excavated, neither completely. Hohenfels (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 33) has a porticus, probably with the usual two pavilions, behind whichlies the essential house. Next to the porticus and heated by a hypocaust was anelongated room (6) comparable in its proportions to a room at Sontheim a.d. Brenz2 IV/V. The building seems to have been entered, like so many villas, on the oppositeside to the display front; a wide hall (14) led to the internal corridor and also a shortcorridor straight ahead to the only entrance to the principal room. This was a widedoorway facing an equally wide one on the other side: an opposition implying thatthe two shared some important common function, rather like the series of roomslinked by aligned doorways in eighteenth-century country houses. Yet such anapproach to a grand room is itself strange; wide doorways and a narrow corridor area contradiction in architectural meaning. A curious feature of the opposed doorwaysis that they are set slightly off axis to the rooms, as if the important part, the place ofprivilege, were on the porticus side, and this, too, is unusual.

Neuburg a.d. Donau (Bay.) (Fig. 33) has a few points in common with Hohenfels.Though lacking a porticus, it looks eastwards down a slope and was approached atthe rear through an entrance-hall (6). At the far end was an extraordinarily long andnarrow room with an apse at one end; it looks like a porticus but is in quite thewrong place, and better analogies are the long rooms at Sontheim and Hohenfels.The next largest room (3) may have been the principal focus of daily life; how therest related to it is uncertain, but the narrow room 5 presumably had the samefunction as its counterpart at Hohenfels. The only other certain example of an axialcorridor appears to be Mézières-en-Santerre/la Croix Saint-Jacques (Somme), whichis known from an aerial photograph and is bigger than the others of this type. Itlooks like two row-houses, each with two or three transverse lobbies, and wasapparently entered at the front.40

Related to these axial corridor plans are villas which are really two houses sharinga common corridor. A large instance of this rare kind, Bad Dürkheim-Ungstein (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 33), has as its principal building a highly developed hall house with twowings.41 Behind it and separated from it by a corridor is a tripartite complex explained


113

as a courtyard with a wing at the east end and a large room at the other. The wing issaid to be a cart shed on the grounds that it has a wide double doorway, the roomto be an industrial or craft area. So what was the purpose of the yard between them?In view of the uses to which the ends were put, a hall might be a better interpretation,and its size, 21×11 m, is entirely appropriate. The problem this creates of lighting acorridor 35 m long and only 2.5 m wide may appear greater in the twentieth century

Figure 33 Houses with internal corridor or yard?


114

than it did in the fourth because the amount of light needed was not very great;borrowed light from the hall and the two largest rooms of the house, and lightcoming in through the doorway at the west end – normally open in daytime – wouldbe enough.

The only other such villa is Geislingen-Heidegger Hof (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 33), dugin 1795, written up in manuscript in 1816, published in 1911,42 and for which notmuch more than a plan is available. It is really two separate buildings rather thanranges of rooms, flanking a space too wide (9 m) to be called a corridor but which,nevertheless, performs more of that function than the term ‘narrow courtyard’ mightimply.43 Detail which might decide whether it was roofed or not is lacking.

The west-facing front (?) range of the villa comprised in [I] a narrow hall, endrooms and porticus and was about the same size as Collingham-Dalton Parlours J [I](Fig. 68);44 pavilions were either altered or added later and the house was enlargedsubsequently. Behind it is the yard or corridor and behind that a double-depth rangeof rooms, the best of which faces east, although it is not at all clear that it was givena formal architectural treatment on that side. For all the deficiencies of our information,the middle yard does appear to have functioned principally as a corridor; perhaps itwas made that wide, and left open, to avoid problems of lighting. It is a kind of planto be differentiated from that of a villa at Bregenz (Aus.), where both ranges faceinwards to a courtyard of about the same width as Geislingen.

THE SOCIAL BASIS OF AXIAL-CORRIDOR PLANS

Axial corridors occur in two very different social contexts. Geislingen and BadDürkheim are the easier to explain; they represent the bringing together of theseparate buildings usual in villa planning, as courtyard, peristyle or big elongatedhouses like Maillen-Ronchinne or Jemelle-Neufchâteau do in other ways. It is adevelopment apparent to varying degrees in most of the European provinces. Yet,however unlike Bad Dürkheim and, for example, Sudeley-Spoonley Wood (Fig.70) look, they embody comparable elements: a principal domestic andrepresentational range; another domestic range, east at Bad Dürkheim, south atSpoonley Wood; and baths, at the west end of the main range and the south rangeof the German and British villas respectively. Lastly, there is a large tripartite openhall, separated by a corridor from the house at Bad Dürkheim, by an interruptionin the porticus between house and north wing at Spoonley Wood: different waysof expressing social inequality between groups of people who lived in closerproximity than would be appropriate to a wage-labour relationship. Beyond theresidential court of Bad Dürkheim the part-domestic outbuilding 4 corresponds tothe aisled building, probably part domestic, at Spoonley Wood (Fig. 44). Suchcomparisons could be made between many villas.

Not all the components just considered appear at Geislingen, where excavation isknown to have been incomplete. Although there is a resemblance to Bad Dürkheiminsofar as the main house is separated by the access court from an inferior blockcomprising principally a hall and end rooms, the presence of two large hypocaustsin the former and a small one in the latter shows that the social gap between them


115

was less than the physical one might suggest – another point linking these unusualkinds of villa to commoner types. There were many ways of achieving rather similarsocial ends.

Hohenfels and Neuburg a.d. Donau are so much smaller as to make anyexplanation of this kind unlikely. So what was the point of putting a corridorbetween two parts of not very large houses? Neither is divided in a way suggestiveof social difference. Hohenfels is the superior house; it has the porticus-with-pavilions lacking at Neuburg. Both have a small bath suite, three squarish roomsand a narrow room by the entrance; the difference is narrowed down to the largehypocausted room 6 and the associated room 8, which give the appearance of alarge, comfortable and rather grand suite. Perhaps the intention of the axial corridorwas simply to create a more centralised plan than could be achieved with row-type derivatives, and at Hohenfels the best rooms were next to a porticus whichwas clearly intended for show and recreation, not an entrance. If this analysis ofan idiosyncratic plan is accepted, the only parallels are likely to be equivalents innumber and kind of rooms – socially rather than architecturally analogous. Neuburgis a humbler attempt to the same end.

BACK-TO-BACK HALLS

Row-type houses back to back are invariably the principal residence of a villa. Back-to-back halls are rarer, seem always to be subsidiary buildings so sited as to demonstratesocially inferior status, and are not always of a single building phase. Graux is one oftwo instructive Belgian examples, with the halls (which must be workhalls) standingto the south of the house. First came the south hall, with a south-facing porticus, anundivided room at one end and three rooms at the other; it was the superior of thetwo. Adjacent to it on the north, and only just touching it, was added a hall withnorth-facing porticus and later a long end room, so that in two stages the first hallwas virtually duplicated. Just how deliberately the new one was sited appears fromits awkward relation to the older building; it looks as though the builders first set outthe front wall and porticus to face in a very precise direction, not simply parallel tothe existing hall, and then found difficulty in fitting in the east gable wall.

Walsbetz (Fig. 31)45 presents the same idea. Two slightly different workhalls aresited parallel and a short distance apart and to demonstrate their independencethey face in opposite directions; they are the Romanised version of two similarlysited halls at Rijswijk (Fig. 65). A similar explanation may underlie the siting of twobuildings (3, 4) at the Hungarian villa of Szentkiralyszabadja-Romkut; also thebipartite hall and the building parallel to it lying south-west of the Dwelling Houseat Langton (Yorks.).

These halls reflect stages in the growth of social inequality, the main house beingoccupied by a superior group under whom were two subordinate groups inhabitingvirtually identical houses, whose not quite equal standing was expressed by theirfacing in opposite directions and thus in differing relation to the main house. Thesetwo buildings were not occupied by people who were at their superiors’ beck andcall – mere labourers – otherwise the relations between them would not have


116

influenced the positioning of their houses. It is a quite different situation from that atSudeley-Spoonley Wood, where only one sizeable hall stands within the courtyardand the lowest members of the villa community lived in the buildings where theyworked, or that at Köngen, where two halls each stand in a slightly different physicaland social relation to a third principal one.

Graux and other villas were built according to a code expressive of social relations,a code that was taken for granted, not put in writing, and was constantly changing inits local applications to meet specific situations. A few basic principles could havebeen stated had anyone thought fit to do so, but the finer points evidently dependedon subtly different power relations that were capable of infinite variation. To takeone example from those mentioned above, a scale of development can be observedrunning all the way from the tiny Somerton-Catsgore building through Villers-Bretonneux to Basse-Wavre, and some factor made it desirable to build the basicunits side by side, even in the smallest house of all. That factor, whatever it was, didnot find the same rigid expression in any other kind of house, not even in Munzenberg-Gambach. And somehow, right to the end, the large Belgian villa preserved elementsof social relations, however modified, that had existed in the little building in Somerset;total rebuilding never became necessary. Archaeologists are driven by the nature oftheir work to concentrate on change, and the timing and causes of change are verymuch the historian’s business too, but it is important to recognise the underlyingstability expressed by the continuity of plan elements in houses and villas.

117

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE PORTICUS-WITH-PAVILIONSPAVILIONS

In the preceding chapters two principal types of house have been isolated, eachcorresponding to the fundamental social organisation of the family group that built

it. To very many houses was added the kind of front defined by Swoboda as thePortikus-mit-Eckrisaliten, the porticus-with-pavilions, that was the badge ofRomanisation in most of the European provinces. It must also, by providing tworooms of considerable size, have modified the conduct of daily life in the corerooms, but unless the changes were sufficient to require structural alteration theywill be imperceptible from architectural remains. As Koepp remarked in a critique ofSwoboda’s book, the fact cannot be underestimated that, in architecture, purpose isthe first consideration and form the second,1 so it is imperative to discover the usesto which these substantial additions were put.

Although it is impossible to do justice to the complexities of this kind of changeon the evidence at present available, a beginning can be made by studying therelation between pavilions and the main body of the house – how they are approached,their size relative to other rooms, and the differences they presented in appearance.This will permit a distinction to be drawn between pavilions and wings in the truearchitectural sense, for it is as desirable to wrest the word ‘wing’ from the Britisharchaeologists who have so long misused it as it is to prevent Germans from applyingEckrisalit indiscriminately to every flanking structure.

PAVILIONS: THE CLASSIC FORM

A threefold intention underlay the porticus-with-pavilions: aesthetic, to create a balancedfacade in which the pavilions provide a strong visual termination to the lighter and moreopen appearance of the colonnaded porticus; cultural, to proclaim to all who came nearthe adoption of a Romanised way of life; and social, to provide additional high-statusrooms. To rank these intentions in order of importance would be pointless because theyare inseparable, but it is important to bear in mind that the extra rooms thus providedwere not, at least in the initial stages of Romanisation, so closely integrated with the corebuilding as to require intercommunication. This is self-evident for some villas and can be

— Chapter Eight —

118

demonstrated for more, and although in the majority of houses it is uncertain, there arenot many clear instances of pavilions being linked with core rooms.

The classic form of pavilion appears most clearly in the simplest hall houses,those where the central mass of the hall touches the pavilions corner to corner andrises above them, while the porticus joining them provides a more or less openscreen; how far open is matter of debate. Great Staughton (Cambs.) (Fig. 40), MayenIV (Fig. 1) and Serville (Fig. 1) are like this. In a few instances the pavilions stand alittle way beyond the dominant block and the whole is unified by the colonnadedporticus; Stahl comes into this category and Voerendaal-Ubachsberg (Neth.) just scrapesin. There are besides a few houses where an intention to give hall and pavilions thiselongated symmetry is evident but is clouded by coeval structures which made aminor visual impact and presumably were thought not to detract from the overalleffect; Bondorf (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 25), where a range of four rooms adjoins the hallto west, is one such.2

Sideways projection of the pavilions is not very common and implies a situationin which separation from the main body of the house did not detract from theroom’s usefulness. Serville illustrates the problems. It has a hall with no adjoiningrooms, a colonnaded porticus and two pavilions; that to south, the only room in thevilla with painted plaster,3 stood over a cellar; that to north, which de Maeyer thoughtwas perhaps a bedroom,4 was slightly the larger. For the south pavilion historicalanalogy may provide a clue. Not a few early modern farmhouses in England andWales have a parlour, the most private and usually the best-appointed room, underwhich is a cellar for the storage of beer or cider, which in a Roman context translateinto wine or family treasures. The point of this conjunction is to give the head of thehouse control of the cellar, and the same motive may reasonably be assumed atServille and villas similar in this respect.

So how did the house function, bearing in mind the limitation that no subsidiarybuildings were discovered? The hall is uncomfortably large for a nuclear family; atthe very least either relatives or servants, whether indoor or outdoor, have to beallowed for; and if servants, it presupposes a more equal relation between masterand man than seems likely in the light of other evidence about society in the RomanEmpire. The south pavilion, though the smaller of the two, was the more importantand was presumably given over to the head of the household; but in what capacity?He could hardly exercise any representational function there. An office is sometimessuggested in villas, although that implies a level of organisation and a separation offunctions hardly to be expected in so simple an establishment. A reception room ordining-room are possibilities, yet the better pavilion lacks the prominent positionclose to the entrance which is usual where such purposes are assumed. This is not afatal objection because a house with a hall as dominant as that at Serville has noother obvious place for a new function. As for the north pavilion, de Maeyer’ssuggestion of a bedroom is anachronistic if a special-purpose room is meant.

If the foregoing possibilities are set aside, the only probable function left for thepavilions is living and sleeping accommodation. For whom? If we assume ownershipby a conjugal family, they could be for master and mistress (each with a personalservant), south and north respectively, perhaps, although the space provided seemsanachronistically large in a society just emerging from a common life in a large hall,

— The Porticus-with-Pavilions: Pavilions —

119

and there seems to be little evidence of this kind of separation. Alternatively, itwould be consistent with the dual occupation suggested for some halls if eachpavilion were occupied by a senior household, the south for the head of the kin-group for the time being, the north perhaps for the next most senior, leaving the hallto kinsfolk who were dependants of various degrees. These suggestions, thoughtotally speculative and quite inconclusive, show that the functional possibilities ofpavilions in any particular house are not unlimited and can be narrowed down.

WHERE WAS THE PAVILION ENTERED?

In trying to understand the various uses of pavilions and the reasons why enlargementof the house takes that form the first problem is to ascertain their relation to the corerooms. Pavilions which are somewhat detached make a useful starting-point.

Most pavilions overlap the main body of the house by about half their width,some by less, others by more, a few hardly at all. Nor do all project to their fulldepth; some are partly or even largely recessed into the hall behind. The extent ofthe overlap determines whether it is possible to fit in a doorway from the main blockto the pavilion, a point that has to be taken into account even though survivingdoorways and other relevant evidence suggest that entrance to a pavilion is usuallyfrom the porticus. Mundelsheim (Bad.-Württ.), Farmington (Glos.) (Figs 22, 3) andAiseau S Bldg are hall houses where the pavilions overlap for about half their width.At Farmington, where there is overlap enough for an entrance to the west pavilionfrom the room at the upper end of the hall, a doorway in that position is virtuallyprecluded by a fireplace, like the north-west pavilion at Neumagen-Dhron-Papiermühle1 (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 68); and access to the east pavilion at Farmington was restricted,though perhaps not entirely prohibited, by a fireplace in the hall near it.

Neckarzimmern-Stockbronner Hof (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 27) further emphasises thepoint. There the overlap is insufficient to permit a doorway of normal width fromthe hall to the south pavilion; intercommunication at that point would have requireda bridge over the staircase,5 and how awkward one would have been is shown bythe cramped entrance from the hall to the cellar beneath the pavilion. That this is notan isolated instance of clumsy planning is shown by the rather similar cellar entranceat Furschweiler (Saarld) above which, certainly, no entrance to the pavilion existed.

Many villas have the sophisticated form of porticus which returns forward toprovide a small square space just in front of the pavilion; Gayton Thorpe N (Norfolk)(Fig. 39) is an example. It is a comparatively late development with the intention,probably, of shielding the entrance to the pavilion from the gaze of those excludedfrom it; and Weitersbach I (Fig. 69) had a simpler way of achieving the same end. Allvillas of this kind reinforce the idea that the customary point of entry to such pavilionswas in the porticus.

Not all pavilions were so entered. Lauffen am Neckar I (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 41) is ahall with porticus-and-pavilions where the evidence is unusually clear: the southpavilion has a doorway from the hall and enough remains of the wall towards theporticus to show that a doorway cannot have existed there in that phase. In II ahypocaust was built in the pavilion, its stokehole blocking the entrance from the


120

hall; at that stage a doorway must have been made into the porticus, there being noother place for it.6 No trace of a doorway was discovered in the north pavilion, butthere, too, a hypocaust introduced in II blocked any doorway from the hall. Thethree-sided apse added to create a dining-room7 demands an entrance from theporticus, so the same change is possible in this pavilion. Although we cannot be sureof that, it is quite likely that structural change in the pavilions brought about anotherchange, from intercommunicating with the hall to a situation of greater social distance.

ASYMMETRICAL PAVILIONS

The classic form of pavilions-with-porticus is symmetrical, yet in fact the symmetry israrely perfect. Even at Serville the pavilions are not of quite equal size, the better-finished of the two being marginally the smaller, and although the disparity of size israrely as great as at Ludwigsburg-Pflugfelden (Fig. 1), pavilions can be asymmetricalin less obvious ways. A common disposition is to have one flush with the end of thehouse, or nearly so, and the other either partly or sometimes almost wholly projectingbeyond the opposite end. The purpose of any arrangement of this kind is clearenough in general terms: the pavilion that is the more clearly distinguished from themain body of the house has, implicitly, some function that ties it less closely to thecore building than its fellow. Even so, the differences between them can be slightand confusing, as at another hall house with porticus-and-pavilions, Biberach [I](Bad.-Württ.): the smaller south pavilion stands over a cellar, is flush with the end ofthe hall, and has painted walls, whereas the larger one to the south projectsinsignificantly beyond the gable-end and has a hypocaust. The one to the north isthe better finished, the more prominent and comfortable and for that reason, perhaps,the more important. A possibility that springs to mind in a villa as simple as this isthat the heated pavilion was a dining-room; yet against that there is not even a singleservice room such as might be expected, and would surely be needed, in anestablishment sophisticated enough to have a specialised dining-room. We simplydo not know the code governing the size, functions and placing of pavilions and itwill take much work to recover it.

PRACTICAL ASYMMETRY? THE CASE OF ROTHSELBERG

Rothselberg (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 6) suggests how one of the pavilions, which projects toofar to be reached from the hall, might have been used and why it was so sited. Sincethe east end of the hall was given over to agricultural or other work purposes, thepavilion could have been used to oversee the wide entrance, where traces of waggonswere observed, and to supervise the yard. To suggest that this pavilion was in partan office may not entirely preclude some domestic function, for its plastered wallswere painted red, like those of the porticus, these being the only places where suchdecoration was found.

The layout of the hall throws light on the pavilions. The circulation space betweentwo opposite doorways divides the hall into a farm-related working part and a


121

smaller domestic part, and to the latter are attached two rooms, a large one with awide doorway and cement floor and a smaller one above a cellar. Although theprecise function of the west pavilion is uncertain, its position at the superior end ofthe house underlines the physical isolation of the east porticus from the purelydomestic rooms.8

ASYMMETRY AS AN EXPRESSION OF STATUS

While it cannot be doubted that pavilions express both the status of a house and ofthose occupying them, it is rarely obvious which was the superior one, even wheredifferentiation was more pronounced than at Serville. Osterfingen I (Switz.) (Fig. 68)was a hall with pavilions of equal projection. When it was enlarged in II by half itslength a new pavilion, larger in floor area but the same width as the one it replaced,was built abutting the gable wall. Entered only from the porticus, it was distinguishedby three pilasters as being in some sense the most important room in the house;nevertheless, its fellow was provided with a hypocaust and a small inner room withpainted wall plaster and was certainly a more comfortable apartment.9 It looks as ifthe pilastered pavilion was important for those approaching the house, perhaps as aplace to meet for the negotiation of business or other matters, whereas the innerroom to the south was important for the household as the seat of internal authority.

Other houses resemble Osterfingen in having one of two pavilions embellishedwith pilasters whose significance is complicated by their being regarded usually asbuttresses, an interpretation the more plausible because so many continental villasstand at the edge of a river valley. Thus at Grenchen (Switz.) (Fig. 22) the mostprominent pavilion (of three) is treated with pilasters on two sides, as though thevilla was approached from the south-east and the most conspicuous feature of thehouse was an imposing pavilion for, if the projecting features really were buttresses,it is hard to see why more were not needed. It is interesting to note, in the light ofthe conflicting views about a bath suite at Osterfingen, that the Grenchen pavilionmay have been a bath at some stage.10 Moreover, a blocked doorway discovered ‘inthe south-east front’, at a place not precisely specified, makes the function of thispavilion yet more dubious. These uncertainties matter less than the evident intentionto dispense with true symmetry in order to proclaim the greater importance and, inthis case perhaps, the greater height, of one pavilion. Symmetry was not valued forits own sake; some imperfection was important to establish to all and sundry thesocial relations between the various parts of the house.

One of the few British hall houses with a strong resemblance to those in Germanydeserves mention here. Byfield (Northants.) (Fig. 3) appears to have been a simpleundivided hall. At first glance the pavilions look equal, yet they are not identical;that to the north is fractionally larger than that to the south, and projects very slightlymore beyond the gable-end. The house model from the Titelberg (Fig. 34) givessome idea of what it must have looked like. So little difference is there between thetwo pavilions that it could be dismissed as a minor discrepancy of setting-out, yetjust such small variations occur in many villas,11 and when combined with thecustomary accuracy of provincial Roman builders in setting out right angles are


122

likely to be deliberate and significant of some social differentiation. In this respect,too, the Titelberg model is helpful; it shows how the size of the pavilions and theheight of their gables would have stood out against the length and especially thedominant roof of the hall in a way which emphasised their respective sizes.

Figure 34 Pavilion details


123

SMALL DIFFERENCE, SIGNIFICANT SOCIAL IMPLICATION

Two comparisons from early modern England strengthen the argument.Aston Bury, a mid-seventeenth-century manor house in Hertfordshire of basically

rectangular plan and one room in depth, is unusual in having two virtually identicalstaircase wings at the rear.12 The staircases themselves have characteristic ornamentof the period and are virtually identical. Only on close inspection does a slightdifference in ornament and painting become apparent, and only measurement showsthat the marginally simpler staircase stands in a marginally smaller wing. For presentpurposes the measurements are more important; both the width and the projectionof one staircase are slightly smaller than those of the other; they are 4.42 m and 4.27m wide, and project 3.20 and 2.90 m, respectively. These differences are of the sameorder of magnitude as are observable between the two pavilions of many a Romanvilla, and it is likely that in an age when people necessarily had to depend on closeobservation, because they had no written aids, two such structures would be instantlyrecognisable as conveying a social message, or rather, reinforcing it, for their sizewould not be the only signal; ornament and decoration played a part too.

Walnut Tree Farm in Pirton parish13 teaches the same lesson. It has two porchesequidistantly spaced which exhibit the same order of difference as the Aston Burystaircases. They were intended for two households, one superior to the other; onecomprised only living-rooms on the ground floor, the other had a kitchen and commonhall/dining-room. If the house had been razed and subsequently excavated, theplan, except for the chimney stacks, would have points of resemblance to a Romanvilla. Anyone approaching the house and confronted with two porches would haveknown instantly which one was appropriate to his status and purpose, quite apartfrom incidental signs of occupation.

Those who doubt that small differences between pavilions and matching roomsare significant have to argue away the relevance of these analogies.

OBLONG PAVILIONS

Most pavilions are squarish. Some, as at Stahl (Fig. 1), are oblong and project boldlyin front of the house. A few villas have an oblong room apparently of equivalentfunction which stands parallel to the house and is roofed parallel to it: Raversbeuren(Rhld-Pf.) (the north-east pavilion) and Badgeworth (Glos.) are examples. The twokinds of pavilion conveyed different social messages; the latter group is anomalousand its significance obscure, the former is the more instructive.

As a general rule a squarish shape proved convenient for most kinds of living-room and consequently elongated pavilions demand explanation. Stahl (Fig. 34)points to one. The left or west pavilion has splayed corners intended to provide asetting for someone or something of importance, probably the former; it looks like avariant of those rooms reduced in width at one end which are found at Bierbach(Saarld) (Fig. 19) and some other villas.

Functionally the room divides into a place of honour emphasised by the splays,where, perhaps, the head of the houseful sat; above him a window lit the body of


124

the room, leaving him in comparative obscurity. He faced an area more or lesssquare where the main activity was carried on, and a circulation and service space atthe doorway end. Thus divided, a dining-room would provide a suitable use, or itmight have had a representational purpose: in the first case the service space mighthave been reserved for a sideboard or its equivalent as a waiting place for servants;in the second for a stand displaying precious objects such as a portrait bust orfigurine of a deity. Broadly similar considerations apply to the use of the floor spacein the east pavilion. From their size, shape and position these are clearly the mostimportant rooms in the house and, just as happened with the parlour in late medievalhall houses, they must have taken over some of the principal functions of the hall,including representational ones; for the upper end, in the sense of a seat of honourwhere the head of the house habitually sat, seems to have disappeared by the timethe pavilions were added.

A British hall house, Kingsweston [F] (Fig. 8), throws some light on how this notvery common kind of pavilion might be used. The west pavilion (7) (Fig. 34) is aninner room in relation to the adjoining room (6) at the end of the hall, the twoforming a functional whole. Presumably persons coming past the hall hearth entered6 at the north end, where the plain border of the mosaic is widest, and, if privilegedto do so, continued on to 7 where, at the far end on the wider part of the border, wasthe place of honour reserved for the head of the household. Uses for the entirespace have to be envisaged on the lines of those suggested for Stahl; but the eastpavilion (11), entered from the porticus, had, insofar as it was more accessible, a lessprivate and thus inferior status.

Oblong pavilions are uncommon and generally smaller than these. Examples areto be found at Ersigen (Switz.), where they are as prominent as those at Stahl;fronting a divided hall at Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer (Pas-de-Calais) (Fig. 9); and at therow-house of Laufen-Müschag (Switz.); none appears to be susceptible of the kindof conjecture ventured for Stahl and Kingsweston.

No general explanation has been offered for the quite common addition to pavilionsof a slightly smaller flanking room, of which Bondorf (Fig. 25), Biberach (Bad.-Württ.)and the north side of Manderscheid (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 39) are examples. They may besmall inner rooms equivalent to what would have been called a closet in seventeenth-century England – a small room used for one of several purposes by one person.

PAVILIONS NOT RECTANGULAR

It might be expected that the Roman predilection for polygonal and apsidal buildings,forms particularly suited to display, would manifest itself in pavilions which, as muchas any part of a house, were intended as a mark of status. Rather surprisingly, thesemore interesting shapes are rare. One is the otherwise unremarkable BrewoodEngletonI (Staffs.), embellished by the addition in II of two bow-fronted pavilions.14 But atBrewood, as in so many houses, one pavilion is flush with the gable-end wall and theother, the left one, is given greater prominence by projecting beyond the end of thehouse, so that shape is not the only mark of distinction. Among buildings of its sizeand type Brewood proclaims its owners’ advanced taste.


125

Lauffen am Neckar has, as already mentioned, a polygonal room which is afairly sophisticated kind of enlargement intended, perhaps, to convert the principalpavilion into a dining-room. At Hüfingen (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 34) the apsidal frontof the left-hand pavilion indicates a use rather like that proposed at Stahl, withthe place of honour facing the house and the doorway into the room close to thehall, leading directly to the supposed circulation/service area. Polygonal pavilionsin the late phases of Fliessem and Stadtbergen are irrelevant because these villasare so large and imposing as not to be comparable, yet apart from them such afeature is hardly to be found among the huge number of villas in Germany andFrance. A remarkable outlier is the Hungarian villa of Hosszuhetény, which hastwo markedly unequal hexagonal pavilions – a shape so awkward by conventionalstandards of room use as to suggest they were designed for architectural effectand leisure. The same can be said of the two round pavilions at Orlandovtsi(Bulg.) (Fig. 60).

Regular geometrical shapes do not exhaust the possibilities. A few widely scatteredvillas have pavilions of irregular shape in otherwise rectilinear buildings. At WhittingtonIII (Glos.) (Fig. 34) the south pavilion forms a five-sided figure, has a hypocaust andmosaic floor and was the most important room in the house, facing a pleasantprospect down to a stream. Where it was entered is not known definitely but, ifsurviving walls are a guide, it was from the larger adjoining room. That also has ahypocaust and the pavilion may have been an inner room to it, with the place ofhonour in the three-sided apse. Interpreted thus, it is a small version of the pavilionsat Stahl and Kingsweston. Yet another is found at Regensburg-Burgweinting 3 (Fig.41), where a canted pavilion forms an inner room to an irregularly shaped roomintruded into the hall. The point of these irregular shapes may be to reproduce on asmall scale the imposing setting created by the canted corners of the Stahl pavilion,and making them inner rooms conveyed the impressive sense of distance otherwiseresulting from size.

Some houses have one of two pavilions built with the front canted towards thepath by which the villa was reached, as if to enable persons approaching to distinguishwhich was the superior side of the house. This may have been intended atBurgweinting, and Friedrichsdorf-Seulberg (Hessen) is another instance among aconsiderable number like this.

MINIMAL PAVILIONS

Pavilions first came to serious notice as ‘corner-projections’ and the notion of projection,though fundamental to their definition, was applied sufficiently flexibly to embracevillas in which the visual effect was slight. Swoboda extended his definition withreference to a building, itself looking like a small villa, at the entrance to the courtyardof the great establishment at Fliessem (Fig. 43). Taking the then current view thatthe space in the middle of the building was an open yard, he described it as an‘extended villa with small internal court and outer porticus on one side betweenpavilions or [their] rudimentary forms’.15 This was said of a house which has apavilion of minimal projection and, at the other end, a room flush with the


126

porticus. On the other hand he made no mention of villas with corner projectionswhich are not really pavilions in the usual architectural sense, those called hereminimal pavilions.

An example is the principal house of the small villa of Langenau Osterstetten(Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 35). Its two pavilions, about 7.25 m in depth, project for littlemore than a metre at the front and less – and unequally – beyond the ends of thehall,16 so that, as in some previous instances, the slightly larger and better appointedpavilion is the less prominent. No porticus was found, and some kind of constructioncomparable to that at Stratford-upon-Avon-Tiddington (War.) (Fig. 35) is likely.17 Itfollows that the front wall was solid and the pavilions projected hardly more at thefront than they do at the ends of the Titelberg model.18

What was the point of such minimal pavilions? If the hall had low eaves they mayhave had more of the customary visual effect of the standard house front than theplan suggests, yet some of the contrast between dark hall and light pavilion, andsome of the privacy must have been lost. On the last two counts they cannot havediffered very much from rooms at the end of open halls like Quinton (Northants.)and Rothselberg. Their primary purpose was to make a symbolic statement, to claima tenuous affinity with the Roman world at the least possible cost.

PAVILIONS IN ROW-TYPE HOUSES

However hard it may be to assign specific functions to the pavilions of a simple halllike Serville, they clearly provide a new kind of accommodation. That is not self-evidently true of even the simplest row-house, and only the indiscriminate use ofblanket terms like ‘wings’ or ‘Eckrisaliten’ has concealed the problem.

Because row-houses are so varied in the number and size of rooms, it is difficult toselect one form of plan and argue a range of functional possibilities, as could be donewith the simplest halls. A beginning may be made with the three-room houses of theSomme basin, which are simpler and less altered than the many well-excavated row-houses in Britain. Bouchoir (Fig. 29) and Marchelepot (Fig. 43) have pavilions in theclassic relation to the core building but Rainecourt (Fig. 68) shows the commonestapplication in row-houses, in which the notion of projection is abandoned and thepavilions are reduced to small appendages rather than major features of the frontelevation. In its classic form the pavilion looks like a private room or parlour, as in

Figure 35 Minimal and quasi-pavilions


127

hall houses like Serville. Not so, though, at Rainecourt (Fig. 68), Sparsholt (Hants.)and other row-houses where the rooms at the end of the porticus are too small toperform any such function. Some may have been internal porches or lobbies; Shipham-Star 2 I (Fig. 37) suggests the possibility that others were service rooms to the roomsthey adjoined; a porter’s lodge is another alternative.19

Small rooms like these do not conform to the basic idea of an Eckrisalit becausethey do not project beyond the perimeter of the house-plan, only, perhaps upwardsabove the porticus. Swoboda, discussing the little villa of Bachenau (Fig. 36) andits analogues, did not call such rooms pavilions,20 nor did he give them a name,so I propose to call them, with implicit reference to the porticus, terminal rooms;and that, whatever its deficiencies, is an improvement on ‘wing’, as in winged-corridor villa.

Sparsholt has two terminal rooms which have earlier been suggested as lobbies(chapter 4). Two are likely at Downton (Fig. 10) because it is so symmetrical in otherrespects, and there they are unlikely to have been lobbies because each apartmentalready has its own. The one terminal room excavated was an inner chamber openingoff a large one, and again the term ‘closet’, meaning a small subsidiary room adaptableto many purposes, may be useful.

Terminal rooms are very rare in hall houses. One example is Beckingen (Saarld)(Fig. 36), where a slight set-back in the front wall shows that the terminal room 3at the north end antedates the bath suite and is original. Another is Broichweiden(Fig. 36), where a wide porticus allows a larger than usual terminal room as largeas some pavilions.

Figure 36 Terminal rooms


128

DETACHED WINGS OR QUASI-PAVILIONS

A fairly rare kind of structure which has caused some confusion is the detached roomor wing standing in front of a porticus and separated by it from the core building. It isvery difficult either to devise a reconstruction for villas which possess this feature or tofind a reason for separating comparatively small parts of a not very large building. Theprime example is Houdeng-Goegnies (Neth.), which misled several people into believingit analogous to Ditchley (Oxon.).21 Another is Newton St Loe S (Wilts.), where, at theeast end, a quasi-pavilion separate from the core rooms provides balance to the terminalroom at the west end. A third villa having this feature is Brewood-Engleton III (andprobably also II), but the evidence is less clear than for the others.

This strange departure from general villa practice may be related to the way theunits of a row-house were entered by lobbies. Brighstone-Rock I (Fig. 36) has ateach end a transverse lobby which is reached from the porticus. Had the pavilion (6)been added to the core structure in the usual way it would, by blocking the porticus,have made the east lobby redundant and necessitated much rebuilding at that end tocreate a new one. Adding it outside the porticus preserved existing social arrangementsto a large extent, although they must have been modified in ways now hard to see.Houdeng-Goegnies may be explicable in this way and probably Brewood too.22

ONE STOREY OR TWO?

In recent years British archaeologists have argued increasingly that the pavilions oftheir villas had two storeys. Insofar as any evidence is adduced it is the greaterthickness of the pavilion walls than those elsewhere on the site, and if one pavilionhas thicker walls than the other, symmetry demands that they be the same height,come what may. External projections are another favourite, to be unhesitatinglyinterpreted as buttresses without regard to probability, perceptible necessity orstructural considerations. Why a pavilion should need several buttresses at the front– and it is usually at the front – and only the odd one at the side is never explained,yet the thrust of a square structure is fairly uniform. In this as in all other matters theneed for a reconstruction to conform to structural logic23 is totally ignored.

Nor, as far as I am aware, has anyone ventured to mark clearly on a plan wherethe staircase stood – in some cases the only possible place is over a hypocaust – andstill less to indicate what form it might have taken. Very rarely is anything said aboutthe materials of which the staircase was built: timber, presumably, but a structureintended to carry people at all mindful of their own safety, let alone one destined tohave heavy loads carried up or down it, needs a foundation of some solid material,whether stone, brick or concrete. Among the large number of villa plans examinedfor this book only three instances have come to light where plausible evidence hasbeen adduced for a staircase. Two are in the Iberian peninsula: Guadaira-Alcala/Casa de Pelay Correa (Seville) and Vila de Frades (Portugal) both retain stone steps– in the latter villa, more than a dozen.24 The third is Stanwick-Redlands Farm(Northants.), where a stone foundation was interpreted as being that of a staircase;the problems of first-floor circulation it raises have not so far been addressed.25


129

The space needed to do the necessary demolition job on the many alleged upperfloors is better used more positively. Besides, such an exercise can provide foranyone of a sceptical turn of mind hours of innocent amusement for the long winterevenings in exposing the absurdities that abound in every aspect of villareconstructions, not just pavilions; it would be a pity to spoil the fun.

CONCLUSION

Pavilions need closer analysis than has been attempted here. Some have hearths orovens, some were built as part of a bath suite or converted to that purpose, somecontain mosaics. A small proportion intercommunicate with an adjoining room,whether by an original doorway or one broken through later. On the whole, though,these instances appear to be the product of particular circumstances. Most pavilionsare explicable in their initial phase in terms of those examined above; some thatunderwent enlargement will be considered below (pp. 261–2).

The distinction between pavilion and terminal room is important for the bearingit has on the transmission of ideas; the relation between the two, and why the morelocalised form developed, are questions to be discussed in the wider context of villadevelopment.

130

CHAPTER NINE

THE PORTICUS-WITH-PAVILIONSPORTICUSES

The problem bedevilling the understanding of many elements of villas, that theyserve more than one purpose, makes it important to analyse which of the

possibilities is primary in any given context. This might be thought not to apply tothe porticus, yet this apparently simple feature has several variant forms which relateto the houses behind them in quite different ways.

A porticus is nearly always a mode of architectural display. Functionally it may bea corridor giving access to the rooms behind it, a gallery overlooking the countryside,or an enclosed room. Entrance may be at the front, either by an imposing doorwayin the middle or by two not quite equal doorways; at the rear, by a middle doorway;or into one or both ends of the porticus. Its length and breadth can be varied toserve particular needs or to give a desired emphasis. In any one villa two or three ofthese purposes can be combined or they can change from one phase to the next,and it can be hard to decide the intention, part functional, part iconic, underlying aparticular example.

These problems will be dealt with under the three heads of social structure,recreation and living-space.

OPEN-ENDED PORTICUSES: AN EXPRESSION OF SOCIALSTRUCTURE

The simplest kind of porticus is open at both ends and extends from end to end ofthe house, as at Aylesford-Eccles I (Kent) (Fig. 66). It perpetuates the purely utilitarianfunction of the timber veranda open at one end and not extending the full lengthof the house but, merely by its greater symmetry, creates greater possibilities ofarchitectural treatment. To what extent this opportunity was seized is not clearand, if turned wooden columns were used on a waist-high stone wall, may neverbe known. But Eccles I, like every provincial-Roman house of any quality, has asuperior and an inferior end, here north and south respectively. So what was thepoint of having both ends of the porticus open, and how did those approaching itknow which was the appropriate point of entrance for them? In a villa sophisticated

— The Porticus-with-Pavilions: Porticuses —

131

enough to incorporate a long ornamental pool the immediate surroundings willhave been laid out to govern the decision. One path led to the entrance at thesouth or lower end where an open-ended room was probably a domestic shrine,as a similarly placed but shallower room at Farningham-Manor House I (Kent)(Fig. 15) appears to be. Nearly everyone entered here. The end of the Eccles housemay have resembled in a general way the shrine from Mainz-Kastel (Fig. 37),1 butwith a square-headed opening under a pediment, a king-post roof and simpleornament or painted walls (Fig. 37). Blankenheim I (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 70) has, at theentrance to the porticus, a wide, shallow version of this.2 Architectural detail wouldhave made clear the importance of the shrine and those entering the house wouldexpect to make an offering.

Inside the porticus some architectural feature or ornament or merely painteddecoration distinguished the entrance to each apartment; additionally, emblematicbarriers such as a wooden arch or a carved tie-beam may have marked stages in theprogress towards the furthest and most important apartment. They were thepredecessors of the arch spanning the porticus at Ormalingen (Switz.) (Fig. 15), andformed customary barriers warning the caller not to venture uninvited, though infact an attendant waiting near the shrine is likely to have guided any visitor’s progress.Only the privileged would enter at the north or upper end of the house or perhapsgo out to a garden. The pool was placed nearer the south or inferior end withoutoverlapping the putative shrine, thus emphasising both it and the best apartment atthe north end as viewed from the west; the latter may well have had some externaltreatment to distinguish it further.3

No other villa as long as Aylesford-Eccles has an open-ended porticus unless,perhaps, Mareuil-Caubert (Somme).4 Only Ault in Picardy has a porticus on bothlong sides; why should so small a house need two? They may connote two equallyimportant elevations, front and garden being the conventional possibilities. Morelikely, in a house as small as this, they indicate the social importance attached toseparate entrances to two apartments, and they extended the full length of thebuilding because the two were not fully independent; here the largest room – aworkhall? – is at one end. Whatever idea underlies Ault appears in modified form atMonchy-Humières (Somme), where the wider porticus of two is open at both endsand the other is closed at one end by a wing larger than any of the range of fiverooms; its size suggests a workhall in a position comparable to those beside theentrance at Farningham I and Blankenheim I.

Open-ended porticuses giving access along the front or rear were appropriate toa series of apartments with some degree of hierarchy but no dominant one, and thechoice of this direction of approach rather than one at right angles is fundamental toporticus development. Aylesford-Eccles I is the most conspicuous example and anearly one, but the same idea was expressed much later in the advanced planning ofBlankenheim IIIA. This kind of porticus needs a series of openings, which mighttake the form of a colonnade, to give light, but otherwise, lacking a focal point, doesnot lend itself to symmetrical treatment or architectural enrichment except at theentrances; Halstock (Dorset) in its later phases exemplifies this point in an otherwiserather exceptional porticus.5

— Chapter Nine —

132

HIERARCHY IN PORTICUSES OPEN AT ONE END

Porticuses open at only one end are easier to understand as a way of approachingunits of not quite equal status than those open at both ends. They have a precursorin the timber veranda, of which the best-known example is Welwyn-Lockleys I. Anearthfast veranda always terminates short of the end of the building, and the reasonfor this is plain: because entrance to the house is gained from only one end the farend room is entered at the nearest point, and to extend the veranda would have hadno conceivable advantage; and where the main elevations do not lend themselves todisplay, nothing was lost by curtailing the simple timber structure. This utilitarianattitude persisted in some porticuses built or replaced in masonry, such as Bramdean6

or Köln-Mungersdorf II (the east porticus). As masonry footings and, increasingly,masonry superstructure superseded timber, the architectural possibilities of the newmaterial, coupled with a growing exploitation of symmetry, caused the porticusreplacing the veranda to be extended the full length of a house. This left a space atthe far end, beyond the last doorway, for which a function had to be found.

Chilgrove 2 II (Sussex) exemplifies this kind of development, as, probably, doesManfield-Holme House (Durham) (Fig. 68) where the evidence is less well preserved.Shipham-Star IIA (Som.) (Fig. 37) is a particularly interesting example. A hall housein I was replaced in IIA by a row-house entered at one end of a full-length porticus,at the far end of which, and flush with it, is a minor room, probably a service room.The two doorways on the west side of room 3 point to there being a timber partitionbetween 4 and the porticus and suggest a kind of use for the end room that mayhave occurred elsewhere. Northchuch IIB, a two-unit house, had a porticus open atone end and closed at the other by a small terminal room of uncertain purpose.7

The open-ended porticus could also lead to a pavilion, as at Démuin (Fig. 37) andPlachy-Buyon. Some social nuance must be implied by one instead of the usual twopavilions, and in the context of a kin-group it may imply the emergence of a dominanthousehold – one of the many ways in which that kind of social change is expressed.A single pavilion, being larger than a terminal room, has a more important function,and no doubt carried something of the symbolic significance of the porticus-with-pavilions front.

Porticuses open at one end or both are commoner in Britain and France thanelsewhere. They are found, as the preceding examples demonstrate, in row-houseslacking a large middle room. It appears that once such a room, large and in the mostprominent position, is introduced into a row-house of two units, the porticus isentered in the middle. Some major new function has been brought in with resultingchanges in social life. A hint of what it may have been emerges from Newport(I.o.W.) and Downton, both with traces of what can plausibly be interpreted as areligious function, in addition to the commonly ascribed one of a dining-room.

THE ULTIMATE OPEN-ENDED PORTICUS: CSÚCSHEGY

More important and more complex than these is Budapest III-V Csúcshegy (Hung.)(Fig. 37). At the entrance to the porticus a doorway on the right leads to a workhall


133

which is, as is commonly the case, the largest room in the house; typically, it wasalso the kitchen and accommodated the stoke-hole for a hypocaust in the adjoiningroom. The porticus led on past a pair of interconnected rooms with hypocausts,terrazzo floors and wall-paintings; they were entered from the next room in line,which had a boarded floor.8 The good-sized room in the north-east corner also hada boarded floor and possibly the adjoining one to the south too, so they werecertainly a pair of living-rooms. So far the proportions of the rooms fall within theusual limits of variation; the two at the rear of the house are outside them, one beingtwice and the other three times as long as wide. Opening off the former, the one inthe south-east corner, is a bath, so it was a public room, not private; and the onlydefinitely established entrance to the two rooms to the north, the ones with boardedfloors, was from it. The larger of the two elongated rooms had a hypocaust and aremarkable plaster ceiling.

How to interpret the plan? It appears to be centralised around the square room atthe heart of the house. From there, certainly, the suite of two hypocausted rooms wasentered; they form the best apartment in the house and cannot have been reachedany other way. If it be assumed that the porticus leads solely to the centralroom, a

Figure 37 Open-ended porticuses


134

doorway from the porticus at its east end matches that into the workhall by the entrance,so forming part of a symmetrical decorative scheme comparable to that found atBocholtz and Bierbach. The common hall with its adjacent bath is reached from thecentral room; so, too, is the apartment comprising the two boarded-floor rooms tonorth.9 This interpretation gives a centralised plan with two apartments each comprisingan inner and an outer room and each with easy access to the common hall from whichthe bath and the grand reception/?dining-room were approached.

However speculative this is, it provides an explanation of the end entrance to theporticus and reveals a coherent, tightly organised plan, the most advanced of itskind. It is a highly developed form of the compact row-house, superior in its subtletyto those of central France. Csúcshegy, indeed, has one of the most remarkable villaplans anywhere and illustrates how adaptable the end-entrance type could be in thehands of an accomplished architect.

In the preceding chapter the porticus-with-pavilions was described as the badgeof Romanisation. That is true of most villas, yet those with an end entrance could, asCsúcshegy shows, be just as Romanised. Possibly the one indispensable elementwas a colonnaded porticus, as in Blankenheim II and III, which come very near tohaving an open-ended porticus (Fig. 70). These plans raise a difficult question, onethat cannot be answered at present: what social factor determined this minoritychoice rather than the standard and universally recognised one of porticus-with-pavilions?

TAPERING AND SPLAYED PORTICUSES

A few large houses of obviously high status show a setting out of the porticus so farfrom rectilinear that it must be deliberate. Küttigen-Kirchberg I (Switz.) (Fig. 19) is arow-house comprising two three-room and lobby units and a middle representationalroom.10 Developments in II show that the right-hand (east) end was the more important,and it is towards that end that the porticus tapers. Wherever the house was entered,and that is not perfectly clear, it was not from the south into the main porticus butfrom the north or west side. The tapering must have been intended to demonstrateto anyone looking at the villa from below where authority resided, and to inducediscretion in those entering the porticus. Similar considerations can be inferredelsewhere, for example at Laufenburg (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 38), a house of higherstatus to judge by its size and the finds. In I it had a stately hall 17 m wide.11 In II twopavilions of proportionate size, bigger than those at Stahl, were added; they wereconnected by a porticus tapering as strongly as the one at Kirchberg towards thebigger pavilion, from about 3 to 2 m, and at that end of the hall lay the private orinner rooms.

Tapering could be used less obviously to the same effect. It is apparent to a modestdegree in the Belgian hall house of Vesqueville, where the front porticus narrows fromright to left, presumably towards the superior porticus, the one equipped with ahypocaust. Even slighter emphasis is found in the small house at Eaton-by-Tarporley(Cheshire) (Fig. 16) which is entered from the veranda by a longitudinal lobby wideningtowards the baths wing and narrowing towards the end with the small suite of private


135

rooms. The divergence from parallel in the lobby walls is so slight that it would not beworth remarking if the rest of the building were not wholly rectilinear, and if thetapering did not correspond to the same order of importance in the rooms as it does inthe grander examples mentioned above. Even though the visual effect was heightenedin other ways, by paint or mouldings, for instance, the architectural code must havebeen universally recognised to be worth applying.

Some similar message was conveyed by the few porticuses which splay from amiddle entrance on one side only. There are two well-known examples, one Belgian,one British. At Chastres, otherwise Chastres-lez-Walcourt, the right (north) porticus isorthodox, the left is sharply angled in a way that makes it difficult to envisage in itsoriginal complete form. It must, nevertheless, have been something like Beadlam N(Fig. 17), where a similar juxtaposition occurs, and in both houses the widening partseems to have served the superior side. A third house, Broichweiden (Fig. 36),splays out from the entrance to the left, with nothing definite to confirm that side asthe less important. It is clear that the message thus conveyed did not necessarilydistinguish between two domestic units, only between superior and inferior ends.

Figure 38 Tapering and splayed porticuses


136

TWO HOUSEHOLDS: SYMMETRICAL ENTRANCES

A few villas have two entrances into a porticus. Sinsheim-Wald (Fig. 8) and Maulévrier(Fig. 13), both published some 150 years ago, are like this and it seems that in allthose years nobody has discussed what is surely a rather remarkable feature. Severalmore can now be added.

At Sinsheim the right-hand entrance lies opposite a bay of the internal arcade; theother, nearer what may be the lower end, faces a stretch of blank wall extendingbetween the two entrances; and the two were differentiated by their architecturaltreatment. Neither external nor internal symmetry is perfect, and the underlyingintention can only be to differentiate between two households of not quite equalstanding. Herschweiler-Pettersheim (Fig. 39) expresses the idea in a rather similarway. The main entrance faces the doorway into the hall, the lesser one a blank wall,so the visitor favoured with entry to the equivalent of an inner room – whoserelative status is shown by its greater distance from the hall doorway – has to turnleft to the slightly bigger pavilion.

At Köln-Mungersdorf III–V (and no doubt I and II) (Fig. 71) the two doorwayswere at the north and south ends of the porticus, one leading to the workhall, theother to the apartments. Had pavilions not been provided from the first, the housewould no doubt have been entered only at the north or lower end along an open-ended porticus.

A generally symmetrical exterior was evidently a prime aim but internal arrangementsreveal more clearly the social requirements met by the placing of doorways and passages.At Maulévrier the bigger of two entrances faced a slightly larger room than did thesmaller, and the minor breach of symmetry caused by the different-sized doorways –no doubt matched by the treatment of the two internal doorways – was the minimumprice of maintaining social distinction. Romegoux-La Vergnée (Fig. 13) shows a slightvariation of this pattern in having two porches within the porticus, one of which, to thewest, opens into a large hall-like room, the other into a smaller square room. HemelHempstead-Gadebridge Park (Herts.) (Fig. 13) achieved the same result differently.The main range appears to comprise two Downton-type units and a further room atthe east end. Both porches led to transverse lobbies, that to the west facing its porch,that to the east not, so that anyone aware of architectural convention knew which unit,probably that to the east, was the more important. This kind of differentiation in theplacing of doorways, locating them carefully to convey some social distinction withinthe houseful, is a constant factor facilitating the interpretation of a villa plan.

It was possible to have axial symmetry externally and confine the expression ofsocial differentiation within the house. Chedworth W (Fig. 74) does that, with asingle entrance in the porticus by which the range was entered, whence the personentering could go left or right to either of the two units. It is a row-house equivalentof the way the hall at Manderscheid (below) was entered. This arrangement is apossibility in any hall-type house where no doorways were found and the principalhearth lies to one end of the hall, or in a row-house where the core rooms areclearly divided into two more or less equal parts.

This group of villas at least can hardly be understood without assuming occupationby two or more households.


137

TWO HOUSEHOLDS: PORTICUS-WITH-PAVILIONS FRONT ANDREAR

A few hall houses have a porticus-with-pavilions on both long elevations. Mander-scheid (Fig. 39) and the two Belgian villas of Doische-Vodelée (Fig. 39) and Habay-

Figure 39 Houses with two porticuses or two porches


138

Rulles are the only absolutely certain ones; Dirlewang (Bay.) (Fig. 39), Neumagen-Dhron/Papiermühle (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 68), GrossSachsenheim (Bad.-Württ.) and Lemiers(Neth.) are all highly probable. They present problems: why, if the porticus-with-pavilions is a proclamation of Romanised ways, should it be needed front and rear?And why are there so few? Swoboda’s explanation that it was a matter of taste12 isunhistorical.

The display front (Schauseite) of Manderscheid, in the Eifel, overlooked the valleyof the river Kyll to the south but was not the entrance. The only external doorwaydiscovered, and at 3 m wide it was certainly the most important, was in the northporticus, from which, near the ends, two doorways opened into the hall. They mustconnote some spatial and social division within the hall which was matched by theprovision of two hearths; one was probably in or near the south-west corner13 andanother might be expected near the south-east corner, in which case the entrance/hearth relation resembled that at Stahl. In the middle of the wall between them wasanother opening, as wide as the outer doorway but rather enigmatic in detail (Fig. 39,detail); it was usable, according to aus’m Weerth, either vertically barred as a windowor unbarred as a doorway.14 Here, then, the functions of the porticuses are clear. One,commanding a view of the valley, gave access to the south pavilions. The otherformed the house entrance and provided the only access to the north pavilions andthe cellar; it was much like the porticus at Serville and many other villas.

Manderscheid has a more obvious balance of room functions between front andrear than most comparable villas, something made possible by the placing of the smallbath suite at the end of the hall, not at a corner of the house as at Habay-Rulles. OnlyDirlewang (Fig. 39), where the plan was not completely recovered, may have hadequal rooms on both sides of the hall, although Habay-Rulles III was much the same15

until rebuilding made the east or entrance side markedly more important, and thebalance of importance was further reduced by incorporating one pavilion in a bathsuite. Any use of pavilions for some special purpose common to the houseful marks achange in the near-equality on which the provision of two porticuses is founded.Doische-Vodelée and Neumagen-Dhron/Papiermühle both developed on those lines,so that the front porticus became linked to the social aspect of bathing.

It appears that in most houses with two porticus-and-pavilion fronts one of themwas built primarily to impress the outside world, since other purposes could beachieved in other ways. Usually the front porticus was both recreational space, as agallery commanding a view, and utilitarian in affording access to the pavilions. Theunusual opening from hall to gallery at Manderscheid deserves consideration in thisconnection: it was not an orthodox doorway, and the possibility that it could beclosed completely and used as a window for longer or shorter periods implies thatthe gallery was not in continuous use and that the pavilions could be reached fromthe end rooms. That still leaves the historically more important question of why,setting aside special uses of pavilions, four virtually isolated rooms, sometimes ofmarkedly different size and always necessitating two porticuses, should be required.If Dirlewang is viewed as a manor house or Herrensitz, the rooms, only three ofwhich are certain, are difficult to envisage as private rooms used by members of afamily; they are all too nearly alike to have been built for that, and some groupingtogether might be expected. In the light of the duality discernible at Manderscheid


139

they may have been shared between two households, each having one on eachside. That, coupled with the social necessity of a Romanised appearance and thedesire for a view (and with it, perhaps, a sense of lordship over the countryside),could account for the architectural form the presumptive social structure took. Butsince an impressive entrance was not always felt necessary, as Horath and GreatWitcombe show, a rear display-front was not essential; and the reason why muchless prosperous and comfortable villas than those needed one must relate to theextent and completeness of the duality presumed to exist in the houseful. Manderscheidneeded a second porticus-with-pavilions; Stahl did not.

Few row-houses have a porticus-with-pavilions front and rear. Munzenberg-Gambach (Fig. 31) is the most interesting of them and the easiest to understand; tworanges, each of two households, require four pavilions. Gayton Thorpe N (Fig. 39),a house of gradual growth, is another example. Beginning in [I] as a core building ofrow-type, it was improved by the successive addition of porticuses and pavilions,16

in [II] at the front and in [III] at the rear. As in other villas, this duplication is taken tocorrespond to two households and, if Gambach is taken as a guide, each of thoseembraced two units of consumption; yet it is impossible to divide into four unitswithout having one passage-room or assuming the north-east porticus was a living-room. Possibly some alteration occurred in [IV] when the rear porticus ceased,following its partial blocking by the enlarged middle room, to be a vehicle fordisplay, and the character of the front porticus was changed by creating a grandentrance. This architectural change is the consequence of social change, reflecting anew concentration of power within the kin-group; and the linking of the two housesmay be part of this process.

These considerations affect the interpretation offered for other houses with twoporticuses of roughly equal status, such as Rockbourne [II] (Fig. 42) and Bray-sur-Somme. Left out of account are the many houses with porticus-and-pavilions at thefront and a simple entrance porticus at the rear, such as Kleinsteinhausen (Hessen)and Merdingen (Bad.-Württ.). But the discussion also has a bearing on Radley-BartonCourt Farm III, which has a modest display-front and was entered, as its smallenclosure reveals, at the rear. Although many British houses are like Barton CourtFarm, few have sufficient detail to show where they were entered and, perfectlynaturally, a front entrance is assumed – perhaps wrongly in not a few cases.17

PORTICUS FUNCTIONS: RECREATION

Pavilions or small rooms were not the only ways of terminating a porticus. A verysimple alternative occurs at Marquivillers (Somme), where the porticus extends ashort distance at both ends beyond the building, forming lug-like projections inorder, perhaps, to set off the structure behind and emphasise its bulk. Such lugsoccur at Vicques (Switz.), at the ends of the principal or front porticus and beyondthe point where it returns forward to link detached pavilions a little distance away.Since the greater bulk of the pavilions would have destroyed any architectural emphasisof the kind supposed at Montivillers, these lugs had a different purpose. They areslightly narrower than the porticus and may have been intended as viewing places


140

overlooking gardens, fields or a more distant prospect, as, too, were the comparablysited rounded projections at Hummetroth (Fig. 18); and the same intention mayunderlie the projecting north end of the porticus at Blankenheim IIA (Fig. 70), wherethe courtyard could be viewed from the superior end of the house.

A variant form appears in the south building at St Lythans-Whitton VI (Fig. 65),where the ends of the porticus are a bulbous shape – a rather surprising touch ofsophistication in a remote district and one for which the parallels are mostly distant,the nearest being Pulborough (Sussex) (Fig. 45) and Fishbourne Palace (Fig. 47).Others are the Bavarian villas of Westerhofen and Peiting, and of the latter, which isa sophisticated building, it was noted that apsidal ends are associated with greatbuildings such as Fliessem and Nennig.18

RECREATION: GHOST PAVILIONS

A few houses have porticuses breaking forward at the ends as if to go aroundpavilions which do not in fact exist. Thus at Frankfurt a. M.-Bornheim (Hessen) (Fig.32) each end of the porticus breaks forward quite widely, reducing the middle partto comparative insignificance. This is a particularly interesting example because themost unusual plan provides nothing to emphasise; behind the porticus the roomsare flush.

Nor is this the only house in which the porticus breaks forward without visiblecause, although such a break is usually combined with a balancing pavilion.19 Bergen-Auf-dem-Keller (Hessen) (Fig. 40) is like this; its frontispiece is not at all closelyrelated to the rooms behind, a clear indication that two building phases are involved,with [I] having a plan much like Rothselberg. The empty projection forming part of[II] is wider than the balancing pavilion and projects beyond the end of the house; itmay have been intended to emphasise the upper end. British porticuses breakingforward in this way appear in the hall houses at Wraxall (Som.) (Fig. 3) and Cherington(Wilts.), and also the row-house Great Weldon I (Northants.) (Fig. 70).20 A projectionof this kind is found even in as highly developed a hall as Raversbeuren21 and itsappearance in a house of this size and quality shows that the combination of pavilionand empty projection must have had a significance now hard to recover.

The explanation may be that porticuses generally, and particularly those describedearlier as galleries, were the provincial Roman counterparts of the Long Gallery inElizabethan or Jacobean manor houses: places used in bad weather for exercise andat other times for talk and relaxation. On general grounds, provincials with Romanmanners might be expected to behave more like the men of seventeenth-centuryEngland than people today, and from that most revealing source for social habits,Samuel Pepys’ Diary, emerges a preference for conducting business or privateconversation between two people while walking – which is in strong contrast to thesedentary habit of the twentieth century. ‘Come, Mr Pepys, you and I will take a turnin the garden,’ said the Lord Chancellor Clarendon when he wished to discuss a veryserious matter, and the diarist was well used to conducting naval business as hewalked in the gallery at Whitehall with the Duke of York, or on Whitehall Bridgewith a colleague; and once at the Exchange he ‘walked two hours or more’ with a


141

merchant acquaintance. Even at home Pepys and his wife would walk up and downin their Great Room as they talked of their private affairs.22

The idea of a place for relaxation may be relevant to two Swiss villas which showthe breaking-forward porticus in minimal form. Kirchberg [I]23 (Fig. 19) had at eachend a squarish space too small to be a room; the one at the west end is only 2×2.8m and that at the east end is scarcely larger. It is typical of the misapplication ofEckrisalit that the word is used of these little projections overlooking the valley ofthe River Aar;24 something different is needed, and since they must surely be placesfrom which to admire the view the term ‘viewing-places’ may be appropriate. It canproperly be applied to a second example, Ferpicloz, a villa built on a peninsula inthe River Sarine, where two such projections overlooked the yard and approach infront and the two arms of water on either side. They appear to be the equivalent oflugs or rounded ends. Viewing-places are appropriate to rather spectacular situationsbut can occur elsewhere, as in Picardy at Villers-sous-Ailly.25

THE PORTICUS AS LIVING-SPACE

Many porticuses were fronted by a half-height wall carrying stone columns of classicalappearance above, but not all can have been like this. At Sinsheim and Kings Weston(Glos.) the wall between hall and porticus was pierced by arched or square-headedopenings in which no evidence of doors was recorded. Consequently it has to besupposed that the front of the porticus was enclosed by glazed windows or shutters,the latter hinged or otherwise movable, and at suitable times light would be gainedby opening doors.

A further reason for thinking that some porticuses were enclosed is the presenceof quite elaborate mosaics. A little hall-type house at Great Staughton (Cambs.)(Fig. 40) is like this; structurally it is perfectly symmetrical but decoratively there is

Figure 40 Ghost pavilions and porticuses as living-space


142

a difference, one of the two mosaics in the porticus being better than the other. Onepurpose was probably to show in which direction the superior pavilion lay, yet, in abuilding of this small size, so well-appointed a space may have been more than justa corridor. Although each half of the porticus has unusual proportions for what islikely to have been more of a room than a corridor, when compared to the elongatedrooms found at Hohenfels, Sontheim a.d. Brenz and Wahlen it is within the normalprovincial-Roman range. The part of the capital of a stone column that was foundmay have been to do with the main doorway rather than a colonnade. The plainpiece of pavement between the mosaics is, in effect, like the internal porch found insome porticuses, of which Romegoux is an example (Fig. 13); a porch of that kindwould be pointless unless the porticus were enclosed.

Evidence to the same effect is the presence of secondary hearths. These areusually regarded by British archaeologists as a sign of ‘squatter occupation’ in thefinal stages of a villa’s existence. Newel IV (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 24) demonstrates thecontrary. Built in the north half of the porticus are an oven and a hearth whichwould, in Britain, have been attributed to people living in comparative squalorduring the final stage of the villa’s decline. Here, that explanation is ruled out by thefact that a stone wall was built to separate the newly created room from the rest ofthe porticus; it is an improvement in the amenities of the house at the cost of itsarchitectural formality. Where squatters are invoked it is rarely clear that the principalheated rooms were abandoned before the use of a porticus as living-space began,and it is never explained why a porticus with its presumptive open colonnade shouldhave been preferred to the makeshift adaptation of rooms: a house falling intodisrepair is likely to have damaged a porticus through falling roof tiles before thecore rooms became unusable. Since so many houses suggest in various ways thatporticuses were commonly used as rooms, squatters should be consigned with bailiffsto the dustbin.

PORTICUS AS WORKPLACE: WIDE OR CONTINUOUSPORTICUSES

A minority of porticuses serve a utilitarian purpose. Some are merely service corridorsas, for example, the one at the rear of Köln-Mungersdorf II (Fig. 71) which links thecellar and the dining-room; they are easily identifiable. A more enigmatic groupcomprises those that are conspicuously wider than the norm for a given kind ofhouse and this is something to be decided, at present, by eye rather than measurement,because what looks right for a row-house in Britain is too small for one in Switzerland.A second problematic group overlapping with the first includes porticuses runningcontinuously (or nearly so) around a comparatively small row-house, so that theamount of what is commonly called ‘corridor’ is altogether disproportionate to theamount of living-space.

A few are so wide as to make it certain that their function cannot have beensimply that of a corridor. Thus the three-room house at Flocques (Somme) has acontinuous porticus on three sides which is half the width of the core rooms, and ifit had a timber veranda at the front they amounted to nearly half the total floor area.


143

The extreme case is Ovillers (Somme) (Fig. 40), where the three rooms occupy athird of the whole house area. Ribemont is the more remarkable for having a porticusonly at the front, and so wide (5 m; rooms 6.5 m) that the applicability of the termmay be questioned.26 Differences of this kind appear in British row-type villas too,for example Marshfield-Ironmongers Piece, where the north house had a front porticusof normal width and the south a wide one.

Continuous porticuses are rare; those on three sides, one long and two short,slightly less so. Wancourt (Somme) (Fig. 29) is like this; the porticus is structurally intwo parts, looking like two L-shaped porticuses open at one end, so that each of twoone-room units was entered at opposite ends of the house or at least at the ends ofthe front.27

These porticuses do not have the iconic associations with pavilions identified bySwoboda, and the wide ones cannot have been simply corridors or galleries. On thisground alone such porticuses had some utilitarian function not at present known,although their general nature is apparent at Marshfield-Ironmongers Piece28 (Fig. 66)where one of the two end-to-end row-houses has a considerably wider porticusthan the other; this was the inferior end of the villa, where much of the work wascarried on.

In southern Germany a yet smaller house, Rheinfelden-Salzbrünnele (Bad.-Württ.),being surrounded on three sides by a porticus forming half the total area, conveysthe same point as Marshfield. Sizeable parts of the porticus must have served workpurposes and been separated from the rest by customary use, not partitions. Storageof winter fuel is possible, as happens under the boldly projecting eaves of oldfarmhouses in Bavaria even today, and so is the kind of ancillary farm task thatneeded light, shelter from rain and space for equipment, such as fashioning woodentools. The three distinct parts of the porticus were differentiated by width, no doubtcorresponding to function; the narrowest part on the south side was the point ofentrance, with the successively wider parts to east and west serving different, oradditional, purposes.

Recently Gaubatz-Sattler described the porticus of a villa, with reference to Bondorf,as a multi-purpose area which might include cooking, corn-drying or a dwelling-place.29 This is a timely reminder for British archaeologists of how inappropriatetheir use of ‘corridor’ is, for Gaubatz-Sattler’s remark is certainly true of late villas andprobably always of wide porticuses, even though hearths may be lacking in theearlier periods.

A curious feature of some rear porticuses, whether continuous or not, is that theperimeter wall is too close to permit entrance on that side. Villas at opposite ends ofEurope are like this: to west Mézières-en-Santerre/Le Ziep (Somme) and to eastChatalka-Delimonyova Niva (Bulg.) and Bihac-Zaloz?je (Yugosl.).30 In Chatalka villathe encircling porticus may have been intended to enhance the imposing quality ofa large building which dominated the courtyard and must have been clearly visibleoutside. That is less likely to apply to Mézières, where a rear corridor may have beendesirable from the first in so long a row-house. It may have been utilitarian if, likethat at Köln-Mungersdorf II-IV, it was principally for the use of servants.

144

CHAPTER TEN

THE ELEMENTS AND FORMS OFVILLA COMPLEXES

The only aspect of villas so far discussed is the principal house. It did not exist inisolation, being only one of a group of buildings which usually stood within an

enclosure. Virtually no attention has been paid to the varied shapes of enclosuresand courtyards, or why the buildings within them are set out as they are. Discussionof these matters here is limited by two considerations. First, although the need toexplore the farm buildings as well as the house was recognised long ago, latenineteenth-century methods made robbed foundations unintelligible and missedtimber buildings completely, so that it is hard to be certain when completeness wasreally attained for any one site or phase. Second, the purely agricultural functions ofbuildings will not, because of my own ignorance of farming, be discussed; excavators’opinions, where relevant, will be followed.

Courtyard and farmyard forms appear in great variety, ranging from the irregularshapes common in Germany to perfectly rectilinear ones in Switzerland, and from thesmall cluster of buildings of some British farms to the many found in some French andBelgian villas. The profusion of types will be analysed by working from loose groupingsof buildings through to the most geometrical and formal of courtyards. This progression,like that of houses, is purely typological, because to include chronology would onlycreate the kind of confusion that has hitherto made a house typology impossible.

IRREGULAR YARDS

Regensburg-Burgweinting

One of the most interesting German villas is Regensburg-Burgweinting (Bay.) (Fig.41). The yard, which is approximately trapezoidal, looks like the piecemealreplacement of an earlier enclosure in less permanent materials – a hedge or awooden fence – and the apparently incoherent disposition of the buildings within itcontrasts strongly with the geometrical layout of those in the regular yards of Picardy.Entrances provide a key to its interpretation.

Two, on the south-east and south-west sides, were established with certainty; those

— The Elements and Forms of Villa Complexes —

145

Figure 41

— Chapter Ten —

146

Figure 41


147

Figure 41 Irregular and divided yards

— Chapter Ten —

148

on the other two sides were regarded as probable1 and here are taken as certainbecause then the plan becomes intelligible. They imply a division of the yard into fourquarters, two of them having clusters of mostly domestic buildings, two emptier andwith only agricultural buildings. The most important sector, the north-west, contains agood-sized tripartite house of incoherent plan which must be of several periods ofconstruction. The core appears to be a squarish hall with a porticus facing the north-west entrance. To it, and facing away from it to west, was added what is virtually aseparate house, comprising two hypocausted rooms, two smaller rooms – one with acellar – a corridor and a porticus; and on the other side was added a second hall-likebuilding. Perhaps then a room was added on the outside (to north-west) of the oldporticus, which may have become redundant when the new front was built and wasnow reduced to no more than a corridor. A number of villas, for example Montacute-Ham Hill (Som.), have a comparable combination of elements in very varied sizes andshapes, much as units in a row-house can be arranged in several ways.

In the south-east quarter three separate buildings provide in total rather similaraccommodation and amenities. The largest is the double-ended hall abutting theyard wall, whose two trapezoidal rooms have already been mentioned (chapter 6).One of them terminates a short porticus, at the other end of which is a terminal roomwith a cellar. This was probably the side on which the house was entered, and theunusual point of entry2 was probably chosen to face away from the one in the north-west quarter and away from the squarish hall to west; and if the latter point iscorrect, it implies that the two buildings are contemporaneous or, more likely, thatthe one to west is the earlier.3 In that building a hypocausted room is evidence thatit was a hall house,4 and in the nearby corner of the yard a second hypocaustedroom formed part of what was presumably another small house.5

Five more buildings, none with signs of habitation, were found. Two in the westhalf of the yard are more than empty rectangles and require explanation in terms ofspecific agricultural functions. Probably all the stone structures were found but othersless permanent, of timber and clay, probably existed. The important points are thatBurgweinting sheltered at least three households, of whatever size, one of whichwas superior to the others, and that the apparent incoherence of the yard masks adisposition of buildings carefully ordered to reflect social arrangements.

One detail of Burgweinting is of wider application. Placing the entrances to thetwo principal houses (1 and 2) at 90 degrees to each other is found elsewhere, as forexample, at Koerich-Goeblingen (Lux.) (Fig. 74). It was evidently a standard way ofrelating two houses of not quite equal importance.

Ludwigsburg-Hoheneck

A second trapezoidal yard at Ludwigsburg-Hoheneck I (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 41) showsevery sign of being of a single building phase;6 its walls are straight and the twoprincipal buildings relate to the entrance and to one another. There can be no doubtwhich of the two was the more important; the broad hall on the north side dominatesthe yard and has an air of authority over the rest.

Was there a second house? Paret in 1911 and Klein in 1992 thought not, regarding


149

the building abutting the south wall as no more than a bath block;7 like mostarchaeologists, they force the rooms of any not very large building which has bathsinto a Procrustean bed of rooms derived from Vitruvius. Here, as in so many instances,this procedure fails to explain why the baths took a particular form. As Klein explainsthem, a short range of rooms in I was enlarged in II into an L-plan around a smallspace, a yard some 9 m square, in which were two furnaces. Why so unusual a planwas adopted is not discussed.8 I think it more likely that 2 began in a timber phase‘which cannot in principle be ruled out’,9 as a small hall which was first improved bythe addition of a bath suite and then rebuilt in stone.

Although the decline in importance of the secondary house compared with itscounterpart at Burgweinting is clear, it no longer turns away from the main housebut faces it with a porticus, perhaps because, architecturally, it no longer lookedanything like an equal. The process whereby one habitation of two or three becamedominant takes a variety of forms and reveals so many nuances of relations withinkin-groups that is hard to put them in a scale of increasing dominance culminating inthe overlordship of one household.

DIVIDED YARDS

One expression of the process was to separate the yard into two more or less equalparts. Ewhurst-Rapsley (Surrey) and Bruchsal/Ober-Grombach (Bad.-Württ.) showways of doing this. From the first Rapsley (Fig. 41) seems to have been divided butonly in III can two yards be seen to be separated by a wall.10 East of it was a smallhouse (6) akin to the row-type but not of any orthodox form and to west lay whatwas definitely another house (1), which may have been aisled but was of equallyunorthodox structure. In the superior yard, east of the wall and close to it, was ashrine, so placed, probably, to be accessible from both sides; Marshfield (Glos.) mayprovide a parallel. Period IV saw the building of another aisled house (2) in the westyard and the conversion of the older one to monospan construction, yet what appearsto be the downgrading of that side by the concentration in it of buildings with a part-agricultural purpose is denied in V by the embellishment of 2 with pilasters.11

Ober Grombach (Fig. 41) is likewise divided into two principal parts, north andsouth, and has unimportant minor enclosures. The principal house (1) (above, 31) wasa hall with porticus and pavilions; it faced, apparently, not a shrine but a limekiln, theview being interrupted by a small rectangular wooden building on unmortared wallswhose purpose is unknown. No certain domestic building was found in the north part,where survival of footings was not so good, unless, perhaps, 3?, divided into smallrooms, was something of the kind. More importantly, what may be a second house (2)lay across the line of the dividing wall, whose full length was not discovered. It may bea house; the purpose of four small rooms with independent hypocausts, if not domestic,is hard to imagine, and there was an entrance into the middle of what might beregarded as the hall. Enigmatic though the building is, its position in relation to thedividing wall may be compared to that of some houses in larger villas, for exampleApethorpe (Northants.), Gentelles and Grivesnes (both Somme).12

Division was not always by a wall as at Bad Homburg (above, 44); a ditch woulddo, as at Welwyn-Dicket Mead (Herts.), where it is called a canal.

— Chapter Ten —

150

Physical division of the yard is not the only line of descent from Ober-Grombachand Hoheneck. Lauffen am Neckar (Bad.-Württ.) has an almost rectilinear yard (Fig.41) in which the principal house (1), a hall with porticus and pavilions, faces twohabitable buildings. Of these, 2 began as a small building (8×6 m) in which was ahypocausted room about 3.5 m square; it is comparable to the hypocausted roomand something else in the corner of Ober-Grombach.13 The other building (3) isdescribed as a ‘granary with work- and living-space’ and space for crop storage andtools; yet, as is well said in the report, ‘fireplaces are certainly unusual in a granary,because the fire danger is great’.14 For good measure, the building has no sign of achimney or of a staircase, yet it is alleged to be two-storeyed. These contradictionsare resolved if 3 is thought of as a modest workhall; then the whole looks like asmaller version of the two blocks of buildings at Ober-Grombach, the main housebeing the most important element from the start but the small building 2 havingsimilar comfort.

It is easier to see how the fundamentally bipartite character of Burgweintingpersisted in one form or another than to understand the kind of houseful thevarious buildings provided for. The point is borne out by the villa of Friedberg-Pfingstweide (Hessen) (Fig. 41), which exemplifies another mode of developmenthaving the principal buildings set parallel to but not opposite each other. Friedberghas, unusually for a German villa, a nearly square courtyard whose geometricalregularity is not matched by the positioning of the buildings within. Dominatingthe courtyard, but not placed quite centrally, is a most extraordinary principalhouse, made even more extraordinary by the conventional explanation of itselongated middle space (28×7 m) as a yard. It must surely be a hall, roofedcontinuously over the rear rooms and flanked by a porticus-and-pavilions in theusual way. At the front, two square garden(?) enclosures separated by a path arematched by two sets of three rooms, separated by a passage, at the rear. It is asthough the rear rooms correspond to the two units of Downton and they share theadjoining hall. In the west garden is a square building which may be a temple. Itis likely to have been common to the houseful, as was the bath building adjoiningthe east garden; hence, perhaps, the little square structure in the middle of theentrance path which, it may be, was a roof on four columns marking where it waspermissible to cross from one household’s private space to another’s.

This important house, the centrepiece of the yard, is canted slightly towards theentrance and lies parallel to the road, not the yard wall. It follows that the line of theroad is significant. Dividing the yard in the proportion of 70:30, it correspondsapproximately to the relative importance of three households, the two more importantto the south, a minor one in the hall near the east entrance. Ober-Grombach yard isdivided into two more nearly equal parts.

Despite the clear inferiority of the north part of Friedberg, those living therewere not all labourers. The hall (2) near the east entrance was a quite imposingbuilding, finished externally on three sides with pilasters and internally by twoflanking the opening from the porticus. In that respect it is like the hall at Bocholtz-Vlengendaal, although its altogether different proportions appear to provide fortwo households, not a representational purpose. One other building (3) in thisnorth part has some claims to be part domestic, the one abutting the yard wall,


151

with a porch and porticus-like front. The two narrow front rooms have not beenexplained, here or anywhere else, in terms of an agricultural purpose; theirproportions and the narrowness (c. 2 m) of the porch prompt comparison withsimilar living spaces for craftsmen and labourers shown in the Plan of St Gall.15

Compared with Ober-Grombach, Friedberg shows a marked shift towards inequalityamong the various households comprising a kin-group.

Another shift in that direction, though one less easy to evaluate precisely, appearsat Olfermont (Haut-Rhin) (Fig. 41). The bipartite row-house [I] survives with addedwings of row-type appearance; and beside it has been added in stages a yard ofirregular plan, a small square enclosure, and a large workhall.

COURTYARDS OF GEOMETRICAL SHAPES

The squarish shape of Friedberg is not common;16 an elongated yard is usual andtakes many forms. It can be a trapezium, tapering from the entrance side towardsthe house, and a variant of this has successive flanking buildings stepped back tothe same effect; or fan-shaped, broadening out from the entrance towards two orthree houses; or rhomboid; or rectangular, entered in the middle of either a shortside (the commoner) or a long side. These forms refer to the principal courtyard,which alone carries a social meaning; where there are flanking or outer yards theyvary in position and shape.

All geometrically shaped courtyards raise questions about social structure, especiallyabout the power relations between the privileged who lived in the principal houseand those who lived in the buildings around the yard. To understand them requiresanalysis of the principal house which, even at the head of a long courtyard linedwith buildings, can be no more than a few simple rooms, or a sizeable residenceenriched with mosaics and hypocausts, or a group of twenty or more rooms with noobvious coherence. Moreover, houses of any considerable size may be groupedaround smaller courtyards of varied shape and consequently raise further problemsof social development.

Geometrical yards present other problems of a different kind. At what stage in theevolution of a farm was it decided to undertake the costly work of laying out acourtyard? What determined the size and shape of courtyard adopted to replacewhat was, obviously, a smaller establishment? To embark on such a change impliesa confidence that the family or kin-group is stable for the foreseeable future, withoutany marked expansion or contraction, and that agricultural or other prosperity wasassured. Then there are questions about how the large amount of building work wascarried out and paid for, and although these two questions will only be touched onbriefly, they present problems which have to be faced by anyone seeking to accountfor courtyard villas.

The largest concentration of courtyard plans at present known is in Picardy and itwill provide many of the examples in what follows.

— Chapter Ten —

152

TAPERING YARDS

Le Mesge (Fig. 42) is a simple and comparatively uncomplicated example of a taperingcourtyard which shows the essentials of the form. The focal point is the houseclosing the end of the courtyard, and this type of plan is not to be confused with atapering yard like Mayen, which expresses a quite different relation between thethree houses. Le Mesge has a row-house of quite modest size, its core much thesame as Downton, with one two-room and lobby unit to south of the large middleroom and an equalsized one of indeterminate form to north. Inner and outer courtyardwalls have what looks like a gatehouse in the middle, showing that the house wasapproachable by a path 250 m long – a prospect designed to impress; but whether aless ceremonious approach was possible, to the rear open-ended porticus, for example,is uncertain. The sides taper fairly equally to give a symmetrical yard, as if neitherrange were of preponderant importance. Ecoust-Saint-Mien (Fig. 42) is another largevilla like this but with one interesting difference; the gatehouses and approach pathare aligned on a cross-wall. This implies that the house was divided like Maulévrierbut was entered by a single doorway at the front of the porticus, from which thevisitor turned either right or left, as at Chedworth (Fig. 74) or Manderscheid (Fig. 39).

Sparsholt [I] (Fig. 68) may be a comparable British example of a tapering plan ifthe slight evidence of an outer yard is a guide. It has three buildings around theinner courtyard, which tapered symmetrically and implicitly focused on a house, theexistence of which must be presumed in order to give the yard shape any point. Theonly building excavated outside suggests a tapering alignment on that side, as if theangle changed at the inner courtyard as it does at Clairy-Saulchoix (Somme).

Yards tapering symmetrically are exceptional. Most taper more sharply on oneside than the other, as do Fontaine-le-Sec (Somme) and Citernes (Somme), whileCromhall (Glos.) has a plan developing on these lines. Some taper on one sideonly so that the plan is like a truncated right-angled triangle, as at Mézières-en-Santerre/La Croix Saint-Jacques (Somme). The intention must have been to emphasisethe importance of one set of buildings rather than the other. A scale of importanceis implied by the successive stepping-out of buildings on the east side of Cachy(Somme) (Fig. 42), whereas the west side shows no such differentiation. It isunlikely that such careful discrimination was needed for buildings which had asolely agricultural purpose.

Tapering yards are rare in Germany. A very small one is Wiesbaden-Höfchen(Hessen) (Fig. 44), where two halls stand close together in much the same relation toone another as several row-houses and aisled houses do in British farmyards; MansfieldWoodhouse is an instance. One example, of slightly irregular outline, is Niederzier-Hambach 69 (Fig. 42); too few buildings were found to permit discussion. Mayen(Fig. 42) has an interesting variation in which the principal house is not at the headof the yard but to one side and canted towards it, so that it would be more prominentto anyone approaching past the little temple or shrine. British villas usually reveal anembryonic plan lacking a yard wall of masonry. Either one never existed or was notfound or the yard was enclosed by a bank and ditch or a hedge. Mansfield Woodhouse(Notts.) (Fig. 42) shows the beginnings of a tapering plan, Cromhall a later stage ofdevelopment, and there are several more.17 A minor variant in France


153

Figure 42

— Chapter Ten —

154

Figure 42


155

has all the yard buildings aligned parallel to one another but stepping inwardsprogressively; Davenescourt (Somme) (Fig. 44) has four buildings set out like this onthe east side of its 200 m long yard.

Figure 42 Yards not rectangular

— Chapter Ten —

156

FAN-SHAPED YARDS

A tapering yard drew the eye to the house at the far end to emphasise its commandingposition and demonstrate where power lay. Fan-shaped yards created a differenteffect, one which is not always obvious.

Darenth [F] (Kent) (Fig. 42) shows this well. Those approaching the villa saw fromthe entrance, which was some 180–200 m away, the prominent and impressive frontelevation of the large principal house and, tucked away at its ends and largely maskedby outbuildings, two smaller ones. To east was the gable-end of the best-appointedhouse on the site, whose external appearance may have proclaimed the fact by ornamentor paint, and to west a similar building more like a workhall may have proclaimed itsrelative status in similar ways. Whatever the fan shape was meant to convey, it did notdo so by specifically architectural means. Nevertheless, Darenth had a different socialbasis from Le Mesge, as would have become obvious to someone advancing down theyard; he was confronted by, first, a small square temple and then a nymphaeum whichblocked a direct approach to the largest building. An appropriate offering made, theperson proceeded to left or right and entered either of the flanking houses in the usualway, by a doorway in the middle of the long side.

So what idea underlay the contradiction between the dominance of the main houseand the denial of direct access to it? Clearly the conventional manor-house interpretationwill not do. Perhaps the intention was to proclaim architecturally the importance of thekin-group through the main block, while preserving something of its basis in [I] throughthe two separate houses. Explanation is complicated because we see only the finalphase of the plan, which embodies elements appropriate earlier but hard to change inaltered circumstances: an inconvenience frequently arising from the long life of structureswhich were expensive to build or replace. In that light, Darenth [I] comprised a principalrow-house which was one of the larger of its kind, comparable to Pulborough [I](Sussex) (Fig. 45); a hall house (uncertain in detail) to west; and what may have beenanother hall – because its subdivisions look like insertions – to east. Allowing for thedifferent main houses, it had a passing resemblance to Katzenbach [I] (Bad.-Württ.)(Fig. 74), where the alignments imply a fan-shaped courtyard; both villas provided forsimilar social relations. Subsequently Darenth developed in the same general way assome German hall houses, concentrating the service functions at the west end andimproving the east end by subdivision and the improvement of mosaics. Most importantof all, the balance of the house was shifted by the addition of a grand room (14.8×4.9m) linking the east and main blocks, which had a middle opening about 1.45 m wide;it looks like the equivalent of the middle room of a row-house such as Newport(I.o.W.), and it may account for the lack of evidence of any such room at the middle ofthe main house.

It is surprising to find a much humbler villa, Hambleden-Yewden Manor (Bucks.)(Fig. 42), presenting something of the same contradictions as Darenth and perhapsfor the same reason, that alteration has confused an originally clear social statement.Phase [I] comprised three principal buildings: a small row-house (1) of stone18 andtwo halls (2 and 3) – to regard them as purely agricultural makes the yard planpointless – which were possibly of timber; and the yard was enclosed by someimpermanent material, a hedge or bank. Enlargement of the row-house took place


157

in [II], when, probably, hall 3 was rebuilt in good-quality masonry;19 and in [III]house 2 and the wall were rebuilt. But 2 [F] still had a good-sized hypocausted room,part of a domestic suite of three, and in earlier phases, before 1 had received its finaladditions, was a relatively more important element of the villa.

Hambleden and Sparsholt resemble one another in having the same threecomponents which, by their setting out in yards of contrasting shape, emphasise theprincipal house to different degrees – slightly in the former, strongly in the latter.Sparsholt, which began with a tapering yard, was realigned with a slight fan shape inorder to give greater prominence than formerly to a secondary building. At Hambleden,where the original splaying out of the buildings made the principal house less of afocal point, the two secondary buildings declined to become very obviouslysubordinate to the principal house.

Fan-shaped yards are rare on the continent. Only one has come to notice, Bargenim Hegau (Bad.-Württ.), where the yard widens from east to west.

SUB-TRIANGULAR COURTYARDS

Sub-triangular courtyard is a shorthand form to describe a variety of courtyarddistinguished by a right-angled triangle at the base and cut off at the top, and isadopted in preference to the more accurate but clumsy ‘truncated right-angled trianglecourtyard’, there being no short, precise name to describe such a figure. The term isnecessary to isolate a distinctive clustering of domestic rooms around the right-angled corner which distinguishes it from other tapering courtyards.

The only fully analysed example, Rockbourne (Hants.)20 (Fig. 42), reveals theidea behind the adoption of such a plan. It began in II, the first Roman phase, witha hall and a row-house set well apart at right-angles. This potential triangular yardwas abandoned in III in order to build one on a larger scale: the row-house wasdemolished; its successor, a larger one of two units and important middle room, wasaligned with the hall; and traces of buildings, including a bath house, mark thebeginnings of a new north-east wing. These changes are instructive. II comprises ahouse and workhall. In III the growth of a much larger villa was foreseen and thenew plan demanded, not simply the addition of a house adjoining the workhall, butthe preservation of their distance apart. There may have been a utilitarian reason,that here was the way in from the fields, but it is interesting that the workhall wasnever incorporated in an inferior range; like a German workhall, it always retainedthe dignity of its intermediate status. The new wing also incorporated a small bathbuilding, and it stood clear of the houses because it served both wings.

In IV the south-east wing is established with an aisled building containing some living-rooms; this was the beginning of a range of work buildings. Not until VI was the north-east wing rebuilt in intelligible form as a row-house of five rooms, and its greater widthcompared with the adjoining range is matched by the corresponding range at Chedworth(Glos.) and elsewhere.21 A difference of this kind must be another point in the codegoverning social differentiation because it is applied in villas of various types.

Few other villas are definitely known to have been laid out with a sub-triangularyard. Bignor IIA (Sussex) (Fig. 42) is one and Liestal-Munzach (Switz.) (Fig. 76),

— Chapter Ten —

158

though greatly altered, was perhaps another originally. One or two incompletelyexcavated villas, for example Atworth (Wilts.), look as though they may belong tothis category of plan.

RHOMBOIDAL COURTYARDS AND THE PROBLEM OFHAMBACH 512

Why one courtyard plan should have been preferred to another is often hard tounderstand. This is especially true of types which appear to convey a similar messageabout the social relations through the layout of buildings in the yard. Thus theconcentration of the purely domestic buildings of a villa, with the most importantworkhall nearby, which is the point of the triangular plan, reappears in two rhomboidalcourtyards in Germany.

Hambach 512 [I] had a small and, for Germany, quite unusually narrow hall (5 m)which is almost a row-house; with rooms at both ends and porticus-and-pavilions itrepresents much the same stage of development as Frocester Court I or Brewood-Engleton I. It faces down a long courtyard from one corner. Nearby and a little infront a workhall stands at right-angles to it. The grouping of buildings in the cornerresembles that at Rockbourne, but whereas the latter is an L-shaped block open tothe yard, the Hambach workhall turns its back on it to create, in effect, a small innercourtyard.22 This beginning of withdrawal from the general activity of the farmyardsignals that new social relations were emerging, bringing a sharper distinction thanhitherto between members of the kin-group.

A number of German villas were enlarged in a rather surprising way by removalof part of the enclosure wall and building out over it. Hambach 512 [I] is an instanceof this kind of change; close to the small hall house and aligned with it was addedin [II] what looks like a second, larger hall, also with a porticus-and-pavilions. It was,in this phase, an independent house and its construction may have required demolitionof a stretch of wall long enough to destroy whatever purpose and meaning the yardoriginally had, yet no new enclosing wall was found, or, perhaps, built. Physicallimitations alone do not account for the chosen method of enlargement; they wouldnot have precluded an L-plan or a change of the kind found between Rockbourne IIand III, involving removal of a building. For some reason it was essential to align thenew hall with the old, as was done at Leutersdorf II (Fig. 45), for example, but herethe two were only joined together in [III]. The new hall seems to have been part ofa large extension, to judge by a building parallel to it and outside the courtyard, andit may be that so extensive an enlargement was only possible by creating, in effect,a second yard.23

There is an alternative interpretation, one suggested by the curious placing of twowells, one on either side of the yard wall only about 10 m in front of the new hall. Thisimplies that the wall still stood at least as far as that point, and the plan gives no reasonto suppose it stopped there. It may have continued and abutted the porticus, like thewall of the divided yard at Bad Homburg (Fig. 9); and in that case the siting of the newhall astride the wall served the same symbolic purpose of uniting two landholdings asdid the similarly placed houses at Marshfield and Condé-Folie (Somme) (Fig. 66).


159

To get back to courtyards, another Hambach site, 69, also has a house in onecorner (Fig. 42). Unfortunately, no workhall is identifiable in its vicinity, thatbeing the part of the enclosed area where least evidence remained. It revealswhat 512 did not, the entrance, which is markedly off the yard axis, as is alsotrue for Hambach 516. This displacement from what appears the obvious placedoes not put it opposite the principal house, only more nearly so, hence its sitingmay respond to an informal division of the yard akin to that at Bruchsal/OberGrombach or Friedberg-Pfingstweide, an idea reinforced by the distribution ofbuildings.24 A third site, Hambach 403, was too incomplete to be certain it wasrhomboidal, but the little hall house and a large workhall were placed in onecorner at right-angles, facing the yard in the manner of Norton Disney (Lines.) orMansfield Woodhouse (Notts.). The comparisons, as with so many aspects ofvillas, are international.

LONG RECTANGULAR COURTYARDS

Fan-shaped, triangular and rhomboidal courtyards are not recorded in France.There courtyards are usually rectilinear, and in the Somme basin are mostlyelongated. Few show any sign of being the result of gradual growth except,sometimes, for enlargement of the principal house; indeed, the form itself arguesthat buildings were expected to line the yard on both sides. Among the few villasof this kind where more than one phase is obvious in the yard are Meckel (Rhld-Pf.) and Liestal-Münzach (Switz.).

The surprising number of large villas in Picardy with long rectangularcourtyards includes two which are remarkable for being in the same communeof Warfusée-Abancourt. At first sight they look much the same. Warfusée-Sudhas a house some 40 m long which is quite large but not in relation to the 300m long courtyard in front. There is no sign of a second house. A quarter of theway down the yard is a square building looking like a gatehouse, governingaccess to an inner court. Warfusée-Nord (Fig. 43) is shorter, perhaps only halfthe size of -Sud, with walls or a terrace separating the main yard from thesmaller court in front of the house. The wall is interrupted by two gatehouses,not one, and the house, very large in relation to the courtyard,25 has in themiddle a cross-wall dividing it into two equal parts: Maulévrier again on alarger scale. A quite large houseful can be inferred, comprising severalhouseholds. Warfusée-Sud is also large enough for two or more householdsbut their separateness was much less. The agricultural workings of the twovillas must have been similar; the groups of people occupying the principalhouses were organised rather differently.

Picardy has eight of these very long rectangular courtyards.26 Of the five wherethe detail of the house is adequate, only Mézières-en-Santerre/Le Ziep is certainlyand Athies possibly divided like Warfusée-Nord; Estrées-sur-Noye definitely not; andRibemont-sur-Ancre has a unit-system house like Lamargelle-Versingue 2 (Côte-d’Or).Anything like a big country house is absent from these vast establishments, and thatis true of the classic villa of this kind and the largest of them all, Anthée (Belg.)

— Chapter Ten —

160

Figure 43


161

(Figs 75, 76). Not only are there no country houses but, as Agache’s plans reveal, thehouses at the head of these impressive ranges of buildings vary greatly in size. TheRibemont yard, not dissimilar in overall size from Mézières, has a house only half thesize, one which, if excavated in Britain without the other buildings, would be regardedas a quite modest farming establishment; and for good measure someone wouldcontrive an estate to match. That is equally true of Marchelepot (Fig. 43), where twothree-cell row-houses – a major and a minor one – dominate what seems to be aquite large yard. These villas form a striking contrast to the large courtyards aroundTrier, where Blankenheim has a sophisticated house and Fliessem (Fig. 43) is dominatedby a subtle and complex architectural composition, while the different but veryimpressive villa of Oberweis might be a third if its yard were better known.27

Figure 43 Rectangular courtyards

— Chapter Ten —

162

Britain has nothing comparable to the big continental courtyards, the nearestapproach being Pitney (Som.), which may have had some agriculturally relatedbuildings as well as domestic ones. It is 84 m long; Picardy has nothing as small asthis. Only Chedworth (Fig. 74) has the characteristic inner court (incompletelyexplored); it also has part of what may have been a long courtyard which, unlikethose in most French villas, has a continuous line of rooms of equal width, alldomestic. North Wraxall (Wilts.) (Fig. 44) is a small villa where some order seems tohave been imposed on what began as dispersed buildings.

Few elongated courtyards show signs of gradual growth. Meckel is one; the longsouth wall of the courtyard breaks alignment and so, twice, does the wall separatinginner and outer courts; and the buildings flanking the inner court relate poorly to themain house and the perimeter wall. This means that a long rectangular yard wasadded to and in part replaced a looser arrangement of buildings on a differentalignment, and the house was rebuilt parallel with the new inner courtyard wall.Levroux-Trégonce (Fig. 76) underwent complete rebuilding of the outer yards, whichleft the wings of the house misaligned with the two ranges of buildings, and apartial, somewhat less drastic reordering of the yard can be inferred at Liestal-Münzach.A commoner indication that the outer or working part of the courtyard has beenrebuilt is provided by the misalignment of the house and the wall of the inner court.Oberentfelden (Switz.) (Fig. 76) and Belleuse (Somme) (Fig. 44) have this characteristicand so, too, very faintly, does Estrées-sur-Noye.

Davenescort (Fig. 44) illustrates the placing of the house to one side of thecourtyard it faces. This not uncommon characteristic might be taken as anothersign of alteration if there were any confirmatory detail in the several instances,such as a hint that some structure has been removed from the blank space; butnothing of the kind has been noticed.

DOMESTIC COURTYARDS AND COURTYARD HOUSES

Some British villas have courtyards corresponding to the inner courts of the long-courtyard villas just described, without any sign of the much larger working yard. Awell-known example is Sudeley-Spoonley Wood (Figs. 44, 70), which comprises threeapartments, service rooms, a workhall and baths arranged on three sides of a court. Itshows signs of gradual growth: the addition of the smaller part of the double room inthe middle, because the opening is not quite symmetrical to the bigger part; theaddition of the porticus-and-pavilions to the north range, because one wall of the westpavilion abuts what looks like an addition to a double-ended hall;28 and alterationaround the baths. Other complications must certainly remain undetected.

Spoonley Wood [F] is a unit-system house comprising three apartments, one inthe south wing (the best appointed), two in the main or east range, and an imposingworkhall to north. Hence it differs in three respects from continental inner courts: bycomprising in a close-knit group several buildings which are usually separate inother countries; by its not being planned from the first in the form it takes; and bynot having a regularly planned outer yard, anything like the Picardy courtyardsbeing precluded by topography.


163

The term ‘courtyard villa’ has long been used in Britain to denote one havingdomestic rooms on three sides – something which, while it finds some continentalanalogies, is quite unlike the generality of establishments in Picardy. Baths are includedas a domestic amenity, as are workhalls of the Spoonley Wood kind, providing livingas well as working space; also a room serving the purposes of private justice andadministration – a basilica – with its appendages.29 Courtyard shapes vary, one ortwo such as Box being rectilinear, others like North Leigh (Fig. 42) and Bignor [F](Fig. 42) trapezoidal.

No British courtyard of a single building phase has come to light. Box I is a row-house with two short wings and continuous inner and outer porticuses which evolvedinto a three-sided courtyard house. It is unique in that the wings deserve that name;because they abut the main range the corner rooms are likely to be original and not,as in most of the analogues, an infilling between blocks which merely, or nearly,touched. Some comparable houses began as separate buildings on three sides of acourt, Chedworth (Fig. 74) being the classic example;30 North Leigh I (Oxon.) hadtwo buildings in line, with little to show more existed on the other sides of the yard.Box, Chedworth and the rest are all stages in formalising what begins as a group ofdetached buildings. Some villas did not become a unified whole: Badbury (Wilts.)was laid out on a large scale and may not have developed much; Folkestone [I](Kent) was laid out with the north and west blocks too far apart to be linked later,and since no workhall has been found, the intended shape of the courtyard isunknown.31 These various ways of relating separate houses, and the extent to whichthey were unified, correspond to different degrees of subordination of one householdor group of households to another.

Continental parallels are not common but are thought-provoking. Marboué-Mienne(Eure-et-Loir) (Fig. 44), the biggest of them, has a courtyard 200 m long, as long asall but the largest of the Picardy yards and longer than Bignor overall, yet this is onlythe equivalent of an inner court; nearby is an agricultural yard some two and a halftimes as big. Little can be deduced from the schematic plan, although, since the sitewas excavated by a distinguished engineer of Ponts et Chaussées, it is probablyaccurate. It has several unexpected features for so large and splendidly appointed avilla: the south range is virtually detached from the west and north wings whichform a continuous L-shaped range; the room with the three-sided apse is well offaxis; and a line from the gatehouse parallel to the north range meets the cross-wallbetween rooms 8/9 and 10. That wall breaks the porticus and separates two three-cell units which comprised, no doubt together with parts of the north and southranges, phase [I]. Interpreted like that, it is analogous to Chedworth I (though rectilinear,not trapezial) and, in effect, a larger version of Maulévrier. Why the structurallydetached principal house [I] should be some way off axis is not clear but in thisrespect Mienne is like Warfusée-Sud and several other Picardy villas.32 Social changecaused the house to be lengthened to the north and provided with a grand middleroom which effectively destroyed one of the original two apartments. To set it on theaxis of the courtyard or opposite the gatehouse, either of which might be expectedin a rebuilding, would have entailed recasting the house altogether, and objectionsto that are more likely to have been for social reasons than on grounds of cost.

About the rest little need be said. Rognée (Belg.) has an unusual near-square

— Chapter Ten —

164

Figure 44


165

courtyard (72×66 m) and is hard to analyse. A villa with a more British look isChâtillon-sur-Seiche/La Guyomerais II, which in II possibly and III certainly is asmall row-house at the head of a courtyard having, on the east (and only excavated)side, another row-house. That is enough to relate it to most other examples ofthe type.

Figure 44 Rectangular courtyards with hints of rebuilding

— Chapter Ten —

166

PARALLEL RANGES AND DETACHED FAÇADES

A few villas comprise two buildings linked by a porticus. Two were explored inBrittany in the 1830s, the better-reported being Plomelin-Perennou (Fin.) (Fig. 45).The two wings to east and west are little row-houses like Drax (Yorks.), two elongatedrooms open off the porticus and there are two small rooms between them. There aredifferences between the east and west sides: the east rooms are bigger;33 in theformer, the end room is closed off from the porticus, in the latter a doorway closesoff the end room and lobby, and the larger (west) of the long rooms has the widerdoorway. It is the familiar situation of two not quite equal apartments. The secondexample, Arradon-Lodo (Morbihan) (Fig. 45), is much larger and the differencesbetween the east and west blocks are greater, as are the doubts about its dimensions.34

To west is a domestic block including four rooms with hypocausts, to east a hall-likeroom surrounded on three sides by smaller rooms, one with a hypocaust. This fairlysharp division of functions matches the very different architectural forms it took inhall houses and other types, and may find a pale reflection in the different-sizedhouses at Perennou.

One British villa comparable to these is Great Witcombe (Glos.). Built on afairly steep slope in a way more characteristic of villas in the Moselle, it comprisesa porticus connecting two wings which seem to have been somewhat differentfrom the beginning, although the way the rooms were used has never been workedout. Later the customary separation of functions took place, the west wingincorporating the baths and the east wing some service functions. Thus far it ismuch like Arradon-Lodo, but it also had, facing the view in the middle of theporticus, a large room which in I was rectangular and was later rebuilt as anoctagon with an apsidal end. On the opposite side of the porticus from it was aquite elaborate shrine.

None of the villas just described has any other buildings, so far as is known.Another British villa, Winterton (Lines.) (Fig. 45) combines a detached main (west)range having some resemblance to Perrenou with parallel aisled houses in whichthe ancillary occupations of farming were carried on. This suggests that the threerelated villas may also have work-related buildings waiting to be discovered.

The west range G of Winterton (Fig. 45) is a curious blend of features. In I theporticus has pavilions of considerable size, each comprising few rooms but plannedquite differently, so in that respect it resembles Arradon rather than Plomelin-Perennou.The north pavilion is slightly larger, corresponding to the larger and nearer of thetwo detached aisled houses. In IA the north pavilion was doubled in size and a smallsquare room – a shrine? – was added in the middle of the porticus and in II it wasreplaced by an apsidal room facing out from the yard. These changes are the firstsign that the porticus was turned to face outwards instead of inwards, without inhibitingthe improvement of the two aisled houses. Change was complete in III when theapsidal room replaced the ?shrine, the pavilions were reduced to a single largeroom, and the whole acquired a purely recreational or representational function.

The creation of a façade lacking any living-room represents a unification of thesocial structure; no longer do the two households share accommodation there, it isgiven over entirely to common purposes. Unification, though, was not on equal


167

terms: while the smaller house (B) underwent improvement to the last, the larger,D, is closer to the north pavilion which had a pilastered east front and alwaysprovided a stately entrance. Phase III also represents a change of attitude towardsthe villa as a farm and comes as near to a country-house mentality as was possiblewithout building a completely new house – a villa in the modern sense, as Steinerput it.35 A near-parallel is the facade of Leutersdorf III (Fig. 45), which, however,incorporates some apparently domestic rooms, and another is La Chapelle-Vaupelteigne (Yonne).

An unusual combination of parallel ranges and a tapering outer yard occurs atOrton Longueville-Orton Hall Farm (Fig. 45). Aisled buildings predominate, withfour at least in the outer yard and another in the inner enclosed court, which has animposing gateway. On the other side of the court is what looks like a single-endedhall. The innermost aisled building must, merely from its position, be a house, andif it accommodated two families, as suggested earlier, with a third in the houseopposite, the social core will have differed in degree rather than kind from what canbe inferred in many other villas: Ober-Grombach, Sparsholt and Rockbourne III–V,for example. The whole villa plan is without a close parallel, yet close inspectionshows it is a combination of elements familiar in different contexts.

Parallel ranges of more or less equal importance are rare. A French example,Verneuil-en-Halatte (Oise), whose beginnings are obscure, seems nevertheless tohave taken this form from the first. In I, a phase approximating to the round housesand buildings A and C I at Winterton, the parallel ranges, north and south, are onlyrevealed by the lines of enclosures and a few six-post buildings which were probablydwellings; and in II a ridge-post hall appears in the north range. By III an innercourtyard of rhomboidal shape existed, closed off from the working yard successivelyby a long range having a general resemblance to Winterton G I, a wall and a longornamental pool like the one at Aylesford-Eccles (Kent). The pool made a directapproach to the middle of the range impossible, from which it may be inferred thatthe end rooms, though smaller than those at Winterton, were linked to the nearer ofthe two main ranges. By VIII the pool had disappeared and rooms, including baths,had been built on three sides of the inner courtyard, which was closed off, after thedemolition of the phase III wall, by a porticus. Even without detailed information –for only a brief note is available at present – the process appears to be similar towhat happened at Winterton but more complicated.

The various ways in which detached facades, parallel ranges and ornamentalpools were combined to express particular social relations show that a stock ofarchitectural features and their iconic associations was common to the westernprovinces of the Empire. How that stock was drawn upon, and how the ideas werediffused, are questions not easily answered.

LINEAR VILLAS

One way of setting out the several buildings that went to make up a villa was to putthem, or the principal ones, in line. Houses like Halstock II (Fig. 46), North Leigh I(Fig. 42) or Saint-Germain-lès-Corbeil (Fig. 74), where the two principal houses are

— Chapter Ten —

168

Figure 45


169

Figure 45 Parallel ranges and detached façades

— Chapter Ten —

170

aligned, have the most rudimentary linear form. All probably had other buildings oftimber and all developed courtyards of some form, unlike Bocholtz-Vlengendaal(Fig. 46), which has the house, a storeyed granary and a workhall in line.36

JemelleNeufchâteau (Fig. 46) shows the elements of this kind of plan unified.Two of these elements occur in Maillen-Al Sauvenière (Fig. 46), where a hall house

developing row-house characteristics is joined by a porticus to an otherwise detachedworkhall lying to east of it which was certainly a building of quite high status; it hasa pilastered entrance37 and the bath block, though connected only to the principalhouse, is positioned to serve the workhall too. In the same commune is a largerexample of the same setting-out: Maillen-Ronchinne, which has a much morecomplicated plan of several phases, nevertheless falls into two distinct parts joinedby a long porticus. One is a well-appointed domestic block with heated rooms and baths;

Figure 46


171

the other to the east is a workhall of which little was recovered except the porticuswith the porch typical of buildings of that kind.

Examples of this type are widely scattered. In the west of England, Montacute-Hall Hill provides a further example of three buildings in line – a row-house and twohalls all linked by a porticus; and at the other end of Europe Budapest III-Testvérhegyalso has three buildings, all apparently domestic and just as irregularly set out.

RECTANGULAR FARMYARDS

In those countries where small villas are common, principally Britain and Germany,rectangular yards are comparatively rare; Newel’s almost perfectly symmetrical planis very exceptional and Hungen-Bellersheim (Hessen) (Fig. 43) tapers insignificantly.It has six buildings set out parallel to the yard walls except for a little square shrineor well-house (2). The largest building (4) is the principal house, 5 a secondary onecomparable to Lauffen am Neckar 3; 6 is said to be a tower granary and 1, by itsposition facing the entrance, may be a little temple.38 It may be the only one of itskind known in Germany but in Brittany a somewhat similar farmyard was discoveredat Malguenac-Guilly (Morbihan). What are described as entrenchments of earth andstone surrounded it on all sides.39 Its six buildings are smaller and more subdividedthan those of Bellersheim, and it is characteristic of villa differences in France andGermany that Guilly should have as the principal building a row-house rather likeShipham-Star II and Bellersheim a hall or hall-derivative. What makes these yardsdifferent is the lack of a house of conventional plan and appearance, whether hall orrow-house; none of the buildings has a porticus, not to mention pavilions.

CONCLUSION

Villas were set out in an enormous variety of ways, those chosen for analysishere being only the more obvious ones. Perhaps the approach taken here willpermit other villas which at first sight do not show any underlying principlebehind the disposition of buildings to reveal a social and not just an economicsignificance. Questions are also raised by the scale of rebuilding of the largercourtyard villas, even though the answers lie outside the scope of this book:questions about where all the inhabitants came from, how the resources to rebuildwere assembled, and how long they took to complete. Regional differences areremarkable too. What factors produced the remarkably uniform geometrical plansof the Somme basin and why did they apparently not operate in a prosperousdistrict like Trier? These historical questions may be tackled in a different way ifthe component buildings of a villa are seen to be fairly uniform in function andvariable in the number of each category, and the manner of their setting out isrecognised to have social and economic implications.

172

CHAPTER ELEVEN

PALACES, PERISTYLE HOUSESAND LUXURY VILLAS

The title may prompt a question: why lump together an administrative function,an architectural form and a standard of living? The justification for so doing is

that they are closely linked insofar as all three are of essentially Roman rather thanprovincial origin and inspiration. A palace is a seat of government, whether of theemperor or the governor of a province, and the administrative functions it providedfor were much the same in any part of the Empire; it was occupied by someone towhom luxury came naturally by virtue of position and wealth and to whose officeItalian forms of planning were appropriate to cater for its bureaucratic and socialcomplexity.

Imperial palaces were few and did not provide for emperors who travelled widelythroughout the Empire, of whom Hadrian, always on the move, is an extreme example.It seems not to be clear exactly where such an emperor and his retinue, which must haveamounted to a considerable number of people, stayed when there was no town ormilitary garrison to receive them; one appropriate residence, a provincial governor’sheadquarters, was apparently never used,1 no doubt to avoid administrative disruption.Some emperors may always have travelled in military style like a small army on themarch but, if not, it is difficult to believe that they could rely exclusively on official andmilitary resources. Still less likely are they to have used the staging-posts (mansiones)provided for official travellers, which are completely lacking in a suitable sequence ofrooms; furthermore, ‘There is no clear and positive evidence that chains of buildingsdistinct from mere mansiones, and designed essentially for imperial use, existed in thesecond or third centuries’.2 On general grounds it seems possible that they wereaccommodated in great houses, much as English monarchs in the early modern periodfrom time to time descended on their richest subjects, and in the late Empire there werein several provinces a number of houses of noble size and splendour which might fitlyhave welcomed the imperial retinue. Private hospitality on the ruinous scale of ElizabethanEngland was common under the late Republic and early Empire3 and appears to havecontinued for long afterwards, and, although little or none of the evidence appears torelate to the northern provinces, practice was presumably similar there. The plan of thehouse at Trier rebuilt by Victorinus in the 260s, when he was an officer of the ImperialGuard under the Gallic emperor Postumus, is not known apart from its having a peristyle

— Palaces, Peristyle Houses and Luxury Villas —

173

and a large mosaic-floored room, but a house in the insula to the south has rooms of asize and quality that can reasonably be called palatial despite uncertainty about theirexact function;4 their arrangement around open courts is reminiscent of Nennig or HaccourtII. However problematic in detail Victorinus’ residence may be, it raises the question ofhow far palatial requirements influenced the planning of villas.

PALACES

‘Palace’ in its primary meaning denotes the residence of a sovereign or other rulerand, by extension, a palatial private house. A palace in the first, formal sense mightbe excluded from this book yet, as the second sense is sometimes used interchangeablywith the term ‘luxury villa’, it will be useful to discuss three that correspond to theprimary definition insofar as they assist the understanding of villas. The concept of acombined seat of government and residence suitable for official entertaining demandsstate rooms, rooms, that is, of a size suitable for the reception and entertainment oflesser rulers, ambassadors and legates, all accompanied by attendants and receivedby corresponding or greater numbers of persons in the imperial entourage. All ofthese would require space appropriate to their dignity, with a distance betweenthem and the emperor or his provincial representative, and the rooms providedrequired stately access. Rooms of this kind were larger than any required for thekind of entertaining done by private citizens, however eminent, or by kin-groups,however large or powerful. Government also required that many persons be able topresent petitions, conduct legal business at the highest level, and hear legislativeacts proclaimed; hence, for the private citizens involved, suitable access separatefrom the corridors and entrances used by the governor and his officials had to beprovided. These considerations will be used to interpret palaces, especially twoearly ones which make the essentials clear.

Not surprisingly, Domitian’s residence on the Palatine Hill at Rome, the DomusAugustana or Flavian Palace (Fig. 47), the original Palatium, shows most clearly theofficial attributes of a palace. Dominating the north side of a peristyle is an audiencehall or throne room, entered on the west from the basilica and on the east from boththe lararium or chapel and its anteroom. The basilica – the seat of judgement – hasindependent access from the outside for litigants and lawyers, who no doubt reachedtheir places via the north porticus or a doorway at the north end of the west porticus,while on the south side were the entrances used by the emperor and his officials. Inone respect basilica and audience hall make an interesting contrast. The functionalorientation of the former is clear: the literal seat of justice was in the apse, facinglitigants, petitioners and lawyers. Not so the audience hall, which has seven doorwaysso placed as virtually to preclude a throne against any wall; the apparently obviousplace in the niche on the south side stands between two doorways and provides afar less imposing setting than the apse in the basilica. From this it can be concludedthat the throne was freestanding.

Opposite the audience hall is the triclinium, a banqueting hall for state receptions.As for the rest, the west side was taken up by an entrance-hall having four doorwaysalternating with apsidal recesses; this was flanked on each side by two apsidal-

— Chapter Eleven —

174

ended flanking rooms, the whole forming a brilliant display of curvilinear shapes.On the east side was a much wider range having, in the middle, a large hall almostentirely open on two sides to give a view of the two peristyle courts; at the ends, twobowended rooms intended to impress; and between, eight small or very small servicerooms.5 Everything about this court except the service rooms was designed by its

Figure 47


175

FIGURE 47 Palaces


176

architectural subtlety and richness of ornament to over-awe those coming into theimperial presence.

Such state would hardly have been appropriate to the palace of a client king orprovincial governor, who, nevertheless, needed both the suite of rooms required byhis official function and a residence in keeping with his standing. One of the fewbuildings in this category known with any completeness is the palace at Fishbourne(Sussex) (Fig. 47),6 the exact date of which does not matter for the present purpose,nor does the precise status of the owner, whether client king or some other ruler.Although not all the state rooms of the Flavian Palace are paralleled in what has sofar been excavated, the number, size and interrelation of those already known aretruly palatial and quite unlike anything to be found in the greatest villas.

In the east wing was an aisled entrance-hall flanked on each side by five smallrooms. The east end room on each side was perhaps reserved for porters who askedtheir business of those arriving, and for servants who conducted people to appropriateparts of the palace. In the hall officials waited to meet those on government businessof every kind and in the small rooms or cubicles they or others of a superior gradediscussed the appropriate course of action, as, no doubt, did their counterparts inthe apsidal recesses of the Flavian Palace. Differences between Roman and provincialsociety may account for the different architectural treatments: sophisticated curvilinearshapes for grandees used to such things, simpler but more imposing rooms for thoseadjusting to Roman ways. All who entered saw in the fountain at the inner end of thehall a symbolic reminder not to trespass further.

Directly opposite on the far side of the peristyle court was a smaller apsidal roomthat looks, from its shape and somewhat smaller size than the other state rooms, likethe basilica but from its position was probably the audience hall or chamber. Astatue in front of the entrance ensured that those approaching had to break theirprogress, however stately; it ensured that nobody could go boldly across the gardencourt and straight up the steps to confront the governor or ruler. On balance thebasilica is more likely to have been the aisled hall at the north-east corner. Thoseseeking justice either went straight to the imposing portico fronting it or were directedfrom the entrance-hall along the east side of the palace, while the governor and hisretinue entered from the opposite end.

Between the entrance-hall and the basilica are two colonnaded courts in front ofa range of the smallest and most inferior rooms in the palace; they must be whatwere referred to in early modern England as officers’ (officials’) lodgings, and theirplan has been revised to conform with the principles of row-house planning (Fig.47). In the London palace, about which little can be said, a similar block of roomsserved the same purpose though differing in detail. It has at the rear a porticuswhich is a true corridor, designed, no doubt, to keep minor officials out of sight asfar as possible and away from the more dignified parts of the palace. As for the restof Fishbourne, the five or six apartments into which the north and west wings weredivided were presumably occupied, at least in part, by counsellors, advisers andofficials, with one or two reserved for visiting dignitaries. They need closer analysisthan can be attempted here.

A reason for placing the audience hall so far from the basilica may be sought inthe vastly different societies over which the respective rulers presided: whereas only


177

those of high rank are likely to have entered the Flavian Palace, some greater separationof a local ruler from ‘the dependants of the estate and . . . low-ranking clients’7 mayhave been thought desirable. As for the state dining-room, it must be supposed onthis reasoning to have been in the south wing, flanked by the private apartments.8

A third palace, Budapest-Aquincum (Fig. 47), was built for a different kind ofperson, the governor of East Pannonia, and although the same governmental functionswere performed here as at Fishbourne, the fact that it was the headquarters of amilitary command sited on an island in the Danube necessarily modified the principalofficial buildings and produced a close grouping in place of spacious formality. Butfirst, where was it entered? Not from the east, by the grand porticus-with-pavilionsfront overlooking the river and proclaiming to the Sarmatians the power of Rome. Tonorth the baths preclude entry, and to west the only possible point is the unlikelyone provided by the long corridor 26. By elimination, the freestanding structure tothe south, linked to the main building only by a vaulted passage, must be theentrance-hall where those on business were received by officials in the two rooms19 and 79 flanking an octagonal room (20), perhaps containing the statue of anemperor. Some formal likeness between this building and the triclinium range ofthe Flavian Palace may be deliberate.

From there some would proceed to the basilica, which was probably room 25,9 asnear to the entrance as was possible where no external porticus existed as at Romeor Fishbourne. Others would advance further to the audience hall (5), approachingit from the south corridor (4). How the other rooms of this very grand front wereused is problematic. Rooms 2 and 3 (and 1?) were perhaps for meetings aboutgovernment business, while the intercommunicating rooms 6 and 7 appear to haveformed, with 9, 8 and 16, the legate’s private quarters adjoining baths of a sumptuousquality appropriate to a household of exalted status. Finally, in the south range aretwo mirror-image blocks of rooms (Fig. 47) which may have been officials’ lodgingscomparable to those at Fishbourne.10 On the opposite side of the porticus a largeroom (77) with hypocaust appears, from its position, to have been linked to them asa common hall or a dining-room for special occasions.

Other governors’ palaces vary in the relative importance of the civil and militaryaspects discernible in their planning. The palace of the Dux Ripae at Dura-Europosseparated the two functions sharply. As at Aquincum (and London) the principalrooms faced a river – here, the Euphrates – and the rooms around the peristylebehind them have, in plan, an austere, barrack-like appearance, with only thegovernor’s public dining-room as a reminder of his civil functions. These wereconducted, otherwise, around a second peristyle, one side of which was occupiedonly by a plain, rectangular building where administrative and judicial business isplausibly supposed to have been transacted. The whole has an air of military austerityquite unlike the monumental scale of its counterpart at Köln. Here again is a porticus-with-pavilions front, facing the Rhine this time and nearby and to the rear is anaisled basilica rivalling in size the famous imperial audience hall called the ‘basilica’at Trier. For the immediate purpose the interest of this building, which cannot bereconstructed as a functional palace, lies in the large apsidal pavilions – the apsebeing inscribed within a square end – which are open towards the river,11 and whichresemble those at Aquincum.


178

VILLAS AS SEATS OF LORDSHIP

It is a commonplace that large and mostly late villas were the residences of magnateswho controlled great estates and wielded power over numerous clients and tenants.To what extent can the exercise of such power be inferred from villa plans? One testis the extent to which the form of significant rooms in palaces, and particularlysequences of rooms, are observable below government level. Relevant to this questionis another: how far did an emperor or provincial governor concern himself with thebuilding activities of the richest and highest-ranking holders of civil office? In othersocieties government was much concerned about the kind of house a potentialcontender for state power might put up: in England, for example, the building ofThornbury Castle may have been a factor contributing to the execution of EdwardStafford, Duke of Buckingham, in 1521; and in the late 1660s the building of a greathouse reinforced suspicion of the Lord Chancellor Clarendon’s intentions andcontributed to his dismissal and exile. It seems that the size and grandeur of privatehouses rarely caused political difficulties in Roman times12 but it would be interestingto consider, in those rare cases, exactly what the objections were.

Recently it has been argued persuasively that the medium-sized villa at Box (Wilts.)(Fig. 48), through the addition of a large apsidal room (10/25/26) at a corner of thecourtyard, became recognisably a seat of power.13 The room is compared with similarones ranging from the Flavian Palace to Winterton (Lines.) (Fig. 45) and argued tohave had ‘at least a partly “public” function’;14 and further, that ‘the distinction between“private” (dining) and “public” (audience) rooms’ is unlikely to have been sharp insuch a ‘comfortable, but not exceptional, rural mansion’.15 But what is meant exactlyby private and public in the context of villas, and in particular of villas owned by akin-group?

The word ‘public’ in this context means essentially private jurisdiction, thatconducted below state level: the settlement of disputes between members of a kin-group, dependants and tenants, and the punishment of misdemeanours; and decisionsabout tenancies and inheritance, especially those relating to shares in kin-groupproperty. Public in the sense of an audience room implies a well-defined socialhierarchy in which one person has power over others in more than a judicial situation,power to hear petitions and grant requests; also to receive the homage of inferiors,in the sense of their public acceptance of jurisdiction and their acknowledgement ofan overlord.

Entertainment can be either public, to display solidarity with equals and on rareoccasions even to receive superiors, or private, which includes the feasts given bythe non-hereditary head for the other members of a kin-group, at which somerepresentational acts might be performed. In the sense of receiving friends, someelement of influencing them in a common cause, political or economic, might wellbe involved; the boundary between private and public is often blurred.

To be recognisably a seat of lordship a villa must have a room whose suitabilityfor public acts is clear. Where direct access to an apsidal room from the outside iseasy, as at Box from the east porticus 21, suitability is established and the case for apublic and particularly a judicial function is strong. Where it is not, privateentertainment is the more likely purpose. On these grounds a separation of function


179

is likely at Box, with the middle room (6) in the main range, which has a mosaic,being a dining-room: impressive when private entertaining was tinged with publicconcerns and luxurious on purely private occasions.

Bignor (Sussex) (Fig. 48) has a similar conjunction of rooms in the north range;the apsidal room, the presumptive basilica/audience room,16 is entered independentlyon the west side, and the triclinium, serving both dining and (with its hexagonalpiscina) representational functions, is nearby (though the latter might have beenexpected in the west range – a problem here). Easy access from the outside is oneimportant point telling against the suggestion17 that the apsidal room 12 added toWinterton G II (Fig. 45) is a justice room; another is the lack of the small ancillaryrooms needed for that purpose.

Instances of the conjunction of two rooms capable of serving the distinct functionsperformed by their counterparts in buildings at the highest level make the lordshipinterpretation of the villa credible.

Problems arise when there is only one important room. The claim, apparentlyvery reasonable, that hospitality and justice are likely to have been dispensed in oneroom in all but the grandest villas, is difficult to accept when the room in question is,like the one at Winterton, in the middle of the house. If a villa was large enough tohave a class of dependent persons sufficiently numerous for a justice room to beneeded, that implies marked social stratification. In that kind of society those privilegedto use the principal room on representational or social occasions are unlikely tohave welcomed at other times the presence of their social inferiors on court business,and for that reason the exercise of private justice can only be argued when theappropriate room is largely separated from the rest of the house.

Several Iberian peristyle villas show the conjunction of justice room and dining-room with more or less probability: Almenara de Adaja (Valladolid) (Fig. 48), forexample, has in the west range an apsidal room interpreted as the dining-room, andin the north range a larger room with semi-octagonal apse which is associated witha ceremonial function – a provincial architectonic variant of the solemnity withwhich the throne room is invested in court architecture, as Castro puts it;18 theyconform to the model proposed for Box. Aguilafuente (Segovia) has a room with asemi-octagonal apse and a large squarish room – basilica and dining-room respectively– standing in much the same relation to one another as at Almenara. There is noobvious independent access to the former and its function would be in question butfor a wall and doorway closing off that walk of the peristyle serving the dining-room. Those seeking justice must have entered at the far end of the adjoining walkto reach the lobby and two rooms adjoining the courtroom where they could preparetheir business. Separation of public and private activities may be a key to identifyingsuch rooms.19

Rielves (Fig. 48) may be a highly unusual instance of such planning. The putativebasilica is separated from the rest; the round room is clearly designed for somespecial purpose; a grand entrance provides for members of the kin-group, a minorone for suitors and petitioners.

Although these identifications of rooms have some consistency, it has to berecognised, in going further, that all such interpretations except that of the FlavianPalace are insecurely based. Yet only by speculating in this way, trying to identify


180

Figure 48


181

broadly similar rooms or groups of rooms – for at this architectural level diversity isthe rule – can we hope to establish the relative importance of the exercise of lordshipin the several villas and the part they played in government at whatever level.

Comparable plans are widespread. In Hungary, Nemesvámos-Balácpuszta 1 has alarge apsidal room on the main axis of the peristyle – the dining/reception room –and a smaller one, reached by a separate entrance, which may be the justice room.Both had mosaic pavements. This last identification is called into question though,by the mosaic pavement, which, in the main body of the room, is composed ofgeometrical patterns but has a middle panel of two ‘pheasant-like’ birds on branches

Figure 48 Seats of Lordship


182

facing each other; and in the apse, a wine-jar amid tendrils of laurel. None of thesemotifs seems to be iconographically appropriate and may invalidate the functiondeduced on more general grounds. In France the inadequately reported villa ofMontcrabeau-Bapteste (Lot-et-Garonne) has a large room with semi-octagonal apseat one corner of the principal of two peristyles, but its relation to any other majorroom is far from clear because the plan lacks detail.20 Possibly the two rooms weresituated quite differently from their counterparts elsewhere.

British villas are not all as straightforward as Box, and what may be true ofMontcrabeau is true of the better reported sites of Bignor (Fig. 48) and North Leigh(Fig. 48), both commonly bracketed together as typical English courtyard villas. Thelatter has, at the west corner, what is usually regarded as a dining-room.21 It is in twoparts, a square vaulted inner chamber (1) and a narrower and longer room partly cutoff from it (1 A), like an antechamber, and the whole is unlike the usual dining-room. The approach to this room is also odd, not reached directly by a wide openingfrom the porticus but through a lobby at right angles to it, and so into the ‘anteroom’.Now this is not the way presumptive dining-rooms are approached: rather, the lobbyand the adjoining rooms suggest the minor rooms needed as offices and forinterviewing clients and suitors next to a court room, while a passage from the farmcourts provides an appropriate point of entrance. And, as at Aguilafuente, the southand west porticuses are separated by a wall and a doorway (with a servant tooversee it, no doubt) to ensure the supplicants for justice did not venture beyondtheir proper station. That leaves the representational/dining-room in something likeits usual position near the middle of the north-west range. This interpretation reinforcesthe idea that the room betokening authority need not be apsidal, as has alreadybeen suggested for Fishbourne. Suitability in terms of size, approach and relation toother rooms, notably the ceremonial dining-room, are the criteria.

Those considerations may assist in understanding Woodchester (Glos.) (Fig. 47),the British villa known best for its huge mosaic pavement, and one of the leastanalysed. It is obvious that the mosaic room, 15m square, dominates the innercourtyard, but what is less noticed is the remarkable size of the range opposite,which is as wide as the hall of Blankenheim I (12 m) and considerably wider thanthe biggest room at Basse-Wavre (Belg.);22 and in this range the outer room adjoiningthe entrance is 14 m and the inner 15.5 m long, both with mosaics. Quite likely theyintercommunicated. Rooms this size must have served some public function; theouter one may have been in the nature of an audience hall or antechamber openingoff the covered(?) entrance, the inner one a justice room. Only Fishbourne has threerooms comparable to the three principal rooms at Woodchester, and they are ofcourse larger and grander. Nevertheless, this does suggest some special status, a rankabove other large villas; in fact, Woodchester is one of the few villas which onecould conceivably imagine an emperor or provincial governor taking over during histravels – a palatial villa properly so called.

That point is reinforced by the recognition23 that the room containing the greatpavement was entered on all four sides by doorways in the middle of each wall. Itprovides no architectural background, that is to say no obvious place for a seat ofhonour, which must have been freestanding, so that this large room was a distantcousin of the audience hall in the Flavian Palace and the corresponding room 5 at


183

Aquincum. A ceremonial use is implied rather than a grand dining-room, for whichpurpose the size of the room and the position of its doorways are unsuitable. Thedistinctive placing of the doorways especially must be a conscious copying of thearrangements in very grand establishments; they imply the presence of manyservants, some to watch the doors, some to provide a suitably large retinue for thepresiding personage and yet others for the performance of ceremonial acts. Suchstateliness is hard to parallel outside truly palatial establishments, even in thelargest villas, and is more than ordinary lordship. The great room itself is so explicit– it gives the impression of a throne room – that a provincial government mightnot have looked kindly on it had it been built by a private citizen without authority.Woodchester is perhaps the only villa at present known, and certainly the onlyBritish villa, which has truly palatial features.

The point has already been made that justice rooms or basilicas can take differentforms. A distinctive room shape not so far mentioned is the rectangular block sometwo or three times as long as wide, with an apse on one of the long sides. The best-known example is the west corner room 27 of Echternach I (Lux.), which in III ismodified to resemble the ‘lop-sided’ apsidal rooms at Ljusina (Yugosl.) (Fig. 60) orOrlandovtsi (Bulg.) (Fig. 60); another is Lalonquette I (Pyr.-Apl.) (Fig. 50). All theseare of suitable size and have the necessary ancillary rooms and suitable access to bejustice rooms, as was in fact suggested for Lalonquette24 and the same use seemsquite likely for an apsidal room at Nemesvámos-Balácpuszta I (Hung.);25 and in bothvillas the apsidal rooms stand in a comparable relation to the principal room. AtMontrozier (Aveyron) (Fig. 52) there is the block formed by the rooms 38, 39, 41, 42.These and other configurations need comparative study.

PERISTYLE VILLAS

The origins of the peristyle are of no concern here. It was in use at Pompeii andHerculaneum in the third quarter of the first century and spread in western Europethrough Italian models, becoming commoner in the Iberian peninsula than in anyother country or region. A useful key to the more important26 shows that peristylesare rectilinear except for three which are trapezial: Santa Colomba de Somoza(León) (Fig. 49), Albesa-El Romeral (Lérida) and Jumilla-Los Cipreses (Murcia)(Fig. 49).27 Such departures from the norm could be ascribed to construction intwo or more phases did they not have one thing in common, that in each case theprincipal or dining-room (triclinium or oecus) is at or near the acute angle of theperistyle. This indicates that the distortion had a social purpose and, like the changeof shape in the courtyard at Sparsholt (below, Fig. 68, p. 246) and other villas, wasintended to emphasise a particular room or building. A similar concern is apparentat Eisenstadt (Aus.), where the off-axis addition on the north side of a bigrepresentational room housing statues of gods appears to be connected with thetrapezial shape of the peristyle.

Not all rectangular peristyles are of one building phase. The main range of Cuevasde Soria (Fig. 49) had at one stage a big apsidal room flanked by three smaller ones,the latter being separated by narrow apsidal lobbies (or closed corridors). The


184

absorption of the westernmost room 1 into the west range suggests that this involveda rebuilding of the latter and a realignment of the peristyle, for there is no reason todoubt that the peristyle belongs to the first phase of construction. That is not the casewith certain Iberian villas in which greater irregularities imply gradual developmenttowards a peristyle. Santa Colomba de Somoza (León) and Quarteiro (Faro) arelikely instances and Valladolid-Prado is certainly of two periods, neither reallyintelligible. These and a number of other sites show the kind of unconformity presentin the final phase of Lalonquette (Pyr.-Atl.), one of only two large peristyle villas asyet excavated to its lowest levels.

Lalonquette: Gaulish Unit System to Mediterranean Peristyle

In its final state this villa (Fig. 50) looks much like other peristyle villas of southernFrance or Spain, yet its first two phases [I] and [II]28 have much in common with

Figure 49 Spanish peristyles


185

the houses of north-west Europe. Lalonquette began with a core of two hall houses:the one to east has some likeness to Frocester Court I (Fig. 69); that to west (aworkhall?) has a small corner ‘room’ that looks like a dais area partitioned off fromthe hall, for which Ober-Grombach A (Fig. 2) may be a parallel. These two houseswere linked by a porticus but physically separated by a narrow passage open to thesky. The more developed east house is linked by the porticus (but not joinedstructurally) to two identical two-room wing-like ranges29 looking like units orapartments – the two parts of Brixworth I (Northants.) (Fig. 11) or the north-eastwing of Weitersbach II (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 69). In the small courtyard is a well or shrine,like Ditchley (Oxon.), and to the west is a workhall with the usual porticus. Lalonquettethus begins with three halls at various stages of development, accommodatinghousefuls of varying composition and serving somewhat different purposes, so thatat this stage it was, in essentials, like its northern counterparts at Köngen (Bad.-Württ.) or Katzenbach (Bad.-Württ.). Only in [II], when the elaborate bath suite, thejustice room and the larger temple were added, did elements then foreign to thenorthern scene appear. The most notable of them is the basilica which, if correctlyidentified, shows lordship making a much earlier appearance than in British orGerman villas.

In [III] most interesting changes took place. The main range remained in twodistinct parts but the principal hall house and its quasi-wings were replaced by alarge row-type house which has, in the middle, a representational room projecting atthe rear.30 To west is a two-room-and-passage unit of Downton type; to east, a verysimilar unit except, perhaps, for one very small room; that, though, may be analteration, as, surely, are the rooms at the end and rear forming? [IIIA]. At the sametime, the west building developed like a German hall, acquiring extra rooms at eachend, and an imperfect peristyle, partly blocked by the baths, was created.

The transformation from hall to row-house can be matched on other sites but therelation of the new house to the whole is extraordinary. Instead of facing the middleof the peristyle court the representational room faces down the east walk in a wayreminiscent of the off-axis dining-rooms discussed earlier. Why so? It must be boundup with the location of other buildings and the desire to provide an impressivedirect approach along the east walk. Two constraints operated: the baths were closeto the house and the most difficult element of the complex to move; and the mainlines of the peristyle were established and its enlargement would have requiredextensive demolition prior to rebuilding. Given that the new row-house comprisedtwo units, they could be differentiated by making one face inwards to the peristylecourt and the other outwards to a garden, which is why it has its own short porticuson that side. The basilica of [II] lost its apse and was turned to some other purpose,being replaced by another opposite the main house; it could be approached fromboth sides, either from the new grand entrance with its subtle changes of roomshape, or directly from the outer service quarters. By now the social emphasis of thevilla was heavily towards the east, including, apparently, an exercise yard (palaestra).

Not until [IV] did Lalonquette acquire a complete peristyle.31 On three sides itutilised the earlier walks but on the west was brought inwards to produce a perfectlyrectangular uninterrupted shape, and nearly everything else around it was rebuilt.The fifth phase, though it resulted in a balanced and more nearly symmetrical


186

disposition of buildings and is interesting in itself, does not affect the developmentof the peristyle.

The important lesson of Lalonquette is that it reveals, beneath the veryMediterranean-looking final phase, beginnings linking it to houses in the rest ofEurope, and that the slight breaks of alignment in other peristyle villas can be more

Figure 50


187

Figure 50 Lalonquette I–V


188

confidently regarded as implying something similar. Castro remarked on the fewnessof Spanish villas with dispersed (or separate) buildings;32 that view may well bemodified when deep excavation of courtyard villas takes place.

Montmaurin I

The only peristyle villa built as such which has been excavated as completely as itspreservation permitted is Montmaurin (Haute Garonne) (Fig. 51). Its story is simplerthan Lalonquette, there being just two main phases.

Montmaurin I was a fully developed peristyle villa.33 The first thing to notice isthat the peristyle has large rooms at its north-west and north-east (correctly northand east) corners that appear to have been used to facilitate circulation but alsoserved to divide the villa into two parts, one the entrance court and the other thehouse with its appurtenances, including the north range of the peristyle. Looked atin this way it is apparent that there are two successive and substantially identicalentrance blocks, each with a square portal or gatehouse reserved for importantoccasions, leaving the flanking passages, off which open small rooms serving asporters’ lodges, for everyday use. The peristyle itself is interrupted by two pairs ofmasonry piers marking what may be a stately approach used on important occasions;alternatively they were decorative, forming an impressive frame to the vista fromeither end. Flanking the north portal are identical suites comprising a large room anda small inner room, and because they appear to have been reached from the innerporticus (but were the doorways found?) they must have been apartments of someconsequence; the corresponding rooms in the south range are probably partaccommodation, part store- or workrooms.

Figure 51 Montmaurin I, II


189

In the wider east range of the peristyle is what is clearly an important room, essentiallya circle inscribed within a square; its purpose is unknown but it shows that this sideof the peristyle was more important than the opposite side, which has only plainrectangular rooms and a portal leading to the service court. Whether the scantyremains establish that a service court existed to east, providing perfect symmetrywith that to west, is open to doubt. That something stood on that side is clear,34 butit is worth noticing that the narrow passage in the east range has a porter’s lodge onthe peristyle side, like those to north-east, whereas the wide opening opposite doesnot. It demonstrates an intention to control access to whatever lay outside the peristyle,not entry to it, which suggests a private garden rather than a service area.

About the house proper little can be said with any confidence. It has a porticusgiving access to the principal element of the plan, a long rectangular receptionroom35 forming an antechamber to what was evidently the most important place ofall – presumably a representational room or shrine. If that is correct, the house wasof a fairly conventional kind.

Montmaurin II

Montmaurin II, like Lalonquette [III], saw an extensive remodelling, preserving onlythe peristyle and much of the fabric of its buildings around it. The social implicationsof this change have hardly been explored.

The intention underlying the rebuilding was to convert it from a well-appointedlarge villa, probably with a sizeable home farm nearby, to a luxurious one having noconnection with everyday affairs, not even the functions expressive of dignity andlordship. Change was proclaimed at the entrance to the new establishment: insteadof approaching the house through a working courtyard, a new semicircular approach,walled off from any trace of useful activity, was created. It would be interesting toknow who entered, and how: did everyone make an offering to the protecting deityat the altar to the left of the middle gateway under the eye of the porter in theopposite lodge, and, if so, who visited the polygonal temple before advancing to thehouse?

Passing through the portico and the phase I entrance portal – perhaps now moreof a reception room – the visitor saw an impressive vista emphasised by terracingand marble staircases, and terminating in an apsidal walled enclosure containing apiece of sculpture. To the left, between the corner of the peristyle and the well-hidden service quarters, was a large bath suite incorporating a nymphaeum of unusualsize and splendour, the whole being devoted to bathing as recreation and enjoymentand no doubt entertainment.

Those privileged to go further admired the peristyle garden before climbing astaircase to the marble-paved inner peristyle at the centre of rooms and spaces givenover to pleasure, and perhaps principally the pleasures of summer. Two semicircularporticos, pilastered and, like all the rooms in this part of the house, floored andfaced with marble, preceded the innermost and highest court. Off the gallery in frontof it opened on each side a suite of three small and richly decorated rooms, andbacking on to each was an annexe with boldly projecting pilasters. Pleasure being


190

the sole aim of all this part of the house, everything necessary to minister to it washidden from view as far as possible. A telling illustration of the villas’s true purposeis the discovery that the six small basins on the east and west sides of the inner courtwere fish tanks, one of them still full of oysters with their shells firmly closed.36

Montmaurin is certainly a peristyle villa in both phases, and although I reflects anextremely comfortable standard of living, only in II did it become what can truly beregarded as a luxury villa in the strict sense of the term, one from which all the caresof administering great possessions were banished. Whoever the owner may havebeen in I, in II Montmaurin became a magnate’s pleasure house.

LUXURY VILLAS

As the preceding discussion shows, it is not easy to isolate one characteristic bywhich to distinguish between villas as large and richly appointed as these, and to saywhich is luxurious and which palatial. Yet the attempt must be made, for until adistinction can be demonstrated, these great establishments will contribute no morethan general impressions to the comparative study of social development in differentparts of the Empire.

Baths enable some distinctions to be made. They are, as Wightman pointed out,37

an early manifestation of the taste for luxury, so that Echternach I combined formalstateliness in the main house with luxuriance of form in the bath block. Euskirchen-Kreuzweingarten (Rhld-Pf.) and Bad Godesberg-Friesdorf (Nordrh.-Wesf.) appear toshare these characteristics. Wightman also noted that the distance of baths from thehouse was an indication of the status of the owning family. Nennig (Rhld-Pf.), wherethe bath block was 250 m away, demonstrates this; so, equally well, does the little-noticed villa of Thuy (Eure-et-Loir),38 where the baths are at some distance from thehouse39 and are reached by a porticus having a series of niches at intervals, like theones at Val Catena (Yugosl.). Yet, although Thuy possesses these signs of real luxury,it was clearly a villa in a more utilitarian sense. So, too, probably, was Nennig: itsmiddle room with the great mosaic is, in the useful phrase of a seventeenth-centuryEnglish writer,40 ‘a piece of state’, not one devoted purely to private pleasure; flankingit on one side are comfortable living-rooms, on the other service rooms; and thedetached quasi-wings recall those at Weitersbach II. Nennig has claims to be luxuriousbut is not, in the same sense as Montmaurin II or Val Catena, a luxury villa. It may beuseful, then, to consider first which are luxury villas and which have luxuriouselements, and so a selection will be passed under review in the hope of bringing outtheir differences.

A few are clearly luxury villas. Wittlich (Rhld-Pf.), following the curving westbank of the river Lieser for 150 m, is, as Wightman remarked, the only one in theterritory of the Treveri than can be regarded as ‘a mere pleasure-ground’.41 In themiddle is a block conventionally said to be the dwelling house,42 which, veryinterestingly, is of palatial inspiration; it has the combination of large apsidal roomsopen to the river terrace and flanking an imposing central block which is found indifferent forms at the governor’s palace at Köln or Aquincum. About 25 m to north,and joined to the middle block by a porticus at the rear and the riverside terrace at


191

the front, is what is described simply as a bath block,43 although it has no less thantwenty-four rooms, many of which do not fit easily into the usual sequence offunctions. To south, joined in the same way and at the same distance, is what iscalled the working part, no doubt because the basement storey or undercroft producedclear evidence that it was a stable. The ground or principal floor, where there is alarge room with two apsidal recesses for which it would be hard to find a workpurpose, belies this. Wittlich, as clearly as Montmaurin II, is a luxury villa.

Both the situation of Wittlich, overlooking a river, and its tripartite form recurelsewhere, by no means always in luxury villas. For disposition at the waterside theextreme case is the villa of Val Catena, built around the inlet of that name in theisland of Brioni Grande near Pula (Yugosl.). On the south side is a large house builtaround two peristyles and combining comfort with the necessarily considerableworking quarters. From it a portico curves around the head of the inlet to runstraight for no less than 1.5 km, past various recesses fitted with seats, to a garden,baths and a suite of rooms intended for entertainment. On a more modest scale –and few villas can compare with Val Catena – Pully-Prieuré (Switz.), built overlookingLake Geneva, had, on the landward side from which it was approached, a porticusat least 60 m long facing an ornamental pool about half that length; and, facing theview, it had a version of the angled front found at Wittlich, with semicircular recesses.Though incompletely excavated, the villa, like Val Catena, shows no sign of anyactivity other than those conducive to pleasure.

That is not entirely true of Graz-Thalerhof (Aus.) (Fig. 52), built on the grand scaleto an extended tripartite plan some 160 m long, of which 125 m are largely occupiedby wings, rooms and two adjoining porticuses all heated by hypocausts. An attempthas been made to show the circulation pattern and the location of service rooms. Atthe west end domestic rooms and baths are grouped around a large entrance hall.An architecturally more remarkable block in the middle spanning the porticuses haswhat is, in effect, an elaborate porch from which the very large house was reachedby a remarkably narrow entrance; the same effect as was achieved by circular spacesin Lalonquette [III]. Here two apsidal rooms whose purpose is hard to guess narrowedthe opening. To south is an elegant and unusual room of basically cruciform shape.44

These two parts of the house may qualify as luxurious. At the west end, on the northside, is an exercise yard, all service functions being clustered in courtyards at thesouth side. There, too, is a large hall with a wide shallow apse to one side, giving ita lopsided look. If, as is likely, this was a justice room or audience room, Thalerhof,though certainly luxurious, was not, in the narrow sense, a luxury villa.

Grandeur rather than sophistication is the hallmark of Téting-sur-Nied (Moselle).45

The great arc formed by the porticus and terrace and terminating in bowfrontedpavilions of slightly different size46 is crowned by an apsidal-ended room, whichmust be a dining or ceremonial room at the heart of the villa. On the west side arebaths and more, of which Grenier remarks that the other rooms ‘have the dimensionsusual in triclinia or other rooms intended for social life and the idle conversationsafter bathing’; and as for the porticus itself, ‘the sun, at every hour of the day and inall seasons, had to light up and warm at least a part’.47 The little that is known aboutthe east or house wing, or about the rest of the establishment, does not detract fromthis view that Téting is another luxury villa.


192

These few villas appear, as far as the evidence goes, not to have been directlyconnected with work of any kind, even (except Thalerhof) with the administrationof estates. All have several or many rooms of complex geometrical shapes, a

Figure 52


193

proportionately large number of them with hypocausts and mosaics, and all havehighly individual plans intended to permit maximum enjoyment of the landscape.Montmaurin II largely shares these characteristics, particularly in the inner peristyle,but is limited by retaining the larger outer peristyle court of I; consequently it has amuch greater, though deceptive, appearance of formality.

Those points, together with the genuinely palatial elements recognised earlier, mayhelp to discriminate between villas not markedly different in size and the quality oftheir appointments but of quite varied social significance. The contrast between thequite common peristyle plan and the architectural luxuriance of the inner court foundat Montmaurin II can be seen to imply, where that kind of thing occurs in other villas,similar constraints resulting from a change in the nature of the establishment. A way oflife necessarily preoccupied with work gave way to one in which thought had to begiven to ways of passing the time, and although nearly all men able to indulge in thesecond engaged also in the first to varying degrees, they had in common the ability toafford, in Thorstein Veblen’s useful phrase, conspicuous consumption. His words implythe desirability of separating elements of extravagance – the essence of the luxury villa– from the costly buildings, rooms and ornament demanded of those in high social oradministrative position, and the need to pick out exceptional features from the risingstandards of comfort observable over four centuries of imperial rule.

FORMALITY AND LUXURY

Several famous villas combine a high level of comfort and conformity to advancedstandards of taste, both of which can be taken for granted in luxury villas, with aformality of plan entirely alien to the latter. Woodchester, with an axial approachthrough two or three courtyards and principal rooms inappropriately large for privateentertaining, provided an impressive setting for lordship in which luxury was not

Figure 52 Luxurious formal villas


194

pursued for its own sake. Comparison with other large and frequently cited villas isinstructive on this point. In the elongated villa of Basse-Wavre (Belg.) the largestroom is at the east extremity, some 50 m from the second largest room in the middleand at the west end is a luxurious-looking bath suite. Whatever point Basse-Wavrewas intended to make, it is not primarily a manifestation of lordship.

Mention has already been made of Nennig (Rhld-Pf.), ‘the grandest of all theexcavated villas in the civitas Treverorum’, even if Mylius’ reconstruction with a two-storey porticus and wide pavilions of three storeys and basement somewhat overstatesthe grandeur.48 Among other things, the big mosaic-floored hall in the middle, usedfor important occasions of a ceremonial nature, is envisaged as being surrounded onall sides by a colonnaded gallery; yet the notion that the great personage at thecentre of such observances might be overlooked, or that there might be anyone oranything above him other than a canopy of state, strains belief.49 In general the planof Nennig is strictly rectilinear and formal, lacking any architectural flights of fancy.The only touch of luxury is the placing of the baths at a considerable distance fromthe house.

For obvious reasons no two large villas are alike. The most that can be expectedis to find what appear to be principles of planning which have administrative andsocial implications. Haccourt II (Belg.) (Fig. 52) incorporates two aspects of formalplanning that link it, on the one hand, to Nennig, and on the other to Montrozier-Argentelle. It resembles Nennig in having a lofty audience hall (4) in the middle,here looking out over a large ornamental pool (3), with the smaller rooms openingoff courtyards: a large one surrounding the audience hall on three sides and asmaller rectangular one (10) at the superior end. Facing south over an ornamentalpool is the dining-room (11) and near it a room with an apse (9), under which wasa cruciform cellar – a family shrine?

It is in the north wing that some resemblance to Montrozier (Fig. 52) can bedetected. The parallel blocks of rooms are quite different in detail in the two villasbut each shows a distinctive kind of compact planning that mixes service functionsand accommodation for those who performed them with the architecturally interestingshapes that must connote superior purposes. At Haccourt a range of rooms (18–23)looking exactly like a row-house faces the semicircular porticus which cuts it offfrom the rest of the wing except, perhaps, for the elaborate room 16 with its severalniches and recesses. Montrozier (Fig. 52), not all of which was excavated – suitablyluxurious private quarters are lacking – combined several buildings commonlydispersed more openly in courtyards and wings: two aisled buildings, one of which,by its size and structure, can only be an audience hall; another apsidal room whichis perhaps a reception room; a bath block, normally detached in an establishment ofthis standing; and an exercise yard (palaestra). The whole has the orderliness, on alarger scale, of the buildings grouped at the north-west corner of Badajoz-la Cocosa(Fig. 48), and is generally reminiscent of the close groupings in parts of Chiragan,50

but in a more orderly way.So what is the status of Montrozier? The element that stands out as requiring

explanation is the audience hall, which is twice the size of the famous one atNennig and somewhat larger than that at Haccourt II, though hardly more thanhalf as big as the Fishbourne Palace audience hall. It has a monumental approach


195

around a peristyle; it abuts a wide entrance flanked by two large rooms comparableto those at Woodchester; and it has in front what may be a large water feature, theequivalent in a peristyle of the pool at Haccourt. The smaller aisled building maybe a reception hall for suitors expecting to proceed to the basilica. In some waysMontrozier resembles Haccourt, yet it has the buildings for the administration ofjustice so strangely absent in the latter, and the audience-hall complex has a palatialquality. Only further excavation could show whether other official, that is, clearlynot domestic buildings are present. Lacking information of that kind, the status ofMontrozier remains uncertain. It may be a large, comfortable villa expressive ofdominion and occupied by someone who had achieved absolute power over hiskin, or it could be a true palace.

LORDSHIP OR JOINT PROPRIETORSHIP?

It is easy enough to pick out in the large villa of Fliessem-Weilerbüsch (Rhld-Pf.)(Fig. 53) the elements indicative of the occupants’ high social status. The verygrand south porticus with its elaborately planned wings may be coeval with ten ormore mosaic floors, hence in Wightman’s words, ‘It may be surmised that a wealthyowner had decided to make the villa his home’.51 No attention is paid to a peculiarityof the main range, that the room facing the main (west) entrance is not a large hallbut a comparatively small one (36), and it backs on to a counterpart facing east(35); both are almost completely open on the entrance side, as rooms in such aposition usually are. They therefore fulfilled much the same purpose as the middleroom at Newport (Fig. 10). Moreover, the east and west porticuses are divided intotwo unequal parts and consequently the wide entrances are off centre to the tworooms; this deviation from customary practice shows how important the divisionof the porticus was. It is bound up with the two transverse corridors of unequalwidth flanking the middle room; that to the south leads to the outer flankingrooms, the function of the other is uncertain and two possibilities are suggested(Fig. 53). The more important point is that there are two entrances of equal sizeand importance from courtyards on opposite sides of the house, and two entrancescan only signify two groups of equal status.

That is basically why the house presents the appearance on both sides of aporticus between wings. It bears the same kind of relation to the row type as dohouses of the compact row type – a distant derivative, but showing in the corerooms clear traces of its ancestry. How the rest of the house was used and dividedcannot be examined in detail except at one particularly instructive point, the blockof four rooms (48–51) at the south end. The west room (51) is marginally wider thanthe east (48); entry from the flanking corridors is at opposite ends, the former tonorth, the latter to south, and in each case is faced by a doorway into the adjoiningservice room: an instance of reverse symmetry which exemplifies the minor socialdifferentiation that was always so carefully observed. So not only was Fliessemdivided into two parts; each end of the house, north and south, can be subdivided,as was demonstrated summarily by Böttger.52 This is shown both diagrammatically(Fig. 53), with some differences from Böttger, and in more detail (Fig. 53).


196

About Haccourt I (Fig. 20) much less is known but what was found of the houseresembles German examples of the row type. It is like Fliessem in the significantrespect of having two porticuses, may also have been of much the same size,53 andso may have been like it in social composition too.

The two villas developed in altogether different ways. Haccourt II (Fig. 52: III is

Figure 53


197

only new baths) was rebuilt on a new alignment a little to the west, on a larger scaleand different plan which seems to have provided for two households of considerablydifferent standing, and was dominated by a great hall in the middle, the symbol ofunity. Fliessem, on the other hand, enlarged and embellished, retained its originalform to the end because the social structure of the community did not changefundamentally; that is why the rooms between the wings, contrary to what oftenhappened, remained unaltered. That the villa was prosperous is shown by the additionof the new south porticus and crypto-porticus, new and larger baths, and largepavilions at three corners, not to mention mosaic floors. The colonnaded southporticus made a statement about social importance implying that whoever occupiedthat end was more important than those living at the north end, but that seems to beonly adding emphasis to what had always been the case. It also provided the eleganceof curvilinear rooms, notably in the south-east corner although, surprisingly, thatquality was lacking where it might most be expected, in the new baths. It is alsosurprising that Fliessem did not contrive that other token of luxury, the distant bathreached by a long porticus. That is what Haccourt III achieved, whereas Fliessem’sinhabitants remained content for two baths, neither very remarkable, to remain integralparts of the house; indeed, two baths may have been an essential accompaniment ofthe continuing kin-group structure. It is necessary to add that the notion latelyadvanced, that the new baths at Fliessem, furnished with mosaics, were intended forthe outdoor servants (Hoffamilie), is bizarre.54

The divergence of these two villas from similar origins reveals contrasting formsof social development. Other villas of very different appearance can be analysed tothe same effect. A notable example is the large establishment of Haut Clocher-SaintUlrich (Moselle) (Fig. 53),55 dug at the end of the nineteenth century with largeresources and reported all too summarily. Much the most striking element of theplan is the wall running unbroken from end to end to divide the massive core of the

Figure 53 Joint proprietorship – grandeur, not luxury

Haut Clocher-Saint-Ulrich 1:3000


198

house (52×28 m) into two equal but not identical parts. Wichmann makes mentionof only one doorway discovered in this part of the house, the wide one (4 m) fromthe east courtyard into the biggest room. All he says about intercommunicationbetween the two parallel ranges is, first, that the two principal rooms facing west andeast were certainly connected, although the phraseology suggests this was anassumption,56 as, probably, is the statement that the customary intercommunicationwas by the flanking corridors 3 and 5, for which no evidence is adduced.

Given the existence of two courtyards and the example of Fliessem, Saint-Ulrichmay be another villa that began and long continued with some form of jointoccupation and proprietorship. If so, two bath suites might be expected. One wasin the elaborate complex of rooms in the north-west corner (5) and Grenier thoughtthere was evidence of a second, but his view has been rejected by an expert onthe subject.57 There is really little sign of luxury anywhere in the villa despiteGrenier’s claims58 and our ignorance of the mosaic floors, which would have madeit more comparable to other large villas but went unreported.59 Architectural subtletyand elegance like that at Fliessem is quite lacking. Nevertheless, here, too, jointownership seems to have been weakening. An indication of this is the entrance-hall or reception room to the east, which is not only large but extremely grand,with an internal colonnade on each side.60 It was much superior to its fellow to thewest and a showpiece for the whole villa.

No doubt these accounts of Fliessem and Saint-Ulrich will appear incredible tomany. All that a doubter has to do is to explain why the main ranges of the twobuildings are so unlike the general run of their kind.

199

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE VILLAS OF SOUTH-EASTEUROPE

Thus far villas have been categorised without regard to the countries in whichthey are situated. This approach is equally applicable to south-east Europe, a

term which for the present purpose comprises Bulgaria, Hungary, former Yugoslaviaand Romania, together with much of Austria. Villas in this vast region are different,broadly speaking, from those in western countries, the houses being usually smalland simple and for the most part of distinctive regional types. Moreover, the totalnumber excavated is small compared with Germany, France or Britain, so that a typeis established more by common features than by the closeness of resemblance foundwith halls or row-houses. House types will be discussed first, then the ways in whichbuildings were grouped.

By way of preliminary, though, one considerable limitation must be stated, thatignorance of relevant languages compels me to rely on reports or summaries inGerman or French; but, that said, it may be possible to improve on the existing villatypologies in these countries.1

HALL-TYPE VILLAS

It is remarkable that the one house type that might have been expected in a region ofmany quite small villas is not at all common, at least in its orthodox western forms.

Szentkirályszabadaja-Romkút (Hung.) has as its principal building a hall of theform, rare in western provinces, with an end-entrance; it had two unequal pavilionstouching the hall only at the corners, must have had a timber porticus, and has beenreconstructed in an impossible way as a yard with corner towers. A similar but ratherlarger hall at Gyulafirátót-Pogánytelek (Hung.) (Fig. 54), secondary to what is said tobe an atrium house, is the subject of a reconstruction as ridiculous as any in theliterature: Oelmann’s article on Stahl is quoted for parallels to a villa which is thenreconstructed with an open yard.2

How such a house might develop appears from Bistritsa (Bulg.) (Fig. 54), wherepart of the interior space is occupied by a long lobby and two unequal rooms.How the hall was entered is not known but so large a room is likely to have hada more imposing and more visible doorway than the lobby could provide. This plan

— Chapter Twelve —

200

illustrates very clearly how the pavilions were related to two more or less separateparts of the house, as has been suggested for other villas with four. Two end-entrance halls of an advanced kind are Budakalász (Hung.) (Fig. 54), which has anapsidalended hall, and Majdan (Yugosl.) (Fig. 54), which is broadly similar althoughthe apse is smaller. In Bulgaria Mikhailovgrad site 2, building 1 is bigger and combinesendentrance through a porticus with an apse added to an inner room which iscomparable to the transept-like space at Majdan. All these houses are related toMauren (Bay.) and other end-entrance halls and those with apses imply someconsiderable change in the way the hall was used; probably a growth of control onthe part of an individual or a family and some degree of lordship over others, theapse being the seat and symbol of power. End-entrance halls are also found assubsidiary buildings at Champdivers and Tavaux in the Jura, which were discoveredby aerial photography.

The sole example of what may be an aisled house occurs in Romania, at Telita (Fig.54); more likely, it is a derivative because it lacks some of the characteristics of thetype. The central part has at the outer (south) end a doorway of domestic width, notone suitable for work purposes as is usual in British examples; and there is no trace ofreplacement of posts by partitions, or of any division of the large north room alongsuch lines. That room could well be a cross-wing to a hall with outshots. Yet anothercurious feature of the building is the projection of the aisles/outshots to form rooms;how they were roofed is hard to imagine. However Telita be interpreted, it is so farunique in the region and the true nature of its structure needs to be established.

Figure 54 End-entrance halls

— The Villas of South-East Europe —

201

SQUARE HALLS

Houses having a square hall as their core structure lack the propensity to longitudinaldevelopment which is characteristic of oblong halls, as Koerich-Goeblingen 2 (Lux.)(Fig. 30) shows clearly. At Mali Mos?unj (Yugosl.) (Fig. 55) the square hall has ontwo sides what looks formally like an L-shaped porticus with terminal rooms, yet thehall itself is the point of entrance and it can hardly be for display or to overlook aview – the same problem as that presented by Ovillers and other row-houses.3 Itoccupies a disproportionately large area relative to the hall and is likely to havebeen simply another room. Another square house, Lisic?ici 2 (Yugosl.) (Fig. 55),4

suggests what it might be: a comparable L-shaped room heated by a hypocaust is theequivalent of a pavilion or other best room. With these houses can be grouped athird, Stolac 2 (Yugosl.) (Fig. 55), which has some evidence of functional distinctionexpressed by flooring materials in the same way as at Frocester Court. Here the hallis entered through a porch and into an area (2) paved with stone rubble, the rest ofthe room (6) having an L-shaped hard plaster floor. The larger subsidiary room 5, byintruding into the stone paving, must have directed attention to the body of the hallwhere the hearth was. A reasonable conjecture is that it stood opposite the doorway,with the place of honour behind it and behind that the doorway into the larger innerroom. The remainder of the hall was given over to some superior use.

This kind of plan is not illuminated by early modern comparisons; important L-shaped rooms seem to be unknown. Lisic?ici 2 suggests that rooms like this may at firsthave been divided according to customary use and only later, in both literal and typologicalsenses, broken up by partitions. It is the kind of process implied by Frocester Court(Glos.) and to be inferred in the difference between Wahlen (Switz.) and Mauren.

One or two houses formally of row-type may be better interpreted, because oftheir size, as a pair of square halls separated by a lobby or shrine-room. Bihac-Zaloz?je (Yugosl.) (Fig. 55) is like this, one of its halls being heated by a hypocaust.It can be compared to Wancourt (Somme) or Niedereschach-Fischbach (Bad.-Württ.)and has no specially south-east European characteristics. That is true also of thedouble-ended hall houses at Bruckneudorf (Aus.) [I] (Fig. 69) and Rohrbach (Aus.),a single-ended hall like Deva (Rom.) (Fig. 73) or the aisled hall at Kaisersteinbruch(Aus.) (Fig. 67). It is not that this part of Europe lacks types common further west,

Figure 55 Square halls


202

simply that they form a minority of villas and are outnumbered by others whichcannot easily be related to them.

That point is borne out by the unusual building Sümeg 1 (Hung.) which is anenigmatic instance of the hall-or-yard problem of southern Germany. The internalspace, some 18 m wide, is surrounded by rooms on three sides, two of which aretwo rooms deep. Since there are four pavilions touching corner to corner theyrequire timber verandas, without which they are inaccessible; but these makethe lighting of the double-depth sides difficult, and with a hall in the middle,impossible. So in that case the internal space is not a hall but a courtyard whichis also hard to explain in detail.5

ROW-HOUSES

A few row-houses, most of which are not much like those of France or Britain, can beidentified. An exception to this rule is Travnik Rankovicí (Yugosl.), which would notlook out of place in Picardy; Ovillers and Mons-en-Chausée are very similar. It wouldbe impossible, though, to match in the Somme basin a building backing on to the yardwall at Drac?evica (Yugosl.) (Fig. 56) which is a row of three large rooms and one orpossibly two smaller ones, each entered independently; there is no sign of porticus orveranda; and Lisic?ici 3 (Fig. 60) (following the numbering given by Cremos?nik whodug this site) is a smaller house of the same kind. Kran (Bulg.) comprises four cellsentered independently from a veranda and so has a general resemblance to westernrow-houses, which is as much as can be claimed for an Austrian house, Mautern amDonau, where only in [II] does the characteristic feature of the row-house, the lobby,appear; until then the rooms may have been approached independently from theporticus. Equally scarce is the porticus with pavilions, whose sole representative todate is the partially recovered villa of Sarmizegetusa (Rom.) (Fig. 56). The core buildingcan hardly be anything but a row-house of unorthodox plan; however the whole isreconstructed, the extreme individuality of villas in this part of Europe makes it unlikelyto have been absolutely symmetrical, as has been suggested.

ROW-HOUSE EQUIVALENTS

Axial Entrance-Halls

The few houses in this category are distinguished from the axial-corridor housesdescribed earlier (chapter 7) by having an entrance directly into the corridor and bya different disposition of rooms. In the simplest, Keszthely-Fenékpuszta 8 (Hung.)(Fig. 56), the entrance-hall is flanked by two identical apartments, each comprisingtwo equal rooms and a middle lobby, like the units at Downton (Wilts.). That it is alobby is implied by the impossibility of reaching the end rooms 2 and 7 from thehall, there being insufficient space for a doorway; access could only have beenthrough 3 and 6 respectively, or 1. The latter was perhaps, by analogy, a shrine roomperforming part of the function assigned to the middle room in a row-house such as


203

Newport (I.o.W) or Marshfield N IIIA (Glos.).6 Hardly more complex is Winden amSee II (Aus.) (Fig. 56). It differs from the Hungarian house in having unequal roomsin the two rows, all three on the south side having hypocausts, and also a porticus,part of which is cut off to provide a small end room whose purpose is unknown – aporter’s lodge is one possibility, a shrine another. It could be classed as an internalcorridor house and is a smaller and socially more closely knit version of Munzenberg-Gambach.

In III, Winden am See changed character by the addition of an apse and thecreation of a large room at that end (Fig. 56).7 In that respect it resembled Majdan(Yugosl.), a villa which, otherwise, has equal minor rooms like Keszthely 8 (Fig. 56);the porticus is reduced to fit between the end rooms, as if in imitation of the porticus-with-pavilions. Budakalász has affinities with these villas; it has the equal lesserrooms of Majdan and the porticus and apse of Winden III. All have a focal point in the

Figure 56 Row-house equivalents


204

apsidal room facing the entrance, so that anyone coming into the hall would instantlysee this dominating feature of the house, whether seat of honour or shrine.

Block Plans

What must surely be the extreme limit of compactness was reached at Budapest III-Csucshegy (Hung.).8 Only one other house falls into this category, the very interestingManerau [II] (Fig. 60).9 It seems to have begun in [I] with a wide entrance-hallequivalent to a transverse lobby in its primary function. To the right was a hall, to theleft two large rooms.10 Reorganisation in [II] produced in the east half what looks likea compact row-house; it has a lobby – longitudinal, in relation to this part of thebuilding – from which two room-plus-inner-room units were reached. Alternativeinterpretations are offered, that of IIB, which bears some likeness to Hummetroth orLussas-et-Nontronneau, being perhaps the more likely. In the west half the plan isless certain and the interpretation dubious; the two north-west rooms and the lobbymay form a unit and the remainder a hall, like the building at Hobita (Rom.) (Fig. 60)or, on a smaller scale, Izola (Yugosl.) (Fig. 60). This interpretation of Manerau [II]rests on the assumption that passage-rooms are unlikely to have found favour in theRoman Empire any more than in later periods, and if that is correct, the resultinglikeness between houses so far apart must arise from a common body of theory anda common approach to design.

Houses Essentially of Two Cells

An altogether simpler kind of house has a core of two cells, one or both of whichmay be subdivided, and one or two transverse corridors or lobbies. The nearlysquare House 1 at Maria Ellend-Ellender Weingarten (Aus.) (Fig. 57), tiny though itis, has a middle room with hypocaust and terrazzo floor and appears to have beenthe principal house of a farm. It was probably entered by the slightly tapering porticusat the north end, where a small projection on the west side, for which no explanationwas offered, may tentatively be interpreted as the base for a statue or shrine. Thestatus of the remaining room is unclear; its position suggests it might be an innerroom to the hall in the middle, its size that it was perhaps a second unit like theindependent rooms at Dracevica. This is a kind of small house that may have beenoccupied by a conjugal family or a stem family. Egregy (Hung.) may be a similarplan on a larger scale with the addition of a porticus.

Two-cell plans without lobby or entrance-hall appear in a number of houses. Oneat Sarajevo-Stup (Yugosl.) (Fig. 57) has a large well-built hearth in the middle of theopen hall-like living-room – not where it might have been expected, since this is aninner room. Entry to the house is through a larger and apparently unheated room bytwo adjoining doorways. This, like Sarica (Rom.) (Fig. 57), must be a single-familyhouse of a size and simplicity not paralleled in western Europe. A slightly morecomplicated plan is found in the small house D at Kaisersteinbruch. It was clearly ahouse of some quality, all rooms being heated; the two small rooms had hypocausts


205

and the large one a circular oven. What differentiates it from other buildings of itskind is the close relation between it and the adjoining house,11 D being a superiorresidence adjoining the work building C; for C[I] is said to have had, under the floorof the small room 3, a pottery kiln.12

Houses of this type may have both cells subdivided. Fischamend-Katherinenhof(Aus.) (Fig. 57), which is less well recorded than Kaisersteinbruch D, is another well-appointed house, with wall-painting and evidence of hypocaust heating, yet if it is asingle house its plan is curiously clumsy. The largest room (1), a general living- andworkroom, probably, was the point of entrance from which other rooms were reached;yet, unless timber partitions were not noticed, there must have been a second passage-room. An alternative is to suppose that each of the two square rooms 1 and 2 had aninner room on the north side, although that raises an unanswerable question aboutthe function of 2, which can hardly be a second general-purpose room unless thewhole formed two separate domestic units.

Simple plans lacking informative detail are hard to understand. Cincis (Rom.) (Fig.57) has some resemblance to Fischamend in its block of four rooms (2–5), yet thepresence of a narrower end cell (1) may invalidate the comparison. Room 2 looks likea lobby but, if the house were entered there, room 4 (or, less likely, 3) would be apassage room to 5. Entry into 3 would remove this difficulty without producing a planthat can be paralleled in the number and arrangement of rooms.

HOUSES WITH ONE CROSS-WING

One of the most remarkable Balkan houses is Stolac 3 (Fig. 58), justly called byTruhelka, its excavator, the Mosaic House. It comprises a range of two rooms (3, 2)

Figure 57 Houses essentially of two cells


206

and a cross-wing (1),13 and at the rear is the largest room (4). All had mosaics, that in4 being of high quality with animals depicted in the middle panels, yet the threealigned rooms formed a little enfilade, one entered from another, and the rear room4 can only have been entered from 2. This arrangement rules out Stolac 3 as a richlyappointed row-house because effectively it has only two rooms, the other two beingsuccessive antechambers to them; indeed, it is not easy to envisage it as a house atall, there being no ancillary service rooms. No real parallel is known; the nearest, butonly in its proportion of mosaics to rooms, is perhaps the small house MiltonKeynesBancroft 1 V (Bucks.). Stolac 3 must surely have been the centrepiece of agroup of buildings, and the enfilade suggests some purpose to do with administrationor the reception of inferiors by a local magnate.

Two small cross-wing houses at Stolac 5 (Fig. 58) and the smaller villa at Regelsbrunn(Aus.) (Fig. 58) are very similar and fairly conventional compared with Stolac 3. Stolac5 is the more intelligible of the two because an adjoining building clarifies its functionin the little villa complex. It is entered at one end of the porticus, beside which are twointercommunicating rooms – a small one (1) being an antechamber to the larger (2) –forming a unit of some kind. At the other end is a larger room serving work purposesbut smaller than the word workhall usually denotes. Standing almost corner to cornerwith this building is a much larger one, a hall. The position of the entrance, whoseprecise size is lost through stone robbing but is approximately in the middle, implies afunctional division into two squarish spaces separated by a narrow one, as has beenenvisaged for Bristol-Kingsweston and other halls. Their relation to the rear porticus-like rooms is uncertain; Proboj (Yugosl.) (Fig. 58) is similar in this respect.

Stolac 5 comprises the equivalent of the row-house and aisled house found atMansfield Woodhouse (Notts.) (Fig. 7) or the small square house 2 and the hall 1 atLauffen am Neckar (Bad.-Württ) (Fig. 41). These comparisons, and they could be

Figure 58 Houses with one cross-wing


207

multiplied, show how unusual Stolac 3 is and suggest that it had some importantfunction which, elsewhere, was carried out in part of a larger building. Both theStolac houses are superior to the larger one at Proboj (Fig. 58), which is formally ofcrosswing type and gives the impression of a working farmhouse.

HOUSES WITH MULTIPLE SMALL ROOMS

Bruckneudorf [F] and Manerau [II] represent in south-west Europe the tendencyobservable in western provinces to replace halls by houses with more and smallerrooms. Two closely related Romanian houses exemplify the same development,Apahida from the beginning and Ciumafaia II (Fig. 59) after extensive rebuilding.Both are unusual among houses of modest size in having two apses unconnectedwith baths, something that links them to the far simpler house Keszthely-Fenékpuszta7 (Hung.) (Fig. 59). The spatially impressive effect of an apse and the kind of use itis likely to have been put to seem to make one enough for any but the largesthouses. When comparatively small villas duplicate such a special feature there mustbe some fundamental reason for it, especially in a province not notable for advancedforms of architectural expression.

Ciumafaia underwent at least one major rebuilding which has made it imperfectlyintelligible. The plan claimed for the early phase14 bears no resemblance to anyother villa and, more important, the rooms neither hang together coherently nor fiteasily into the later work.15 Only on [F] (Fig. 59), which has the same awkwardnessof an altered plan as Bruckneudorf, can positive comment be made. The north sideof the building resembles Budakalasz or Winden a.S. III, and room 2 is apparentlyrelated to it in much the same way as the entrance-hall to the apses in those housesexcept for being off-axis and closed off from it by (presumably) a doorway. On thefront of the house a second apsidal room (4) is not, as might be expected, connectedwith baths, of which there is no other possible trace; instead it provides a room ofsome architectural quality matching the one on the other side and must reflect asocial requirement, not mere luxury, otherwise it would be more natural for twosuch rooms to form part of a suite. If that be accepted, the rooms of Ciumafaia aregrouped around the entrance-hall (2) and the lobby (3) opening off it (to avoidpassage-rooms), with 5 and 4 each part of a two-room unit, leaving 11 and the roomto north as another.

Figure 59 Houses with multiple small rooms


208

Apahida (Fig. 59), only 15 km away, has three apses of which 7a, part of a bathsuite, can be disregarded. The house was entered on the south side by the L-shapedentrance-hall (7), the counterpart of 2+3 at Ciumafaia. The remainder falls into twoparts: to the west a block of three rooms entered from the hall may comprise alivingroom, an apsidal inner room and a service room; to the east the lobby (5a)leads to the important room 5 and the large room 1. That by no means disposes of allthe difficulties, nor does it explain all the small rooms, but interpretation on thoselines is strengthened by a comparison with the simpler house Keszthely-Fenékpuszta7 (Fig. 59) which also has two apsidal rooms. The entrance-hall separates a superiorblock of rooms (4–6) from an inferior one (2, 3) as noted by Thomas,16 each terminatingin an apse. Why both apses should have been set off-axis, though not explicable,demonstrates that they and the rooms were used in a similar way.

Most of the houses so far mentioned prove on analysis to be readily divisible intotwo parts. This is not true of all the two-cell plans unless the assumption be madethat passage-rooms are unlikely to have found favour then as now. Though thesignificance of bipartite division is open to argument, that characteristic, runningthrough so many other kinds of house and expressed in such varied ways, requiressome equally comprehensive explanation if the notion of joint family occupation isrejected. As will appear later, two important groups of houses lack this duality, butseveral larger forms of plan can be interpreted as multi-family establishments.

THE WAYS OF GROUPING BUILDINGS

In Line

As with the houses, so with the grouping of buildings: the villas of south-east Europehave only a passing resemblance to those further west.

Villas like Montacute-Ham Hill or Maillen-Al Sauvenière which were set out inline and linked by porticuses, baths or other rooms do not exist. The nearestapproach is Mautern am Donau (Aus.), where a workhall abutted the house tonorth, and Kaisersteinbruch C (Fig. 60) may be another such. Related to it is BudapestIII-Testvérhegy (Hung.), where the principal building of three steps out of linewith the others.

Other villas which have little or no resemblance to anything in western Europemay be explicable on these lines. Konska (Bulg.) (Fig. 60) has two sizeable hallsfronted by a single end-entrance porticus, and abutting this block is another, also oftwo distinct parts, which looks like domestic quarters. The less well-preserved buildingat Chichmanovtsi (Bulg.) may be an instance of this arrangement, with two domesticunits at the end of a workhall.

The point of laying out buildings in line is to demonstrate the relative importanceand status of each. This aim was achieved in a different way with two fairly smallhouses at Weyeregg (Aus.) which stand a short distance apart on opposite sides of aboundary wall joining them. This disposition of two houses, which are plentifullyfurnished with mosaics and hypocausts but have few service rooms and in thatrespect have a south-east European air, is comparable to that of the two principal


209

houses at Collingham-Dalton Parlours (Fig. 68). Its essence is that two houses wereindependent in all aspects of daily life while acting jointly in working a farm andforming a single unit in political matters. The total number of households within thehouseful could vary and the closeness of the houses reflects the degree to whicheveryday life was integrated. Where the houses were a little distance apart and moreor less equal in size and appointments, as at Weyeregg, two parts of a kin-group co-operate economically and politically on equal terms. Where they stand corner tocorner and are considerably different, as at Mettet-Bauselenne [I] (Belg.), they are inevery sense closer and this leads eventually to a degree of integration in [F]. Wherethey stand end to end forming an architecturally integrated whole, as at Marshfield(Fig. 66), one house is in a dependent or subordinate relation from the beginning.How the two elements begin and how they develop can be compared with thevarying fortunes of their counterparts in other villas, notably with the row-house andaisled hall at Norton Disney and Sparsholt.

As a Block

An alternative to housing various domestic and agricultural functions in abuttingbuildings was to put them together under one roof. That is what seems to havehappened at Hobita (Fig. 60). The largest room (1), the hall, is at the south-westcorner, with a room (2) to the north which may correspond to the long narrow roomsometimes found at the end of a hall.17 In the other half of the building and reachedby a corridor (3) is a small bath suite and two rooms. As is apparent from the plan,Hobita is unusual among unified houses in the proportions of its rooms, two of thelargest being oblong and only a minor one having the common square shape.

Izola (Yugosl.) (Fig. 60) has a general resemblance to Hobita in the position of thehall at the corner of the core rooms and in its room proportions. On the south side,what is said to be a porticus is unbelievably narrow for the purpose;18 more likelythe house was entered by an internal porch on the north side that served also as alobby to the two flanking rooms.

Bearing in mind how widely the porticus in its various forms was adopted, it isextraordinary that so many Balkan houses manage without this very useful way ofarticulating the rooms of even a simple plan. Novi Saher (Yugosl.) is small and socompact that it is hard to imagine how it functioned. It has four rooms, two squarishones (2 and 4) flanked by two long rooms (1 and 5); both 4 and 5 had hypocausts.Room 1 is an inferior room from which the hypocausts appear to have been fired; 2may have been the point of entrance. It is difficult to see the point of giving whatmay have been the best room in the house, 5, such extraordinary proportions as 4:1,yet since it is only a local manifestation of a widespread phenomenon the spacemust have been usable in practice and desired for social reasons. All that can be saidis that such a shape necessitates use as two parts and a function duplicated; that andlimited resources may have determined the plan.

Several times in the preceding chapters a connection between western and southeastEurope, running contrary to the general impression given by villas of the region, hasbeen noticed. The theme of compactness brings another instance in the likeness


210

Figure 60


211

between the villas of Deutschkreutz (Aus.) and Friedberg-Pfingstweide 2 (Bad.-Württ.)(Fig. 41). Both are effectively three rooms in depth, combining a row-house, a halland a porticus arranged as a triple-pile. This is particularly true of Deutschkreuz,where the porticus has, not pavilions but an internal porch which, implicitly, isflanked by rooms. The hall, most unusually for a room of its size (19.5 × 8 m), washeated by a hypocaust and had a mosaic floor.19

Houses like these may represent the same tendency as that which producedcompact row-houses, one which runs contrary to that other tendency, predominantin the western provinces, to elongate a house one room deep, whether in a line oraround a courtyard.

L-SHAPED PLANS

Given the general idea of a house with rooms and buildings set out in a line, a bigvilla might stretch out very far, Maillen-Ronchinne (Belg.) for almost 300 m, Voerendaal-Ten Hove (Neth.) (despite its having courtyards) 180 m. Although nothing as big asthese has yet been found in south-east Europe, for the more modest continuous total

Figure 60 Ways of grouping buildings


212

length of 65 m of Iskar-Gara (Bulg.) (Fig. 60) an L-plan was preferred. The domesticor north range20 comprises, between a bath block and a hall, four rooms, all ofdifferent size – a characteristic of row-houses. At the south end of the east wing is alarger hall – a workhall – and between it and the small hall are two unequal-sizedrooms, one perhaps a lobby. The whole provides much the same kind ofaccommodation found at Konska: each villa has two halls and two rooms linked bya porticus, with further domestic rooms – fewer at Konska than Iskar – beyond. Andalthough Iskar is inferior in amenities to Sudeley-Spoonley Wood (Glos.), the elementscomprised in the respective plans are not very different – major and minor halls, abath block and two or three domestic units – so that overall the two houses aresufficiently alike for anyone to have felt at home in both, even to a doorway cuttingoff the bigger workhall.

Kralev Dol (Bulg.) (Fig. 60)21 is bigger, having the considerable total length of 100m. Although it is not strictly of L-plan, the north range was clearly the least importantand will be disregarded. A slight break forward near the middle of the south rangeshows that, contrary to what its excavator Naidenova supposed, the east part (rooms1–8) is of a different and probably later phase from the rest. The remainder makes aninstructive comparison with Iskar. It comprises, first, four rooms of different sizeslooking like a little row-house. In the west wing a small hall (14) adjoins the domesticunits and a pair of square rooms separates it from the large workhall. How theremaining room 19 and room 20 in the north wing, and also the oblique east range21, modified this pattern is impossible to say, but otherwise the resemblance to Iskaris marked.

Because Kralev Dol is unusually fully reported, this alternative interpretation isworth discussing further. The added east part of the south range22 was shown byarchaeological evidence to be devoted to work activities or storage and, being sealedoff from the rest of the house by a wall, was entered separately by a strangelyoffcentre monumental gateway. This much is well founded;23 the west wing is thebone of contention. This was the residential part, according to Naidenova, becauseit has a colonnaded porticus, the rooms are more spacious and comfortable, and ahoard of silver coins was found in 16. It is certainly remarkable that the colonnadeterminates before covering the supposed row-houses – or did it? But comparisonwith British villas may extend to the different widths of ranges; for at Chedworth andSpoonley Wood the best rooms are the narrower, and the same appears true of Iskar.Like reverse symmetry, different range widths form part of a code which no doubtapplied in Bulgaria as in Britain.

FORMS OF COURTYARD AND FARMYARD

Most kinds of yard plan found in western countries appear not at all or very rarely insouth-east Europe. While it is hardly surprising, in view of the smallness of so manyhouses and the fewness of the outbuildings, that signs of regular geometrical planningare rare, even small irregularly shaped enclosures of the kind so common in Baden-Württemberg have not often been discovered. Insufficient exploration of villa sitescaused by a combination of lack of interest in the villa as a farm and lack of government


213

resources as compared with Germany or France must account for much of this blankin the record. Nevertheless, it is strange, in view of the determination implicit in theextent of digging on sites where the lack of mosaics, hypocausts and baths wouldhave discouraged many west European archaeologists, that boundary ditches orbanks were either not recognised or not reported, because it is impossible to believethat none such existed.

RECTILINEAR YARDS

A few villas have the buildings laid out in so regular a fashion as to imply an equallyregular boundary wall or enclosure. One Hungarian villa, Szilágy-Arnyoldal, has asmall scatter of buildings reminiscent of Hungen-Bellersheim (Hessen) (Fig. 43), butno enclosure was found. Buildings are laid out parallel at Stolac [6],24

Szentkirályszabadaja-Romkut, Hobita (Fig. 60) and the early or north villa atKaisersteinbruch. Nevertheless, plans like these may be accompanied by an onlypartially rectilinear or geometrical yard, as Hobita shows; conversely, buildings werenot necessarily sited parallel to the walls of a (nearly) rectilinear yard, as at the largervilla of Regelsbrunn (Aus.).25 Enclosures which are rectilinear in part only occurseveral times. Two and a half sides of Kaisersteinbruch look as if a square yard wasintended and then the idea was abandoned and the wall completed irregularly (Fig.60); Lisic?ici 3 (Yugosl.) (Fig. 60) and Hobita give the same impression. It is notobvious why these yards were completed as they were, and what was gained by thechange of shape. Whether Deutschkreuz (Aus.) had a truly rectangular yard, as thepart uncovered suggests, cannot be known; one point telling against the idea is thatthe porticus of what is taken to be the principal house has, running obliquely fromit, a wall reminiscent of that at Bad Homburg (Hessen) (Fig. 9), as if the yard hadbeen divided.

A few of the largest villas have correspondingly large walled enclosures.Nemesvámos-Balácpuszta has inner and outer courts with sides about 200 m longoverall. Spanning the wall between them is a large bath building. It must have beenintended to serve people of not too dissimilar status living in both yards, for otherwiseits siting is pointless. A second house was not found, no doubt because little of theouter yard was explored, but the baths imply some kind of dual occupation of thevilla. At Bruckneudorf, in a courtyard as large as this, there is no apparent concern tocreate a setting for the grand house which, strangely according to the standards ofFrench or German villas, faces a corner.

It is curious that so little attention was paid to the relation of buildings to yard inthese large villas when the much smaller Bulgarian villa of Chatalka-DelimonyovoNiva is set out with great formality. In its rectangular yard all the buildings are alignedwith the sides and the principal house dominates the whole from a position not oftenparalleled in western Europe, very close to and in the middle of a long wall.26


214

COURTYARD VILLAS AND PERISTYLES

Bulgaria has a number of villas built around a courtyard which is far too large everto have been roofed. Sofia-Obelja, on a trapezoidal plan, differs comparatively littlefrom a British courtyard house. Pleven-Kailuka has a small inner courtyard and alarger outer one, Kadin Most probably the same but with the buildings set out in amore disjointed way; these two have a less familiar look. A local form of courtyardvilla has a square enclosing wall against which are buildings little wider than theranges at Basse-Wavre and, freestanding, a wider hall-like building with two or threerooms. Mogilets is one, the architecturally more pretentious Orlandovtsi (Fig. 60)another.27 Like some other villas of the region, the latter gives the impression ofapplying features familiar in western contexts in an unfamiliar and even, as withpavilions, in a slightly bizarre way. The porticus-with-pavilions theme was evidentlyknown at some level but whoever commissioned Orlandovtsi dispensed with theelement making it so attractive, the porticus which, whether colonnaded or not, byits contrast of height and bulk created a characteristically Roman appearance. Onlypavilions, two square, two round and all of markedly different size provide a variationon the four square pavilions of Manderscheid (Rhld-Pf.) and other villas and conveythe different standing of their users.28

The distinctive asymmetrical plan of the freestanding building at Orlandovtsi isparalleled at Ljus?ina (Yugosl.) (Fig. 60), where it is almost freestanding. Apsidalasymmetrical buildings like these have been interpreted above as basilicas andthese two certainly bear a remarkable resemblance to one at Badajoz (Fig. 48), butthat it perhaps too grand a title and function to apply here, or at least to theotherwise modest Bulgarian villa. A virtually identical building at Chatalka-Lambata(Bulg.) adjoins the baths and is interpreted as tepidarium (the apsidal room) andvestibule (the small room adjoining), which, indeed, they may be, but a tepidariumof this size (10×6 m) for an otherwise quite small bath suite seems disproportionate.29

Perhaps it could have accommodated the socialising connected with bathing. Thismay be another instance of the Roman architectural repertoire being transmuted ina Balkan context.

The actual shape of a courtyard seems to be less important for the siting ofbuildings than in Germany or Britain, so that, for example, Salzburg-Liefering (Aus.)is the nearest place where the principal house is tucked away in a corner like someRhenish villas. To this generalisation Sofia-Obelja provides an interesting exceptionin having, around its trapezoidal courtyard,30 four ranges of different width whichresemble the differences found at Chedworth, for example, and which form a socialhierarchy. The most important range seems to be the narrowest, the west. Its porticusis entered from the yard by a wide opening leading to an equally wide doorway intoa shrine room, and there are smaller domestic rooms beside it. The wider and largerrooms of the north range are reached by two openings from yard to porticus ofdifferent widths to show their relative status – like Maulévrier; and to south and eastthe rooms are not of sufficient importance to need a porticus. Two entrances fromthe yard into a porticus would not have surprised anyone familiar with North Leigh(Oxon.), nor the shrine room anyone who knew Newport; and Chedworth hasalready been mentioned. Panik (Fig. 60) shows an interesting variation on the double


215

entrance theme with two porches of different size. The larger one led to the domesticrooms, the smaller to the inferior side and the baths, but the latter seems also to haveprovided access to the room opening off porticus 19, which has the size and wideentrance of a representational room; and further along the porticus is a room ofcruciform shape suggestive of a non-domestic purpose. If this analysis of thecomponent parts of a Balkan villa is valid it shows that the social structure underlyingit was not so very different from that revealed by analysis of west European villas.

Peristyles will be dealt with briefly because they require more detailed study thanhas been possible. Several large villas of this type are known in Hungary and Bulgariabut not in former Yugoslavia or Romania. Most are the product of more than onephase of building with Hosszuhéteny (Hung.) as a probable exception. Its uniqueoctagonal pavilions, which were evidently built to impress, are an instance of thechange familiar features underwent east of the Alps.

Tac-Fövenypuszta (Hung.) may also have been built on a peristyle in I or alternativelywas begun to such a design and only completed in II. The row of five rooms at thenorth end implies a design of that kind; after the addition of three apses in echelon inII this villa had a certain likeness to the Spanish villa of Cuevas de Soria.

A much bigger peristyle at Madara (Bulg.) is unusual in being surrounded byranges of double depth throughout except for a square representational room ofabout the same size as that at Blankenheim. Madara, though, is highly unusual inhaving, outside the wall which surrounds it quite closely, several buildings, somelarge, arranged more or less in rows. In this respect it resembles the big Hungarianvilla of Keszthely-Fenékpuszta which, with its fifteen subsidiary buildings andsurrounding wall studded with round towers, forms a ‘fortified town-like settlement’.31

Western parallels for villas like these simply do not exist. Montrozier-Argentelle, forexample, has as many buildings as Madara but they are set out in lines more like apalace, while very large villas such as Mettet-Bauselenne (Belg.) or Orbe (Switz.)convey much more sense of a grand house dominating regularly set-out lesser buildingsthan the more sprawling and apparently orderless layout of the Bulgarian andHungarian villas. Without necessarily denying that the latter are villas, theirdevelopment and perhaps their beginnings must differ sharply from anything inwestern Europe.

FORTIFIED VILLAS?

Keszthely-Fenékpuszta was certainly fortified. Its walls are strengthened by towersof real defensive value, some 10 m in diameter and far removed from the toy towers(about 1.5 m diameter) which embellish the perimeter walls of Italian villas at SetteFinestre or Cosa. The problem with Keszthely is not whether it was fortified butwhether it was a villa.

Several other villas said to be fortified have been claimed as such through theconfusion of pavilions with corner turrets. In this regard Romania provides a specialsource of confusion in the fortlets of the type called the quadriburgium, of whichGornea may be the best example.32 It has a square plan of much the same size asOrlandovtsi and has four towers wrapped around the corners, each with a doorway


216

into the central space. The latter is devoid of buildings but is entered by a bigmilitary gateway. The relevance of such obviously military buildings to Romanisedfarms is questionable. Only Bistrica (Bulg.) Has anything like this treatment of thecorners, but it is so much smaller, about 14×14 m – the size of the smallest castellumon the frontier defences in central Germany – that its defensive value is doubtful.Possibly it was a police or signal post, only partly roofed. Those appear to bepossibilities, but since a Bulgarian scholar thinks fit to classify this ambiguous site asa villa, Bistrica has been accepted as such (above, p. 200).

CONCLUSION

The villas of south-east Europe show marked differences of form from those furtherwest even when, as happens in a considerable proportion of them, the elements –domestic units, workhalls, secondary workhalls – recur at both ends of the continent.That suggests a generally similar social structure throughout Europe which foundsomewhat different architectural expression while drawing on the same body ofideas. Why that should be can only be answered from a much wider body of evidenceand by relating it to the general problem of how ideas in material culture weretransmitted.

PART III

THE VILLA SYSTEM INOPERATION:

MODES OF CHANGE

219

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE LATE PRE-ROMAN IRONAGE BACKGROUND

It is generally accepted that virtually all villas in the European provinces of theRoman Empire were built and occupied by indigenous inhabitants. Why did they

choose any particular one of several forms of villa? Various factors must have influencedchoice: cost, obviously; the range of forms available; and suitability to the socialcircumstances and aspirations of the builder. Cost, which is principally in labour, isat present beyond conjecture and the availability of house types will be discussedlater (chapter 16). A satisfactory understanding of the third point would entailknowledge of family structure, number of dependants, numbers of servants or slaves,and the pattern of hospitality. It goes without saying that much of the requisiteinformation is hard to come by, yet a beginning can be made by considering thekinds of house in use on the eve of the conquest.

THE EVIDENCE: LIMITATIONS AND PROBLEMS

To reconstruct from settlements the social structure of a country under Roman rule ishard but not as hard as understanding its native origins. Many villas have beenexcavated because a farmer could not, until the 1950s, ignore the difficulties masonryfootings create for the plough; any earlier open settlements went unnoticed unlesssome eye-catching object were unearthed and consequently the body of evidence ismuch smaller. Germany illustrates a discrepancy in the kinds of evidence available;on the one hand the large number of highly visible cult earthwork enclosures calledViereckschanzen, on the other a paucity of the farms which must have accompaniedthem. A survey of twenty-five years of excavation on Iron Age sites mentions only asingle open settlement, one at Bad Nauheim which was a centre of salt production.1

Even on the most carefully dug open settlements houses have proved elusive, eithermutilated by later structures or their fugitive traces indistinguishable in black soil.Thus a survey of the Celts in Baden-Württemberg published in 1981 speaks of thiskind of site only in the most general terms,2 and annual summaries of the intenseactivity during the following decade have thrown less light than might have beenhoped for on the immediate predecessors of villas. Nor is the exploration of open

— Chapter Thirteen —

220

settlements in Hessen any more advanced,3 and it is tantalising that no late preRomanIron Age settlement within the frontier has yet been excavated and publishedcompletely. Much the most important body of pre-Roman house types has beenexcavated over the past forty years at the hill-fort of Manching and recently a majorstudy of their measurements and design principles has been published.4

The situation is a little better in Britain and Belgium and much better in Holland,where fuller information is available than anywhere else and with it an unparalleledrange and depth of discussion of early house types.5 In all three countries sites havebeen excavated which begin before or about the time of the conquest and continueuntil Romanised to greater or less degree. Among them Rijswijk-de Bult stands out asa model of meticulous digging and interpretation and, although Britain can shownothing on this scale, work on house sites and particularly discussion of theirinterpretation have been enlightening. In recent years French excavations haveproduced reliable evidence and useful syntheses, accompanied by destruction of theancient myths about those bottoms of huts (fonds de cabanes) which for so longobscured understanding. As for other parts of the Empire, little seems to be knownabout immediately pre-Roman houses, even from such widely quoted sites as Basel-Gasfabriek (Switz.).

The strictly pre-Roman evidence can be supplemented from sites with indigenouskinds of house, even though they fall within the Roman period: sites, that is, where thematerial effects of the new rule are confined to portable objects or the reorganisationof yards and enclosures. Moreover, imprecise dating, coupled with uneven geographicalcoverage, makes it hard to know, in most countries, just what the houses immediatelypreceding villas were like on the eve of conquest. Germany illustrates the difficulties.Many excavations have been conducted in that country, especially in Baden-Württembergand Bavaria. All are reported according to the Hallstatt/La Tène sequence, and only aspecialist could redefine their chronology on the lines proposed by Collis6 to showwhich settlements are most relevant to the present concern. Moreover, becauseoccupation levels have been destroyed, houses have to be discussed almost entirely instructural terms: an unsatisfactory situation occasionally bedevilled by wild interpretationsof soil traces that have confused matters further.

TWO-AISLED HOUSES: FORMS AND DISTRIBUTION

One widespread type of house has a rectangular plan two or three times as long asit is wide and, on the long axis, the principal element of roof support, comprising anumber of posts rising to a ridge-piece to which the common rafters were attached.Since it has no generally accepted name in English the readily intelligible continentalterm ‘two-aisled house’ will be adopted. Functional interpretation of long rectangularplans has to conform to certain limitations. A point made earlier has to be reiterated:if the entrance is in the middle, the building is virtually divided into two parts; if nearone end, the part nearer the entrance becomes to some extent a passage.

The considerable variations of wall structure and size of ridge-post recorded inbuildings of this type do not affect interpretation of the plan. It is important, asstudents of vernacular building learned long ago, to treat plan and structure as

— The Late Pre-Roman Iron Age Background —

221

independent variables, even in archaeological contexts where both superstructureand plan have to be derived from ground-level evidence. But the roof supportsintroduce further possibilities. Where the internal posts are closely spaced they arelikely to have been incorporated in any partitions that may have existed, andthemselves tended to break up the unity of the living-space if it occupied more thanone bay of the structure; furthermore, the lack of evidence for partitions, whether ornot caused by the loss of occupation levels, does not preclude the drawing ofinferences about functional division from differences in bay rhythm.

Germany can show a wide scatter of two-aisled houses. Two at Haunstetten(Bay.) (Fig. 61) near Augsburg are among the few firmly ascribed to the Late LaTène period; neither produced hearths or other evidence of how they were used.At the other end of the country the early Roman site of Bedburg-Garsdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 68) has, where a workhall might be expected in a fully-fledged villa,an un-Roman-looking double square building (11×22 m) with four hearths allclose to the ridgeposts. Another large ridge-post house among several in a Hallstattsettlement at Eching-Neufahrn (Bay.) has a floor area of 130 sq. m; and the Urnfield-Hallstatt settlement at Eching-Autobahn (Fig. 61) produced both house 16 of 16×7m and the exceptionally large house 1 (21×9.6 m), which was divided into twoprincipal rooms.

For the Low Countries we have fuller evidence, albeit largely of the early Romanperiod, and for the Meuse-Demer-Scheldt area it has been collected.7 The seriesbegins c. 300 BC (Middle Iron Age) at Haps (Neth.) and continues with the Oss-Ussen (Neth.) type, defined by structural characteristics, which appears in the firstcentury BC. Not long afterwards the Alphen-Ekeren type, defined in similar terms,appears. Both persist for a long time and a settlement like Hoogeloon, spanning twohundred years, produced as many as thirty examples. Houses in both groups havean average width of 6–7 m, range in length from 12 to 20 m, and reveal littleevidence of how they were partitioned or used. Later still is Beegden 1 (Fig. 61).

How widely two-aisled houses are distributed is uncertain. Britain has nothingof the kind that is definitely pre-Roman but, just as the later two-aisled stonebuilding at the villa of Bocholtz-Vlengendaal (Neth.) (Fig. 46) shows its affinitywith those described above, so the incompletely explored Building 6 at the Rudston(Yorks.) villa, combining stone walls with a ridge-post, suggest that timber precursorsawait discovery. A very uncertain example, smaller than those in the Netherlands,may occur at Fishtoft (Lines.) (Fig. 7); it is 11×4 m with clay walls, had a hearth ateach end, and looks as if the walls have been considerably rebuilt. It appears to bethe largest house of a group including a smaller rectangular one and a circularhut.8 An entirely illusory building of this kind at Pilsdon Pen (Dorset), alleged tobe no wider than the Fishtoft house but at least three times and implicitly fivetimes as long (32 m, 55 m!), deserves mention as a curiosity of archaeology.9 It wasrightly compared by its excavator to a cross-slotted palisade ditch at Bundenbach-Altburg (Bad.-Württ.).10

Of the few examples from France two may be cited. Thoraise (Doubs) has afourbay building of very regular ridge-post and wall-post spacing, and Vix (Côte-d’Or) is an equally regular two-bay outbuilding.11


222

TWO-AISLED HOUSES: INTERPRETATION

What can be said about the uses to which this type of building was put? Only theevidence from the Low Countries is full enough for serious consideration. It can bedivided into two main categories, those houses with clear signs of accommodationfor cattle or other animals and those without. Despite the lack of positive evidencein the second and more numerous group, those at Haps have, nevertheless, beenassimilated to the first group on the basis of their division into two unequal parts. By

Figure 61 Aisled buildings


223

analogy with two- and three-aisled houses elsewhere, the larger part served as abyre or (a significant qualification) ‘conceived of more broadly, as a work-room’.12

This may be true but it is not accompanied by discussion of the bay systems of theprimary roof supports, the ridge-posts, which require analysis.

The largest and best preserved building at Haps, house T (Fig. 61 ),13 has fiveridgeposts, one of them exactly in the middle of the building, with a bay rhythm ofcacbbc, a being the biggest. The logic of this is that the middle bay c corresponds tothe width of the two opposite entrances and demarcates a cross-passage, whetherdefined by structure or customary use. Next to (west of) the entrance bay the longestbay of all has the characteristic openness, free as far as possible of encumberingposts, that has been remarked in the principal living area of three-aisled domesticbuildings of all kinds. How the rest of the building – the lower end, surely – wasused its bbc rhythm does not make clear, but the greater number of posts hints at abyre, as in three-aisled houses. One other point: given that both end bays are short,the closeness of the end ridge-posts to the gable-end walls14 must relate to thestructural necessities of a hipped roof. In general the end bays are so short that theycan only have performed some minor function subsidiary to that of the adjoininglarger bay and have to be disregarded in a functional analysis.

House T is not typical. Only in one other (V) of twenty-one houses does an axialbay correspond precisely to the entrances and in seven it is slightly longer. In theremainder the house is entered in a longer, and sometimes the longest, bay. All butone house (B) has a ridge-post aligned with the door-jambs nearer the upper endand forming a barrier, probably structural rather than customary, between entranceand upper end. Why was another barrier not thought necessary between entranceand lower end? And why did the lower end, in ten houses, have a bay as long as thatin the upper end or longer when indubitable three-aisled byre-houses retain shortbays at that end? No doubt the notion of a workroom may account for this situation,and the ambiguity about function was repeated in relation to a house of ‘the beginningof the Middle Iron Age’ at Zijderveld (Neth.) (Fig. 61),15 There, where the lower endbay was double the length of those at the upper end, ‘the intention . . . could onlyhave been to create here (in the storage or cattle area) as much room as possible’.16

If this is true it contrasts sharply with the care taken in the big combined shelters ofnorth Germany to divide the livestock area into stalls.

Paradoxically, houses with both more and fewer ridge-posts than the two justdiscussed present greater difficulties of interpretation. A longer and narrower houseat Oss-Ussen (Fig. 61), more lightly built and with a less regular bay spacing,17 islinked to Haps T by having, exactly in the middle, one of the two posts defining theshortest bay, next to which is the longest bay. That the former was the position ofthe entrance is confirmed by slight indications of extra posts in both long walls.Here, though, spatial organisation is more complicated because the building has along bay at each end, hence the presumed domestic end comprises the longest andone of the next longest bays as well as the entrance – the equivalents of a hall andinner room, perhaps, and divided by custom rather than a partition. The lower endis more problematic. Whether or not the longest bay needed an open roof truss, thespacing of bays points to some differentiation of function more complex than that atHaps T or Zijderveld.


224

Two-aisled houses with this number of axial posts are exceptional. A commonerform, of varied length and sometimes bigger than any of those so far mentioned, haswide-spaced posts making, usually, three or four axial bays. This gives spacingbetween posts of up to 6.5 m, and as de Boë recognised, intermediate tie-beamtrusses carrying king-posts were needed.18 Two points arise from this: first, the roof-supporting structure itself gives no hint of any differentiation of use in the building,nor of the position of the entrance; second, some important purpose must underliethe clearing away of posts by a comparatively complicated technique.

That purpose was present already in the first century of our era at Hoogeloon, wherethe houses have less in common than might be expected with those at Haps. All haveridge-posts in the gable-ends, so floor space throughout could be used more effectively;and only one house of thirty has the post in the middle characteristic of Haps. And thereis a tendency for bays to be more equal in size, so that whereas Haps has only fiveexamples with two bays of the largest size a, Hoogeloon has six and three more withthree.19 Yet, even in the solitary case of house 22, comprising only three equal bays, thedisposition of ridge-posts in such an apparently logical way can hardly have a purelystructural explanation because the bay length of 6 m demands intermediate, and technicallymore difficult, support for a ridge-piece weighed down by rafters and cladding.

Variation of bay length in a house requires explanation and, because structuralconsiderations alone demand regular spacing, it has to be sought in functional terms.The obvious division, between living-space and byre, is difficult to apply, given thevarying proportions between the two elements in those houses at Hoogeloon wherea difference could be recognised: the byre may occupy between a fifth and a third ofthe whole. Moreover, not a single byre matched a bay length exactly, although thedifference might in every case be accounted for by an entrance passage or feedingwalk; nor is the relative length of the byre bay constant, being neither the largest northe smallest. That said, there can be no doubt that small differences of length wereimportant, as the babab rhythm of house X, with no more than a metre as betweenone bay and another, shows. Explanation is further complicated by a temporal differencein use, the byre-houses being later.

The simplest case is presented by two houses (5, 8) which have a single internalpost forming two unequal bays differing by 2 m in length. This difference may berelated to the point of entrance: whereas the short bay in the middle of Haps and Oss-Ussen is demarcated by a post on each side, here there is only one, forming, it canbe assumed, a quasi-passage entrance in the longer bay.

The possibilities of these elongated houses are shown by the workhall at Bedburg-Garsdorf (Fig. 68), a larger building than those so far analysed and no earlier than themid-first century. It has no less than eight bays, and the post marking one side of theshortest is here not exactly in the middle but about a metre to north; here, by analogy,was the entrance. It was not a passage; on the far side of the two posts was a storagecellar, presumably lined with timber. There were four hearths, each standing besidea ridge-post, not in the bay between them as might be expected. It looks as thoughtwo important ones were near the end of the building, to northeast and south-westof the axis, and a third is near the middle on the west side. Possibly this throws lighton the Oss-Ussen house, where also two important bays are at the ends, with anotherto one side or other of the entrance.


225

This use of Roman evidence to help elucidate pre-Roman houses is undesirable,yet the similarity of the plans and their unlikeness to villa houses may justify thisprovisional interpretation until fuller early evidence is available. Arguments derivedfrom English medieval halls may also be thought suspect, yet anyone familiar withhouses of the period knows how closely varied bay lengths correspond to the relativeimportance of parts of the hall and – something not recoverable in Roman buildings– how the position of roof trusses reinforced that message.

Two-aisled houses with their very varied bay lengths contrast strongly with three-aisled byre-houses in which the variable post spacings of the domestic end arecombined with a regular bay rhythm in that part accommodating cattle: a clear andconsistent structural difference corresponding to evolving domestic needs at oneend of the house and an unchanging agrarian function at the other. The differencebetween the two patterns may be due to the adaptability of the roof supports in thethree-aisled house to the creation of cattle stalls on each side of the middle aisle,something which is lacking in the two-aisled house; yet ridge-posts could certainlyhave been used to the same end, given suitable wall height and a feeding walkdown one side.

Why a consistent structural form never evolved in two-aisled houses to meet aconstant need is puzzling. It may be that the adaptation of the house type toaccommodate a byre, which must have been a response to new circumstances,occurred piecemeal and over what was, by comparison with the long history ofthree-aisled houses, a short period, so that there was insufficient time to develop astructural response. Two considerations are relevant here. The first is that asatisfactory way of keeping cattle indoors must have been found, whatever thereal or apparent structural limitations. The second is that, although traditional buildingtechniques do change in response to needs, roof construction in particular is veryslow to do so, and adaptation to anything other than strictly structural purposeswould have been difficult.

More surprising is the lack of any definite structural demarcation of an entrancepassage on the lines of Haps T. Given that some houses have large bays at bothends, it may be that some other use than a byre has to be envisaged, as is the casewith the aisled houses of Roman Britain (above, pp. 36–8). If the sequence of thehouses were established, a development from more to less regular rhythms might beobservable, and certainly the Haps houses appear to have more consistent baylengths than those of Hoogeloon. Such variation in bay length indicates very fluidsocio-economic conditions.

The Dutch types may have a wide distribution. The larger of the two Late La Tènehouses at Haunstetten (Fig. 61) has, in the middle, a large axial post-pit and, about2 m from it, another; together they defined the entrance, and the resulting bayrhythm is bacab, with the two presumed living areas about 5 m long by 8 m wide. Afaint hint of a similar arrangement can be seen in the other house. Other Germantwo-aisled houses can hardly be said to convey even a hint, although a number ofthose of only two bays have the intermediate post and the corresponding wall-postsset markedly off the middle, for example at Eching-Autobahn House 13 (Fig. 61) orDietfurt a.d. Altmuhl (Bay.). Probably they retained an entrance in the middle withoutits being defined structurally on one side.


226

An intermediate development between the two- and three-aisled types is foundin the largest building of the Late Hallstatt settlement at Königsbrunn (Bay.) (Fig. 61,D), which combined a ridge-post in the domestic part with pairs of internal postsforming a three-aisled construction in the byre. It occurs also at Oss-Ussen20 in theRoman period. These houses show a clearing away of intrusive axial posts in part ofthe building where they were inconvenient. In the living-part a similar result wasachieved by moving the two ridge-posts the whole width of the building apart andso creating a square living-space.

THREE-AISLED HOUSES

More remarkable than anything so far described are two three-aisled buildings whichhave only their structural form in common. The first, a hall of the Early Hallstattperiod at the Heuneburg (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 61), has the imposing width of 16.5 mand was at least 20 m long, with a clear middle span of 9 m that necessitated someadvanced form of roof construction – all this at c. 500 BC. Its size, the absence ofpartitions and the complete clearance of axial posts point to its being a representationalbuilding, not simply a large house. The second, an aisled long-house which was theprincipal building at the small hill-fort of Befort-Aleburg (Lux.) (Fig. 61), belongs tothe Hunsruck-Eifel culture and is perhaps of 400–300 BC; it was 31×8.8 m, all threeaisles were of equal width, and the living-space occupied about a third of the totallength. It is one of the comparatively few pre-Roman house in northern Europe tohave a fully intelligible ground-plan.

For these two houses I must accept the dates given by those who dug them andapparently approved by prehistorians generally. Nevertheless, the 9 m span of themiddle aisle of the Heuneburg hall and the stone footings for the internal posts atBefort are unparalleled at their respective periods and indeed for perhaps anotherthree hundred years, so I endorse the conclusion drawn by another writer consideringthese buildings from a structural standpoint: that in the present state of research theyform such an exception that parallels must be awaited before they can be given asecure place in the history of central European houses.21 Other claims for three-aisled buildings at Welwyn-Lockleys (Herts.)22 and Colchester-Camulodunum (Essex)23

are without substance.A three-aisled building found at St Michael-Gorhambury may be pre-Roman but

is not provably so.24 Whatever its precise date it was an important building, thelargest in the whole complex, and comparable in status, though not in detail, tosuch aisled byre-houses as 9 and 4 at Rijswijk IIA. It would certainly not haveaccommodated ‘workers’ families’,25 whatever that term may be supposed to meanaround AD 43.

Halls claimed to have been aisled occur in France at a much earlier date, notablythe Middle La Tène house at Verberie (Oise) (Fig. 61) which was 21.2×11.5 m overalland had aisled structure only near the ends; its width and the apparent lack ofinternal roof supports in the middle space 12.5 m long present problems not so farsolved satisfactorily but do not diminish the importance its size implies. Earlier still,Chassemy (Aisne), of the Early La Tène period and regarded as an aisled building,


227

has been subject to doubt,26 and certainly the roof-supporting structure with a middlespan no wider than the side aisles is problematic.

By far the best evidence for three-aisled buildings comes from Holland, mostly ofthe Roman period. A long series beginning much later occurs at Rijswijk and will bementioned below (chapter 14); otherwise most lie outside the Roman frontier.

SQUARISH AND TRAPEZOIDAL BUILDINGS

Aisled buildings have attracted much attention because of the intrinsic interest oftheir plan and structure. In some parts of Europe, though, aisleless buildings werethe norm but because, in so many, little remains except a much less informativepattern of post-holes or stone footings, less notice is taken of them.

Small square timber buildings have been excavated in Britain, northern Franceand Holland,27 most of them revealed simply by four post-holes. They are generallyinterpreted as granaries on account of their smallness and the lack of any sign ofoccupation, and no doubt that is correct in many instances. Exceptions to this generalrule have been found in the hill-forts of the Welsh Marches where, at Croft Ambrey(Herefs.) (Fig. 62) and particularly at the Wrekin (Salop) (Fig. 62), hearths werefound in several squarish four-post structures, some of them quite tiny, their sidesranging from 1.8 m to 3.6 m long.28 They are of the fourth century BC. Sizenotwithstanding, it is difficult to gainsay a hearth as proof of occupation, and althoughthese houses are small their interpretation is strengthened by the discovery of notmuch larger stone-built ones in Languedoc. Martigues-L’Arquet 8 (Bouches-du-Rhone),a trapezoidal house of c. 450 BC whose longest side was 3.5 m, had an area of about11 sq.m – less than the 13 sq.m of some of their British equivalents – and it may becompared with 5, 10a and 14 (Fig. 62) or a house at Mailhac-Cayla (Aude).29 Their

Figure 62 Square buildings


228

size and hearths, in Britain as in Languedoc, show that they are the houses ofconjugal families. Despite the wide date range, which eliminates them as the immediateforerunners of villas, they throw light on the minimum amount of space required bya family, that is, a conjugal unit or unit of consumption.

Some timber houses found at Braughing-Skeleton Green (Herts.) (Fig. 62) belongto this category if the very incomplete evidence can be trusted. The most certainwere 3, about 6×4.5 m, and 7,30 with ridge-posts, about 5 m square.

Slightly larger are three at Eching-Autobahn, all with ridge-posts; another at theHeuneburg lacked internal posts but had a central hearth. A few larger square buildingsare known: one at Danebury (Hants.) (Fig. 62), almost divided by axial posts, andanother at Hornchurch (Fig. 62) are 9×9 m, and at the latter site is a second one,slightly larger. Among the great variety of houses at Bundenbach-Altburg is a squarehouse (17) of this order of size (8×7.5m). It is earlier than the English examples,belonging to the middle phase, c. 130–80 BC, but lacks ridge-posts and, like others ofits kind, presents, as its excavator remarked, considerable problems of roof construction.31

So, too, does the best-known of all these square buildings, Mayen I, a house singularlylacking in sizeable structural posts. Allied to this type by its wide span is a bow-sidedvariant, the Late La Tène post-built house at Landshut-Sallmannsberg (Fig. 62), whichis 10 m square but may possibly have been longer because one wall was not found. Aclear span as great as that of an average German hall-type villa demanded roofcraftsmanship of a high order, must have created an impressively lofty internal space,and demonstrates the comparatively elevated status of such a house.

Some larger square buildings with a row of ridge-posts could be classified as two-aisled houses, but the shape is a more important characteristic. A square room orbuilding, normally a spatial unity, is to an extent divided by ridge-posts, as anyonewho has seen a two-aisled Gothic church knows, yet the analogy must not bepressed too far, for the timber building lacks the visual block presented by a stonearcade. Moreover, this kind of square house has no obvious point of entrance,unlike all elongated plans which, whether a doorway is postulated in the long or theshort sides, permit logical consequences about use of the interior space to be drawnfrom the initial assumption. For square two-aisled houses, entrance remains anintractable problem but some customary division seems likely, whether betweenwork space and living-space, inner and outer ‘rooms’, generations of an extendedfamily, or whatever.

One such house, Beegden 2 (Neth.) (Fig. 61),32 associated with a slightly morerectangular and probably superior house, is thought, partly by analogy, to be of thefirst century AD. The relation of the two buildings is reminiscent of that between tworound-houses, one large, one small, sometimes found in Britain, or that of a smallrow-type house with an aisled workhall, as if they represent something fundamentalabout social organisation over a long period of time.

MONOSPAN OBLONG BUILDINGS

Buildings of this kind are rare on Dutch and German sites and small by comparisonwith two-aisled structures, so that at Eching-Autobahn, for example, where half a


229

dozen of them do not exceed 8×4 m, they were not very important. In Britain, whereevidence is usually fragmentary and understanding has been clouded by highlydubious structural interpretations, they do nevertheless occur more than was oncethought. One of the best is Babworth-Dunston’s Clump (Notts.) (Fig. 63), built in thefirst century AD; the principal entrance suggests a division into east and west parts,the former about three times as long as the latter and each having its own gable-endentrance. Buildings of much the same size and of immediately pre-Roman datewhich have been found at Wickford (Essex) and Canterbury (Kent) are so incompletethat they add little to knowledge. Some more complete small buildings at Silchesterwhich lack evidence of how they were used may have been houses.

The few aisleless buildings found in northern France – excluding an improbable-looking one of L-shape at Suippes (Marne) – are for the most part small. Several stone-built ones in Languedoc33 are only 4–5 m wide; those with an undivided ground plan areup to 9 m long and the bigger ones are invariably of two rooms. One of the rooms usuallyhas a hearth, the other not; the former is the living-room, the latter a store room.

Monospan houses are much rarer in Holland than those with one or two rows ofinternal posts and belong for the most part, like Kaalheide-Krichelberg (Fig. 63), to theperiod shortly after the conquest.34 Some, like those at Kethel, are byre-houses.

Another type, the monospan house divided into two or more rooms, is rarer still;nevertheless, its mere existence in a house landscape of aisled buildings and open andlargely unpartitioned halls demands explanation. Niederzier-Hambach 59 comprises asquare hall, entered through opposite porches, and a second room of about the sameeffective living-space which appears to have been entered from it. Pending fullpublication and discussion of this house, Rijswijk (Neth.) IIB 2 (Fig. 65) is a moreinformative example of the kind. It is large (24×6.5 m), aligned east–west, and of threebays about 7, 9 and 7 m long; the middle bay has a hearth placed towards the northwestcorner and all three bays were connected by doorways on the southern side. Anentrance at the west end is likely from its width, about 2.3 m, to have been for cattle;people entered on the north side, almost in front of the hearth. Most unfortunately forinterpretation, the west room was poorly preserved and much about it, particularlywhether it was for cattle or storage, remains uncertain. House 2 is as near anapproach to the compartmented house of a Roman villa as has been found in an

Figure 63 Monospan halls


230

indigenous settlement anywhere, yet, even granting that Roman influence was strongin this phase of Rijswijk’s history, in plan and construction alike it is of indigenousinspiration.35

ROUND-HOUSES

Round-houses of a variety of structural types are all but universal in the Late IronAge settlements of the British Isles. Those in the Thames Valley average c. 9 m indiameter,36 and the tendency seems to be for round-houses to get smaller duringthe Iron Age. Usually a settlement stands within an enclosure formed by a palisadeor a bank and ditch, and comprised one to three houses at any one time. TollardRoyal (Dorset) had a single house a little over 5 m in diameter; Harding-MingiesDitch (Oxon.) had a single much larger one (c. 15 m diameter) which was replacedfour times.

A small Iron Age enclosure at Draughton (Northants.) (Fig. 64) had within it threeround-houses, two small and one large, a pattern sometimes repeated in the groupingof houses in larger settlements. Colsterworth (Lincs.) has a hint of it in the north-east

Figure 64 Grouping of houses


231

quarter37 and at Pilsdon Pen three round-houses in close proximity are linked bygullies which are evidence of fences (Fig. 64).38 Groupings of this kind are appropriateto a kin-group larger than a conjugal or even a stem family and appear with variationson many sites. Outside Britain round-houses are comparatively common in Brittanyand a scatter has been discovered over a large area of France from Aulnat (Puy-de-Dôme) to Achenheim (Alsace). Although these instances show that the contrastbetween Britain, where round-houses predominate, and the continent, whererectangular houses predominate, can be overstated, the extent to which the Britishtradition is diluted by rectangular buildings has been exaggerated by talk of housesbuilt on a frame of sill-beams or even on the log-cabin principle39 – remarks indicatingan unfamiliarity with timber construction.

In the generation or so before the conquest St Michael-Gorhambury (Herts.) isimportant for the round-houses of the Late Iron Age phases IV–V, lying within thebracket AD 20–43. In IV a round-house (6) of medium size (7.3 m diameter) occupiedan important position in the inner enclosure B, within which stood a second andvery fragmentary house (11). The first rectangular building, three-aisled, appears inV and in VI, the immediate post-conquest period; other aisleless buildings replace allthe round-houses. So, too, at Harting-Garden Hill II, one certain and one possiblepre-Roman round-house preceded the rectangular buildings that appeared in thepost-conquest period III. And the story is not very different at Radley-Barton CourtFarm (Fig. 68): in [I], perhaps early first century AD and so approximately coevalwith Gorhambury IV–V, a circular ‘hut’ 5 m in diameter within a small enclosure anda house just outside it are followed in [II], late first to mid-second century, by atimber hall some 28–30 m long and 8.5 m wide (Fig. 63).

COMPLEX HOUSES

The houses so far described are all of quite simple plan, however complex thecustomary subdivision of space may have been. In a few, though, structural partitionsreveal a more advanced functional or social division. Sigean/Pech-Maho (Aude)(Fig. 64) is remarkable for having a hearth in each of the three compartments intowhich the trapezoidal plan is divided.40 It is considerably bigger than the smallsquarish houses and appears to comprise an entrance space from which two elongatedrooms are reached. Because it was built against the perimeter wall of the enclosureno light came from the south-east side; this may be why the front part is regarded asan open court rather than a roofed space or room common to both the others, but itis not conclusive.

Two similar plans occur at Villeneuve-Saint-Germain (Aisne) (Fig. 64), where thehouses are freestanding and thus do not raise any problem of lighting, minimalthough that is likely to have been. Here the front ‘court’ has much more the appearanceof a small porticus, which was more than simply an entrance, probably a workplaceor common room.


232

CONCLUSION

Several types of house found in western Europe after the Roman conquest whichwere built of stone or at least with stone footings are traceable to pre-Roman origins.Even that most un-Roman type, the British round-house, has some successors withstone footings. The one obvious absentee is the row type; nothing really like itappears in pre-Roman contexts unless Villeneuve-Saint-Germain or Rijswijk IIB bethought to prefigure it. Certainly in Britain, where row-houses are the commonesttype in villas, nothing like this is known. Conversely, it is hard to find much evidenceof Roman-period halls with ridge-post construction, and tempting to suppose thatsuperior carpentry enabled builders influenced by Roman technology to adoptmonospan roofs. Against this is the fact that, in certain parts of Europe, wide buildings,notably some square ones, had roofs which did not need freestanding posts forsupport and must have demanded quite advanced carpentry techniques. Simplesquare halls of one building phase, with no additional rooms, are also scarce, thoughnot unknown, and can sometimes be inferred in multi-period structures. Thus, despitethe difficulty of tracing a type back from Roman to pre-Roman times on the samesite, in typological terms continuity is certain.

233

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

MODES OF ROMANISATION

Just as the forms of house and the ways in which buildings are arranged in relationto one another vary in innumerable ways, so the transformation of an indigenous

pre-Roman society into a more or less Romanised one is a process of infinite variety.Moreover, the various ways it was done are less easy to categorise because both thestages in the process and the end result could be very different. The period at whichRoman rule (not simply conquest) became effective and its cultural values began tobe accepted is relevant to the types of house available for adoption by subjectpeoples, and that applies not only as between one country and another but alsowithin countries, due to uneven development. If the concept of kin-groups emerging,as it were, into a Romanised society be accepted, it follows that at that stage theywould require some fairly simple house, but those building in the new fashion in thefirst century of our era would choose from a rather different range of types thanthose doing so in the early third century, even in the same country, simply becausethe types themselves changed somewhat over that long period. A further complicationis that immediately prior to conquest the various peoples were living in societies atdifferent stages of development and in different relations with the Roman world;consequently the degree of familiarity with Roman culture and receptivity to it alsovaried, and this factor must have affected the spread of house types. More will besaid on these matters in the final chapter, but now some of the ways in whichRomanisation came about will be described.

NATIVE TO ROMAN BY EASY STAGES: RIJSWIJK AND STLYTHANS-WHITTON

The long approach to Romanisation is best exemplified in the Netherlands, at Rijswijk-de Bult, where the most important excavation since Mayen fifty years earlier hasgreatly advanced understanding of the social and economic processes leading to thebuilding of a villa (Fig. 65).

Settlement virtually coincided in duration with Roman rule in the country. PhaseIA comprised a single aisled house and an adjoining enclosure and IB–D saw theaddition of other houses scattered at some distance from the first, with their separate

— Chapter Fourteen —

234

small enclosures; rebuilding was frequent. Formalisation began in IIA when thecomponents of the settlement were reorganised into two intersecting trapezoidalyards for the two principal houses and an area outside, not wholly bounded byditches, for two houses of less (and unequal) importance. It continued in IIB with achange from trapezoidal to sub-rectangular yards and the complete enclosure of thelarger outer yard. In the latter, two houses were reduced to one and it was subdividedby a fence to create a temple courtyard common to the whole settlement. What mayappear a small increase in amenity in this phase, the addition of a hypocaust tohouse 19, is of great importance. The mere existence of this badge of status establishedmore clearly the superiority of house 19 to the others, and provided a strong reasonfor improving it piecemeal thenceforth rather than rebuilding it in a slightly differentposition, as had been usual hitherto. That is what happened in IIIA, when the housewas rebuilt with stone footings and a form of roof construction designed to free theinterior space of posts, and at the same time the settlement was unified by thebuilding of a large trapezoidal enclosure in which four houses were set out in ahierarchy. The process continued in IIIB.

By III Rijswijk had attained a modestly Romanised way of life and a recognisablevilla layout which in its final state has a strong resemblance to Walsbetz (Belg.) (Fig.31). There, too, a principal house is combined with two halls lying parallel and closetogether but with this difference, that the halls are further from the house and atright-angles to it in order to show their subordination.1

Perhaps the beginning of Romanisation should be seen in IIA, when each of thethree principal houses was for the first time set within its enclosure and a separatenesswas introduced. That sense of formality did not, in material terms, present anobstacle to future reordering of the settlement in the same way as formerly, but infact the decisive step towards making it permanent came in IIB when the first useof stone in pursuit of Roman luxury was accompanied by making two courtyards amore regular geometrical shape. It is impossible to know whether the kin-groupconsciously took an irreversible decision or whether its consequences only becameapparent later; whichever was the case, the social basis of a villa had begun theprocess of fossilisation.

A British villa with a longer life illustrates this theme. St Lythans-Whitton (Glam.)(Fig. 65) was limited throughout its existence by the circumstances of its immediatelypre-Roman origin, when it was built within a squarish protective bank and ditchenclosing an area much smaller than that occupied by Rijswijk ID. Whatever theagrarian potential of the locality – and about the economy of the villa nothing is saidin the report – the farm seems to have been ‘at all times a reasonably prosperousagricultural unit’2 – growth on the scale of Rijswijk would have been difficult. Probably,though, social and demographic factors were decisive in restricting growth.

Whitton I probably has three round-houses. Two, with porches, face the entrance;the third, B2, in the innermost and thus superior position, turns away from it andwas approached at a tangent, rather as early row-houses were approached from oneend. In phases II–V the buildings were quite mobile, changing in number and location,3

and it is not easy to know which was the superior house. Unfortunately, the authorspay no more attention to social structure than to the economy and the reader is leftto attack the problems unaided.4 The most important change in II was the addition

— Modes of Romanisation —

235

Figure 65


236

Figure 65


237

Figure 65 Stages of Romanisation


238

of a large round-house facing the entrance; its position suggests it had a more publicfunction than the smaller houses, perhaps in the nature of a workhall, and its mereexistence argues for an increasing population.

In III numbers appear to have fallen from that peak and in IV social change issignified by the division of the site into three parts, corresponding to Rijswijk IIA: animportant house in the south-west enclosure, the most important one in the innernorth-west enclosure, and a third sub-rectangular one and possibly even a fourth,very minor, in the outer yard. In V a complete change takes place with the fencing-off of a yard at the entrance, to limit access, and, within it, a small yard in front of around-house. This successor round-house to the workhall-like one has some publicpurpose, otherwise it would scarcely have opposite doorways of equal size. Twosquarish buildings now appear, facing each other in a way which expresses a relationnot much different from that of the two halls (10 and 11) of Rijswijk IIIA. Unless thatsiting be regarded as incipient Romanisation, the first real sign of that is the buildingin VI of a small hall with stone footings, and the curious aspect of this developmentis a dramatic fall in population.

At Whitton, as at Rijswijk, the sequence of changes from loose grouping throughdefined yards to a unified hierarchical grouping of houses can be interpreted asstages in the transformation of a kin-group or clan. Originally composed of equalsworking collectively under a head for the time being, it turns first into independentextended family units collaborating in the operation of a farm and then, by theemergence of one pre-eminent group among the three, into a hierarchy. Much themost puzzling aspect of the story is provided by the contradictory evidence ofpopulation decline and material advance in VI.

ROMANISATION BY LUXURY

A development similar to that at Rijswijk is observable, though not in the opinionof the archaeologist who dug it, at Barnsley Park (Glos.) (Fig. 65).5 In the versionpreferred here, Barnsley Park is analogous to Rijswijk except that it began withthree adjoining yards instead of expanding from one and, of course, the earlierbuildings are round, not rectangular. Furthermore, the evidence, being of a verydifficult kind – largely scatters of stones – made it harder to achieve certainty aboutthe changes of shape the yards underwent. Even in I, the north yard had twobuildings which are likely to have been houses and little change is detectable in II.By III the site seems to have been fenced off more sharply into three main and twominor yards, the three main ones each having two houses – the same populationincrease immediately before the adoption of stone for building as took place atWhitton. The transformation into a villa began in IV with the building of a bathsuite at the end of one of the earlier buildings, a proceeding analogous in terms ofboth structure and luxury to the addition of a hypocausted room at the end of anindigenous type of building at Rijswijk.

When did Romanisation begin at Barnsley Park? Is it observable in the replacementin III and IV of round buildings by more or less rectangular ones, or only when thebath block is built? Probably the latter, even though the change of building shape


239

may well be of Roman inspiration.6 It is significant that the first part7 of a sizeablehouse to be put up was the bath building. By VIII, Barnsley Park, with its house atthe head of a small courtyard and the subsidiary building to the sides, looked muchlike many another British villa.

Baths provide the link with the Romanisation of a very different kind of site, theiron-working settlement of Hartfield-Garden Hill (Sussex) (Fig. 65). It was establishedwithin the ramparts of a small hill-fort and had, in its pre-Roman phase II, tworound-houses. These were followed, early in the Roman phase III, by a hall (E)unusual for Britain in its proportions (3:2) and in having a proto-porticus or timberveranda running round its north and west(?)sides. It is coeval with another timberstructure (C), a building on rubble footings measuring 9×3.3 m, proportions whichsuggest in the light of its siting and subsequent history that it functioned like a wingto an adjoining structure to the east. That seems certain to have been the situation inIV, when whatever had adjoined it was replaced by a hall c. 9×6 m, parallel withwhich was a small bath house.

So when does the site become Romanised? A house with a veranda is not in thenative British tradition of building, but if that is excluded, the bath house marksacceptance of the new cultural forms. At Hartfield the hall and baths correspond tobuilding M in the romanised phase of Collingham-Dalton Parlours (Fig. 68) andhouse C is the latter’s J. Two houses facing in different directions are common inRoman villas, often principal house and workhall, and this arrangement may, likethe hierarchical setting-out of Rijswijk IIIB, indicate social relations of a kind familiarin many provinces.

Something similar may have been true of München-Denning (Bay.)8 where, in amaze of unintelligible post-holes and pits, a good-sized bath building was found,superior to any so far mentioned. Although the only other identifiable part of a stonebuilding was no more than a pavilion and part of a porticus, it, a few other stonefragments, and some ditches appear to have been laid out on parallel alignments, asif a number of timber buildings partly rebuilt in stone formed a villa-like grouping.

The first-phase Romanisation represented by a stone bath-house among theotherwise timber buildings of a native-style farm may account for some of theapparently isolated bath houses that long puzzled archaeologists; dug long ago, thepost-holes around them were missed. Fanciful notions of a bath house serving alocality can be abandoned.

HOUSES BUILT OVER BOUNDARIES

Many villas were built like Rijswijk-de Bult and München-Denning within complexsystems of enclosures. Traces of earthwork boundaries and fences appear frequentlyand are commonly not explored fully because they are thought to be irrelevant.Sometimes the potential significance of a ditch line is not recognised and as a resultit is not traced even within the bounds of a site. Once more Rijswijk provides astarting point for enquiry. When all its buildings are looked at together in a singleplan,9 the general course of development based on three domestic sites is clear;successive rebuildings do not move far from the position of the first house on any


240

particular spot and new construction is sited to avoid ditches. Why, then, are someother sites so different?

Much of the evidence for building across boundaries comes from Britain,something which may in itself signify social differences from other provinces ratherthan superior excavation techniques. A good example is Marshfield-Ironmonger’sPiece (Glos.) (Fig. 66), where a stone wall appears to have separated two round-houses and their yards, neither of which was explored extensively. That may notmatter much because the subsequent history of the site is clear. The wall wasdemolished and a villa, comprising two row-type houses built end to end andfacing opposite ways, was constructed over it, and the builders carefully sited thenew work so that the transverse wall where the two houses joined lies obliquely tothe demolished boundary. In the circumstances of a house designed for two separatehouseholds replacing two separate houses, the location of the joining wall is certainlysymbolic of the unity of equals or, rather, near-equals; for even at the time ofunion one house was more utilitarian than the other. The short subsequent historyof the site reveals that the two were unified by the building of a porticus so thatboth faced in the same direction, and the greater dominance of the better housecorresponded to the decline of its neighbour.10

Marshfield is a different manifestation of the unifying process that is demonstratedat Barnsley Park and Rijswijk by the Romanisation of the buildings. Another instanceof simultaneous unification and Romanisation appears to be Condé-Folie (Fig. 66) inthe Somme basin11 and there may be another at Trouy (Cher).12 The significantcriteria in such cases are that the boundary, usually a ditch, coincides with an importantinternal division in a building, commonly that between one domestic unit and another;or traverses an important room, commonly the large middle room of a row-house; orhas a house abutting it end-on; or runs diagonally across a building, which is unlikelyto have been built in that relation to it by chance.

Uplyme-Holcombe (Fig. 66) shows the stages by which an elongated row-housemight develop. Settlement began in [pre-I] with a small late pre-Roman Iron Ageditched enclosure not much more than a quarter the size of St Lythans-Whitton,within which were two round huts. Some wooden houses of unintelligible plan in I,the first Roman phase, were succeeded in II by others equally unintelligible and alsoa small single-ended hall of stone or with stone footings which abutted the ditch atits south end.13 When the time came to enlarge the house, it was extended outwardsover the ditch, not, as might have been expected had purely structural considerationsgoverned the decision, at the opposite end where vacant space was to be had. HadUplyme, which was twice lengthened subsequently, been dug in the nineteenthcentury the unphased plan would have been assigned correctly to the Aylesford-Eccles class; what would have been missing is the evidence that building over theditch was a quite deliberate choice, and that maintaining social relations was all-important. Any risk of structural failure was incidental. What might have appeared asnecessity caused by lack of space was a decision taken to perpetuate the socialorder. Bignor, in its relation to a ditch, began in the same way (Fig. 42) but itsdevelopment was determined by building along the boundary line, not across it. Atboth Uplyme and Bignor the ditch was very important.

Aylesford-Eccles I (Fig. 66) too was built over what must have been a boundary


241

ditch. It runs obliquely underneath the house at the mid-point in the length of thedomestic units, excluding, that is, the supposed open-ended shrine at the south end.This is an instance where such a siting seems unlikely to be the result of chance, andthe same may by true of the much smaller row-houses at Radley-Barton Court Farm,Little Milton14 and Jublains (Mayenne).

Slighter evidence can be interpreted in the same sense. Beadlam N I (Fig. 17), aunit-system house, has, under the floor of the middle room and extending beyond itunder the approach road, a trench, whose course is marked by subsidence: ‘Thistrench may have been for a drain, or it could perhaps have held a water-pipe – itwas not excavated.’15 In the light of Marshfield it may have been a boundary overwhich the new house was built as a symbol of the unification of two houses, eachhitherto in its own yard. Henceforth they would be run as one.

In this connection Kings Weston (Glos.) (Fig. 66) is interesting. Many years agoBoon pointed out that a ditch appeared to run diagonally under a pavilion andacross the hall (then thought of as a yard), because strengthening had been necessaryat several points. That being so, the siting can hardly be fortuitous. If the ditch fillinghad not consolidated sufficiently to prevent subsidence, its presence is likely to havebeen noticed at the outset by builders to whom variations of soil and vegetationmust have been part of their everyday work; and had they found the ditch whiledigging footings trenches, removal to a trouble-free site would have been easy.Deliberate choice to mark the supersession of a boundary by the new hall is theprobable explanation, as it certainly is at Condé-Folie.16

Other kinds of relation between buildings and ditches are observable. At MiltonKeynes-Bancroft II (Bucks.) (Fig. 67) six buildings reveal social organisation inthe way they abut, overlie or stand tangentially to ditches. The two principalbuildings, an aisled house (7) and a hall (2), face each other across a spacedenned by two eastwest ditches; house 7 is aligned with the edge of one, hall 2stands parallel to and just over the other. An intention to efface a boundary isvery obvious in 2, whose construction necessitated packing the ditch withlimestone rubble. On the wall of 2, facing house 7, are what archaeologistsinvariably describe as buttresses:17 as such they have no conceivable functionand are in fact the pilasters appropriate to an important domestic building. Toeast of 2 a larger single-aisled building (9) abuts the same ditch. One round-house barely impinges on a ditch and is, in effect, abutting it; another, 11, overliesone slightly and in that part the floor was reinforced against subsidence. Allthese points amount to a careful siting of buildings in three kinds of relation toditches with the quite deliberate intention of obliterating old boundaries. A similarintention is likely at Hemel Hempstead-Gadebridge Park (Fig. 67), built parallelto a ditch with the wings projecting forward over it. Hamblain-les-Prés resemblesit in having the porticus built over a ditch, while Faversham I and Brixworth I arebuilt parallel and close to ditches (Fig. 11). Variations on these themes appear atDragonby (Lines.) and Jublains-La Boissière (Mayenne) (Fig. 67).


242

Figure 66


243

COLLINGHAM AND RADLEY: CONTINUITY ORDISCONTINUITY?

These two carefully excavated British sites have been thought to show a clear breakbetween the indigenous settlement and its Roman successor. When the evidence isexamined in the light of Rijswijk and Whitton this conclusion is less clear.

It has to be said at the outset that Collingham-Dalton Parlours (Fig. 68) was toodamaged by ploughing to provide the stratigraphical clarity of the Dutch site. Giventhat limitation, the Iron Age saw four phases of growth, from one enclosure with onehouse to four enclosures and two houses, then successively to five and three and, atits apogee, five and four. In a final native phase the settlement was reduced to asingle house and greatly simplified enclosures. The corollary of this rapid shrinkagemust be a sharp reduction in the number of inhabitants, just as happened at Whittonbetween phases V and VI.

In the next phase Collingham became a Roman villa comprising three principalstructures and, we are told, ‘There is no sign that its erection was symptomatic of thegradual Romanisation of native farmers, as . . . at Whitton. . . . Rather, it representsthe plantation on this site of a high-status household with military associations.’18

The dramatic change notwithstanding, ‘there are clear indications that the positionsand orientations of the buildings were affected, if not by the ditches, at least bythe boundaries which the ditches had once helped to define’.19 Three Romanbuildings – J, B and A in order of importance – stand on the site of earlier round-

Figure 66 Building over boundaries


244

Figure 67


245

houses, the most important of them succeeding the last native house. Two (J, M)were set out much like the first house at Uplyme, with the west gable wall aligned onan enclosure ditch, as if the two parts of Marshfield had been staggered, not aligned.In fact, the evidence simply requires continuity and possibly the gradual replacementof round timber houses by rectangular ones with stone footings, and given theimpossibility of establishing at all closely the duration of any of them, something like

Figure 67 Building along or over ditches


246

Figure 68


247

Figure 68


248

the transition observable at Whitton or Barnsley Park, continuing the pre-Romanevolution, seems probable.20

Radley-Barton Court Farm (Fig. 68) is another villa thought to show a break incontinuity, in this case of a century or more, between its latest timber phase and theerection of a stone building; yet apart from that its development follows much thesame course as that of the villas described earlier, though it has fewer phases. In [I],within a trapezoidal enclosure were two progressively smaller ones and a round-house; just outside it was a second round-house. All was swept away in [II], to bereplaced by a larger bipartite trapezoidal enclosure, differently orientated, containing,

Figure 68 Problems of continuity


249

in the smaller part, a timber hall house of about the same size as Farmington I overallbut without any subdivision.

Then, it seems, from the mid-second to the late third century, the site lay vacant,unless some pottery which may be of the later second century ‘may indicate aphase of occupation undetected on the site’.21 this was followed by the constructionof a squarish enclosure fenced off into three principal yards which were themselvessubdivided by rectilinear ditches and fences, and containing a sub-rectangularditched enclosure within which the stone-built villa stood. Insofar as it is aprogression through increasingly rectilinear enclosures to a stone villa it resemblesRijswijk, from which it differs in the interposition of a slightly Romanised timberhall between the native round-houses and the villa. The time gap may exist but thesite develops as if it did not.

BUILT ON DITCHES: KAISERSTEINBRUCH AND RUDSTON

Although the villa of Kaisersteinbruch-Königshof (Aus.) (Fig. 67) appears not toillustrate the transition from native farm to Roman villa, it provides an instance ofbuilding on ditches so striking and so much in need of explanation as to deservemention here.22 The story is briefly that an early villa site I was cut through bydefensive ditches not definitely associated with any buildings, which themselveswere superseded by a wall and towers protecting a second villa II. Problems of I andthe significance of the ditches will be ignored here. What matters for the presentpurpose is that the complex of yards and buildings in II is deliberately sited on thatpart of the ditches enclosed within the defensive wall, something which can hardlyhave happened by accident and which nobody has attempted to explain.

Three of the elements comprising a villa can be recognised in II: they are the largeaisled workhall E and two blocks of domestic buildings (K, H+1) standing on oppositesides of a yard, the whole, with outbuildings, giving the impression of a single buildingcampaign. A most striking aspect of the aisled building is that it straddles the doubleditch perfectly symmetrically. Moreover, the south domestic range K is built along theouter ditch which runs along the middle of its entire length, yet, had it and the northblock been sited 5 m to south, neither would have been over a ditch. Although thebuilders were clearly aware of the ditches, all of which must have been visible, theysited two principal buildings upon them quite deliberately. Why?

Thomas provides the clue with the comment that the settlement does not give theimpression of a country seat or centre of a large agricultural enterprise (latifundia)but rather resembles the buildings appropriate to several families.23 In fact, there arefour residential blocks of varied status (including C+D), three of row type and theworkhall, which had as much domestic accommodation as, for example, Hölstein(Switz.) (Fig. 7). Looked at in that way the site has some resemblance to Marshfield,and it is difficult to find an alternative to the reorganisation of boundaries to accountfor building over ditches.

The villa at Rudston (Yorks.) (Fig. 67) reinforces the argument. Under the wholelength of the principal (east) house and a workhall at right-angles to it a little distanceaway ran ditches. As Stead, who dug the site, remarked: ‘these two ditches . . . set


250

the orientation of the subsequent buildings. Why the buildings were constructedover deep ditches has not been explained: the problems of subsidence must havebeen obvious, yet buildings were re-built, or refloored on the same site.’24 FromHungary to Britain the siting of buildings over ditches was of the greatest significanceto contemporaries and is another element of the code governing property rightswithin kin-groups.

REMOVAL TO A NEW SITE

Commonly the transition from native to Roman is thought of in excessively simpleterms as the direct replacement of one kind of house by another. Of course thishappened and it is observable at such well-known sites as Ditchley (Oxon.), Welwyn-Lockleys (Herts.) and Mayen. Sometimes, though, the intention to rebuild asettlement in the Roman manner seems to have been achieved by moving it to anew site, hard though it is to establish such a move archaeologically. Some instancesare known of a native and a Roman site standing in close proximity, for examplePort-le-Grand in Picardy (Fig. 68),25 where a sub-rectangular enclosure in whichare two round-houses, one large and one small, stands about 100 m from a villalaid out with a perfectly rectilinear courtyard; the caption to the published planasks whether there is a link between the two. At Sparsholt (Hants.) (Fig. 68),where a similar juxtaposition occurs, excavation of both has taken place and it isclaimed that there is no continuity from one to the other; the gap is some thirtyyears.26 It is worth considering this statement in conjunction with the inferencesthat can be drawn from the development of the villa courtyard.

The oldest element of the courtyard dated by excavation is a hall on the right-hand (north) side; it was aligned with a fragment of wall, all that remained of theoriginal north side which tapered inwards from east to west. The opposite sidetapered similarly, from which it is clear that the setting-out of the courtyard isdesigned to emphasise the importance of the main house opposite and facing easttowards the entrance. That the existing house was in that position is not in doubt,but it must have had a predecessor for the shape of the courtyard to have anymeaning. For the immediate purpose the importance of Sparsholt is that it was setout as a hierarchy of buildings comprising, probably, the same elements of houseand two halls as are found at Rijswijk IIIB but arranged more formally. So if theoriginal tapering courtyard does really represent the removal and initial phase ofRomanisation of the kin-group that had lived nearby it expressed a hierarchy fromthe first; and it would be interesting to know whether any stages towards thatsocial situation were perceptible in the old settlement.

ROMANISED COURTYARDS AND WOODEN BUILDINGS

Many villas began with timber buildings of Romanised rectangular form in what wasusually a short-lived phase before rebuilding in stone, as Hemel Hempstead-BoxmoorI (Herts.) shows (Fig. 68).


251

Where more extensive excavation has been possible, a grouping of timber buildingsaround a yard, of a kind more familiar when executed in stone, has usually appeared.Bedburg-Garsdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 68) shows the kind of change that tookplace on continental sites. About 100 m north-west of the villa site a late pre-Romanindigenous settlement produced, among vestiges of building, the plan of a smallhall. In the succeeding Romanised phase three buildings perpetuate in improvedform the use of earthfast posts and ridge-post or (implicitly) king-post roofs, andnative pottery is found alongside Roman. Here, then, continuity is established and,although pottery evidence pointed to occupation from the first to the fourth centuries,comparatively little change took place, only the principal house being rebuilt instone with one undivided inner room.

So what is meant by Romanisation in the context of Bedburg? In terms of architectureand building construction, not very much. More important are the social implicationsof organising the settlement on unmistakably villa lines, something which its failure todevelop on conventional lines tends to obscure. Comparison with the irregular plansof yards in southern Germany such as Regensburg-Burgweinting (Bay.) shows howbig a step this was. As Bedburg is set out it displays the same way of ordering a kin-group as many a British or French villa except that all we see are the beginnings,before increased prosperity sharpened the differences between the component partsthrough the addition of mosaic pavements, baths and an inner courtyard. ChedworthI, set out on similar but not identical lines, also has scraps of evidence to suggest that,like Bedburg, it was first conceived of in timber in the form later carried out in stone.

Much the most remarkable instance of a Romanised courtyard combined withtimber buildings (which, like Garsdorf, largely remained so) is Druten-Klepperhei(Neth.), which lies, like Rijswijk, just inside the frontier. Essentially it is a long courtyardaligned east–west which splays out slightly towards the principal house at the westend, like a less pronounced version of Tarrant Hinton (Dorset) or Darenth (Kent). Itshows some departures from the orthodox form, for instance in the change of buildingline in the north range but, had all the buildings been rebuilt in stone, it would nothave looked out of place among Picardy courtyards.

Druten and Bedburg raise the question of what ‘Romanisation’ really means.They show that the term cannot be limited by the connotations of the word villa asdefined early in this book, because both sites would have appeared more familiarto someone coming from central France than, for example, Burgweinting orLudwigsburg-Hoheneck, particularly when their timber buildings were encased inplaster and embellished, as they no doubt were, with wooden mouldings andpainted with classical architectural motifs. Such a visitor would have put themtowards the bottom end of the scale by which Romanisation was measured, but acomparison with the indigenous farms of the region, even Rijswijk IIIB, wouldhave left no doubt that these farmyards were a kind of villa, however modest.They conform to Collingwood’s definition, which reads, in part: ‘Any house of theRoman period may be called a villa, provided that it was the dwelling of people,somewhat Romanised in manners, who farmed a plot of land.’27 Whoever set outthe plan of Bedburg or Druten was perfectly familiar with Roman ways; and if‘villa’ be rejected as an inappropriate term, it is hard to think of an alternativewhich differentiates them from, say, Hartfield-Garden Hill.


252

Just how fully Druten conforms to villa norms appears in the siting of the principalhouse, which is closed off in a typically Roman way. Although it forms the centrepieceof the vista seen from the entrance, it is not truly in the middle but stands somewhatto one side, and the same is true, less markedly, of Bedburg. This is generally thecase with long villa courtyards and is particularly noticeable in Picardy.28 Symmetryitself ties Druten to the Roman world; a deliberate partial rejection of it, which iscommon to a large segment of the western Empire, proclaims some indigenoussocial imperative which related two of the three principal buildings more closely toone another than to the third.

AN IMPLIED FIRST PHASE IN TIMBER?

On present evidence villas with a first phase in timber are a minority although, asexcavation to the lowest levels becomes commoner, the proportion is rising rapidly.It may be possible, using the kind of inference developed in the study of Britishvernacular buildings, to add a few more from old excavations.

In Switzerland and Germany a number of hall houses are set out in anunrectilinear way which has not been explained. Neumagen-Dhron-Papiermühle(Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 68) may be the best illustration of this kind of irregularity. No twowalls of the hall are parallel, the porticus is poorly set out, the pavilion at thesouth-east (correctly south) corner is slightly out of square – all these departuresfrom the right-angles usual in halls are sufficiently pronounced as to suggest thatthe normal building process was not followed. Explanation can either be specific,such as asserting that the builders were incompetent, or that considerableallowance has to be made for footings (which may in part be what was actuallydrawn) being more roughly built than the walls they supported; or it can be of amore general nature, founded on the hypothesis that a structure of impermanentmaterials – walls of clay (cob) or some fairly rudimentary kind of timber-and-clay– of which no trace was found, was rebuilt piecemeal. Obvious objections canbe raised to all these explanations; the last is preferred here, as having proveduseful in some British contexts.

On this assumption Neumagen-Dhron [I] was a timber hall of about the samedimensions as its successor. In [II] the porticus-and-pavilions were added, a processthat entailed rebuilding the front wall of the hall – which is the best piece of setting-out in the whole building – while leaving the rest standing. In [III] the other threewalls of the hall were rebuilt one by one, perhaps leaving the roof intact to provideshelter for the inhabitants who went on living there while the work was proceeding.29

A number of hall houses apparently set out without benefit of right-angles arefound in Switzerland. They include Osterfingen I (Fig. 68), Altstetten andWiesendangen-Steinegg; Öschelbronn (Bad.-Württ.) is similar. The kind of irregularlyset-out structure which is assumed to have preceded these villas appeared underanother Swiss villa, Laufen-Müschag, although here it did not dictate the shape of itssuccessor. For all the examples quoted, the general explanation suggested abovemight be considered.

Some halls taper markedly without displaying all the imperfections of Neumagen-


253

Dhron. Three such in Switzerland are Bellikon (Fig. 68), Huttwilen and Bözen (Fig.68) and in Bavaria there is Ehingen-am-Ries, known only from an aerial photograph;they lend credibility to the timber hall preceding the Ditchley villa. This kind ofdeparture from the rectangular norm may be thought deliberate, as some other villaplans certainly are,30 and if so it requires a different explanation.

BUILDING IN STONE: EARLY HALLS

The best-known example of the transition from indigenous timber house to Romanisedstone hall is Mayen. Two successive pre-Roman buildings gave way first to a hall ofmixed construction and then to one in which the stone walls were fully load-bearing.It is a story expounded so clearly by its excavator and so often recapitulated orquoted that it needs no repetition now. A point often overlooked is that it is not theonly model of transition from native to Roman house; an alternative one has beenlargely ignored.

It has to be said at the outset that the alternative model is incomplete; of the threestages – indigenous house, first stage of transition, second stage – all of which areobservable at Mayen, the first is totally absent at present. In the examples whichfollow, no clear evidence has been found of the pre-conquest houses which precededthe first transition. The model is based on a few, mostly German, houses, all of themrather fragmentary.

Köln-Mungersdorf [pre-I] (Nordrh.-Westf.) is the best example.31 The firstbuilding of a Roman kind appears to have been a structurally more sophisticatedversion of Mayen III, a hall as long but not as wide as Mayen. A second andlarger example, Leiwen [pre-I] is of more sophisticated plan with a small apsidalprojection at one corner (Fig. 72). Vierherrenborn-Irsch (Rhld-Pf.) is a third examplefrom the same part of Germany; Romanisation began with a hall about 10×9 m,of much the same size as the pre-Roman house at Landshut-Sallmansberg (Bay.).All three were pulled down to be replaced by much larger, highly developed hallhouses of three very different kinds. Far away in central France, Noyers-sur-Serein (Yonne) provides another instance of this short-lived transitional stagebefore the building of a goodsized villa; here, a square hall with what is probablya porticus gave way to a cluster of row-houses. That is possibly the only certainFrench example of these early halls. Others may have been found and either dugincompletely or reported in unclear terms, as, for example, the ‘rather erodedbuilding on a different alignment’ which formed Saint-Herblain I (Loire-Atl.)32 orSaint-Germain-lès-Corbeil I (Fig. 74).33

Total demolition as a prelude to rebuilding in the same material is rare in Romanvillas, as, indeed, in other cultures. The question of why these early halls were notimproved and incorporated in new work involves some very broad social issues andwill be taken up in the final chapter.


254

BUILDING IN STONE: ROUND-HOUSE OR ROUND PAVILION?

Britain has produced no such early stone halls destined to be swept away by asecond and more thorough wave of Romanisation. If, though, the square stone hallsat Vierherrenborn-Irsch and Noyers-sur-Serein be regarded as the translation intostone of wooden predecessors, an analogous change of material applied to theround-house is observable which, as appears to be the case with the continentalbuildings, is accompanied by a change of status or function.

An interesting situation occurs in one or two villas where a circular buildingcoeval with a rectangular main house, both of stone, occupies a very prominentplace within the enclosing wall or bank. A northern villa, Manfield-Holme House(Co. Durham) (Fig 68),34 stood inside a walled enclosure built in [III] (and replacinga pre-Roman sub-rectangular earthwork of [I]/[II]), in the centre of which, andoccupying the most prominent position opposite the entrance, was a round-house; itwas coeval in [III]/ [IV] with a small row-house of three rooms placed only a shortdistance away.35 It is, on the face of it, strange that a central position should havebeen occupied by an obsolescent type of house with the new Roman-style house setto one side.36 That dominant position facing the entrance, just where, in most villas,a representational room might be expected, must indicate the pre-eminent socialimportance of the building, whatever its actual function.

At the same time as the row-house was enlarged in [IV] and a bath suite added,the round-house was rebuilt, and of this Harding observed: ‘The fact that the rectilinearvilla was displaced to the north . . . while the central location continued to beoccupied by a building in the native tradition . . . might argue for an element oftradition in the siting of the latter.’37 Yes, indeed! That perceptive observation is thekey to the perpetuation of this pre-Roman kind of building. Anyone approachingthrough the years saw the conical roof of the round-house matching in height, andprobably overmatching, the roof of the adjoining building.38 In a society in whicharchitecture was one of the most important forms of social display the contrastproclaimed the importance of a traditional form of structure. The intention waspresumably to emphasise continuity39 or perhaps seniority within a kin-group; even,perhaps, legitimacy of title by a kin-group departing in other respects from the oldways. For although there is a tendency to look upon the transition from round torow-type house as a simple outcome of prosperity or the recognition of superioramenity, the old form must, from its siting, have carried social implications andmight ultimately affect claims of inheritance.40 In some such sense the need toemphasise architecturally the continuing importance of the old while establishingthe new becomes intelligible.

A hardly less striking example, though more difficult to understand, is the round-house at Great Weldon (Northants.) (Fig. 70). The site produced ‘not a single scrapof pottery or other clearly pre-Roman material’,41 so any question of confirmingancient legitimacy of title could only relate to this successor to the old site. Moreover,the round-house – and it was a house, with a hearth – first appears in III, when itaccompanies a replacement of the row-house which was the only building in I; bothwere set to one end of the enclosure and consequently neither had the highly visibleposition of the Manfield round-house. Nevertheless, the older kind of structure had


255

a diameter larger than the width of the newer one and must have been a veryprominent feature of the yard, however enigmatic the choice of form.

These contrasting types may be combined differently by putting a round-house atthe end of a porticus instead of a pavilion. West Marden-Watergate (Sussex) is themost remarkable of them.42 The earliest extant building, a round-house (4), mayhave been originally freestanding; its relation to the villa entrance is unknown, theenclosing wall not having been found. Very likely it accompanied a timber predecessorof the row-house, and its being built over a ditch may be significant. In [II] theputative timber house was replaced by a stone-built row-house of three rooms whichintruded into the round-house; a doorway connected them but a timber veranda isvirtually certain to have existed and may have extended the whole length of therow-house. In [III] a new front, like a porticus-with-pavilions in conception but notin detail, was added to the row-house and entailed demolition of 4, the latter beingreplaced nearby by a freestanding square building.

Perhaps the most important point about this sequence is that the round-housebegan as a separate house, when it had about the same floor area as the open hall ofa small, late medieval English house. In the succeeding phase, when it became aroom equivalent in size to a two-room unit at, say, Brixworth, it had a burnt area orhearth and was large enough for a conjugal family.

Whatever social relations were embodied in the conjunction of round and row-house at West Marden appear at Ringstead (Northants.) (Fig. 68), where the villa hasa somewhat larger round-house standing in a comparable relation to the incompletelyexcavated main range. So, too, perhaps at Walton on the Hill-The Heath, where around-house stood very near the rear porticus of the row-house, close enough for atimber porch to have connected them, although nothing of the kind was found inthe mid-nineteenth-century excavation.

The idea that house 4 at West Marden and the Ringstead round-house wereindependent houses finds support at Milton Keynes-Bancroft I, where two suchbuildings (11, 4) spaced well away from others have hearths. Finally, a fewRomanised sites such as Overstone (Northants.) show only round-houses withstone walls or footings.

It appears that round-houses Romanised by the use of stone for footings orwalls present, in their siting more than their form, some of the same problems asthe small early halls like Irsch and Noyers-sur-Serein. At Manfield, one long remainedin some sense the principal house or building (if it did not have a domestic function).That may well be true of Old Durham too but is rare. Elsewhere round-housesretained an important subordinate position, standing in the same relation to a row-house as the hall wings did to the main house at Katzenbach (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 74).Sometimes they were equivalent to pavilions, which raises questions about theway the latter were used.

Then there is their distribution, which is confined to districts where stone waseasily obtainable. If the availability of a building material determines the existenceof these houses, the social implications also must be confined to those areas, whichis unlikely. In parts of England where timber and clay were the usual buildingmaterials the traces of round-houses may commonly be too slight, not for detectionbut for confident interpretation in the ways advanced above. But if round-houses


256

really did not exist there, the problems of these stone-built ones are reduced insignificance to a regional difference.

In either case, here is another nuance of architectural language awaiting translationinto social history.

257

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

PATTERNS OF VILLADEVELOPMENT

In the preceding chapters the development of the several kinds of house has beenillustrated by reference to phases of individual villas without, usually, recounting

their whole history. Now certain kinds of change to which scattered reference hasbeen made will be described in more detail, mainly through the story of particularvillas, to bring out their social implications. A suitable beginning will be with the mostuniversal kind of house in the Roman Empire, the hall open from floor to roof-ridge,warmed by an open hearth and ranging in size from very small to very large.

THE OPEN HALL: ITS RISE

If we set aside round and very small squarish houses, virtually all pre-Roman housesconform to the definition of a hall, so that it is possible to see their story over thewhole duration of the Empire as a tale of steady decline so far as their relation to thegrowth of the house as a whole and to other house types is concerned. Viewing thehall as a structural type, not limited functionally, the story is one of success, culminatingin the huge imperial audience hall, the basilica, at Trier and, of course, this increasedtechnical ability to build roofs with wide spans had a beneficial effect on domestichalls. This kind of improvement, coupled with social changes, led, at certain timesand in many places, to an increase in the size and rise in importance of halls relativeto other villa buildings. It is not a straightforward story.

Halls should be observable first in Italy and, although few have been claimed assuch, Francolise-San Rocco I (Fig. 69) has two single-ended halls of c. 100-90 BC setside by side in the sophisticated arrangment of reverse symmetry. The hall 4 wasrecognised as such from the first; it is almost square, with two smaller rooms to eastand a wide ‘terrace, protico or room’1 on the south side. To north, another hall, 2, ofalmost identical size but inferior in ornament and lacking a terrace, is turned through180 degrees and has its ancillary rooms – one a reservoir of common use – at theopposite end; this hall was thought to be a courtyard for storing vehicles. Why thatpurpose should need a ‘hard, smooth and waterproof floor’2 is not explained, norwhy a smaller ancillary room, entered past carts, needed a mosaic floor.

The antecedents of San Rocco are unknown. Elsewhere in continental Europe

— Chapter Fifteen —

258

timber halls were common, and the rise of the open hall can be seen mainly instructural improvements and so to larger buildings of a wider clear span. Increasedsize must have been prompted by new needs, whether of greater numbers in thehouseful, a desire for prestige or some other consideration, and these matters will be

Figure 69

— Patterns of Villa Development —

259

Figure 69


260

Figure 69 Rise and decline of the open hall


261

touched on briefly in the final chapter. Whatever its cause, the building of largerhalls was commonly accompanied by the provision of ancillary rooms, sometimesone long, narrow one, often two square ones. In some big German houses therewere many more rooms than that but the hall remained dominant.

In a few parts of Europe, notably (on present evidence) Britain, halls appearedwhere none or hardly any were known before. The best-documented case is Radley-Barton Court Farm (Oxon.) (Fig. 68), where the transition from round-houses hasbeen demonstrated, but the same process no doubt took place at many other villasites. At Barton Court Farm the hall appears to have been undivided insofar as thestate of its surviving remains allowed interpretation (Fig. 63) and Otford (Kent) maybe another such, whereas at Farmington, Frocester Court (both Glos.) and otherhalls the first stage included at least one additional room. Evidently houses bothlarge and small needed some space, however used, which was cut off from the bodyof the hall, and the tendency to increase the number contained the seeds of decline.

THE OPEN HALL: ITS DECLINE

Just as Francolise-San Rocco marks the beginning (at present) of the rise of halls, sotoo it shows the earliest manifestation of their decline. About half a century after itwas built the superior hall D was broken up into several small rooms – a changecomparable to that which transformed English medieval halls in the hundred yearsafter 1550 – and its neighbour B was improved by throwing the two ancillary roomsinto one, filling in the reservoir and covering it with a mosaic pavement. The newroom was accesible from what were originally two separate parts of the house,which in II was unified to a considerable extent.

The transformation of San Rocco finds parallels in many parts of Europe. InBritain two open-hall houses of the characteristic narrow elongated type, Maidenhead-Cox Green (Fig. 69) Huntsham ‘main house’ and probably Graux (Fig. 69), undergoa direct transition to row-type. How easy the transition is from one type to the otherbecomes apparent if alternative paths of development, different from those thatactually occurred, be envisaged. If the limits of the various kinds of floor in the hallof Frocester Court I are redefined as walls (Fig. 69), a plausible row-house emerges.And if the hall of Kingsweston [I] be divided into two square rooms flanking anarrower entrance-hall (Fig. 69), a Downton unit or a Wancourt appears.

In Germany Blankenheim changes from a large hall in IIB to a smallerrepresentational room in IIIA. Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler (Fig. 69) underwent changeto similar effect; there the hall, which from the start had other rooms at each end,was divided by light partitions into four small rooms, one of which, opposite theentrance, may also have been an oecus. One simple hall, Bözen (Switz.) (Fig. 68),was divided up to different effect by timber partitions. In all these cases the intentionis intelligible; not so in the next one.

At the eastern end of Austria, at Bruckneudorf (Fig. 69), occurred an even moreradical transformation, in which the large hall of the original building was split upinto small rooms, leaving – and this is what is so surprising – not one of anyconsequence at the entrance to a grand house. As altered in [F], the middle part of


262

Bruckneudorf resembles the core of Fliessem (Fig. 53), displaying a change fromlarge hall to small rooms which can be paralleled and would in itself be perfectlyintelligible but for the addition at the rear of an apsidal room 1, nearly as big as theformer hall. So how did Bruckneudorf [F] function?

The porticus, divided in [F], leads to two corridors, 12 and 31, which lead toanother, 8 and so, probably, to the apsidal room. On the way the wider hypocaustedcorridor 31 gives access to two rooms, one large (27) and a corridor-like one (32),also heated. Adjoining these two is the minor bath suite, the major one being at adistance on the other side of the house. At the front, facing out over the porticus, arethree small rooms with hypocausts (25, 24, 29), and behind them what may be twoservice rooms (11, 30). The sizeable square room 9, which must be to some extent apassageroom and can be compared to room 12 of Bocholtz-Vlengendaal [F] (Neth.),may also be a common hall. Fliessem provides a partial key. The hall of Bruckneudorf[I], larger than that of Blankenheim I and differently proportioned, was more of amulti-purpose hall – a cut above Mayen VI (Rh1d-Pf.) and its like but lacking thedignity of the Rhenish villa.3 As split up in [F] it expresses less elegantly the divisionof the houseful found at Fliessem. That does not explain the new apsidal hall at therear, which has no equivalent in the German villa and is hard to parallel anywhere.It must have had a different purpose from the old one, as the apse shows; andalthough it lacks any of the ancillary rooms that might be expected with an audiencehall, some element of that function seems to be implied.

A kind of change whose social consequences have hardly been recognised is thatresulting from the addition of wings to a hall. Weitersbach I (Fig. 69) began as anopen hall surrounded by several rooms and porticuses, with the hall itself comprisingabout two-fifths of the total area. Rebuilding in II involved sweeping away all butthe hall and replacing the rest with larger end bays; wings, one a little row-houseand the other a bath suite; three rooms at the rear; and, surprisingly, a timber porticus.After all this the hall occupied no more than one-fifth of the whole. A second, minorphase of alteration reduced that still further.4 This unusual way of reducing theimportance of the hall obscures the fact that other German hall houses differ from itsgeneral development only in the way it was done, Mehring (Fig. 69), with largequasi-pavilions, being a notable example. More generally, the development ofsecondary rooms around or within halls are all symptomatic of decline, as atSchleitheim [I] (Fig. 69), where what look like two row-houses stand on oppositesides of a corridor. The hall had little more importance than that at Kinheim, anddeclined further with the building of wings. The same is true on a smaller scale ofFriedberg-Fladerlach (Bay.) (Fig. 69): in [I] it was akin to Frocester Court I, but whenadditional units were added at both ends and baths and also a large wing room, itlost much of its hall character and had points in common with both Sudeley-SpoonleyWood and Kinheim. The extreme case is the complete replacement of a hall by arow-house, as the dwelling house at Langton changed between I and II.

The decline of the hall, observable as between Mayen VI and Kinheim [F], finds aparallel at Leutersdorf (Fig. 45). In [I] the hall is all-important; in [II] its function andstatus are reduced to those of the hall at Köln-Mungersdorf [VI]; and in [III] it declinesto comparative insignificance when it is completely overshadowed by the newdetached facade.


263

THE AISLED HOUSE

Aisled houses show the decline of the hall in a special form which is implicit intheir recognition as a type. The general direction of change is much the same asin other kinds of hall, towards the creation of small living-rooms, and commonlythere is encroachment on the lower end by the building of baths and otherrooms in the aisles.

Generally the changes at the upper end are more complicated than those at thelower and involve cutting off a room from the end of the nave, and sometimes thenave was extended. The purpose is to create an important square room betweentwo groups of rooms in the aisles, as if the whole were the equivalent of a five-room,two-unit row-house: Norton Disney and Denton II (both Lines.) (Figs 75, 7) areexamples.5 Looked at like that, these houses bear comparison with Weitersbach II(Fig. 69), a different kind of hall out of which two two-unit wings developed, andalso with Villers-Bretonneux (Somme) (Fig. 31), where the proportions of thecomponent units are similar to those of the new aisle rooms. In a variant form, ofwhich Exning-Landwade (Suffolk) and Winterton DII (Lincs.) (Figs 7, 45) are examples,the big room created in the nave has a narrower extension beyond and open to it, sothat together these two rooms resemble the double middle room of Sudeley-SpoonleyWood or St Stephen-Park Street. It has to be assumed that all such double rooms hada similar function.

Alteration could take an alternative form in which the upper end was cut off fromthe rest, and where this occured the nave was usually divided by a corridor into twosquare rooms. East Grimstead (Fig. 7) is an example which, like others of its kind, iscomplicated by extra rooms. In this case it is the isolated room on the south sideand, if this is ignored, the rest falls into place as a porticus off which opens atransverse lobby leading to two-room units. Stroud is the same with a differentcomplication created by the two small, well-appointed rooms at the west end; theyor one of them forms part of a superior unit.6 In all these houses the designation‘porticus’ refers to function, not any particular architectural treatment. The rooms atthe upper end were entered from the front aisle, which itself seems in some cases,possibly in all, to have been reached from the usual point of entrance towards themiddle of the building, although that does not preclude another doorway oppositethe transverse lobby.

Quite other social arrangements are implicit in the symmetrical disposition ofrooms at West Blatchington (Fig. 7). The two large rooms at the upper end are ofequal size and reached by equal long lobbies or porticus-like aisles; the lattermay well have had, for part of their length, some secondary use as storage orliving-space.

Whichever of these two kinds of change was adopted, the aisled house developedrow-type characteristics, so that someone coming from Kinheim, Newel or Bocholtz-Vlengendaal would have recognised a social pattern, however much simpler it wasand however different its architectural guise from what he was used to.


264

THE SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT OF A VILLA

Blankenheim I

The current archaeological concern with theory obscures the continuing usefulnessof some older and simpler ideas. To speak of the convergence of types nowadayssounds very old-fashioned, yet it may be worth applying the notion to the developmentof a few selected villa plans and the kind of society they represent, to see how fartheir very marked architectural differences correspond to differences of either housefulstructure or wealth. The evidence available, small though it is in comparison withthe largeness of the subject, and uneven in quality and depth, can throw some lighton these matters. Of all the villas so far excavated, the one most suitable for thispurpose is Blankenheim, which, eighty years after its publication, remains the bestanalysed of its kind.

In its first phase, IA (Fig. 70), the house has a large hall in the middle and twowings and was, as Oelmann put it, ‘essentially symmetrical’.7 The qualification isimportant because the architectural evidence is clear: the porticus wall and an offsetin the foundations run unbroken from the side wall of the monumental staircase inthe middle of the front to the north wing and so preclude a return of the porticus.8

Mylius, in the course of justifying his perfectly symmetrical reconstruction, mentionsneither the evidence nor the conclusion drawn from it, nor does he explain why theeast porticus wall extends right up to the north wing but not to the south. Instead hestates merely that the wall of the porticus returning on the south side of the wingappears in Oelmann’s plan of phase IIB.9 This is unsatisfactory and should be rejected.Blankenheim IA was indeed only essentially symmetrical and the plan explains why.

The representational room in the middle was used on grand occasions, when theflight of steps up to it might be used. Everyday access was by the south wing, pastwhat are assumed to be a wide shrine and the adjoining workhall (12/24).10 Facingthe entrance is a doorway into a room (22/25) which appears to have been, in effect,a lobby serving the four adjoining rooms (18, 19, 21, 28/29), although this makes 21a passage-room. Room 22/25 is large to be solely a lobby and probably served as acommon hall11 for three sets of people.

On the north side of the hall, room 39/40 is only marginally bigger than thecorresponding room 28/29 to south12 but, as with row-houses, the smallness of thedifference demonstrates its importance; this was the superior room. It was reachedfrom the corridor which led from the porticus to room 42 – a room of indeterminatepurpose – and, beyond, to the five rooms which, ‘at least in part’,13 formed an L-shaped bath suite. In the angle of the baths is a large workhall.14 That leaves only thewing room 60/62 whose purpose is unknown.

The whole building gives an impression very different from that conveyed bymost villas, one of a high proportion of common space compared with the total area:leaving out of account the principal hall (33/38) there are two workhalls (12/24 and51/67), two fairly large hall/passage-rooms (22/25 and 42), a passage-room (21) andwhat is probably a little lobby through which room 51/67 was reached from theporticus. Only four rooms (18, 19, 28/29 and 39/40) can really be called living-rooms, and together they occupy a smaller area than the middle hall. Although it is


265

impossible to envisage at all precisely how many households inhabited the villa,whose farm buildings of this period are entirely unknown, the plan suggests sevenor eight. There is no indication that any of them occupied more than one room andthe houseful may have been like that at Aylesford-Eccles (Kent) on a larger scale.

A first step to changing this situation was taken in IB when, in the course ofreorganising the baths, the so-called ‘Hof’ (51/67) was replaced by a square room(67) with pillared hypocaust and a corridor (66); and at the opposite end, 21 and 22/25 were rationalised.15 In addition, the building was lengthened at both ends, tosouth by at least three rooms including a porticus,16 and similarly to north wherewalls had been largely destroyed.

Blankenheim II

In IIA (Fig. 70) the most obvious change was a transformation in the appearance ofthe house to give it a flush front. Demolition of the north wing entailed total removalof the end?porticus and of the south wing, a complete reworking of that end of thehouse. Now it was entered at the south end through a large hall/kitchen17 and sopast the hearth and the cellar steps to the porticus. This is a strange way of enteringa house of some architectural pretensions but the obvious point of entry at the endof the porticus – as at Budapest III-Csucshegy, past a workhall – is ruled out by acellar window there.

One other important change in IIA was the addition to 21/22 of a hypocaustand an unheated apsidal extension, which together made it the most importantapartment in the house. It was entered through a lobby which was also the entryto 28/29, so there is likely to have been a fairly close link between the peopleliving in both rooms.

In IIB room 42 was enlarged by the addition of a square projection matchingexternally the one to south and implying an enhanced importance and probably achange of function; strangely, though, it still provided the only way into the baths.

Phase II changed the shape and importance of some of the rooms remaining fromI but left unaltered the middle hall and the shrine room 30, no doubt because thesocial relations which were expressed from time to time in ceremonies and feastscontinued substantially unaltered. Removal of the workhalls from the house mustmean that their functions were transferred to buildings in the yard, and although itproved impossible to collate their phases with those of the house, some of themmust go with IIA.

Blankenheim III

Phase III (Fig. 70) saw a complete reordering of the middle part of the house. Awaywent the hall, replaced by a much smaller room with an entrance even wider than itspredecessor’s. It is more like the middle room of Newport (I.o.W.) than anything ina hall-derivative, and its creation, combined with the building of smaller rooms to


266

Figure 70


267

north and the retention of those to south, produces something approaching a row-house in social terms, though far more complicated than any house built as such. Itcomprises three suites of rooms grouped around the focal point formed by the newmiddle room. To south the first apartment next to the hall/kitchen is enlarged by theinclusion of the partially heated room 28/2918 but otherwise remains the same. Betweenit and the new hall a corridor leads to what looks formally like a Downton-type unitin which a passage-room gives access to two flanking rooms. The south room, in

Figure 70 The social development of villas


268

which, on the west wall, was a niche, had some special purpose, perhaps in relationto the heated room behind. The third group of three rooms, all opening off thecorridor (39), lack hypocausts and, their size notwithstanding, seem to be an inferiorapartment. The projecting double room now forms part of the extensive baths (as itmay always have been) and is only accessible from them.

Blankenheim shows more clearly than any other villa the general direction ofsocial change. In IA it has a few separate, more or less equal rooms and much spaceused in common. It is impossible to be precise about the activities carried on in theseveral rooms of common use: religious observance, feasts, ceremonies, cooking,perhaps the making of small wooden or metal tools – all the indoor tasks associatedwith a properous farm can be envisaged at the outset. In two stages the inhabitantsof Blankenheim moved away from this kind of life. The first step in II was to removesome of the work functions to buildings in the yard. The second and bigger one inIIIA was to recognise newly emerged social divisions by building three markedlystratified apartments and a fourth block of rooms including the hall/kitchen in whichlived people who may well have been kin but were virtually servants. At the sametime, the nature of domestic religious observance changed; altars now appeared inthe baths and at the entrance to the hall/kitchen but the shrine in the middle of thehouse was replaced by a small detached temple outside.19 Greater social rigidity inthe house was probably reflected in the yards because, although the date when theywere built is unknown, the two inner walls parallel with the perimeter wall are laidout in relation to the phase III house.

SUDELEY-SPOONLEY WOOD

No row-house has produced as much evidence of its history as Blankenheim. Fewhave revealed any doorways and the only British villa to show many, Sudeley-Spoonley Wood (Fig. 70), which was carefully dug and analysed, has never arousedmuch interest except in general terms. Like other British courtyard houses, it is reallya row-house built around two sides of a square of which a third side is occupiedsolely or largely by work-related buildings. Since only the final phase is known,evidence needs to be supplemented from multi-phase villas where the kind ofinferences already applied to row-houses are the sole path to understanding.

The most notable room of the main or east range is the large double room in themiddle. This, unlike its counterparts at Blankenheim III and Newport (I.o.W.) has adoorway of normal width from the porticus. Presumably, therefore, it lacked therepresentational aspect of those and many other rooms so placed, and had becomean altogether more private place – for what? A dining-room is often suggested forimportant middle rooms, but for whom, and on what kind of occasion? If we thinkin contemporary (and possibly anachronistic) terms of personal friends enjoying aconvivial meal, that does not demand a grand room or, usually, a particularly largeone. Still less does it demand a bipartite room like that at Spoonley Wood, where theinner and outer parts of the room could have provided for favoured and less favouredguests; that is the kind of distinction to be expected in entertainment designed toforward political ends, in the broadest sense of the term.


269

That does not explain why the wide doorway so common in rooms in thiscommanding position was unnecessary here. Its absence may have to do with theremoval from the room of all religious ceremony which, being of a public natureand not simply private devotions, was performed in public view. These activities, itmay be suggested, had been transferred to the porticus, where a masonry foundationblocking access to the north end, and not otherwise explained, was perhaps for ashrine of considerable size; there observances were still in public view.

What, then, of Blankenheim IIIA, where the wide doorway to the middle roomhas to be explained on other grounds? There can be little doubt about the removalof the religious function; the smallness of the middle room compared with itspredecessor and the disppearance of the accompanying shrine room establish thatas well as archaeological evidence can. The continuing need for a wide doorway isperhaps explicable in relation to the other activity assumed to have taken place inthe former hall, the performance of representational acts. Whatever ceremonies wereperformed to reinforce community are likely to have been accompanied by feasts,and it may well be that this function was perpetuated in a diminished form whichstill had a public character, rather as in post-Restoration England the king’s publicdining days persisted for a few years, long after losing the real importance of earliertimes. If an explanation on these lines be accepted, it reveals a difference betweenBlankenheim and Spoonley Wood, not just of social habits but of social structureand development.

To left and right of the principal room at Spoonley Wood are similar suites ofrooms, with that to the right, which intercommunicates with the dining-room, beingthe superior one. Each is a three-room apartment somewhat differently planned butincluding one room heated by a hypocaust. In the apartment to the left a lobby,which once had a doorway to the porticus,20 leads to a hall of some kind – a minorworkhall, presumably. At this end the porticus terminates against the pavilion of themajor workhall; in the opposite direction it continues past a kitchen and the entranceto service rooms, returning down the south wing.

That part of the south wing nearest the kitchen and service rooms is occupied bya suite of three heated rooms and the rest by the baths, which were entered by astone-flagged corridor from the west end; there is apparently no other entrance fromthe wing. On the opposite side of the courtyard a large workhall is dignified by aporticus-with-pavilions front as a sign that it was more than accommodation and aworkplace for craftsmen and labourers. This wing has a doorway into the courtyardwhich forms the only entrance; a doorway facing it on the other side provided bothsymmetry and convenience.

In this analysis Spoonley Wood and Blankenheim III both incorporate a principalroom which had something more than a domestic purpose, together with threeapartments of graduated importance and baths. They provide for cooking, certainkinds of domestic-related work and entrance in different ways, Blankenheim IIIAgrouping them all in the big combined kitchen and entrance hall, Spoonley Wooddividing them between special-purpose kitchen, lesser workhall and three doorwaysfrom yard to porticus. Of these, the contrasting manner of entrance would havestruck a visitor with most force. Entering Blankenheim IIIA must have conveyedmuch the same impression as entering a hall like Mayen or Kinheim, except that the


270

smaller rooms were not immediately visible and thus the kitchen/hall was a barrierfor some. At Spoonley Wood the barriers went up in other places: between majorworkhall and smallest apartment plus minor workhall, and between the second ofthose blocks and the more important apartments.

A major social difference between the two villas is revealed by the bigger workhallat Spoonley Wood. Its presence in the inner courtyard in the latest phase, as aworkhall was in the earliest phase of Blankenheim, implies that the social divisionswithin the kin-group had not yet advanced as far in Spoonley Wood [F] as they hadat Blankenheim II, from which a labour force was excluded entirely.

The gradual growth likely at Spoonley Wood was established by excavation in avilla with a similar double room, St Stephens-Park Street (Fig. 70), although not allthe plan could be recovered. In its general lines the story is common in Britain.Small beginnings in VI (Fig. 11), the first Roman phase, were followed in VII (hereII) by the addition of a lobby-and-room unit to south, probably another to north too,and a narrow south wing difficult to explain. In VIII (here III) further enlargementwas overshadowed by the rebuilding of the middle of the house to correspond tonew social relations. This is when the large double room appears and several smallrooms are replaced by larger ones, both changes being found in other houses atmuch the same time.21

Thus Park Street and Spoonley Wood in their final phases have in common thesame kind of middle room and two adjoining apartments with service rooms. Thecomparison cannot be pressed further because Park Street is incomplete, but it doessuggest that both villages, though one was larger and obviously richer than theother, had a broadly similar social basis.

CHANGE IN A ROW-HOUSE: GREAT WELDON

Some recent excavations have uncovered kinds of house development which couldnot be deduced from a plan of the final phase, in which they have left no trace. Onesuch is Great Weldon (Northants.) (Fig. 70).22 By the final phase VI the house has aquite conventional appearance: fairly obviously, the apse and the rear wing havebeen added and what is left is a row of five rooms and two lobbies for which manyparallels exist. Even an unphased plan would lead to that conclusion; it would giveno hint of two previous phases and a less orthodox row-house.

Great Weldon I had four rooms of ascending size from south to north and atimber veranda entered at the north end but not extending the full length of thebuilding. The largest room may have been equivalent to a workhall and the smallestto an inner room; if so, the former may have been thought not to need a veranda,that being reserved for the superior houshold rooms. To this core were added in IIa north porticus, widened at one end, and a porticus-like range of rooms on thesouth side, the largest part of which extended for about the length of the timberveranda and no doubt replaced it functionally. The manner of entrance links thiswith other early row-houses, yet the lack of lobbies makes a confident grouping ofrooms in units impossible.

In phase III complete rebuilding in effect lengthened the house by one room, the


271

large one in the middle. This formalisation of the plan must correspond to theintroduction of a new function not hitherto necessary, and marks the transition froma kin-group operating in fairly informal ways to one in which some degree of authoritywas required. Subsequently the middle room was made more imposing with an apsebut, surprisingly, it never had a mosaic. Embellishment of that kind was confined tothe flanking blocks of rooms, and was carefully balanced; both received mosaics butonly the south end had a hypocaust as well. The middle room at Great Weldonnever became as grand as the one at Park Street.

The successive enlargements of a quite modest nature show that no suddenincrease of wealth and no considerable increase of population took place. Whatgrowth in numbers there may have been depends on how complete the excavatedevidence is thought to be. If no other buildings existed than those discovered, andthere is no reason to suppose so, the population of the house remained fairly constantand a slow natural increase was accompanied by increasing stratification whichpopulated the outbuildings, not with labourers or hands but with farm workerswho had a blood tie to the two principal households. The addition of an apseprobably indicates that the middle room had more than a strictly domestic purposeand was important in the life of the whole houseful, but without being either ajustice room or a state diningroom.

A STABLE VILLA POPULATION

Where the principal house of a villa was enlarged over a long period of time it wasdue to an increase in population or an improvement in the standard of living or a bitof both. Often there are signs that the way of life changed too, as at St Stephen-ParkStreet. Where a house survived for a long period with little or no enlargement theremay not have been population growth, but only if a villa yard has been excavated orrevealed completely from aerial photographs is it possible to be sure of that. Otherwisean increase in numbers could have been accompanied by a loss of social status andrelegation to minor buildings for some members of a kin-group. This no doubtoccurred but, where it did, it is likely to be accompanied by aggrandisement of atleast some part of the principal house and the persons occupying it. The mostproblematic case is the house which grows in amenity but not in numbers of livingrooms, shows no significant social change and displays in its outbuildings noconsiderable extra accommodation for members of the kin-group who descendedthe social scale.

It is not all that common a case but Köln-Mungersdorf (Fig. 71) is one. Leavingout of account the first small hall in [pre-I], the house in phase I comprised a largeworkhall at the north end and a block of rooms at the south. The domestic quarters,seven rooms in all excluding a T-shaped corridor, fall into two distinct parts: fourrooms at the north end correspond very closely to blocks of rooms at Schupfart III(Fig. 71) and Newel (Fig. 24), while the remaining three resemble the middle block(incorporating the dining-room) of Blankenheim.23 Now the dining-room, facingwest, can only have been reached from a veranda or porticus on that side; it isinconceivable that it should have been approached from the workhall. In that case the


272

Figure 71 Social stability in villas


273

other transverse corridors will also have opened on to the porticus, and the shortarm of the T can be explained as going to a south-facing porticus, which perhapshad a pavilion at one end only.24 Moreover, the plan demands a third porticus orveranda, otherwise the north-east porticus could only have been reached by goingout of doors.

On this analysis Mungersdorf I comprised one two-room and two one-room unitscarefully differentiated by size and position, a central dining-room and ?service room,and a workhall. Its principal elevation faced west, away from the yard, and the waythe house was entered seems to have been perpetuated in III, when gaps at the endsof the west porticus can only be for doorways.

To east lay a group of three buildings (Fig. 75), set out with the most importantone in front; this was another workhall, its superior status as being also a dwellinghouse proclaimed, as Fremersdorf noted, by a porticus; he thought it was for indoorand outdoor servants.25 They must have been somewhat different people from thosewho inhabited the workhall in the main house and may have performed only farmtasks. If this separation of halls is correct it implies that Mungersdorf was a considerablydiminished kind of hall-villa even in its first phase. All those who lived in these andother buildings within the perimeter are assumed to be part of a large kin-group.

It is extraordinary that in the rest of its long history the house changed not at allin essentials. In the core of the house the only change was the creation of a passageat the north end, the equivalent of a porticus; this is room 10, which is omitted fromall the phase plans because it could not be dated properly.26 That can be doneapproximately by considering its purpose, which is that of a passage by which thebath block added in IV is reached without traversing the hall, and that is the probabletime when it was built. When this happened the hall was surrounded by domesticrooms and their approaches and must have lost nearly all its workhall functionswhile continuing to serve as a kitchen, for which no other obvious place exists – likeits equivalent Blankenheim 10/19.

Köln-Mungersdorf is remarkable for its stability over a period of three and a halfcenturies. It had a stable population, showed no marked increase in wealth andunderwent no serious social change. The baths represent an important advance incomfort and may even have added a touch of luxury to villa life, but their only socialeffect was to modify how the hall was used; there is no reason to suppose therelations between the several families in the villa changed. Perhaps any naturalincrease in population was offset by the opportunities of urban life in the neighbouringcolonia, in which case there would have been no pressure on resources and nonecessity for new power relations. How far this situation applied in Blankenheim isuncertain for lack of full information about the lesser buildings, but there, too, thehouse itself does not reflect population growth. It is a story repeated in other villas,for example Newel (Fig 24), where change is confined to improving baths andpavilions; yet why is Leutersdorf (Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 45), not far from Trier, so different?To explain these contradictory tendencies demands a wide range of evidence and isbeyond the scope of this book.


274

PROSPERITY WITHOUT SOCIAL CHANGE: SCHUPFART-BETBERG

Schupfart in Switzerland (Fig. 71) is of the same basic type as Köln-Mungersdorf,having a large workhall at one end and a group of domestic rooms at the other. In itsfirst intelligible phase, II, three rooms are reached from the porticus by a narrowcorridor; one has the elongated proportions which are so hard to understandfunctionally, the others look like a domestic hall or living-room and an inner room(with a hearth). These two blocks of domestic space are comparable to the twosimilar blocks found at each end of the simpler German halls, so that Schupfart canbe regarded as their economic and social equivalent. So what does the difference ofplan signify? Probably the position of the hall/workhall depended on its socialimportance. If it was the focus of daily life, as at Bollendorf or Mayen, a centralposition was desirable; if a division of labour and differentiation of status had takenplace, the end might be preferred.27

In III, Schupfart was much enlarged without change of type. Now there were fourrooms grouped as a pair and two singles like those at Newel or Mungersdorf butturned through 90 degrees. Two of these rooms were heated by a small one betweenthem, a hypocauston, and a further improvement was the addition of a pavilion andcellar. The building of one pavilion, not two, may be the only sign that the limiteddegree of equality they imply at Mungersdorf (where pavilions were of differentsizes) was breaking down.

Contrary to what happened in so many villas, the work element here grew inimportance rather than diminished, so that the proportion of the total space occupiedby the workhall shows a marked increase. Even so, the house was turned through180 degrees; why? Originally the ground in front of the workhall fell sharply away,doubtless towards the fields worked by the farm. It may have proved an inconvenientapproach. An easier entrance was provided in III and at the same time the fallingground was utilised to make the cellar and, certainly, to provide a view, for onlytowards the valley did the best room and the one between it and the porticus haveany view at all.

Schupfart, then, demonstrates increasing prosperity based on agriculture and, atthe same time, a Romanised concern not only for comfort but also for the outlookfrom the house and the impression it made on those approaching. Population pressurewas minimal.

The villas discussed in this chapter cover several kinds of development which canbe paralleled elsewhere, and it is hoped that they are reasonably representative ofthe more important variations. The questions posed, which are hardly mentioned invilla reports, and such answers as are offered, may, it is hoped, be thought worthconsideration in future.

275

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

A MODEL OF DEVELOPMENT

Types of house and forms of yard and the ways each developed are not the wholestory. Now they will be brought together to show how the various patterns of

social relations within villas changed, first under the impact of Roman rule andsubsequently through economic stimulus. Because the process about to be describedoccurred at different times and with different emphasis in the several countries andeven in regions of the same country, no precise chronology will be offered; andsome outstanding questions posed earlier will be taken up.

The form of this chapter follows Peter Medawar’s definition of the ‘kind ofexplanation the scientist spends most of his time thinking up and testing’; this, hesays, is ‘the hypothesis which enfolds the matters to be explained among its logicalconsequences’.1

THE HYPOTHESIS

The hypothesis, which is founded on British evidence, runs as follows. Late pre-Roman societies in all parts of the Empire are likely to have had certain features incommon. The most important is that land was not held allodially, by individualshaving absolute right of possesion and disposal, but by kin-groups. By that term ismeant a group of families, each of which was a basic reproductive and economicunit – a conjugal family – varying in numbers at different stages of the life cycle. Toit might be added elderly parents and unmarried relatives who were not economicallyindependent, producing an extended family. Kin-groups might differ greatly in size,from two families to many more, and in the economic and power relations betweencomponent families. Individual families or small sub-groups of families might live innearby separate houses, in houses or apartments joined in an architectural whole, orcommunally. What united them into a kin-group was their joint economic activity,which was essentially agricultural but could include some industrial production; thekind of housing and the nature of the mode of support are less important than groupco-operation. It need not be assumed that all the families, at any stage in the kin-group’s existence, were of exactly equal status. They could be but commonly were

— Chapter Sixteen —

276

not, and the senior member of the group, or of its leading family, was the recognisedhead of the kin-group for the time being.

Since land was held in common it could not be disposed of without the consentof the group. Moreover, the kin-group can be supposed, like pre-feudal societiesgenerally, to have followed the custom of partible inheritance, by which a deceasedperson’s estate was divided equally among his heirs. ‘Estate’ here connotes principallyland rights, in the sense of an entitlement under customary law to the occupationand use of part of the group lands. In conditions which permit a steady naturalincrease of population, an inevitable consequence of following to the letter thiscustomary right to share equally in the deceased’s holding is the fragmentation offarms to the point where they are no longer viable even for subsistence; but it seemsthat, wherever the operation of partible inheritance has been studied, steps havebeen taken to minimise this adverse effect. Perhaps only when preventive measuresbreak down, as in South Wales between the late fifteenth and the early seventeenthcenturies, does the splitting up of landholdings actually occur, although it may havetaken place more often at very high social levels, as is suggested by the example,remote though it is from Britain, of Herod the Great dividing his kingdom betweenhis two sons.

The equality fundamental to partible inheritance was affected by the needs of thegoverning class at central or local level, whatever form these took. For those and moregeneral social purposes the kin-group had necessarily to be represented by one person(and similarly for larger groupings such as septs), the one who has been referred toearlier as its head for the time being, and this of itself introduced an element ofinequality. This exercise of power by an individual on behalf of his kin could not beshared but had the advantage of bringing honour and prestige to all members of thegroup. A study of the German aristocracy in the Early Middle Ages has shown that asociety with grades of nobility was perfectly compatible with a system of partibleinheritance ‘from which neither kings nor dukes nor lesser powers could depart’2 butthe need for someone to exercise power and the authority that necessarily went withit was a perennial threat to the solidarity of a kin-group.3 This historical analogy showsthat partible inheritance is perfectly compatible with Caesar’s mention of a Britisharistocracy and explains why a villa plan readily divisible into three or four units hasone somewhat larger than the rest. In pre-Roman Britain the division, not clearlydiscernible in literary sources, appears to have been between nobles and knights orwarriors on the one hand and the common people on the other.

Any discussion of these matters must take into account recent work on earlyWelsh society and how it operated, notably in the most recent exposition by GlanvilleJones.4 The way hereditary land was held and transmitted in pre-Norman Walesaccords with the proposed model, and although Welsh practice cannot be applied indetail it illustrates some possibilities of change over time. Thus the occupation ofland for four generations by agnatic (male) descent conveyed absolute proprietorship(by simple appropriation) on the holders, while still subjecting it to partible inheritance.Where such a situation arose the proprietors retained, in proportion to their hereditarylands, rights – which were also subject to inheritance custom – in jointly held land.Descent of property worked thus: during a father’s lifetime the sons would set uphomesteads on the family’s appropriated lands; on his death the youngest son would

— A Model of Development —

277

succeed to the parental homestead. At that time the family’s appropriated landsmight be redistributed (but not necessarily); and this did not apply to homesteads.Later, ‘after the brothers had died, their sons, being first cousins, if they wished,could revise the sharing of the land, presumably so as to remove the rise of markedinequalities’. This redistribution of their grandfather’s lands, applicable also to secondcousins and their great-grandfather’s lands, was a right but not an obligation; andwith second cousins the right was extinguished.5

There remains the question of how new settlements were created. Welsh sourcesindicate that as increased population led to progressively smaller subdivision of thearable lands around the primary or ‘old’ settlement of a kin-group (a gwely, renderedas ‘clan’), new gwelyau were established within the group holding, with considerabledifference of size between old and new until the latter was well established. It led toa pattern of dispersed settlement6 resembling the scatter that has been noticed ascharacteristic of late pre-Roman settlements and villas.

This hypothesis is used to explain the origin of house types and the ways theywere developed to meet the economic and social changes in provincial-Romansociety over some four centuries. To apply this model to a large part of the RomanEmpire is hazardous, rash even, yet it may prove to explain villas a little better thanthe present simplistic categories.

BEFORE THE ROMANS

So few Late Iron Age settlement excavations have any pretensions to completenessthat conclusions about the number of houses coexisting at any given time are hardto draw. On some widely scattered open sites two houses of similar size standingclose together imply equality in the working of a farm;7 enclosed settlements withone large and two small round-houses show, if the former belonged to the headman,the beginnings of social stratification.8

In south-east England and in the Somme basin it was common for settlements tocomprise two enclosures. The French sites mostly have one enclosure within theother and appear to develop from quite irregular shapes9 to approximately rectangularinner enclosures within a not very much larger and less geometrically shaped one.They are succeeded, probably not until the early Roman period, by sites where theinner enclosure is perfectly rectilinear but the outer one still has a less regular shape.10

Little is known about how many houses stood within these enclosures; in someinstances one is discernible in each.11

British sites might be expected to resemble the French but do not. St Michael-Gorhambury (Herts.) (Fig. 64) had, in III (the first Iron Age phase) a single sub-rectangular enclosure, to which was added in IV what became the inner enclosure,both having more than one house; L’Etoile (Somme) resembles it in its courtyardsand the position of the later villa. Elsewhere in Britain multiple small enclosures andtwo or more houses appear to be common.12 At a site like Dragonby the strongimpression is left of the constant cutting and recutting of ditches, implying, perhaps,that boundaries were changed frequently in response to the reallocation of land(among other things). All these sites are compatible with occupation by a kin-group.


278

THE EMERGENCE OF VILLAS

Amongst the early houses built in any particular province one category stands out,that of residences for members of the ruling or official classes. They are not villas inthe ordinary sense but have an important bearing on them. Whether those who livedin them were native to the province or incomers is not known and is in any eventirrelevant to their houses, which must have been planted where they are by purchaseor expropriation and which, in planning and construction, owe nothing to theindigenous society. The most striking example is Echternach (Lux.), laid outsymmetrically on a virgin site in the 70s of the first century to face a symmetricallyplanned farm enclosure. This is exactly what is to be expected of great houses,whatever their political status, and a reminder that they needed a source of basicfood and fodder independent of the market. Beginning as and remaining a luxuriousresidence, Echternach was also the centre – the caput in medieval terminology – ofa territory of unknown size or tenure over which private justice was administeredfrom the basilica at the north-west corner.

Imported buildings of this kind include the proto-palace at Fishbourne (Sussex),Southwick (Sussex),13 Euskirchen (Nordrh.-Westf.) and possibly Birkenfeld-Elchweiler(Rhld-Pf.).14 They provided models of building technique, ornament and forms ofplanning, examples of the last being the two room-and-lobby units in the east rangeof Fishbourne Palace and the ‘room within a room’ or L-shaped lobby at Echternach.Just as important was the resulting creation of a local labour force capable ofdisseminating the new ideas and methods wherever there was a demand.

Villas appear in Britain within two decades of the conquest,15 so the earliest mayantedate the great houses a little. What motive did a kin-group have to merge two farmsinto one and obliterate the boundary by building this new kind of house across it?

Within a few years of the conquest it must have been apparent to even the mostpowerful kin-group that the old way of life in which its prestige was established by themilitary strength of its warrior members had gone for ever; indeed, it had probablybeen weakened a good deal in south-east England before the Claudian invasion. Authorityhad to be legitimised quickly by the new rulers, so that, once local government hadbeen established, the pressing need for the group to maintain influence and a degree ofpower by other means was solved by representation, through its head for the timebeing and other members of the former warrior class, on the civitas council or aperpetuated tribal council. These circumstances diminished the comparatively fewindividuals in a kin-group who belonged to that class while increasing the importanceof the group, thus making unity desirable politically and the muscle provided by collectivewealth necessary. This new-found source of power, like the old, required visibleexpression – the outlook of the time demanded it – and while dress and entertainmentkept their importance, that of retinue inevitably declined. Architecture took its place. Astrade with army garrisons and the nascent towns developed, the economic benefits ofthe civilizing process combined with potential political advantage to make the buildingof a villa and the creation of an agricultural base to sustain it both possible and desirable.It might be regarded less favourably as a familiar manifestation of colonialism, that ofcurrying favour with the new powers to demonstrate assimilation.

Those remarks apply to the thirty or so years following the conquest. As the political


279

structure and its workings became familiar, smaller kin-groups found two motives torebuild – the prestige Roman fashion conferred on the whole kin and the enhancedpossibility of office-holding for its members. Just this kind of point has been made aboutanother society where partible inheritance was universal – early medieval Germany:

It is interesting to see the ways in which the group was to be reconciledwith the outstanding position achieved by one of its members, how cousinsor more often brothers were to be made to share the heightened dignity andstanding an officefief represented.16

Persons prominent in a kin-group who would have been warriors in Caesar’s timeand perhaps potential warriors in Claudius’s might, as Black has argued, serve in theRoman army or be officers in the local militia17 but as time went on and militarystanding yielded in importance to civic office, this aspect of their social positionceased to be important, even though such people may have taken up military servicefor a time. Tacitus, writing from an imperial point of view, might describe this asenslavement, and so, in a sense, it undoubtedly was. In historical perspective it wasa true civilizing process, the exact counterpart of what happened in Europe over avery long period, beginning in the High Middle Ages, as authority became morecentralised and fell progressively into fewer hands.18

THE CONSOLIDATION OF SETTLEMENTS

Such is the background to every decision to build a villa, whether taken by a kin-group or a part of it wishing to create a new gwely. Probably only a minority ofsettlements went directly from their Late Iron Age state to a Romanised one, meaningwhat is commonly called phase I of a villa; increasingly, deep excavation shows thatmany passed through at least one intermediate stage. What remains of that short-lived stage is usually a hall built of stone or with stone footings, as at Noyers-sur-Serein (Yonne), Köln-Mungersdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) (Fig. 71) and Leiwen-Bohnengarten(Rhld-Pf.) (Fig. 72). Why it should have been thought impossible or undesirable toincorporate the building or buildings of that phase into a later one, as invariablyhappened with those of the next phase (the convential I) is not obvious, nor why itwas sometimes accompanied by a change of alignment. At Noyers-sur-Serein a changefrom hall to row-type houses may explain total abandonment of the old building butthere is also a slight change of alignment. The same thing happened in the changefrom Vieux-Rouen-sur-Bresle (Seine-Marne) I to II, where a courtyard house wasreplaced by another of virtually the same dimensions.

Another change in the [pre-I] to I transition is an apparent increase in the numberor size of buildings. A simple stone hall at Noyers-sur-Serein was replaced [II] by twosmall units, a Downton-type unit and a workhall (Fig. 72); its [pre-I] counterpart atKöln-Mungersdorf was replaced by a large hall-derivative (Fig. 71) incorporatingmuch the same accommodation. On the face of it this kind of change implies adramatic growth of the villa population in a short period of time, which is highlyimprobable. It is better accounted for by assuming that the timber buildings of which


280

Figure 72


281

traces are sometimes found on sites like these were houses or combined shelters forfamily and animals or crops, which would allow for a considerable villa population.Consequently, the transition to a villa involved two decisions, not one, and thisraises the further question of why the kin-group was unable to go straight to its finalobjective and had to achieve it piecemeal.19

The answer to that question where sizeable villas are concerned may be that thefinal objective was inconceivable at the time when the first stage of stone andtimber buildings was decided on, and not simply in terms of the resources needed.Both stages involved change in the social structure and the second may well havebeen influenced by the outcome of the first. In a society where partible inheritanceinvolved the periodic division of land, buildings were of impermanent earthfastconstruction and replaced comparatively frequently, even if they did not movetheir location. A house built of stone or with stone footings was less prone todecay and its survival in the hands of the leading family of a kin-group may havetended to perpetuate that family’s position within it, and to limit or eliminate theidea of a ‘head for the time being’.

Villas with many buildings around a rectangular or trapezial courtyard such asthose in the Somme basin must, if they show no sign of being of two phases, be theproduct of a single decision to rebuild. The problem is to understand what kind ofperson or group took such a decision, given the disparity observable in several villas

Figure 72 Second-phase enlargement


282

between the various houses enclosed by the perimeter wall. Something may belearnt from the only example which has been dug to its lower levels, Winkel-Seeb(Switz.) (Fig. 72).

Winkel I comprised two timber buildings, one large, the other about a fifth of itssize, set at an angle to each other rather like Gayton Thorpe (Fig. 39). They are theequivalent of the single hall of Köln-Mungersdorf [pre-I] and lasted perhaps twentyyears before being destroyed by fire. Phase II corresponds to Köln-Mungersdorf I,Noyers-sur-Serein II or Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor II as a period of expansion, thedifference between those villas and Winkel being the scale on which the latter wasplanned from the outset. Those parts established archaeologically were the rectangularhall (Fig. 7) forming the core of the main house, the three subsidiary buildings in theinner courtyard and the west hall of the outer yard; and there is every reason tosuppose that the building set perfectly symmetrically to east of the latter representsa second building campaign forming part of the initial design, and the same is likelyto be true of H and J.

The whole is intended for a far larger and more hierarchically structuredpopulation than that in I, and already when II was begun (in AD 45–55) mostpeople must have been living nearby and moving in as buildings were completed.Labelling A the Herrenhaus or manor house and its builder a ?veteran of the 13thLegion20 does not explain where the additional people came from. The presenthypothesis postulates a kin-group, one probably, to judge by the lack of pre-villafinds, living in scattered clusters of small buildings. A decision to build a villaproduced I but, as in other places, this seems to have been felt unsuitable quitesoon and a new set of buildings was planned to accommodate the whole and torealise new political and economic objectives.

Explanation of all big regular courtyards has to be in terms of a single decisionunderlying their planning and setting-out, and the social and economic circumstanceswhich led to it. The matter cannot be pursued here but it may be noted that atWarfusée-Nord the unit-system house (p. 159) implies more clearly than the hall ofWinkel II that a kin-group decided, at a certain time, to recognise architecturallythe social divisions which had emerged under Roman rule. Warfusée-Nord showson a large scale the bipartite division apparent in much smaller villas like Maulévrierand Laperrière-sur-Saône, and the wings, one front, one rear, at Winkel-Seeb andLangton Dwelling House III (Fig. 3) are a different way of expressing it. Evidentlythe kin-groups retained, in big establishments and small alike, a fundamental bipartitestructure, within each part of which a number of units of consumption or conjugalfamilies existed. Perhaps the two courtyards of St Michael-Gorhambury should beinterpreted similarly.

THE DIFFUSION OF VILLA TYPES

When house plans are assembled from Europe and not simply, as usually happens,from a single country, the various types have a very international look, crossing bothmodern and Roman boundaries. Tholey-Sotzweiler [I] in eastern France and Deva inRomania constitute one striking instance of nearly identical houses found far apart,


283

and Schaanwald (Liechtenstein) is not so very different (Fig. 73). Row-houses appear inBritain, the whole of France down to the Spanish border, Germany and Switzerland.Halls are everywhere except – so far – Spain, but so basic to human shelter is theirelementary form that this wide distribution is not surprising. More remarkable is the useof particular architectural means to achieve a social end, notably reverse symmetry; it isfound from Italy to Belgium and in Switzerland but not further east and has a distributionsimilar to that of the porticus-with-pavilions front. Yard types are less widespread, beinglimited by the different economic base and the varying duration of Roman rule in theseveral countries, but they are not confined within national boundaries.

Regional types hardly exist. Peristyles are confined, with few exceptions, to southernEurope. South-east Europe has a distinctive character with its many small villas ofunorthodox plan which are different from those in other parts of the continent andmostly from each other. Many are halls; otherwise the individuality of this part ofEurope consists in unusual combinations of elements familiar elsewhere.

The hypothesis postulates that the several types of house and the ways they werecombined were designed to meet the needs of kin-groups of varying compositionand at different stages of development, and that the choice depended on the sizeand structure of the group. Precisely what decided the choice of house type for anyparticular kin-group is unknown at present but the general progression is from hallto row type. How did the members of the group know about types? A feature ofhouse planning as distinctive as reverse symmetry cannot possibly have developedindependently in several places far apart; it can only have been diffused by the

Figure 73 Diffusion of a type


284

architectural profession. The same goes for the very widespread types of lobby. Atransverse lobby sounds simple enough to be invented independently wherever itappeared useful; in fact, making it the basis of a house type, especially when used inconjunction with the square lobby, and using that type over a wide area, indicatesan ultimate common origin for all of them.

How architectural ideas, for example those concerning classical detail, were diffusedseems not to be known save by inference from the architecture itself. Presumablyarchitects were summoned to a province as required, primarily to design the publicbuildings and a few early great houses like Echternach but also to work for privateclients. At some level the Roman administration must have been aware of the needsof native societies and made the information available to official architects, since it ishardly credible that individual professionals devised independently the same limitedrange of solutions, some of them specific to a particular situation. As was said earlier,they worked to a code applicable from the Netherlands to the Pyrenees and fromWales to Switzerland. Eastwards to Romania and Bulgaria a different code applied,one that is much harder to crack and has only tenuous links with the first.

DEVELOPMENT OF THE VILLA SYSTEM

A recurrent theme of the preceding chapters has been the many and variousexpressions of duality in villas. It is not simply a matter of two units and two householdsin small houses like Sinsheim (Fig. 8) or Maulévrier (Fig. 13); Munzenberg-Gambach(Fig. 31) and a really big villa like Haut-Clocher/Saint-Ulrich (Fig. 53) show it too,even though the number of households in both is certainly more than two. Fliessem,again, shows its dual character in its two entrance fronts, behind which are severalapartments. In the story of villa development a division of this kind, however achieved,is fundamental though not universal.

Ewhurst-Rapsley (Fig. 41) is an instance of what are effectively two farms unitedto the extent of being in adjoining yards. Marshfield (Fig. 66), originally two farms,was truly united by the building of two houses end to end. Elsewhere one housefaced a divided yard, as at Bad Homburg (Fig. 9) and perhaps, in effect, at Hambach512.21 At Winkel-Seeb II the hall forming the main house shows, in the ‘portico-likeannexes’ at the ends,22 minimal signs of dual occupation which are reinforced in IVby the addition of wings front and rear. The pavilions of Mehring [F] were enlargedto become wings; the wings of Weitersbach II (Fig. 69) are two row-houses developingfrom a hall house; and Geislingen-Heidegger Hof (Fig. 33) is effectively two houses.These are some of the many kinds of duality running through villas.

All the houses mentioned in the preceding paragraph are of more than one periodof construction, as is inevitable where occupation extends over two hundred ormore years. Where they show continuity of occupation with a pre-Roman settlement,they correspond to the old settlement of the hypothesis; where not, they may benew gwelyau or settlements (but the Welsh term has slightly different implications).If a villa is separated by a considerable period of time from previous occupation itmay also be a new gwely, one placed on part of the kin-group land from which theinhabitants had moved away under partible inheritance and redistribution.


285

That point is bound up with the question of whether it is possible to determinethe extent and boundaries of what British archaeologists, sticking to their Victoriancountry-house model, call the villa estate. For Roman Britain the matter cannot beproved archaeologically and any area defined by natural boundaries or the proximityof other villas is speculative.23 Moreover, there is an important objection to the ideaof an estate as it is currently peddled, that no allowance is made for the effects ofland transfers, whether by inheritance and division between heirs or by sale andpurchase. For the latter little evidence exists for Britain,24 probably because therewas no such market, yet if lands were divided by inheritance there should havebeen one. But if ‘estate’ boundaries can really be ascertained, and if there is reasonto think they were fairly permanent, the hypothesis of a kin-group’s occupation andefforts to avoid fragmentation into smaller and smaller holdings fits well.

SOCIAL CHANGE IN HALL AND YARDS

Architectural unification can be observed in broad halls, from a stage in which twoor three are grouped loosely in an enclosure to the final one of transmutation into aquasi-row-house. The most basic grouping in which two or three houses turn theirbacks on one another is exemplified by Koerich-Goeblingen (Fig. 74). Nearer together,but still not positioned in any close relation to one another, are the buildings atSontheim an der Brenz (Fig. 74). A modest degree of authority is apparent amongthe three houses, comprising four or five households, at Regensburg-Burgweinting(Fig. 41); the north house-and-hall appears to be superior to the halls or workhallsopposite. At Köngen (Fig. 74) the principal hall is the seat of a kin-group headdistinctly superior to those living in the two lesser halls; the one to west, if the lineof the enclosure has been correctly ascertained, may well be second in importance,as being more visible and easily approachable from the entrance. This developmentis carried further at Vierherrenborn-Irsch (Fig. 74), where the central hall house isbigger and better appointed than that at Köngen, and its two households havecourtyards (gardens?) to separate them from the farmyard; it may well have been theresidence of the hereditary head of the kin-group, which, if that is correct, nowshowed the disparities of wealth found in eighteenth-century Scottish clans.

Hierarchy is rarely expressed as strongly as at Irsch, to the extent that many yardsappear to lack an organising principle. Pforzheim-Hagenschiess (Fig. 74) is dividedby a road or path into two parts. To east is the principal hall (1), which was probablyentered from the south; to west is a workhall (3); baths (2) are sited more or lessequidistantly from both; and each has a subsidiary building. The layout is reminiscentof Ober-Grombach with a surrounding wall of more regular plan and control passedto one household. At Bondorf (Bad.-Württ.) (Fig. 74) a very similar house standingroughly in the middle of the yard dominates it completely; nothing else matches it insize, and the two flanking buildings are perhaps workhalls of depressed status, thesuccessors of the minor halls at Köngen.

Köngen can be taken as the starting-point of a different line of development. Itsprincipal hall corresponds to that at Katzenbach (Fig. 74) – a building of two or threephases which began, probably, as a simple double-ended hall-derivative. At each end


286

Figure 74


287

Figure 74 Yards as indicators of social relations


288

of the porticus in front of it is a hall. Their position suggests a degree of independencegreater than that of pavilions (Eckrisaliten), as they have been misleadingly called;they are effectively cross-wings, albeit at a slight remove. An advance beyond thisstage can be seen in a few houses which have subsidiary halls projecting as longwings, the best example being Ödheim with two. The story continues through changesin the wings, from hall to row type, so that at Flumenthal (Switz.) one wing is a halland the other is divided into two rooms. That is a step towards the end of the serieswhere the wings are independent row-houses: Weitersbach II has a north wingmuch like Drax and a south wing like Asthall-Worsham I; Wachenheim (Nordrh.-Westf.) an east wing like Plachy-Buyon (Somme) and a west wing like Fontaine-le-Sec.25 The south wing of Friedberg-Fladerlach (Fig. 69) is yet another example.

In these ways halls became steadily more like row-houses. Just how closethese apparently contrasting types were is shown by three examples. If theedges of the various floor materials at Frocester Court I be translated into walls,the result is recognisably a row-house (Fig. 69). And if the hall of Kingsweston(Fig. 69) be divided into two squarish end rooms, each with a hearth andseparated by a transverse lobby, the result is like Dury or a Downton unit.Although broad halls did not lend themselves to easy total transmutation of thiskind, one possible example is the principal house at Graux (Belg.) (Fig. 69).Beginning as an unidivided hall, it was converted into a living-room, transverselobby and a longitudinal lobby between two small rooms; the latter partresembles in a general way a unit at Ktittingen-Kirchberg or the dometic end ofSchupfart I and Newel.

It is not surprising, therefore, that in number and type of rooms Weitersbach II(Fig. 69) comes fairly close to Blankenheim I (Fig. 70), which itself, though by nomeans a row-house, is far removed from a simple hall. Halls pose the problem, justas acutely as row-houses, of why and how an indigenous kin-group came to adopta hall at any particular stage of development. Someone who knew all the currentoptions must have been on hand to advise them. Such a person must surely havebeen, if not formally a government architect, one who worked closely with officials.The precise level of co-operation within a kin-group seeking to build the appropriatekind of Romanised house established what kind of plan was best suited to its needs,but the choice was always related to a tightly knit series; the archaeological evidencedoes not, on present showing, include the unusual or eccentric solutions that mightbe expected had the matter been left to a kin-group’s whim.

SHRINES AS A UNIFYING DEVICE

In many cultures houses incorporate a religious function in the form of a shrine,statue or other cult object. Private recognition of spiritual forces usually involvedpropitiating gods or spirits with offerings at pools and springs. Devotions of thiskind can be inferred in villas through certain minor architectural features andaspects of planning, and many examples have already been suggested. But theyreveal more than religious feelings; they were used, and again this has alreadycropped up, to unify blocks of buildings or separate farmyards. Applebaum put


289

the matter succinctly: ‘Cults are required to impose authority not upon slaves andhelots, but upon potential equals.’26

A few early villas have, at the entrance to the principal house, a rectangularstructure open on the fourth side, the side facing the person entering. Blankheim Ihas one such, Farningham-Manor House I (Fig. 15) another. Suggestions that the firstwas a pair of buttresses and the second the house entrance are untenable; a shrineis more likely, for all the complete absence of confirmatory evidence. It is the onlyobvious use for a room open to all who approached the house, and the sameargument applies to a square open-ended room at the south or approach end ofAylesford-Eccles (Fig. 66), looking like a less ambitious version of the temple, replacingthe early shrine, at Chedworth (Glos.) (Fig. 74). In an advanced form of end-entrancehouse like Blankenheim IIIA (and perhaps IIA), a structural shrine was replaced byan altar beside the doorway into the hall (Fig. 70).

End entrances soon fell out of favour for houses of any size. Instead of three ormore units it became customary to have two flanking a large middle room, to whichthe shrine was transferred, a move which may imply relegation of one household toa workhall in the yard and increasing social stratification. Newport (I.o.W.) (Fig. 10)had unusual evidence of this religious change in the form of two boulders buried‘just within the threshold of the entrance’; the larger had a flattened top, the smaller‘a pivot hole for a metal pin’.27 That it had to do with a grindstone is unlikely, giventhe obvious importance of the room;28 they are bases for shrines. An entrance 2.4 mwide suggests that the whole room retained something of the character of a littletemple, like its equivalent at Aylesford-Eccles. A stone structure in the middle roomof Marshfield N IIIB can hardly be anything other than a shrine or altar29 and theroom must have been virtually a small temple.

The change brought symmetry and a touch of classical dignity to the house front,qualities desirable in provincial societies whose members’ building activities weredesigned to reinforce their membership of the ruling elite, even if only of its lowerlevels. But why incorporate a shrine? North Leigh (Oxon.) reveals the intention: whenthe separate row-house and hall were unified by adding a porticus, an apsidal shrine,filling the space between them, was built. It was not opposite the entrance to the whole;the hall retained its own gateway, the row-house probably did too, and the shrineprovided a common focus for two separate households. So too, in a different way, didthe shrine placed across yard or farm boundaries, of which Ewhurst-Rapsley (Fig. 41)and Marshfield (prior to the building of the villa) (Fig. 66) are examples.30

Not all structures of this kind have been correctly identified. A squarish masonrybuilding at Voerendaal-Ten Hove II (Neth.), said to be a granary, stands midwaybetween the south-facing hall-derivative house and a large north-facing hall of sufficientpretensions to have a pilastered porticus. In III and IV it was surrounded on threesides by domestic rooms and distant from anything like a barn.31 As a temple it suitsits position; as a granary, hardly.

Shrines having the same unifying purpose appear in later houses such as Downton,where a direct approach to the middle room across the porticus was blocked by alittle (nymphaeum). Verneuil-en-Halatte/Bufosse (Oise) is similar, though unrecognisedin publications.32 Not quite the same effect was intended at Brighstone-Rock (Fig.36), where a circular ‘pier’ flanked the point of entrance on the outside. It is reasonably


290

explained as a base for something; that it was for a rotary mill33 is less likely than fora shrine – one apparently not involving water. Its position to one side of the axialapproach, not precluding direct entrance, implies that the middle room stood in asomewhat different relation to the flanking units than at Downton. This may signifya greater unity and common action on the part of the households.

Bringing a shrine into the house had architectural consequences. Putting it in asmall room opening off the grand hall, as at Blankenheim, implies that the devotionsand ceremonies were confined to the houseful, hence a separate shrine was requiredto enable those entering to make an offering to the household deities. To accommodatethe first to an imposing exterior was not difficult, the second much more so, and thesolution adopted may have proved inconvenient and certainly detracted from agenerally symmetrical elevation. A more satisfactory solution from a purely architecturalstandpoint was found at Aylesford-Eccles by prolonging the house structure as alittle temple; it was less satisfactory insofar as domestic observances could only beperformed by first going outside. Farningham-Manor House combined the architecturalmerit of Aylesford with the shallower shrine form of Blankenheim, thereby losingthe dignified setting appropriate to solemn group ceremonies which was available inboth those villas while retaining the disadvantage of Aylesford.

When Blankenheim III was built (and this probably applies to II), an altar notrequiring a monumental setting setting sufficed at the entrance to the house and,there being no longer a need to bind the kin-group together by domestic religion, adetached temple was built. A comparable though archaeologically less clearlyobservable change occurred at Aylesford-Eccles when the original porticus was blockedat the south end, a return added to west and the shrine closed up to make a room.Where a replacement shrine was situated is not obvious. One possibility, since nodetached temple was found, is the little lobby-like room opening off the porticus inthe middle, which is coeval with the blocking.34

If that last suggestion is correct it is an example of the well-attested link betweendomestic religion and symmetry and shows how the two were related. Early row-houses comprise two or more domestic units and usually nothing more; Aylesford isexceptional in its shrine room and Farningham-Manor House in that and the workhall.The only opportunity for symmetry is provided by those two-unit houses whichhave back-to-back lobbies and could have had adjoining doorways in the middle ofthe elevation. Whether they did so is doubtful. Symmetry is part and parcel of theneed for unity and co-operation, not, initially, something to be desired for its ownsake. That shift came as the leadership essential to maintaining the kin-group’s positionin the face of governmental and economic pressure became first control and then, inthe stage represented by Gayton Thorpe [F], something close to expropriation.

Where Aylesford differs from most row-type houses is in never linking religiousobservance and a representational room. How some large kin-groups managed withoutsuch a room is not clear, nor is any obvious alternative to be seen here. It is remarkablethat a kin-group managed to prosper without undergoing any fundamental changein what, by [F], must have been an outmoded social structure; but that accounts forits asymmetrical appearance. The increased population of the villa, which may havebeen of lower status than those families in the core rooms, was accommodated inextensions at both ends.


291

All villas will have had a place devoted to religious observance and commonly itappears to have left no archaeologically detectable traces. How easily they coulddisappear is shown by one of the Hambach villas, Ha77/264, which had, lying in theporticus next to the probable entrance, a millstone and, near it, a bronze statuette ofApollo. There is no proof that the two are connected, or that the millstone wasdeliberately placed where it was found, and only in the light of the precedinginstances does the conjunction of the two appear possible: a base for the figure witha drain for libations. In the same vein explanation may be offered for a very minorarchitectural feature of some continental villas, for example Treuchtlingen-Weinbergshof (Bay.), where the north wall of the proticus has two small projectionsfor which no purpose has been suggested. Similarly with Houthem-Vogelsang (Fig.9): in the front wall of the porticus are two small projections placed perfectlysymmetrically between the pavilions, whereas the imposing staircase is not set axiallybetween them. No explanation or even mention of them appears in the text and theyare conveniently omitted from the reconstruction drawing of the front elevation35 –shades of Mylius’ high-handed treatment of Blankenheim! Some correspondencebetween the pair of projections and the two parts of the main range seems likely, asbetween those at Treuchtlingen and the double-ended hall behind. I suggest theseare the bases for cult statues connected with the two households sharing each villa.

FREESTANDING SHRINES AND TEMPLES

In still larger villas a water cult found expression in detached structures of someelaboration which always had a social as well as a religious purpose. Darenth (Kent)(Fig. 42) had, in front of the main building, what has been called a well.36 Nearer themark is the first explanation offered for it, ‘a domestic chapel or Lararium, and theminute projecting structure the place where the images of the gods were kept’.37

Nearer the house, and dividing the courtyard into two, was a well-built stone channelwith a cistern and an arch or other monumental structure at the south end; it was anornamental pool, so placed to emphasise the importance of the flanking wings andthe lack of a direct approach to the middle block; and that is also the primarypurpose of a bigger pool at Famechon (Somme).38 The Darenth ‘chapel’ or shrinehad a more impressive counterpart at Winkel-Seeb, a round tower-like structure39

paralleled in a temple at Metz-Sablon (Moselle).40

Many villas have, close to the house, a squarish stone building which can be mostplausibly interpreted as a little temple. In one such building standing at the yardentrance at Mayen, the terracotta figurines and other votive objects found withinestablished its purpose beyond doubt. Where social division was stronger, as atBlankenheim, the temple stood in its own enclosure near the house entrance. Where,as at Chedworth, the access of several households to the temple was important, itwas placed apart in one corner of the inner domestic court and the buildings wereskewed towards it, whereas in a large villa such as Oberentfelden with strong socialdivisions, a temple of commensurate size dominated the view and was presumablyaccessible from both the inner and the working courtyards. The siting of templesand shrines, like so many aspects of villa planning, was used to express social


292

relations as much as religious feeling, whether to unify, as at Mayen (Rhld-Pf.), or todivide, as at Oberentfelden.

WHY DO LARGE VILLAS DIFFER SO MUCH?

Two groups of villas provide a strong contrast. On the one hand Woodchester,Nennig, Basse-Wavre and Haccourt II/III are dominated by a large, impressive roomin the middle; on the other, Anthée, Haccourt I and Fliessem are not, while Haut-Clocher/Saint-Ulrich is unique in having two rooms of that kind set back to back.

According to the hypothesis, kin-groups founded them all. Haccourt I, like Anthéeand Fliessem, is a row-house combining a few large rooms of full depth with passage-or lobby-like ones. In II it is swept away to be rebuilt as a great country house, yetits plan retains an extraordinary duality: the grand middle room stands isolated,flanked by two equally well-appointed peristyle residences facing in differentdirections.

Haccourt II/III is nevertheless not a truly palatial villa. It lacks the architecturalunity of Nennig because the kin-group, having prospered remarkably, preserved itsstructure and built two separate houses unified by a common ceremonial hall. If theidea of two splendid houses where orthodox opinion expects one appears strange,the example of the two identical palaces built side by side for the sons of KingHerod the Great should be remembered,41 and the symmetrical main range at Oberweis(Rhld-Pf.) looks like two sizeable houses, each with a large hall in the middle,42

under one roof. Splendid though Haccourt II is, it has the rather sprawling characterof many palaces. It lacks the tightly knit architectural unity of Fliessem (Fig. 53)which retained the ‘simple core of a modest farmhouse’.43 The facades – three accordingto Boettger, four, to Koepp44 – include two, west and south, which are quite remarkablearchitecturally and in themselves appear to reflect some internal division of thehouse. As Boettger notes: ‘This individual variant finally arises through the settingback-to-back of two villas with porticus-and-pavilions’; and even though duplicationis not as clear-cut as Munzenberg-Gambach, each of the two residences in bothvillas comprises two or more households. Tantalisingly, the accompanying plan showswithout argument five houses, which may be the correct total but they ought to bedisposed differently.45 One crucial point is that the east and west porticuses aredivided by a cross-wall, each part being equivalent to a longitudinal lobby fromwhich those entering went into a transverse lobby. Lobbies and porticus divisionswere carefully matched to the relative standing of the two parts of the house, thelarger leading to the more frequented part (with two sets of baths), the smaller to thepart with the grandest facade. Of course the division was not absolute; the occupantsof the grander south part entered the ‘new’ baths either along the porticus or, in fineweather, across the terrace in front of it, and another part of the houseful used thesmaller or ‘old’ baths.46 The plan fits a kin-group structure perpetuated in a housefulgrown rich better that that of a line of proprietors who have gradually become rich,47

and it is precisely because that structure remained intact that a representational roomcould not be placed in the middle of the house.

Another famous villa, Anthée (Fig. 75), also lacks the dominant middle room and


293

regular planning of, for example, Oberweis, and shares with Fliessem the characteristic,unusual in so large a house, of a divided middle cell, and its unit-system structure ismade clear by the device of a front pool, as at Bocholtz-Vlengendaal. There are fouror five units: two, probably three, in the main range and one each in the north-westand north-east wings. It is effectively the largest member of the row-house class.

One more example deserves mention in order to illustrate the diversity of theclass of very large unit-system houses. Aylesford-Eccles (Fig. 75), despite beingextended at both ends and acquiring two semi-detached wings and many smallrooms, retained to the end, hardly altered, the orignal room dispositions of [I]. Verysignificantly, it retained to the end the original pool; no sign here of the change soapparent at Bocholtz-Vlengendaal. And in this context the evolution of a few smallervillas might be considered: Milton Keynes-Bancroft (Fig. 75), for example, kept in Vthe duality expressed by a pool – here placed at right-angles to the house, likeFamechon – and two bath buildings for separate households, like Fliessem; or NortonDisney (Fig. 75), where two buildings are unified by a bath house. This, in the laterEmpire, can hardly mean that the farm staff commonly supposed to occupy theaisled building shared comparative luxury with the ‘master’ and family; it may indicatethat the unit system was not dead – that it was, more likely, flourishing.

THE PROBLEM OF A STABLE VILLA POPULATION

Some villas show a remarkably rapid increase in the size of the main house in theirearly [pre-I] phases, Köln-Mungersdorf being one. Coeval with I is a second sizeablehall, built to accommodate people described somewhat misleadingly (according tothe hypothesis) as servants; they must have been quite numerous and were of sufficientstanding to merit a porticus at the front of their house and wall-paintings inside it. Inthe new social structure they formed a third stratum below those in the apartmentsand in the workhall, but it was not the lowest one: that comprised the labourers,cowherds and others who were lodged in barns, byres (buildings 6, 8) and thevarious late outbuildings.48

By VI the villa of Köln-Mungersdorf had increased in population, notably whenthe workhall 3 was built. Nevertheless, without entering into the difficult business ofestimating numbers, it seems unlikely that new accommodation matches the probablenatural increase over a period of about 350 years. Just as remarkable is the persistence,virtually unaltered, of the social structure of I to the end of the villa’s existence in VI,the late fourth century. Had the numbers of people living at the villa increasedmarkedly, some change would have occurred, either in the direction of Anthée andan enlarged but still comparatively equal social structure, or of Meckel and its muchgreater stratification and perhaps slave labour. What may have made continuance ofthe original pattern possible is the siphoning off of surplus labour to the great urbancentre of Köln. With little or no pressure of additional numbers the balance betweenthe three strata did not change, added to which no marked rise in living standards isdiscernible in mosaic floors or other manifestations of luxury. That, of course, givesrise to economic questions which need to be asked of all the houses in the presumedkin-group territory before a satisfactory answer can be given for any particular one.


294

Figure 75


295

COURTYARDS FOR KIN OR SLAVES?

A necessary accompaniment of the development of villas was the steady erosion oftheir original social basis. How far removed some villas were from a large kin-groupor clan is revealed by looking at large courtyards such as that of Anthée (Fig. 76),which, like a number of the Somme villas and a scatter elsewhere, has an outercourtyard lined by two rows of buildings. Who lived in them – slaves, serfs, wagelabourers or what?

One or two villas have what appear to be slave barracks. Liédena (Navarra) (Fig.

Figure 75 Unit-system villas of the Late Empire


296

76) has such a row near the house and the outermost court is lined with nearly fortymore rooms looking like prison cells which may be for slaves working a latifundia.49

Chatalka-Delimonyovo Kale (Bulg.) has a few comparable rooms for the master’sown servants in the small outer court.50

A barrack-like court is different from a yard lined with identical small buildings

Figure 76


297

Figure 76


298

Figure 76 Courtyards for kin or slaves?


299

spaced apart just like a Virginia plantation. Levroux-Trégonce (Indre) (Fig. 76) hasnine identical buildings, each equal to two of the cells at Liédena, along one side ofits 360 m-long courtyard; Oberentfelden (Switz.) (Fig. 76) is similar; Dietikon is thelargest and the only one devised as one building phase throughout, with twenty-four virtually identical houses. Noyers-sur-Serein (Fig. 76) shows a variation of thepattern; the outer court, not fully explored, has a row of four uniform halls each withtwo litle wings. No doubt all these establishments were slave-run.

Several rectangular outer yards in Picardy show little sign of uniformity in thebuildings lining them; at Warfusée-Sud and Athies (Fig. 43) they show considerabledifferences, at Estrée-sur-Noye less, and only at Mézières-en-Santerre/Le Ziep andWarfusée-Nord (Fig. 43) are they comparatively uniform. A small but perhaps importantdifference between these villas and those looking like a Virginia plantation is thatbuildings in the former are not set out in opposite pairs, which suggests a concernthat the inhabitants, whatever their status, should not be too obviously regimented.

The best-known large courtyard villa, Anthée (Fig. 76), is the only one of its kindto have been explored fully. Its buildings, laid out in two rows in a long trapezialyard – and the shape itself, a not uncommon one, needs explanation – includehouses with porticuses, cellars, mosaics and hypocausts (Fig. 76). The larger andbetter-appointed ones are nearer the house, except for 15 which seems to haveslipped a couple of places. Building 3 is like Bad Rappenau (Fig. 25) in a generalway; 15 is a bipartite hall like Nünschweiler or more precisely Neckarrems whichalso had an enlargement beyond the west pavilion. No slaves or serfs these, butpeople who would, if their houses stood independently, be called farmers. Whethereven those living in the outermost buildings were of a lower status is doubtful. Thenature of the connection between yard and main houseful is hard to guess beyondsaying that the whole settlement looks much more like an enormous kin-group thana serf- or slave-run establishment, a kin-group which has prospered exceedingly andgrown continually without ever hiving off some families to form new settlements – agwely of extraordinary size. How so many people contrived to farm the land fromone spot is a puzzle, the more so now that the idea of a factory making enamelledbronzes and especially brooches has been dispelled.51

Marked differences are observable between the houses standing in the innercourt of these enormous yards. Anthée is a row-house on a large scale; Warfusée-Nord is divided in the middle by a cross-wall, the two parts of the house matchingthe two gatehouses; it is like Romegoux, and Ecoust-Saint-Mien is probably thesame. Athies (Fig. 43) is like Brixworth (Northants.) or Faversham in having adjacentlobbies in the middle. All three have unit-system characteristics as, less clearly, doesLevroux-Trégonce, which is set out like North Leigh. Although Anthée and Warfusée-Nord and Athies must all have been organised in somewhat different ways, thefactor common to them is that partible inheritance survived among the ruling familieswhile relegating most members of these large communities to various levels of inferiorstatus. None, though, were slaves. The stages by which this situation developed areunknown but the next, the final transition into slavery, is beginning at Liestal-Munzach.There the house (not the yard) has some likeness to the later phases of Rockbourne,the north side of the yard is occupied by workhalls of varying size and comfort, andmuch of the south side has been built or rebuilt on a changed alignment with


300

identical dwellings. Only the villa of Dietikon52 is set out in rigidly geometricalfashion from end to end; this is work discipline approaching that of the barracksquare or prison.

Dietikon is untypical. Villas with signs of reorganisation and a unit system are thenorm and Oberentfelden is alone in having a good-sized house comprising only fivelarge core rooms (plus porticus-and-pavilions overlooking the valley). It is comparableto Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor VB, and could conceivably be a single-familyresidence.

A rectangular outer courtyard breaking alignment with the inner and earlier onemay mark the presence of a definitely inferior class. This is the situation at Liestaland at Estrée-sur-Noye, where the divergence, though very slight, is absent in otherSomme villas of its class. It can be inferred at Meckel, where only the yard wall wastraced and not the buildings. At Oberentfelden and Belleuse, the way the house liesobliquely to the rectilinear yard and poorly related to it implies that the latter hasbeen completely rebuilt. Crucial to any such inference is the poor relation of houseand rectangular yard, otherwise rebuilding need not be invoked, as Chedworth Iand probably Vieux-Rouen-sur-Bresle II show. They have much in common. In eachthe principal (west) house, comprising two units,53 is narrower than the south range,which is narrower than the north range. Neither villa shows any evidence of theuniform habitations which are the hallmark of a depressed class.

THE EMERGENCE OF HEREDITARY LORDSHIP

Concentration of power in what begins as a confederation of kinsfolk raises aquestion difficult to answer from architectural evidence: is it possible to infer astage at which that superior power becomes hereditary? A development in thatdirection may ultimately be inevitable once permanent houses are introduced intoa community which formerly was accustomed periodically to redistribute the landit worked and move dwellings as necessary. Henceforth, however much the kin-group might seek to maintain redistribution, it would be difficult to change theheadship from one household to another. At Aylesford-Eccles the head for the timebeing was installed at the time of Romanisation in the biggest houe. What mechanismexisted, or was created, to deal with this new situation in which, if reallocation ofthe headship was to be achieved, it would be necessary to change houses? Theanswer must certainly be none; nobody is likely to have foreseen the long-termeffect on the control of power. As long as land was subject to redistribution,hereditary power was impossible to attain, but the element of choice in the matteris likely to have meant that the amount still subject to partibility diminished steadily.How long it was before the operation of customary law finally ceased is shown bythe disputed case of inheritance rights which went up to Rome for the emperor’sdecision. What C.E. Stevens called ‘the cry over the abyss’54 died at about the sametime that the main range at Chedworth came into the hands of a single family, inthe early years of the fourth century. The death of the old system and theconcentration of wealth in fewer hands coincides broadly with the age ofconspicuous consumption in British villas, as evidenced by mosaics.


301

THE END OF THE VILLA SYSTEM

Where the social foundation of villas, the kin-group, withered away, the housesdesigned for it became obsolete. Many were altered to a greater or less extent to suitthe needs of rich and powerful men who now controlled what can properly becalled estates. Woodchester, Bruckneudorf, Basse-Wavre, Gayton Thorpe andSudeleySpoonley Wood all show this tendency and form an approximate scale ofimportance in descending order.

Some villas disappeared entirely and were presumably incorporated into nearbyestates although, if that is the case, it is surprising that accommodation of a simplekind under a bailiff – and for once the word can be used with some probability –was not constructed or improvised in more instances than are yet apparent. NorthLeighShakenoak A IIIB, the workhall, may at this stage have been partly roofless andhad become generally squalid. Piddington (Northants.) declined in the same wayeven if the details of its final state, when it is said to have had several quite separaterooms, may be open to question.

Farningham-Manor House also testifies to the disappearance of the old order ofthings. It was completley redesigned in III, being reduced in size with fewer andlarger rooms. It has two good elevations, one with a porticus on the line of itspredecessors, though now embellished with pilasters, the other fronting three roomswith mosaics and facing the river close by; ‘a luxurious riverside retreat’, as itsexcavator put it,55 may be slight exaggeration but expresses the essence of the situation.

A concomitant of the decay of some villas ought to be that others flourish,notably in the sense of becoming luxurious. That may find its principal expressionin the large number of mosaics and perhaps, too, in more hypocausts and elaboratebath buildings,56 rather than enlargement. Basilicas or justice rooms may also berelated to the growth of lordship over other villas, which would account for thesize of the one at Box.

Change of this kind is much harder to identify in German villas and particularlyin hall-type houses. Decline may have taken more the form of completeabandonment of many small halls, and it may be chance that no yard has yetshowed signs of the partial abandonment of a villa, as at Shakenoak. The otherside of the coin may be the luxurious elements of such villas as Bad Kreuznach(Rhld-Pf.) and Bad Godesberg (Nordrh.-Westf.). About the end of the villa systemis France it is difficult to form an opinion because little evidence of the kinds justdiscussed has yet been published.

CONCLUSION

This chapter aims to provide a better basis for the interpretation of villa society thanhas hitherto been available. It is not the first time that kin-groups have been suggestedas a basis for villa occupancy. Oelmann, without ever enlarging on the notion, hadit in mind when discussing who lived in the two smaller houses at Mayen; they weretwo families dependent on the master (Herr),57 perhaps younger married sons, inany case, families with fewer rights – bondsmen, even. C.E. Stevens interpreted


302

RomanoBritish settlements, including villas, in the light of Welsh law58 and, followinghim, Applebaum made the explicit connection: ‘not a few [capitalistic estates] grewout of kinship groups whose land ultimately came under the control of one man andwhose occupants became his clients or tenants, as the patriarchal farmhouse evolvedinto residence, outbuildings, and hands’ quarters’.59

It has not been possible to include every strand of the argument, for exampleabout the different sizes of hall or the growth of luxury, but there should be sufficientto assess its validity. Among other things, it may permit comparison of the process ofRomanisation in different countries and thereby prompt new questions; it may alsosuggest that some of the explanations now popular, notably those that see villa‘owners’ as market-oriented entrepreneurs, are wide of the mark and simply do notexplain why villas are as they are.

303

NOTES

CHAPTER ONE: AIMS AND SCOPE OF THE BOOK

1 McKay 1975; Percival 1976.2 Rivet 1969, 237.3 R. Taylor, Soc Archil. Historians Newsletter, no. 41, 13.4 Baxter, 1931, 240; Colvin and Newman 1981, 122–3; Latham and Matthews 1970–83, 8, 402

(26 August 1667); de Beer, 1955, 3, 502 (1 December 1667).5 German nomenclature illustrates this, although the dividing lines between Herrensitz, Gutshof

and Bauernhaus, especially the first two, are not at all clear.6 Harmand 1951.7 Smith 1992, 106–11.8 Hingley 1989, 159–61.9 Hemp and Gresham 1942–3; Fox and Raglan 1953, II, 75–7, III, 135; Smith 1970.

10 de Caumont 1883, 13–15.11 Schumacher 1896; Haverfield 1990, 296, 302–3, 316; Ward 1911, chapters 6, 7; Haverfield

1906, 299, 326.12 Anthes 1906, 120; Kropatscheck 1910–11, 78.13 Swoboda 1918; Oelmann 1921; Oelmann 1928.14 Fremersdorf 1933; Paret 1932, 38–9. Paret’s incidental enlightening comments on buildings,

e.g., on Merklingen (p. 39), make one deplore his unwillingness to reinterpret villassytematically.

15 Gnomon 1939, 40–1, esp. 40 n.l.16 Collingwood 1930, chapter 7; Grenier 1934, 784–95, 798–9, 819–21; de Maeyer 1937, 85.17 Arch Cambrensis 102, 1951–2, 130–1; Proc Dorset 87, 1966; Collingwood and Richmond

1969, 134–5; Branigan 1975, 50–1; Branigan 1977, 125–7.18 Brack 1975, 49–72; Agache 1978, chapter 6; Castro 1982, esp. Fig. 79, 82–6; Gorges 1979,

113–27, esp. Fig. 19; A.E. Housman, Selected Prose, Cambridge 1961, 49.19 Vasic 1970; M.-T. and G. Raepset-Charlier 1975; Ternes 1975; Nikolov 1976, 69.20 Mylius 1933; McKay 1975; Ward-Perkins 1981.21 Several papers on monumental architecture by T.F.C. Blagg display a rigorous approach

which needs to be applied to villas; de la Bedoyère 1991 and 1993 do not advanceunderstanding of villas.

22 J.P. Darmon has set out amusingly the ideal conditions which a comparably large project,

304

a survey of mosaics in the western Empire, demand of the researcher (ANRW II, 12.2,1975, 268).

23 Rostovtzeff 1957, quoted Percival 1976, 56.24 Wightman 1970, 139.25 The changing structure of local government creates problems in Germany, for which I

have used, not wholly systematically, Müllers Grosses Deutsches Ortsbuch, 1982–3 edition,and in Britain, for which the Ordnance Survey Map of Roman Britain (7th edn, 1956), hasbeen supplemented by Scott 1993b. France presents less of a problem.

26 For Germany and Britain unpublished work by Dr Friedolin Reutti and Roger Goodburnwas not consulted. Regrettably, but hardly surprisingly, no publication comparable to Drack1975 or Thomas 1964 exists for either country although Scott 1993b provides a comprehensivechecklist, as, for northern France and the much wider area of northern Gaul, does vanOssel 1992.

CHAPTER TWO: METHODS AND ASSUMPTIONS

1 Swoboda 1918, chapter 4; Oelmann 1921.2 See pp. 24–5.3 Chapter 8.4 Steiner (1923) was intended to be the first of a series of publications on Roman villas in the

Rhineland; the intention failed, probably because of economic circumstances, but wastaken up again by Koethe (1934). Thereafter the idea was abandoned, ‘probably on politicalgrounds’. (Letter dated 20 May 1975 to the author from Dr W. Binsfeld of the RheinischesLandesmuseum, Trier.)

5 TrZft 9, 1934, 44.6 Fox and Raglan 1951–4; Drury 1982.7 Smith 1963; Jones and Smith 1963–72, esp. Part I, 5–34, ‘Development of the long-house’.8 Aydelotte et al. 1972, 77.9 Hemp and Gresham 1942–3; Fox and Raglan 2, 1951–4, 75–7; Jones and Smith 1963–72.

Wills in the National Library of Wales show that equal division among heirs persisted insouth Wales 200 years after the Acts of Union, among people who had little or no landedproperty to bequeath.

10 P. Smith 1975, 167. Edwinsford is described more fully in P. Smith 1974, 72–3.11 Bull Inst Arch 29, 1992, 165.12 Raynham Hall, Norfolk, was built with a cross-passage or ‘Entrey’ at both ends of the hall.

This apparently unique feature went unremarked when the plan which provides the onlyevidence of it was published (John Harris, ‘Raynham Hall . . .’, Arch J 118, 180–7, esp. P1.XVI.

13 Webster in Rivet 1969, 245; the late Dr J.B. Ward-Perkins, pers. comm.14 Reece, Oxf J Arch 3, 1984, 197–210.

CHAPTER THREE: HALL HOUSES

1 Oelmann 1921.2 Oelmann 1928, 64, 130–1.3 Doppelfeld (Kölner Jährb 1960–1, 7–35) shows in II a hearth only at the lower end, whereas

in all probability the one at the upper end in III had a predecessor; he began a much-

— Notes to pp.10-27 —

305

needed clarification of the phasing but his understanding of the building itself is open toquestion.

4 Steiner 1923, 5.5 BJb 133, 1928, 64, 145.6 Rev Est 1977, 117–35; Uffler 1981, 72–3. I am indebted to Mile A.M. Uffler for lending me a

copy of her thesis (Dijon 1980) in which Crain and many other villas are discussed.7 For this observation I have to thank Professor Amatzia Baram, University of Haifa, who

speaks from experience.8 This is evident in the ideal plan of a Benedictine monastery of AD 820–830 (W. Horn and

E. Born, The Plan of St Gall, 3 vols, Berkeley, 1979).9 One of the cauldrons dated to Final La Tène or the early first century AD contained coins

of AD 259–260 (CAG 49, 77).10 Rahtz and Greenfield 1977, 49.11 Cf. Neumagen-Dhron (Fig. 68).12 Rahtz and Greenfield 1977, 53.13 Leech 1982, 10.14 For the vicus, Oudhdk Med NS 6, 1925, 40–4, esp. 42.15 Archiv Fft 3rd series, 12, 1920, 323.16 English terminology is deficient; ‘nave’ and ‘aisle’ have connotations which make both

inappropriate to a secular building having two equal compartments. ‘Schiff and ‘vaisseau’are better.

17 Smith 1963. ‘Basilican’, coined by Ward in 1911, is used by Swoboda (1918), Fellmann (inBaselb Hmtb 5, 1950, 1–52), Collingwood and Richmond (1969), Hinz (1970).

18 Smith 1963. Virtually every farm building is likely to have been inhabited by the personsresponsible for the work associated with it; see above n. 8.

19 Todd 1992.20 For this phasing see Smith 1963, 3, n. 1.21 Denton, with a hearth in the middle of the nave, has much less room for cattle than the

aisled farmhouses of north Germany. The Hallenhaus may not be a proper parallel, andmuch of what has been said on this score (Applebaum 1972; Smith 1963) needs to bereconsidered.

22 Applebaum (1972, 135–6) elaborated remarks in the report and was followed by Hingley(1989, 43-5) with two plans showing room use. The stables and byres are identified byfloors and unspecified ironmongery for male use.

23 Drack 1990, 40, 265.24 Drack 1990, 46, 267 (Halle); reconstruction, Gerster 1973, 66–70, partly reproduced Drack

1990, 276–9.25 Liédena (Fig. 76) (Castro 1982, Fig. 32) is certainly not a basilican building, as claimed by

Gorges (1979, 120). Maulévrier (Grenier 1934, 805: note the structural problems arisingfrom different bay lengths); Châtillon-sur-Seiche (which has a hearth) (Gallia-Inf. 1990,292).

26 FdbaB-W 1977, 405, n. 4.27 Ibid., 408.28 Reconstruction, Dmpfl Bad-Württ 1972, 38.29 Samesreuther, noting that excavation at Laufenburg thus far had provided as many grounds

for thinking of an open yard as for a roofed hall, added that, purely intuitively, one wouldallow more probability to the latter (Germania 24, 1940, 36). Elsewhere he appears toimply a hall (Gnomon 1939,41). This opinion is confirmed (RiBad-Württ 1986, 401). Thelatest discussion is inconclusive (Rothkegel 1994,

30 Oelmann 1921, 72.


306

31 Schallmeyer, Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1986, 155.32 Two solutions are possible: with tie-beams spanning the whole, as at Neuburg a.d. Munz

(Binding 1991, 151–3) and Landshut (Ostendorf 1908, Abb. 124); or with a higher tie-beamover the nave and running the rafters through continuously to the lower aisle eaves, as atthe collegiate churches of St Goar am Rhein or Stuttgart (Binding 1991, 151, 155; Ostendorf1908, Abb. 127). The Roman form of construction would have used king-posts.

33 The alternative, that the bases were for an open roof truss, is unlikely in the absence ofother pairs.

34 Bipartite halls like these may go some way to explaining the very curious plan ofSchleidweiler.

35 Understanding of Nünschweiler is complicated by its construction, which probably combinedclay walls with heavy posts carrying roof trusses.

CHAPTER FOUR: ROW-TYPE HOUSES

1 ‘Oblong villa with rooms strung out in a line’, in three variants (Drack 1975, 56; Smith 1978,160–2).

2 Jones and Smith (Brycheiniog 16, 1972, 10 = Pt 6).3 Fox and Raglan 1951, followed by Smith 1978.4 Smith 1978, 160–2; Drury 1982, 296–9; Black 1987, 23–6.5 Agache 1978, Fig. 11.6 Cf. Marshfield, room 6/7, interpreted as a shrine room (Smith 1985, 251).7 Drury (1982, 295) points out that the common designation of such rooms as passages is

demonstrably false. They occur frequently, e.g. Feltwell, Newton St Loe S [I],RamsburyLittlecote Park [I], Whitwell [I], Worplesdon; Carnac E Bldg [I], Ribemont-sur-Ancre; Vicques W Bldg [I].

8 Thus John Evelyn went to London in 1676 ‘to take order about the building of an house, orrather an appartment, which had all the conveniences of an house’ (Diary, 4, 98).

9 Arch Cant 87, 1973, 2; a ‘vestibule’, p. 3.10 Some doorways are assumed. That from the lobby to 1 is hinted at in the published plan

(Arch Cant 87, 1973, 4).11 Jones and Smith (Brycheiniog 12, 1966–7, 53–6) for corner-to-corner connection; Hemp

and Gresham 1942 and Smith 1992, 72–4, for interconnection in one range.12 Oelmann 1938.13 Basler Zft 9, 1910, 81.14 Kolling (15 Ber Saar, 1968, 14) notes of Bierbach that room 20 at the east end forms a

pendant to 2 at the west end, and de Maeyer (1937) may have a comment, which I cannotnow trace, on the same dispositions at Jemelle-Neufchâteau and Mettet-Bauselenne. Tworooms (12 and 13) in the north wing of Matagne-la-Petite are arranged like this.

15 A porticus or veranda of some kind must surely have extended to 8. For the splayingporticus of II see chapter 9.

16 See chapter 7 for other examples of narrow rooms.17 These words should perhaps be amended to:’. . . against thought’. Cf. to the same end the

statistical treatment of incommensurables (Clarke 1990).18 Ferdière 1988, 107–9; ‘great specialist’, (ref. to Grenier), 27.19 Burgaud, Rev Arch NS 16, 1940, 53; vasarium, which has several different meanings, is

here, presumably, furniture or moveables in a bath, and is found in Vitruvius (F.J. Kilvington,pers. comm.); ‘buanderie’ is a wash-house.


307

20 Black 1985.21 Why the west porch should be the only part of III set out irregularly is not explained, and

the significance of the porches is not discussed (Neal 1974).22 Châtillon-sur-Seiche/La Guyomerais 2/III (Ille-et-Vilaine) may be another example. The

symmetrical completion of the plan in V is unconvincing.23 Mercer 1975, chapters 4, 5.24 The veranda at Faversham I is very wide (nearly 4 m) but it is difficult to see what else it

might have been. The idea that the Lockleys posts might be the only relic of an aisledbuilding (Rodwell 1978) has nothing to commend it; multiplying such evidence multipliesthe absurdity.

25 Piddington S [I] (Northants.) and Sudeley-Wadfield [I] (Glos.) are functionally equivalent toBrixworth [I] but socially less advanced.

26 The cellar is unlikely to have lacked a room above it.

CHAPTER FIVE: DEVELOPED FORMS OF ROW-HOUSE

1 Drack 1975, 59.2 Drack (1975, 19) drew Ferpicloz as an undivided hall and claimed it as such (RiSchw 394).

I think it more likely that Ferpicloz [I] resembled Schupfart-Betburg I, although the hall wasnot necessarily used in the same way.

3 Smith 1992, 72–5, 108–10.4 Incomplete excavation of Landen-Betzveld creates uncertainty about later additions, but

the grouping of rooms at the ends, each prolonging a lobby, appears intended to maintaina balance. This impression might, nevertheless, be mistaken, as the development of Vicques[II] suggests; there, a very large squarish room in the east wing, heated by a pillaredhypocaust, has no counterpart facing it.

5 Said to be the tablinum and summer dining-room (Helv Arch 1978–9, 10).6 Gerster-Giambonini thought the narrower part of the lobby was a staircase with entry to 2

and 4 from the wider part (Helv Arch 1978–9, 10).7 Cf. Bocholtz and Bierbach.8 Or a kitchen and ‘from time to time . . . an eating-room’; the work-hall is assigned, without

specific evidence, to the north pavilion 1 (Helv Arch 9, 1978–9, 12).9 Drack 1975, 59; but even if that were correct it would imply the introduction of reverse

symmetry, which is itself an indication of the unit system, in a secondary phase.10 Masonry joints and the off-axis doorway into the middle room show Bierbach was of more

than one building phase but the published evidence is insufficient to distinguish them.11 15 Ber Saar 1968, 14.12 Ibid., 39.13 Cf. the small room intercommunicating with the hall of Blankenheim I.14 The L-lobby at Latimer has a profusion of doorway positions but the only original one

seems to have been at the rear of the room; Branigan 1971, 64 and Fig. 17.15 Friendship-Taylor (Northants Arch 24, 1992, 101 and Fig. 1) argues that one lobby is in fact

a small room built after demolition of the villa core; but it happens to fit into the old planlike an L-lobby and has a doorway in just the right place.

16 Rev Nord 66, 1984, Fig. 5.17 ‘kleinen Einschlussen’ (Keller 1864, 152).18 Fremersdorf 1933, 22.


308

19 Room 17 is unlikely, in my opinion, to have been a kitchen; the resemblance of the endrooms to those at Newel or Schupfart II is strong.

20 Smith 1992, 120, 53 respectively.21 Ann Bret 79, 1972, 221–2.22 Ibid., 222. It is not possible to check this assumption since no indication is given of the

height to which walls survived.23 Ann Bret 79, 1972, 224.24 This assumes that the lobby 13 is original, not an alteration as in Reutti 1974, appendix 4.25 Drury 1982, 295–8. A weakness of this article is that no attempt is made to explain rooms

not forming part of the proposed grouping.26 Black 1985.27 Rooms not numbered as in summary report, Gallia 35, 1977, 333.28 It was partly dug and published by de Schmidt, Receuil d’antiquités de la, Suisse I, 1761,

Berne; not consulted, but cited Keller (1864, 129–31 and Tafel 16).29 Drack 1975, 60.30 Also Feltwell, Whitwell and Carnac E [I].31 Buchs [I], following Drack (1975, 60), is an enlightening example. To the east and west of

the middle room are blocks of three and four rooms respectively in which a short passageleads to the largest room of the unit. The west block resembles the domestic end ofSchupfart I, the east block the east block of Newport, both turned through 90 degrees.

CHAPTER SIX: DEVELOPED FORMS OF HALL HOUSE

1 Something similar was found at Beringen-Lieblosental (Anz Schw Altkde, 19, 1886, 332).2 TrZft 24–6, 1956–8, 512.3 Bollendorf I (Fig. 2), like many other hall houses, has just such a room, though without the

cellar; it, too, had no access to the porticus.4 FdbaSchw NS 9, 1935–8, 108.5 Seon-Biswind (Switz.) may be a third (Argovia 57, 1945, 224).6 Following Drack, Jb Solothurn 40, 1967, 447; but the phases he proposes (1975, 59 and, in

more detail, 1988, 407) are not wholly clear.7 Drack 1975, 56, para. 4.8 Drack, RiSchw 1988, 535.9 FdbaSchw 13, 1905, 64.

10 Camb Ag Hist I, 142–5.11 de Maeyer 1937, 130–1. Applebaum refers to the villa as Al Sauvenière, which is different.12 Ann Namur 24, 1900, 11–20.13 de Maeyer, Afb. 8B.14 Doc Charleroi 7, 1875, 104.15 Camb Ag Hist I, 144.16 See above, ch. 3, n. 7.17 Usually cited by its local name, although TIR 32 Mainz distinguishes it from Neckarzimmern-

Unteren Au which is invariably cited by the commune name only.18 Schumacher 1896, 4.19 E.g., Courcelles-Frécourt (Moselle); and Etalle, Rulles-Chaumont and Nadrin [I] in Belgium.

I am indebted to Mr Alain Thomas for information about Rulles.20 BJb 133, 1928, 62.21 Wightman 1970, 152.


309

22 Room 8 is claimed as a staircase from its narrowness and position between two largerrooms (TrZft 34, 1971, 154). Much ephemeral evidence was recorded but not a scrap of ittestified to a staircase.

23 No compass points are given (Jahresber Schwaben 12, 1847, Beiträge, 25–30).24 The alleged terracing of the hall – ‘yard’ in the report – is unconvincing; a slightly sloping

floor and crypto-porticus, or more properly, undercroft, are more probable.25 By the only certain doorway, its threshold being still in place (FdbaSchw NS 9, 1935–8,

108).26 GrossSachsenheim has, in front of the porticus, a projection that does not look, in a

smallscale plan, like a porch or the foundation for steps; it may be some comparablefeature.

27 This room, interpreted as an open inner court, was presumed to have a doorway betweentwo buttresses (Int Archiv Ethnog 24, 1918, 3).

28 An alteration in room 15 which I do not fully understand is its division by a timber-framedpartition which ‘lay crosswise through the room from north-east to south-east’ (Int ArchivEthnog 24, 1918, 6).

29 Oelmann’s uncertainty as to whether the doorway was original to 30 may now be resolved;if the implications of Kinheim are accepted, it was (BJb 123, 1916, 215).

30 Raversbeuren is relevant to this discussion but its phases are hard to unravel satisfactorily.31 As the archaeological evidence showed (BJb 123, 1916, 215).32 An upper storey is postulated on the ground that the height of the adjoining hall demands

one, at least over 7–9 (Tr Zft 34, 1971, 154). The reconstructed plan, Abb. 43, showing asecond staircase at the north end, conflicts in this point with the text, 216.

33 This is perhaps to follow classical precept too closely in a very un-Roman building. BaselbHmt b 5, 1950, 22.

CHAPTER SEVEN: PROBLEMATIC HOUSE TYPES

1 Dmpfli Bad-Württ 1, 1972, 38ff.2 Mühlacker-Lomersheim (Bad.Württ) has a hall only 10.50 m wide which is claimed as a

yard (FdbaB-W 16, 1990, 180–1).3 FdbaB–W 1, 1974, 509–11. Bierlingen is not discussed here because its plan, reconstructed

as perfectly symmetrical, is open to doubt.4 Choisy 1887, 152, 162. A late twelfth-century roof at Angers with tie-beam 18 m long has

remarkably small scantlings for its clear span of 15.40 m (Centre de Recherches, Charpentes,Parts 1, 2). Wooden clamps forming hangers from posts to tie-beam appear at Mantes notmuch later; for Roman metal hangers, Adam 1984, 226.

5 Roofs of 1618 and 1777; H. Götzger and H. Prechter, Das Bauernhaus in Bayern I,Regierungsbezirk Schwaben, Munich 1960, 201, 179; also many without precise dates.

6 Bondorf, Gaubatz-Sattler 1994, Abb. 127; Inzigkofen, Dmpfl Bad-Württ 2, 1972, 38; Westheim-Hüssingen, Arch Jahr Bayern, 1980, 134.

7 FdbaB-W 3, 1977, 405 and n. 4.8 FdbaB-W 16, 1990, 446–8.9 Chapter 9, pp. 126–27.

10 Cf. Winkel-Seeb D, with a clear span of 14.80 m, which was reconstructed with a roof(Gerster 1973, 80).

11 Paret 1932, 38–9.12 I have used the more detailed plan (Naeher 1885, II), rather than that in the excavation

report (BJb 74, 1882, Taf. X).


310

13 Its location in a district prone to avalanches and on a Roman road are reasons for callingAlpnach a mutatio (Pferdewechselstation) (Drack, RiSchw, 320); they are not compelling. Itwas regarded as a villa by Scherer, who dug it, by Schulthess (8 Ber RGK 1913–15, 106–8)and by Drack himself at first, who thought all four rooms encroached on a hall (Drack1975, 58).

14 Walls remained to heights which made door positions certain (Mitt Zürich 27, 1909–16,232).

15 The purpose of the passage(?) west of 7 is unclear.16 Also Kösching, known only from an aerial photograph.17 ‘Gang’: 0.60 m (FbaSckw 19, 1911, 84).18 Ibid.19 FdbaB-W 13, 1988, 356.20 Some villas have, in a position appropriate to a workhall, a secondary structure looking

like a hall but devoid of confirmatory detail, e.g., Aulfingen (Bad.-Württ.) – 19.70 × 15.70m; Cromhall (Glos.), 21 × 12 m; Inzigkofen B, 19 × 13.5 m; Nagold (Bad.-Württ.), 13 × 10m; Remmingsheim, 20 × 17 m. The hall (or barn?)/yard problem applies equally to them.

21 Agache 1978, 287.22 Plachy-Buyon is excluded because it does not correspond to the plan of Plachy-Buyon/les

Trois Cornets in Agache 1978, 338, nor, I think, to any site in Agache and Bréart 1975.23 Bouchoir, Démuin, Dury, Fontaine-le-Sec, Vaux, Wancourt.24 FdbaB-W 13, 1988, 356.25 Some difference of interpretation is required by the different porticuses – open-ended at

L’Etoile and Harbonnières, on all sides at Ovillers.26 Elongated hypocausted rooms are not uncommon; e.g., Aulfingen (Bad.-Württ.) with a

room 9.90 × 3 m and Hohenfels (Fig. 33).27 TrZft 14, 1939, 249; hearths not shown on plan.28 Final report awaited; further details proved unobtainable.29 Hartley and Fitts 1988, 81.30 Petrikovits’ building sequence (BJb 143–4, 1939, 408–23, esp. Tafel 79) is here reversed.

Once the wall of [II], only 1 m from [I], was built, with a narrower doorway somewhat off-centre to that of [I], it is difficult to see any point in an opening so wide and so placed.Therefore the latter is earlier.

31 To regard these structures as later insertions within what is here taken to be [II] (as inSchmidt 1971, 21 and RiHessen, 459) makes the two parallel walls about 0.40 m apartinexplicable.

32 Percival 1976, 81; de Maeyer 1937, 75 respectively.33 Published as Bertenbreit-Ottenhardt (Schwäb Mus 1930, 159–60); W. Czysz, Die Römer im

Ries, 83.34 Czysz (as n. 33) makes the middle room 1 open to the porticus 2, so producing a compact

row-house; cf. Villers-sur-Lesse/Genimont.35 Smith 1993, 12–13.36 Sir Roger Pratt (Gunther 1928, 24).37 Rooms 8/10 are said to have been built as one (Ann Bruxelles 19, 1905, 315). No reasons

are offered.38 The end rooms 41 and 38, 39 – the latter separated only by light partitions – may well have

been altered when the baths were added (Ann Bruxelles 19, 1905, 311).39 Black 1987, 112.40 The only other example is Zazenhausen (Bad.-Württ). Listed in TIR Sheet 32 Mainz as a

farm, it has an incomprehensible plan. In Spain the axial corridor is used in a more limited


311

way to group several well-appointed rooms together at, e.g., Quintanilla de la Cueza andComunion-Cabriana.

41 The reconstruction drawing showing it and the wings and added outbuildings as twostoreyedis unbelievable (RiBad-Württ, 318).

42 Wagner 1908–11, II, 133–4.43 Described by Wagner as ‘Hof oder Gang’.44 Without the apse 5 and room 6.45 The scale of the Walsbetz plan is as de Maeyer (1937, Afb. 26) but is doubtful. I have not

found it possible to consult the original publication.

CHAPTER EIGHT: THE PORTICUS-WITH-PAVILIONS:PAVILIONS

1 Koepp 1924, 7.2 The reconstruction in Gaubatz-Sattler (1994, 138–9) is wholly implausible.3 Ann Namur 24, 1900, 25.4 de Maeyer 1937, 51.5 Cf. Stuttgart-Stammheim, Fig. 27.6 The phase I door jambs and wall are perfectly visible in Spitzing 1988, Abb. 7, and in II the

floor level must have been some two courses of masonry higher.7 The suggestion (Spitzing 1988, 59) that the apse accommodated a staircase is impossible,

as consideration of the resulting first-floor arrangements shows.8 Rothselberg was published as being of one building phase, yet the divorce of cellar and

porticus and the lack of alignment between the doorway into the porticus and that into thehall hint at the addition of the porticus-and-pavilions to a simple kind of hall house.

9 These rooms were thought to be a bath suite by Schib (Jb Solothurn 14, 1937, 319–20), aclaim rejected by Laur-Bellart (JbSGU 28, 1936, 73).

10 A length of lead water-pipe in the west part suggests this (Drack, Jb Solothurn 40, 1967,447).

11 As, for example, in the sizes of rooms in row-houses.12 Smith 1992, 87–8; Smith 1993, 16–18.13 Smith 1992, 108–10; Smith 1993, 142.14 Published as having a sinuous outline: I follow Richmond (1969, 55) in doubting this.15 Swoboda 1918, 107.16 Württ Vierteljahresh 11, 1888, 30; the overall plan shows the east porticus incorrectly, the

detail plan correctly, in this particular.17 Osterstetten was carefully dug by the standards of the day and the reporting good, so it is

unlikely that a stone wall was overlooked. Stratford-upon-Avon-Tiddington itself is a smallversion of Bilsdorf or the principal house at Ludwigsburg-Hoheneck.

18 Hémecht 22, 1970, 378–80.19 I envisage a porter in a kin-group as an honoured and important member of the community,

in the sense that a monastic porter was, rather than in the modern sense of a menial.20 Swoboda 1918, 106–7.21 Smith 1983, 241–2, citing earlier literature.22 It is unfortunate that Richmond (1969, 54–5), in clarifying the form and phases of Brewood,

could not set out his ideas fully; much remains to be explained. Reconstructing the appearanceof Brewood-Englewood or even the phases may well be an impossible task because thepublished plan contains too many structural anomalies.


312

23 See Smith 1982.24 Gorges 1979, 139, 358, 477. I have not consulted the sources there quoted.25 Current Arch 122, 1990. It is hard enough to envisage uses for an undivided long groundfloor

room, harder still to do the same for a first-floor room above it, entered at one end, andhardest of all to devise a reasonable access to other upstairs rooms. The staircase rises tothe end of a long room, and the absence of partitions in the room below implies theirabsence above. Upstairs partitions in English vernacular houses are invariably placed aboveground-floor ones in order to prevent deflection of the binding beams.

CHAPTER NINE: THE PORTICUS-WITH-PAVILIONS:PORTICUSES

1 Oelmann, 1938.2 Oelmann, BJb 123, (1916, 216) was evidently puzzled by the two short projecting walls and

made the implausible suggestion of buttresses. Mylius (1933) in his reconstruction insistedthat the plan was perfectly symmetrical and consequently had to ignore them.

3 This interpretation modifies Smith 1978, 160.4 Agache 1978, 276.5 Smith 1993.6 Bramdean (Hants.) looks as if its porticus was built with one open end, otherwise it is hard

to see why it should stop short of the other end. Its development is uncertain.7 Neal 1974–6, 6–7. The suggestion that it was a latrine because it had a drain sounds like a

late twentieth-century preoccupation transferred to the second century.8 This arrangement has something in common with Stolac 5.9 The room next to (east of) the central room may have been entered from it, according to

Thomas (1964, 220), but since the doorway could not be precisely located I am inclined todisregard this idea.

10 Following Drack 1975, 59.11 I follow Samesreuther’s phasing, which makes this villa structurally and socially intelligible;

Rothkegel’s raises more questions on both counts than it answers. The two interpretationscan be compared in Rothkegel 1994, 19–21.

12 Swoboda 1969, 54, para. 2.13 Aus’m Weerth compared the wall stub there to one at Allenz (BJb 39–40, 1866, 259).14 BJb 39–40, 1866, 260.15 Halbardier and Thomas 1987, 127.16 Or quasi-pavilions. The north-east corner block is structurally separate from the rooms

behind it and is a pavilion; the south-east block is structurally one with the room behind itand is properly a wing.

17 Gayton Thorpe N may be one; if the grand doorway in [F] was used only on grandoccasions, the rear porticus may have met everyday requirements.

18 Bayer Vgbl 22, 1957, 223. Cf. also the slightly different application at Hechingen-Stein(Bad.-Württ.).

19 Köln-Braunsfeld, published with one such empty projection, has been reinterpreted withorthodox pavilions (Kölner Jahrb 5, 1960–1, 9–13).

20 Not all empty projections on villa plans are really so. A large one at Upchurch-Boxted(Kent) was ‘the exterior chamber’ with a cellar or hypocaust (Arch Cant 15, 1883, 105).

21 The completeness of the extant remains and the fullness of architectural detail shown on the


313

plan make it unlikely that the empty projection at the south-west corner is really anundiscovered pavilion.

22 Pepys, Diary, 14 July 1664 (garden); 12 May 1666 (bridge).23 Drack 1975, 59.24 RiSchw 418; Swoboda (1918, 92) uses it of [II].25 Hamblain-les-Prés (Fig. 67) would be more credible if the term could be applied to what

are called angle-turrets (tourelles d’angle). One is only 2.2×1.5 m and the other even tinierat 1.8×1.6 m; and how were they reached?

26 Timber verandas also vary, that at Faversham being unusually wide.27 An alternative explanation might be found for Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor I on these

lines.28 Smith 1987.29 Gaubatz-Sattler 1994, 115. I take Aufenhaltsstatte to imply that the dwelling-places were

occupied by those doing the work.30 Nikolov 1976, Fig. 58.

CHAPTER TEN: THE ELEMENTS AND FORMS OF VILLACOMPLEXES

1 Röm-Germ Korrbl 7, 1914, 54.2 Among the rare instances of end-entrance halls is Dirlewang (Fig. 39).3 The double-ended hall tapers slightly, as if it had been built against the yard wall.4 British readers will have a feeling of inevitability on learning that this was the bailiff’s

house (G. Steinmetz, Verhand Hist Ver Oberpfalz 67, 1917, 28).5 As Reinecke pointed out, it can hardly have been part of a bath suite because other bath

rooms are lacking (Röm-Germ Korrbl 7, 1914, 55). It is a valid point because, althoughuncertain evidence of rooms was found, distinctive features such as a plunge-bath mightbe expected to survive.

6 Confirmed by excavation (Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1992, 179–82).7 FdbaSchw 19, 1911, 100–5; Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1992, 181.8 Nothing like it is to be found in the Trier region, the closest resemblance being to the baths

and hall (only) at Meckel (Koethe 1940, 71).9 Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1992, 179.

10 For the division of the villa and an interpretation see Surrey Arch Coll 65, 1968, 1–70 and72, 1980, 63–8.

11 The idea that building 6 V turned its back on the rest (Smith 1980, 67) is unfounded; whatwas added was a rear porticus with end-entrance.

12 Agache 1978, 336, 339.13 A building of less easily explicable development but standing in a somewhat similar relation

to a hall is Sontheim a.d. Brenz 2 (p. 105).14 Spitzing 1988, 65.15 Horn and Born 1970. Cf. also the brief remarks by Drack 1975, 58.16 The larger villa at Regelsbrunn is another (Thomas 1964, 258).17 Cardiff-Ely and Newton St Loe are others.18 Following Richmond 1969, 57.19 Archaeologia 71, 1921, 149. The two buttresses in the east wall of 3 suggest it was aisled;

this would accord with its being split up by timber partitions.


314

20 The villa was dug in the 1960s by the methods used before 1914. The RCHME 1983publication (Arch J 140, 1983, 129–50) is a salvage operation. Here the Commission’slettered phases are replaced by numbers.

21 Llantwit Major, N and S ranges; probably Badbury, E and S ranges; and in slightly differentform, at Sudeley-Spoonley Wood, where the different widths of the three ranges resemblethose in the three buildings at Aiseau.

22 Many aspects of the Hambach courtyards are dealt with in Gaitzsch 1986.23 Too little is known about the area to north of the old yard to know whether it had been

developed in any way before the enlargement took place.24 Gaitzsch 1986, 411.25 If the scale of Agache 1978, Fig. 24, is correct it is 74 m long and it is disturbing to find that

the east and west porticuses are 7.5 m and 6.5 m wide respectively. These are incrediblefigures; the porticuses of the great villa of Fliessem are only 4–4.5 m wide and the frontporticus of Köln-Praetorium is only 5.4 m. Probably the scale should be 1:1000, not 1:2000.

26 Agache (1978) has Athies, Estrées-sur-Noye, Mézières-en-Santerre/le Ziep and WarfuséeSud;Namps-au-Mont, Quevauvillers and Ribemont-sur-Ancre lack the enclosing wall. Laboissière-en-Santerre appears only in Agache and Bréart 1975, Fig. 93. Behencourt is excludedbecause of doubts about the scale.

27 As Koethe suggested (TrZft 9, 1934, 22).28 There is nothing to be said for Richmond’s notion (1969, 57) that the north block, the

workhall, formed [I] and the east range is a later phase. Matagne-la-Petite has someresemblance to Spoonley Wood, particularly in the main range.

29 Hurst argued convincingly for a justice room at Box (Wilts Arch 81, 1987, 29–32).30 Wellow, Pitney and Keynsham-Cemetery are probable.31 The wings of Folkestone W[I] are surely an addition – that to S must be – and may denote

the conscious abandonment of a unified court of any kind.32 Port-le-Grand (Fig. 68), Namps-au-Mont, Ville-sur-Ancre, etc.33 De Caumont’s plan, reproduced in Grenier (1934, 801), differs in the proportions of the

east wing rooms from that in CAG 29, 158. I have followed Grenier, as being the morecomplete.

34 De Caumont’s plan, reproduced and reduced in Grenier (1934, 869), agrees with Jacquemet(1857, 180) but does not correspond with the only dimensions given in the latter’s text: theporticus is 3 m wide and 60 m long. The resulting scale of 1:800 makes sense of thebuildings whereas 1:500, which is Jacquemet’s drawn scale, does not.

35 Referring to Bollendorf, Fig. 27 above (Steiner 1923, 5).36 Goossens thought the plan of this workhall, the lack of heated rooms and the fewness of

the finds precluded a dwelling although, in the north ‘corridor’ (Gang), the soil was burntred in many places (Int Archiv Ethnog 24, 1918, 10).

37 The pilasters on the north side of the workhall can only be for an entrance; the projectionsto east and west are probably buttresses. I take the porch-like room in the porticus to be alobby with a room to the east of it. The remainder of the porticus was primarily or solelya corridor.

38 Lischewski regards 5 as the Herrenhaus?, 4 as a house and the granary is also his opinion(RiHessen, 362).

39 Not on plan (Bull Morbihan 1899, 138).


315

CHAPTER ELEVEN: PALACES, PERISTYLE HOUSES ANDLUXURY VILLAS

1 Millar 1977, 41.2 Ibid., 42.3 Ibid., 30–1.4 Plan most easily accessible in Wightman 1970, 116.5 Ward-Perkins 1981, 78–80.6 Thought by Cunliffe (1971a, 1, 219) to be of AD 75–80 (reiterated, Cunliffe 1991); and by

Black (1987, 85) to be of AD 90–110. The Flavian Palace was begun c. AD 75 and inauguratedAD 92.

7 Cunliffe 1971b, 124.8 The question of whether Fishbourne was a palace or a villa ought not to be linked to its

dating and alleged ownership by the client king of the Regni, Cogidubnus. Those whodeny that it is a palace in the sense defined above have to explain why it is so unlike anyknown villa.

9 The suggestion that this was a granary can be dismissed out of hand (Bud Rég 14,1945, 73).

10 Difficulties presented by cellars and floor levels (Bud Rég 18, 1958, 74) are here ignored;the fact that the two blocks of rooms are a pair is more important.

11 Professor J.J. Wilkes pointed out to me the relevance of the residences of commanders inlegionary fortresses and auxiliary forts, as showing the kind of accommodation adequatefor a senator or a Roman knight (eques). Unfortunately it proved impossible to follow upthis idea.

12 Information from Professor Wilkes.13 A point also made by Grunewald 1974, 263.14 H. Hurst and others (Wilts Arch 81, 1987, 28). The discussion at pp. 29–32 is important.15 Ward-Perkins 1981, 78–80.16 Hurst et al. 31.17 Ibid.18 Castro 1982, 207, 314 and Plan 7. Although ‘arquitectura aulica’ has the connotation of a

princely court, the dispensing of justice is a princely activity which may justify the applicationof Castro’s words.

19 The idea that Aguilafuente began as a row-house or ‘villa linéaire à galerie de façade’(Gorges 1979, 131) has no obvious foundation and the disposition of rooms makes itunlikely.

20 It is a schematic plan (Congr Arch 41, 1874, 41).21 Wilson and Sherlock 1980, 16.22 The suggestion that this range is the original nucleus of Woodchester ignores its extraordinary

width, for a British villa (Clarke 1982, 218).23 Clarke 1982, 199. The suggestion that so grand a room may have had an upper gallery

around it (de la Bedoyère 1991, 156; 1993, 114) is inherently unlikely – no grandee wouldhave allowed himself to be looked down on by inferiors in a ceremonial situation – quiteapart from the lack of any trace of the considerable staircase that would have been needed.

24 Gallia 31, 1973, 133.25 Thomas 1964, 80.26 Gorges 1979, Fig. XXII.27 Gorges 1979, Figs XXXVI, XXXVII.28 In the excellent summary report of the excavation the villa was separated into four phases.


316

I have ventured to divide the first into two on the grounds that the first small temple wassoon replaced by a larger one(?), the baths are imperfectly aligned with the west ‘wing’ andmask the workhall to west, and the basilica appears to be part and parcel of the baths/temple layout. This has entailed renumbering the phases.

29 Cf. de Maeyer 1937, 82; also Smith 1983, 240–2.30 The room has unusual proportions but its location leaves no doubt about its function.31 Fig. 26 (‘Villa urbana du IVe siècle’) is mistakenly captioned and referred to (heading, p.

148) as the last state of the villa, and Fig. 20 (‘Etat probable du Ve siècle’) is captioned asthe fourth-century plan. The continuity of the baths from Fig. 11, Haut-Empire, to Fig. 26and their disappearance in Fig. 20, Ve siècle, confirms the point. Ferdière, I, 198–9, repeatsthe error.

32 ‘Villa de plan diseminado’ (Castro 1982, 64–9).33 In the light of the difficulty of exploring this phase I, the doorways indicated on the plan

are taken to be assumption, not ascertained fact (Fouet 1969, 46).34 Fouet 1969, 50.35 Called an ‘oecus?’ (Fouet 1969, 49).36 Fouet 1969, 76.37 Wightman 1985, 111.38 Then spelt Thuit (de Caumont 1870, 388–9).39 The distance is uncertain; the plan lacks a scale.40 Roger North, quoted in Mark Girouard, The Making of the English Country House, 1978,

122.41 Wightman 1970, 153, with plan. It is impossible to say on present evidence whether

Welschbillig was a palace or a luxury villa.42 RiRWa-Pf, 671–2.43 RiRWa-Pf, 671.44 Another, more removed from the rest of the villa, is in the north-west wing at Téting.45 No report was published. A description and discussion appear in Grenier 1906, 159–68.46 East and west are of 10 m and 12 m diameter respectively (Grenier 1906, 160). The scale

published in Grenier (1934, 824) does not match the measurements given on the plan.47 Grenier 1906, 163, 160 respectively. Great Witcombe is a simpler version.48 Wightman 1970, 145; Mylius 1924, Abb. 1, Taf. IV–V.49 A similar reconstruction recently proposed for the great room at Woodchester is even more

unlikely (de la Bedoyère 1991, 156, with gallery, and 1993, 58 and Pl. 1, without).50 Despite its obvious importance I say nothing about Chiragan, having failed to understand

its most important parts. A very different kind of villa, Lullingstone, has what is to me anequally incomprehensible plan.

51 Wightman 1970, 145.52 Gunther and Kopstein 1985, 157.53 Fliessem I excluding pavilions, 35×21 m; Haccourt I, more than 30×22 m.54 RiRhld-Pf, 368; that this is the intended meaning of Hof is confirmed by the English edition of

the site guidebook which includes the baths in the ‘farm buildings wing’ (Cüppers 1979, 8).55 Zittersdorf/Haut Clocher-Saint Ulrich in TIR 32, Mainz.56 ‘Mil dem Saal 17, der genau so in der Mitte der westlichen Haelfte liegt wie 4 in der Mitte

der oestlichen, stand er gewiss in unmittelbarer Verbindung’ (Jb Lothring 10, 1898, 172). Itake ‘gewiss’ here to mean ‘surely’ in the sense of a strong probability that a statement iscorrect.

57 The evidence was the circular room 88 with its four niches (Grenier 1906, 150). This wasdismissed by Koethe (1940, 128).


317

58 Grenier 1906, 152.59 Gallia 29, 1971, 28.60 Wichmann was uncertain on this point (Jb Lothring 10, 1898, 172). Grenier (1906, 145)

mentions the discovery of many column fragments.

CHAPTER TWELVE: THE VILLAS OF SOUTH-EAST EUROPE

1 Biro 1974; Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969; Thomas 1964; Vasic 1970.2 The pavilions of Szentkirálysabadaja-Romkút, which are drawn as towers and said to be for

storing corn, hay and other crops, show absolutely no way of being entered from the yard(or elsewhere), nor any domestic rooms around the ‘yard’ (Thomas 1964, 121). The illustratorseems to have preferred a toy fort as a model to Köln-Mungersdorf with its corner pavilions.For Gyulafirátót, Thomas 1964, 44, n. 112 and Abb. 20.

3 Chapter 7, above, 105.4 The north wall extending beyond the squarish house is likely to be for a furnace, nothing

more, as the lack of any return to the yard wall confirms.5 Calling it quadriburgium-like and fortifying it, as in the reconstruction drawing, makes

matters worse (Thomas 1964, 113).6 Marshfield (Smith 1987, 250).7 Following Thomas (1964, 208), using Majdan as a parallel to decide between her

alternative sizes.8 Above, pp. 132–34.9 As TIR L34; Miclea and Florescu 1980, I, 64 have Minerau. The alleged corridor 0.80 m wide

running the whole length of the south side, and with the walls of every adjoining roomcrossing (or cut by?) it, is omitted in Fig. 56; it is probably the effect of refronting thatelevation. Cf. the similar feature at Aiud.

10 It could be argued from the setting-out of the transverse entry that all internal walls arelater insertions, but that results in an improbably large hall.

11 As pointed out by Groller (RLiÖ 6, 1905, col. 41).12 Claimed as such by comparison with one in Pompeii; Groller 1905, col. 40. It appears an

unlikely situation for a kiln and no wasters are mentioned in the vicinity.13 It could have been roofed in line with the adjoining rooms but, in the absence of any

definite Roman evidence for such a building practice, a wing is to be preferred.14 Mitrofan, Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 134; Miclea and Florescu 1980, 87.15 For example, in the relation between rooms 2 and 3 and the apsidal-ended room 9.16 The incredible suggestion is made that the entrance-hall was an open yard (Thomas

1964, 65).17 Weitersbach and Betzingen are examples.18 Icannot suggest any explanation of these rooms.19 Strupnic (Yugosl.) has a certain resemblance to Deutschkreuz.20 Assumed orientation; none is given in Dremsizova-Nelcinova (1969, 505) or Nikolov

(1976, 168).21 I am indebted to Sergei Kovalenko for supplementing the French summary with essential

details from the Bulgarian text.22 Described as the east wing in the report. Sergei Kovalenko furnished the details

mentioned here.23 The idea that this part had an upper storey is unsupported by evidence.24 Additional to the Stolac numbers in Wilkes 1969.

— Notes to pp.198-213 —

318

25 Regelsbrunn 1 has two pilasters dignifying the entrance to the porticus of the principalhouse (1), showing that it was reached from the south gate past 2 – a small-scale instanceof the intended effect of in-line planning, to emphasise the importance of the house at theend. House 1 is not in a dominant position in the middle, like Vierherrenborn-Irsch orKöngen, but sufficiently off-centre to show that the second building is of some importance– a habitation of some kind rather than the granary its excavator supposed it to be; Groller,cited Thomas 1964, 257. Thomas expressed no view about its function; the suggestion thatit was vaulted and had an upper storey has nothing to commend it.

26 It was, of course, the bailiff’s house (Nikolov 1976, 33).27 The claim that it was fortified is groundless (Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969, 510).28 Bull Inst Arch Bulgare 3, 1925, 299–300; Sergei Kovlenko provided essential details.29 Nothing like it appears in the Trier district (Koethe 1940).30 It looks as if the courtyard was originally open to east and was only closed by a new range

later.31 Thomas 1964, 60.32 Miclea and Florescu 1980, II, 187.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: THE LATE PRE-ROMAN IRON AGEBACKGROUND

1 Schaaf, Ausgr Deutschland, 189–91.2 Bittel et al. 1981, 84.3 Herrmann and Jockenhövel 1990, 241.4 Schubert 1994. I am indebted to Dr F. Schubert for very kindly providing me with a copy of

this most important article.5 It is impossible to do justice to the wealth of material from Holland despite some useful

comments by Mr Joris Aarts of the Free University of Amsterdam, and what follows aboutthat country is inevitably inadequate. Manching will be of comparable importance whenthe houses are fully published.

6 Collis 1986.7 Slofstra 1991.8 No report of the excavation has appeared. Mr S.J. Catney provided additional information.9 Rodwell 1978, 34–7.

10 Gelling, Proc Prehist Soc 43, 1977, 282; ‘quergeschlitze Palisaden Graben’ (Schindler 1977,26).

11 The Vix building is an ‘à fonction annexe’; Villes 1985, Fig. 5. A large four-aisled buildingat Mont Beuvray is structurally incomprehensible (Bulliot 1899, 2, 166–72).

12 Verwers 1972, 88.13 Verwers 1972, 77, 88.14 Three houses, J, M, P, had upright gables (Verwers 1972, 86).15 Hulst, Ber ROB 23, 1973, 105.16 Ibid., 106.17 The house is either of six or seven bays according to whether one of the axial post-holes,

hatched in Sanden and van der Broeke 1987, 58, Afb. 5, open in Slofstra 1991, 142, Fig. 7c,is thought to belong to the building or not; I am inclined to accept it.

18 Slofstra 1991, 141, n. 27, citing an observation by de Boë.19 These remarks are based on the only source available to me for Hoogeloon, the small-scale

plans Figs 12, 22 and also Fig. 26 (Slofstra 1991).


319

20 Van der Sanden 1987, 64. I am grateful for the help of Karen Waugh in obtaining this andother Dutch publications.

21 Trier 1969, 145, n. 15.22 The posts are for a veranda; above, Fig. 11; discussed, Rodwell 1978, 32–4.23 Too irregularly set-out to permit reconstruction; Hawkes and Hull 1947, 89–91.24 Neal et al. 1990, 32.25 Ibid., 34.26 Verwers 1972, 93.27 For example, at Oss-Ussen (van der Sanden 1987, 62 (plan)).28 Stanford 1974, Fig. 5 (Hut F5) and 123–5; Arch J 141, 1984, 61–90, esp. 71; Stanford 1991,

60–1. Dr Stanford very kindly drew my attention to this material.29 Dedet 1987 has an importance beyond its immediate concern with Languedoc. The houses

mentioned are described and discussed at pp. 185–96 with plans at p. 191.30 Here as elsewhere Roman numerals in the original publication are replaced by

Arabic to avoid confusion with phase numbers, which are Roman throughout inthis book.

31 Schindler 1977, 42.32 Roymans, ROB 1988, no. 356, 355.33 Dedet 1987, esp. p. 192.34 van Es 1981, 181.35 Other settlements with houses of this type are Haamstede-Brabers and, just over the Dutch

border, Weeze-Baal (Niedersachsen); van Es 1981, 168–9, 179–80.36 Hingley and Miles 1984, 63.37 Grimes in Frere 1960, 21–6.38 Proc Prehist Soc 1977, 273–5.39 Harding in Hawkes 1973, 55–6.40 But it is not always possible to know whether the hearths are contemporaneous or were in

use simultaneously, as pointed out by Dedet (1987, 193). If, though, a hearth had fallen outof use for any considerable time, its remains might not have been left occupying usefulspace, as is evident in the north-east room.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: MODES OF ROMANISATION

1 The plan redrawn as Fig. 31 follows de Maeyer 1937, 106 but looks too small and I havenot consulted the original publication. Nevertheless, it illustrates the point made in the text.

2 Jarrett and Wrathmell 1981, 250.3 Buildings could not always be related stratigraphically and the views expressed here are

not always those of Jarrett and Wrathmell.4 Jarrett and Wrathmell (1981) failed to discuss the implications of the finds and the specialist

reports for the history of the site and since they chose to dismiss the need for an index (p.vi) I may have missed some important evidence or observations.

5 Smith 1985; Webster and Smith 1987.6 The same development at Radley-Barton Court Farm may be a similar response to Roman

rule.7 The two parts must have been phases of a single building campaign, even if implementation

of the second was considerably delayed.8 This demonstrates again how right Wightman was to underline the importance of baths in

early villas or, in the case of Barnsley Park IV, a proto-villa (Wightman 1985, 110–11).


320

9 Bloemers 1978, Abb. 42.10 This interpretation of the site appears in Smith 1987.11 Agache and Bréart 1975; Smith 1987, 247, 249.12 Leday (1980, 2, Pl. LVI), where what seems to be a ditch approaches a row-type house and

may run diagonally across it.13 Cf. the beginnings of Bignor.14 J Roman Stud 40, 1950, Pl. VI/2. For examples illustrating this and other themes, and for a

valuable discussion, Wilson 1974.15 Yorks Arch J 43, 1971, 180.16 Note also Rheinbach-Flerzheim (Hambach 512).17 Williams and Zeepfat 1994, 142.18 Wrathmell and Nicholson 1990, 282.19 Ibid., 279; ‘gradual Romanisation’ is inexact because the native farm of V largely disappeared

in VI.20 The continuity of boundaries and house sites raises doubts about the last phase of the pre-

Romanised settlement; why, if some house sites had been abandoned, was such care takento perpetuate them by masonry buildings?

21 Miles 1986, 14.22 I follow Thomas (1964, 152–4) for the history of the site rather than Barb in his reassessment

(1937, 153–7) or Groller in his excavation report, RLiÖ 6, 1925, 6–50.23 Thomas 1964, 157.24 Stead 1980, 13, 35.25 Agache 1978, 331, Fig. 24; also Lockington (Leics.) (Wilson 1974, Pl. XXII).26 David Johnston, lecture, Nottingham 1978; see also Johnston 1978, 89.27 Collingwood 1930, 113.28 Agache, 1978 and, further afield, at the Swiss villa of Oberentfelden (Fig. 76).29 This procedure can be inferred in a few English houses where the roof is older than the

outer walls, and I have myself observed the gradual progress of just such a rebuilding atWareham (Dorset).

30 Chapter 7, above, p. 107.31 Here and at Leiwen the early pre-villa phase of the site was not numbered.32 Described as ‘quelques murs d’un bâtiment assez fruste’ (Gallia 41, 1983, 320).33 Saint-Germain-les-Corbeil I has a combination of hall- and row-type houses comparable to

Lalonquette I or North Leigh I.34 Scott (1993a) gives the parish name.35 Phases as Harding 1984, 21. It is highly unlikely that the round-house was abandoned

in [III]; had that been so its position would have been occupied by the house or‘primary villa’.

36 It becomes even stranger if Harding’s view is accepted: ‘Doubtless the native building-typewas considered adequate as living-quarters for farm-labourers or slaves, to whom in anycase native ways may have seemed preferable to the trappings of Romanisation.’

37 Harding 1984, 8.38 The notion of an upper storey is fanciful (Harding 1984, 10).39 Could it have been a shrine or temple? No hearth was found.40 I have in mind what C.E. Stevens called ‘the cry across the abyss’ (J Roman Stud 37, 1947,

134).41 Northants Arch 22, 1988–9, 60.42 I am indebted to James Kenney for information about this villa and discussion of its

problems. His provisional conclusions are incorporated in the text but Mr Kenney is notresponsible for any misinterpretation that may have crept in.


321

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: PATTERNS OF VILLA DEVELOPMENT

1 Cotton and Métraux 1985, 19.2 The drains hereabouts were for removing surface water, especially that coming from a

steep slope to north (Cotton and Métraux 1985, 17, Fig. 3b).3 Bruckneudorf [I] has no room which corresponds precisely to Blankenheim [I] 30.4 Wings of this kind occur more widely than in hall-houses. Oberweningen (Switz.), with a

strange double-depth plan, has an east wing planned much like Drax and a west wing, likethat at Vicques, resembling Lamargelle.

5 Mansfield Woodhouse (Notts.), Carisbrooke and Brading differ only in having extra smallrooms.

6 Elsted-Batten Hanger (Sussex), to which David Rudling drew my attention, is a goodexample. West Dean (Wilts.) and West Meon-Lippen Wood (Hants.) can probably be groupedwith it.

7 BJb 123, 1916, 215. I am much indebted to the kindness of Dr Walter Janssen of theRheinisches Landesmuseum, Bonn, for providing me with a typescript of the report of 1908by Constantin Koenen.

8 The report is emphatic on this point, contrasting the way the porticus stops dead (totlauft)against the north wing but turns round the corner of the south wing (BJb 123, 1916, 215).

9 BJb 138, 1933, 15. This wall was probably built in IB at the same time as outer rooms wereadded to both wings, thus making the house truly symmetrical. Had Mylius superimposedhis absolutely symmetrical model based on a hexagon (p. 12) upon the real rather thanideal plan of I the fit would have been less than perfect. If this is the correct geometricalmodel and it does not fit at all the relevant points it was evidently modified in execution;on no account should it override archaeological evidence where that is unambiguous.

10 Mylius divided the room into two because it is ‘improbably large’ (BJb 138, 1933, 14).Oelmann says that how it was divided can no longer be known (BJb 123, 1916, 215). Cf.Budapest-Csúcshegy for a large workhall in such a position.

11 The point is borne out in IIA when the two functions were separated: 25 is no more thana lobby and 21/22 becomes like a small double-ended hall. This makes it more likely thatin IA 21 was a passage-room which it was undesirable to perpetuate in IB.

12 It is incorrect to say they are of exactly the same size, as Oelmann did (BJb 123, 1916, 216).13 BJb 123, 1916, 216.14 Interpreted as a yard (BJb 123, 1916, 217).15 See n. 11.16 This addition was ‘in part open to the south and so may have formed a porticus [Halle]’

(BJb 123, 1916, 218).17 A yard in the report (BJb 123, 1916, 219); corrected by Oelmann (Mitt DAI Röm 38/39,

1923–4, 211 n. 1) and treated without remark as a hall (Arch Anz 43, 1928, 240).18 Only the east part had a hypocaust (BJb 123, 1916, 222).19 The date of the temple is uncertain; it could fit in II but, even if that were so, it is likely to

have gained importance in III.20 The plan shows what look like two holes, perhaps representing door jambs; cf. also a

similar depiction of the opening from the baths corridor to the mosaic room 8.21 Plan of St Stephen-Park Street VIII, Oxf J Arch 2, 1983, 244; and of VII and VIII,

Caesarodunum 17, 1982 = Actes du Colloque Villa Romaine, 336. Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor (Herts.) was greatly simplified in phases VA and VB.

22 I am grateful to Dr D.J. Smith for providing me with an offprint of his excavation report,which I had missed on its appearance, and for saving me from some errors; I am solelyresponsible for the present interpretation.


322

23 ‘Speisesaal, oecus’ (Fremersdorf 1933, 22).24 At both ends according to Fremersdorf (1933, 14–15).25 ‘Dienerschaft und . . . Gesinde’ (Fremersdorf 1933, 31).26 Fremersdorf 1933, 21, Tafel 4.27 This may be relevant to the very strange villa of Saunderton (Bucks.) which has never been

adequately explained, despite a valiant attempt by Branigan (1966–70).

CHAPTER SIXTEEN: A MODEL OF DEVELOPMENT

1 Medawar 1967, 87.2 Leyser 1968, 38.3 Goody 1983, 121.4 Jones 1972, 320–58.5 Ibid., 321.6 Stevens 1966, 111.7 Haunstetten (Bad.-Württ.), Landshut-Salmannsberg (Bay.), Beegden (Neth.), Odell (Beds.).8 Draughton (Northants.), St Lythans-Whitton (Glam.).9 Comparable to Hardwick-Mingies Ditch (Oxon.).

10 Agache 1978, 138; CAG85, Vendée, Fig. 76.11 Tailly-l’Arbre-à-Mouches and Nempont-Saint-Firmin (both Somme) are like this.12 Collingham-Dalton Parlours (West Yorks.), Lechlade-Claydon Pike (Oxon.) and Barnsley

Park (Glos.) are examples.13 The most useful source for Southwick (Sussex) is Black 1987, 102–4 and Fig. 43. This book

is more important than its restricted geographical scope suggests; many of the discussionsare enlightening.

14 Birkenfeld-Elchweiler (Rhld-Pf.), despite being very incompletely excavated, is more complexthan most fragmentary plans. Nennig (Rhld-Pf.) has some resemblance to Fishbourne Palacebut is of much later date; Wightman 1970, 146–7.

15 The long row-house built c. AD 65 at Aylesford-Eccles replaced an earlier structure (Detsicas1983, 120).

16 Leyser 1968, 38.17 Black 1994, 107.18 Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process, esp. vol. 2, State Formation and Civilization (Basle

1939; English edition, Oxford 1982).19 As is implicit at Barnsley Park, where IV is incomprehensible unless it is a stage towards V.

Barnsley Park IV–VI present problems which need reassessment of the archaeologicaldetail.

20 Drack 1990, 287.21 Otherwise, building across the yard wall seems pointless.22 Drack 1990, English summary, 287.23 Not that the author of this study has any reason to object to other people’s following his

own practice.24 Duncan-Jones 1974; Stevens 1966, 109, 121.25 There are besides one or two halls in Germany and the Netherlands which, by their

proportions and development, look rather like British halls; Friedberg-Fladerlach [I] (Bay.)(Fig. 69) has some resemblance to Frocester Court I. I have not pursued this line ofenquiry.


323

26 Applebaum 1972, 46.27 Ant J 9, 1927, 145.28 Cf. the corn-drying alleged to have taken place in the best room 9 at Saunderton, in

Bledlow-cum-Saunderton (Bucks.) parish. Ashcroft accepted this with reservations (RecordsBucks 1934–40, 402), Branigan without comment (Records Bucks 1966–70, 261).

29 Smith 1987, 250–1.30 Smith 1980, 66; 1987, 254, respectively.31 Hence the alleged parallel of Köln-Mungersdorf, where the distribution of buildings is very

different, is invalid (Braat, Oudhdk Med NS 34, 1953, 59 and n. 14).32 An alternative explanation offered in a lecture (Abbeville, 1972) is a urinoir – a notion so

bizarre as to appear so even in villa studies.33 Britannia 1976, 369.34 Arch Cant 86, 1971, Fig. 1.35 Oudheidk. Med NS 6, 1925, Afb. 44, at 49.36 Detsicas 1983, 105.37 Payne, Arch Cant 22, 1897, 77.38 It may also have been a fishpond (Vermeersch, Cahiers Picardie 1981, 152, citing parallels,

and for detail, Bull Trim Picardie 1976, 317–20).39 Reconstructed as a monumental well by Gerster (1973, 75–7). This interpretation – repeated,

Drack (1990, 59–62) – sits uneasily with its distance from the two nearest buildings E andB – 35 m and 47 m respectively.

40 Drack 1990, 61, n. 44.41 Netzer 1988, 41–2.42 No evidence is offered for the staircases shown in the reconstructed plan (Koethe

1934, 25, 29).43 Gunther and Kopstein 1985, 156.44 Ibid., 156; Koepp 1924, 10.45 Gunther and Kopstein 1985, 157. Their location if not number no doubt changed when the

house was enlarged and a clearer separation of service rooms emerged.46 Not for the use of those misleadingly called ‘indoor servants’ (Mylius 1924, 122).47 Mylius 1924, 127.48 Fremersdorf 1933, 310. Fremersdorf is unusual among archaeologists in perceiving that all

the farm buildings would have been dwellings too.49 I regard this as more likely than a peasant militia (Gorges 1979, 323).50 Following Nikolov 1976, 14 and Fig. 12.51 Spitaels 1970.52 Excluding a timber phase (Ebnöther 1991, 250–1).53 The paved area (Agache 1978, Fig. 13) of elaborate geometrical outline is an ornamental

pond by analogy with the larger one at Welschbillig (Rhld-Pf.).54 J Roman Stud 37, 1947, 133.55 Arch Cant 88, 1973, 9.56 I have not studied bath buildings. A British equivalent to Koethe 1940 is needed, also an

examination of the many instances of two baths in a house, sometimes a fairly small one,as Milton Keynes-Bancroft V (Bucks.).

57 A word, Oelmann said, to be taken with a grain of salt (BJb 133, 1928, 136, n. 1). The pointmade in the text comes from the same page.

58 Stevens 1966. I do not altogether understand this article; fortunately its general significanceis clear.

59 Applebaum 1972, 236–7.

— Notes to pp.289-302 —

324

ABBREVIATIONS OFPERIODICALS

AASR Associated ArchitecturalSocieties’ Reports and Papers

Acad Bulg Fouilles Rech AcademieBulgare, Fouilles et Recherches

Acta Arch Acad Sci Hung ActaArchaeologica Academiae ScientiarumHungaricae

Acta Mus Napoc Acta MuseiNapocensis (Cluj)

Allg Geschfrd AllgäuerGeschichtsfreund

Ann Bret Annales de BretagneAnn Bruxelles Annales de la Société

d’Archéologie de BruxellesAnn Litt Univ Besançon Annales

Littéraires de l’Université deBesançon

Ann Lux Arlon Annales de l’InstitutArchéologique de Luxembourg(Arlon)

Ann Namur Annales de la SociétéArchéologique de Namur

Ann Norm Annales de NormandieAnt J Antiquaries JournalAnz Schw Altkde Anzeiger für

Schweizerische AltertumskundeAquitania Aquitania: Revue Inter-

Régionale d’ArchéologieArch Aeliana Archaeologia AelianaArch Anz Archäologische nzeigerArch Aquit Archéologie en quitaineArch Ausgr Bad-Württ Archäologische

Ausgrabungen in Baden-Württemberg

Arch Bret Archéologie en BretagneArch Cambrensis ArchaeologiaCambrensis

Arch Cant Archaeologia CantianaArch Dtld Archäologie in DeutschlandArch J Archaeological JournalArch Jahr Bayern Das Archäologische

Jahr in BayernArch Korrbl Archäologisches

KorrespondenzblattArch Limburg Archéologie en

LimburgArch Nachr Baden Archäologische

Nachrichten aus BadenArch Schw Archäologie der SchweizArch Wallonne L’Archéologie WallonneArchaeologia Archaeologia or

Miscellaneous Tracts relating toAntiquity

Archéologie Archéologie: ChroniqueSemestrielle

Archiv Fft Archiv für FrankfurterGeschichte und Kunst

Archiv Hess Archiv für HessischeGeschichte und Altertumskunde

Ardenne Ardenne et Famenne, Art,Archéologie, Histoire, Folklore

Argovia Jahresschrift der HistorischenGesellschaft des Kantons Aargau

— Abbreviations of periodicals —

325

Bad Fdb Badische FundberichteBaselb Hmtb Baselbieter

HeimatbuchBasler Zft Basler Zeitschrift für

Geschichte und AltertumskundeBayer Vgbl Bayerische

VorgeschichtsblätterBer RGK Bericht der Römisch-

Germanischen KommissionBer ROB Berichten van de Rijksdienst

voor het OudheidkundigeBodemonderzoek

Ber Saar Bericht der StaatlichenDenkmalpflege im Saarland

Berks Arch J Berkshire ArchaeologicalJournal

BJb Banner JahrbücherBl Heimatkde Blätter für

HeimatkundeBl Schwäb Albver Blätter des

Schwäbischen AlbvereinsBritannia Britannia: A Journal of

Romano-British and Kindred StudiesBrycheiniog Brycheiniog: Journal of

the Brecknock SocietyBSDSaarld Bericht der staatlichen

Denkmalpflege im SaarlandBud RégBudapest RégiségeiBull Ant Calais Bulletin de la

Commission des AntiquitésDépartementales du Pas-de-Calais

Bull Arch Bret Bulletin Archéologiquede l’Association Bretonne

Bull Arch Com Trav Hist BulletinArchéologique du Comité desTravaux Historiques et Scientifiques

Bull Art et Arch Bulletin desCommissions Royales d’Art etd’Archéologie

Bull Calais Bulletin de la CommissionDépartementale d’Histoire etd’Archéologie du Pas-de-Calais

Bull Comm Hist Nord Bulletin de laCommission Historique duDépartement du Nord

Bull Comm Royales Art Bulletin des

Commissions Royales d’Art etd’Archéologie

Bull Hesbaye-Condroz Bulletin duCercle Archéologique Hesbaye-Condroz

Bull Inst Arch Bulgare Bulletin del’Institut Archéologique Bulgare

Bull Inst Arch (London) Bulletin of theInstitute of Archaeology

Bull Liégeois Bulletin de l’InstitutArchéologique Liégeois

Bull Loire-Atl Bulletin de la SociétéArchéologique et Historique deNantes et de Loire-Atlantique

Bull Luxembourg Bulletin Trimestrielde l’Institut Archéologique deLuxembourg

Bull Luxemb Arlon Bulletin del’Institut Archéologique duLuxembourg Arlon

Bull Mon Bulletin MonumentalBull Morbihan Bulletin de la Société

Polymathique du MorbihanBull Picardie Bulletin de la Société

Historique de PicardieBull Rouennais Bulletin de la Société

des Amis des Monuments RouennaisBull Soc Ant Picardie Bulletin de la

Société des Antiquaires de PicardieBull Soc Normande Etudes Préhist

Bulletin de la Société Normanded’Etudes Préhistoriques

Bull Trim Picardie Bulletin Trimestrielde la Société des Antiquaires dePicardie

Burgenl Forsch BurgenländischeForschungen

Burgenl HeimatblBurgenländische Heimatblätter

Cahiers Alsaciens Cahiers Alsaciensd’Archéologie, d’Art et d’Histoire

Cahiers PicardieCahiers Archéologiquesde Picardie

Carinthia I Carinthia I: Zeitschrift fürGeschichtliche Landeskunde vonKärnten


326

Carnuntum-Jahrb Carnuntum-Jahrbuch

Cheshire Arch Bull CheshireArchaeological Bulletin

Congr Arch Congrès ArchéologiqueCurrent Arch Current ArchaeologyDacia Dacia: Revue d’Archéologie et

d’Histoire AncienneDmpfl Die DenkmalpflegeDmpfl Bad-Württ Denkmalpflege in

Baden-WürttembergDerbyshire Arch J Derbyshire

Archaeological JournalDNHAS Proceedings of the Dorset

Natural History and Field ClubDoc Charleroi Documents et Rapports

de la Société Paléontologique etArchéologique de Charleroi

Dossiers Alet Dossiers du CentreRégional Archéologique d’Alet

Dossiers Arch Les Dossiers del’Archéologie

FdbaB-W Fundberichte aus Baden-Württemberg

FdbaHessen Fundberichte aus HessenFdbaSchw Fundberichte aus

SchwabenFdbÖ Fundberichte aus ÖsterreichForsch u Fortschr Forschungen und

FortschritteGallia Gallia: Fouilles et Monuments

Archéologiques en FranceGallia-Inf Gallia-InformationsGermania Germania: Anzeiger der

RGKGlasnik Bosna Herc Glasnik Zemolskoj

Muzeja u Bosni i HercegoviniGlasnik Sarajevo Glasnik Zemaljskog

Muzeja u SarajevuGymnasium Gymnasium: Zeitschrift

für Kultur der AntikeHelinium Helinium: Revue Consacrée

à l’Archéologie des Pays-Bas, de laBelgique et du Grand-Duché deLuxembourg

Helv Arch Helvetia ArchaeologicaHémecht Hémecht: Zeitschrift für

Luxemburger GeschichteHerts Arch Hertfordshire ArchaeologyHerts Arch Rev Hertfordshire

Archaeological ReviewHist et Arch Histoire et ArchéologieHist Coll Staff Historical Collections

for StaffordshireHistoria (Stuttgart) Historia.

Zeitschrift für Alte GeschichteInt Archiv Ethnog

Internationales Archiv fürEthnographie

Izv Muz Severozapadna BalgarijaIzvestija na Muzeite SeverozapadnaBalgarija

Jahresber Bayer BodendenkmapflJahresbericht der BayerischenBodendenkmalpflege

Jahresber Dillingen Jahresbericht desHistorischen Vereins Dillingen a.d. D.

Jahresber Ges Nützl Forsch TrierJahresbericht der Gesellschaft fürNützliche Forschungen zu Trier

Jahresber Hessen Jahresbericht derDenkmalpflege im GrossherzogtumHessen

Jahresber Oberösterr MusverJahresbericht desOberösterreichisches MusealvereinesJahresber Schwaben Jahresberichtdes Historischen Vereins vonSchwaben

Jahresber Seetal Jahresbericht derHistorischen Vereinigung Seetal

Jahresber Stein Jahresbericht derForderverein zur Erforschung undErhaltung der Kulturdenkmale im Stein

Jahresber Straubing Jahresbericht desHistorischen Vereins für Straubing

Jb Bern Jahrbuch des BernischenHistorischen Museums

Jb DAI Jahrbuch des DeutschenArchäologischen Instituts

Jb Liechtenstein Jahrbuch desHistorischen Vereins für dasFürstentum Liechtenstein


327

Jb Lothring Jahrbuch der Gesellschaftfür Lothringische Geschichte undKunst

JbSGU Jahrbuch der SchweizerischenGesellshaft für Ur- undFrühgeschichte

Jb Solothurn Jahrbuch fürSolothurnische Geschichte

J Brit Arch Ass Journal of the BritishArchaeological Association

J Northampton Mus Journal of theNorthampton Museum and ArtGallery

JOAI(B) Jahreshefte desÖsterreichischen ArchäologischesInstitutes (Beiblatt)

J Roman Arch Journal of RomanArchaeology

J Roman Stud Journal of RomanStudies

Kent Arch Rev Kent ArchaeologicalReview

Kölner Jahrb Kölner Jahrbuch für Vor-und Frühgeschichte

Korrbl WdZ Korrespondenzblatt derWestdeutsche Zeitschrift fürGeschichte und Kunst

Kurtr Jb Kurtrierischen JahrbuchLatomus Latomus: Revue d’Etudes

LatinesLincs Hist Arch Lincolnshire History

and ArchaeologyLincs Rep Lincolnshire Architectural

and Archaeological Society Reportsand Papers

Mém Côte-d’Or Mémoires de laCommission des Antiquités duDépartement du Côte-d’Or

Mém Normandie Mémoires de laSociété des Antiquaires deNormandie

Mém Prés Divers Savants Acad InscripMémoires Présentées par DiversSavants à l’Académie des Inscriptionset Belles-Lettres de l’Institut deFrance

Mém Soc Ant Fr Mémoires de la Sociétédes Antiquaires de France

Mitt Bad Homburg Mitteilungen desVereins für Geschichte undLandeskunde zu Bad Homburg v.d.H.

Mitt Central-Comm Hist DenkmaleMitteilungen der Königliche undKaiserliche Central-Commission zurErforschung der Kunst- undHistorischen Denkmale

Mitt DAI Röm Mitteilungen desDeutschen Archäologischen Instituts,Römische Abteilung

Mitt Heddernheim Mitteilungen überRömische Funde in Heddernheim

Mitt Hohenzollern Mitteilungen desVereins für Geschichte undAltertumskunde in HohenzollernMitt Pfalz Mitteilungen desHistorischen Vereins der Pfalz

Mitt Salzburg Mitteilungen derGesellschaft für SalzburgerLandeskunde

Mitt Zürich Mitteilungen derAntiquarischen Gesellschaft in ZürichMZ Mainzer Zeitschrift

Nassau Ann Nassauische AnnalenNorfolk Arch Norfolk ArchaeologyNorthants ArchNorthamptonshire ArchaeologyNorth Staffs J North StaffordshireJournal of Field Studies

Not Scavi Notizie degli Scavi diAntichità

Oberösterr HeimatblOberösterreichische HeimatblätterOudheidk MedOudheidkundige Mededelingen uit hetRijksmuseum van Oudheden te LeidenOxf J Arch Oxford Journal ofArchaeology

Oxon OxoniensiaPeuce Peuce: Studii si Comunicari de

Istorie si ArheologiePfalz Mus Pfalzisches Museum


328

Pro Alesia Pro Alesia. Revue desFouilles d’Alise

Proc Cambridge Proceedings of theCambridge Antiquarian Society

Proc Cambridgeshire Proceedings ofthe Cambridgeshire ArchaeologicalSociety

Proc Devon Proceedings of the DevonArchaeological Exploration Society

Proc Dorset Proceedings of the DorsetNatural History and ArchaeologicalSocietyProc Hants Proceedings of the

Hampshire Field ClubProc Leatherhead Proceedings of the

Leatherhead and District LocalHistory Society

Proc Soc Ant Lond Proceedings of theSociety of Antiquaries of London

Proc Somerset Proceedings of theSomerset Archaeological and NaturalHistory Society

Proc Univ Bristol Spelaeological SocietyProceedings of the University of

Bristol Spelaeological SocietyProc Prehist Soc Proceedings of the

Prehistoric SocietyPubl Limbourg Publications de la

Société Historique et Archéologiquedans le Limbourg

Quartalbl Hist Ver HessenQuartalblätter des HistorischenVereins für das GrossherzogtumHessen

Records Bucks Records ofBuckinghamshire

Reports Lincs Reports of theLincolnshire Architectural andArchaeological Society

Reports Northants Reports of theNorthamptonshire Architectural andArchaeological Society

Rev Arch Revue ArchéologiqueRev Arch Narbonnaise Revue

Archéologique de NarbonnaiseRev Arch Picardie Revue

Archéologique de PicardieRev Est Revue Archéologique de l’Est et

du Centre-EstRev Nord Revue du NordRöm-Germ Korrbl Römisch-

Germanisches KorrespondenzblattSaalb-JbSaalburg-JahrbuchSammelbl Ingolstadt Sammelblatt des

Historischen Vereins IngolstadtSargetiaSargetia: Acta Musei DevensisSchaff Beitr Schaffhauser Beiträge zur

GeschichteSchr Baar Schriften des Vereins für

Geschichte und Naturgeschichte derBaar

Schr Württ Alt-Ver Schriften desWürttembergischen Altertums-Vereins

Schwäb Mus Schwäbische MuseumSoc Préhist Nord Société Préhistorique

du NordSouth Midl Arch Newsletter of the CBA

South Midlands GroupSurrey Arch CollSurrey Archaeological

CollectionsSussex Arch Coll Sussex Archaeological

CollectionsTrans Birmingham Transactions of the

Birmingham Archaeological SocietyTrans Bristol Transactions of the

Bristol and GloucestershireArchaeological Society

Trans London and MiddxTransactions of the London andMiddlesex Archaeological Society

Trans Thoroton Transactions of theThoroton Society

Trans Woolhope Transactions of theWoolhope Naturalists’ Field Club

Tr Grab Forsch Trierer Grabungenund Forschungen

Tr Jahresber Trierer JahresberichteTrZft Trierer Zeitschrift für

Geschichte und Kunst des TriererLandes und seiner NachbargebieteVerhand Hist Ver Oberpfalz


329

Verhandlungen des HistorischenVereins für Oberpfalz undRegensburg

Vom Rhein Vom Rhein: Monatsblattdes Wormser Altertumsvereins

Wavriensia, Wavriensia: Bulletin duCercle Historique et Archéologique deWavre et de la Region

Westd Zft Westdeutsche Zeitschrift fürGeschichte und Kunst

Wilts Arch Wiltshire Archaeologicaland Natural History Magazine

Wiss Arb BurgenldWissenschaftliche

WMBH Wissenschaftliche Mitteilungenaus Bosnien und der Herzegovina

World Arch World ArchaeologyWürtt Vierteljahresh

Württembergische Vierteljahresheftefür Landesgeschichte

Yorks Arch J Yorkshire ArchaeologicalJournal

Zft Hist Ver Schwaben Zeitschrift desHistorischen Vereins für Schwaben

330

BIBLIOGRAPHY

All books and articles other than excavation reports on single sites

ABBREVIATIONS OF BOOKS AND SERIALS

Actes Balkaniques 1969 = Actes du Premier Congrès International des Etudes Balkaniques etSud-Est Européennes, vol. 2, Sofia

AFdS = Archäologische Führer der SchweizANRW = Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen WeltArch Belg = Archaeologia Belgica (reprints)Ausgr Deutschland = RGK, Ausgrabungen in Deutschland 1950–75, Mainz 1975Ausgr Rhld = Ausgrabungen in Rheinland 1981–2, BonnBAR = British Archaeological Reports, Oxford:

Brit Ser = British SeriesInt Ser = International SeriesSuppl Ser = Supplementary Series

CAG = Carte archéologique de la Gaule01 Ain03 Allier14 Calvados16 Charente18 Cher19 Corrèze23 Creuse27 Eure28 Eure-et-Loir29 Finistère35 Ille-et-Vilaine36 Indre37 Indre-et-Loire38/1 Isère40 Landes41 Loir-et-Cher44 Loire-Atlantique

— Bibliography —

331

45 Loiret46 Lot48 Lozère49 Maine-et-Loire50 Manche53 Mayenne62 Pas-de-Calais64 Pyrénées-Atlantiques71 Saône-et-Loire87 Vienne

Camb Ag Hist = Cambridge Agrarian HistoryCBA Res Rept = Council for British Archaeology Research ReportDéchelette = J. Déchelette, Manuel d’archéologie préhistorique, celtique et gallo-romaine, 8

volsEAA = East Anglian ArchaeologyForsch u Ber Bad-Württ = Forschungen und Berichte zur Vor- und Frühgeschichte in Baden-

Württemberg, StuttgartKent Mon = Kent Monograph Series, DoverNAR = Nederlandse Archaeolgische RapportenNeue Ausgr Dtld = RGK, Nette Ausgrabungen in Deutschland, Frankfurt, 1958ORL Obergermanische-Rätische LimesParet = Paret, O. 1932, Die Siedlungen des Römischen Württembergs, Stuttgart = Goessler, P.,

F. Hertlein and O. Paret, Die Römer in Württemberg, vol. 3RCHME Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of EnglandRGF Römisch-Germanische ForschungenRiBad-Württ Filtzinger, P. 1986 Die Römer in Baden-Württemberg, StuttgartRiHessen Baatz, D. and F.-R. Herrmann (eds) 1982 Die Römer in Hessen, StuttgartRiNordrh-Westf Horn, H.G. 1987 Die Römer in Nordrhein-Westfalen, StuttgartRiRhld-Pf Cüppers, H. 1990 Die Römer in Rheinland-Pfalz, StuttgartRiSchw Drack, W. and R. Fellmann 1988 Die Römer in der Schweiz, StuttgartRLiÖ = Der Römische Limes in Österreich, ViennaROB = Rijksdienst voor het Oudheidkundige Bodemonderzoek, OverdrukkenSKF = Schweizerische KunstführerSoc Ant Res Rept = Society of Antiquaries of London Research ReportTIR = Tabula Imperii Romani: Sheets L32, L33, L34, M31, M32, M33; not numbered – Condate-

Glevum-Londinium-Lutetia; Britannia SeptrionalisTr Grab Forsch = Trierer Grabungen und ForschungenVCH = Victoria History of the Counties of England

Adam, J.-P. 1984 La Construction romaine, Paris.Agache, R. 1970 Détection aérienne, Amiens.—— 1978 La Somme pré-romaine et romaine (= Mémoires de la Société des Antiquaries de

Picardie, vol. 24, Amiens).Agache, R. and B. Bréart 1975 Atlas d’archéologie aérienne de la Picardie, vol. 1: Le bassin

de la Somme à l’époque protohistorique et romaine, Amiens.Alfoldy, G. 1974 Noricum (transl. A. Birley), London.Allen, T.G. 1993 Excavations at Roughground Farm, Lechlade, Gloucestershire, Oxford.Anthes, G. 1906 ‘Römische Landhäuser in Deutschland’, Dmpfl 8, 117–22.Applebaum, S. 1972 ‘Roman Britain’, Camb Ag Hist I/ii, 3–277.Aucher, M.-R. and M. Aucher 1984 Villa-gallo-romaine des Cassons, Poitiers.


332

Aydelotte, W.O., A.C. Bogue and R.W. Fogel 1972 The Dimensions of Quantitative Researchin History, London.

Barb, A. 1937 ‘Das angebliche Kastell Ulmus’, RLiÖ 18, 153–8.Barker, W.R. 1901 Account of Remains of a Roman Villa discovered at Brislington, Bristol,

December 1899, Bristol.Baumann, V.H. 1983 Ferma Romana din Dobrogea, Tulcea.Baxter, R. 1931 Autobiography (Everyman edn.).de la Bedoyère, G. 1991 The Buildings of Roman Britain, London.—— 1993 English Heritage Book of Roman Villas and the Countryside, London.de Beer, E.S. (ed.) 1955, The Diary of John Evelyn, 6 vols, Oxford.Binding, G. 1991 Das Dachwerk, Munich.Binsfeld, W. 1979 ‘Zu treverischen Kultdenkmälern’, Festchrift 100 Jahre Rheinisches

Landesmuseum Trier, Trier, 263–9(= Tr Grab Forsch 14).Biro, M. 1974 ‘Roman Villas in Pannonia’, Acta Arch Acad Sci Hung 26, 1–57.Bittel, K., W. Kimmig and S. Schiek 1981 Die Kelten in Baden-Württemberg, Stuttgart.Black, E.W. 1985 ‘Hypocaust Heating in Domestic Rooms in Roman Britain’, Oxf J Arch 4, 77–92.—— 1987 The Roman Villas of South-East England (= BAR Brit Ser 171).—— 1994 ‘Villa-Owners: Romano-British Gentlemen and Officers’, Britannia 25, 99–110.Blockley, K. 1985 Marshfield-Ironmongers Piece Excavations 1982–3 (= BAR Brit Ser 141).Bloemers, J.H.F. 1978 Rijswijk (Z.H.) ‘de Bult, een nederzetting van de Cananefaten’ (=

Nederlandse Oudheden 8).Bodewig, R. 1906 ‘Römische Gehöfte zwischen Limes und Rhein’, Nassau Ann 36, 133–57.Braat, W.C. 1934 ‘Nieuwe Opgravingen van Romeinsche Villae’, Oudheidk Med NS 15, 4–37.—— 1941 ‘Nieuwe Opgravingen van Romeinsche Villa’s in Limburg’, Oudheidk Med NS 22,

39–51.Bradley, R. 1984 The Social Foundations of Prehistoric Britain, London.Branigan, K. 1971 Latimer: a Belgic, Roman, Dark Age and Early Modern Farm, n.p.—— 1977 The Roman Villa in South-West England, Bradford-on-Avon.Branigan, K. and P.J. Fowler 1976 The Roman West Country, Newton Abbot.Brodribb, A.C.C., A.R. Hands and D.R. Walker 1968–73 Excavations at Shakenoak,3 vols,

privately printed.Bulliot, J.G. 1899 Fouilles de Mont Beuvray,2 vols, Autun.Carandini, A. and S. Settis 1979 Schiavi e padrone nell’ Etruria romana, Bari.Castro, M.C.F. 1982 Villas romanas en Espana, Madrid.de Caumont, A. 1838 Cours d’antiquités monumentales, Paris; 1st edn 1830–1.—— 1870 Abécédaire d’archéologie française; ère gallo-romaine, Paris; 2nd edn, Caen.Centre de Recherches sur les Monuments Historiques, Charpentes,7 vols, Paris, n.d.Choisy, A. 1873 L’art de bâtir chez les Romains, Paris; repr. 1984, Bologna.Christlein, R. and O. Braasch 1982 Das Unterirdischen Bayern, Munich.Clarke, G. 1982 ‘The Roman Villa at Woodchester’, Britannia 13, 197–228.Clarke, S. 1990 ‘The Social Significance of Villa Architecture in Celtic North-West Europe’,

Oxf J Arch 9, 337–53.Clemen, P. (ed.) 1900 Die Kunstdenkmäler des Kreises Euskirchen, Düsseldorf.Collingwood, R.G. 1930 The Archaeology of Roman Britain, London.Collingwood, R.G. and I.A. Richmond 1969 The Archaeology of Roman Britain, London.Collis, J.R. 1986 ‘Adieu Hallstatt, Adieu La Tène’, Aquitania, Supplement I, 327–30.Colvin, H. and J. Newman (eds) 1981 Of Building: Roger North’s Writings on Architecture

(Oxford).Corder, P. (ed.) 1954 The Roman Town and Villa at Great Casterton, Rutland, Nottingham.Corder, P. and J.L. Kirk 1932 A Roman Villa at Langton, near Malton, East Yorkshire, Leeds.


333

Cotton, M.A. and G.P. Métraux 1985 The San Rocco Villa at Francolise, Rome.Coutil, L. 1898–1921 Département de l’Eure: archéologie gauloise, gallo-romaine, franque et

carolingienne, 4 vols .Cunliffe, B. 1971a Excavations at Fishbourne 1969, 2 vols (= Soc Ant Res Rept 26).—— 1971b Fishbourne: a Roman Palace and its Garden, London.—— 1991a Danebury Excavations 1979–88, vol. 4: The Site (= CBA Res Rept 73).—— 1991b ‘Fishbourne revisited; the site in its context’, in J Roman Arch 4, 160–9.Cunliffe B., and D. Miles (eds) 1984 Aspects of the Iron Age in Central Southern Britain,

Oxford.Cunliffe B., and T. Rowley, 1978 (eds) Lowland Iron Age Communities in Europe (= BAR Int

Ser 48).Cüppers, H. 1979 Otrang Roman Villa, Mainz.Czysz, W. 1974 Der römische Gutshof München-Denning und die römerzeitliche Besiedlung

der Münchner Schottenerbe, Munich.Darmon, J.P. 1981, ‘Les mosaïques en Occident I’, ANRW II/12.2, 266–319.Dedet, B. 1987 Habitat et vie quotidienne en Languedoc au milieu de l’Age de Fer (= Rev

Arch Narbonnaise, Suppl. 7).Detsicas, A. 1983 The Cantiaci, Gloucester.Down, A. 1979 Chichester Excavations, vol. 4, Chichester.Drack, W. 1975 ‘Die Gutshöfe’, in Ur- und frühgeschichtlichen Archäologie der Schweiz, vol.

5, 49–72, Basle.—— 1976, Die römische Kryptoportikus von Buchs ZH und ihre Wandmalerei (= AfDS 7).—— 1990 Der römische Gutshöfe bei Seeb, Gem. Winkel, Zurich.Dremsizova-Nelcinova, C. 1969 ‘La villa romaine en Bulgarie’, Actes Balkaniques 1969, 503–25.Drury, P.J. (ed.) 1982a Structural Reconstruction (= BAR Brit Ser 110).—— 1982b ‘Form, Function, and the Interpretation of the Excavated Plans of Some Large

Secular Romano-British Buildings’ in Drury 1982a, 289–308.Duncan-Jones, R.P. 1974 The Economy of the Roman Empire, Cambridge.Ebnöther, C. 1991 ‘Die Gartenanlage in der pars urbana des Gutshofes von Dietikon ZH’,

Arch Schw 14, 250–6.Eiden, H. 1982 10 Jahre Ausgrabungen an Mittelrhein und Mosel 1963–76, Koblenz (= TrZft,

Supplement 6).van Es, W.A. 1972 De Romeinen in Nederland, Bussum; 2nd edn 1983, Haarlem.Fallue, M. 1836 ‘Sur les antiquités de la forêt et de la presqu’Ile de Bretonne, et sur la villa de

Maulévrier, près Caudebec’, Mém Normandie 10, 369–94.Fokkens, H. and N. Roymans (eds) 1991 Nederzettingen nit de Bronstijd en de Vroege Ijzertijd

in de Lage Landen (= NAR 13), Amersfoort.Fouet, G. 1969 La villa gallo-romaine de Montmaurin, Haute-Garonne (= Gallia, Supplement

20).Fox, Sir C. and Lord Raglan 1951–4 Monmouthshire Houses, 3 vols, Cardiff.Fremersdorf, F. 1933 Der römische Gutshof Köln-Müngersdorf (= RGF 6).Frere, S.S. (ed.) 1960 Problems of the Iron Age in Southern Britain, London.Friendship-Taylor, R.M. and D.E. Friendship-Taylor 1989 Iron Age and Roman Piddington,

an interim report, Northampton.Gaitzsch, W. 1986 ‘Grundformen römischer Landsiedlungen im Westen der CCAA’, BJb 186,

397–427.Gaubatz-Sattler, A. 1994 Die Villa rustica von Bondorf (= Forsch u Ber Bad-Württ 51).Gerster, A. 1973 ‘Der römische Gutshof in Seeb; Rekonstruktionsversuche’, Helv Arch 15,

62–81.—— 1983 Vicques: une grande villa gallo-romaine, Porrentruy.


334

Girouard, M. 1978 The Making of the English Country House, New Haven and London.Gnirs, A. 1908 ‘Istrische Beispielen für Formen der antik-römischen villa rustica’, Jahrb Altkde

2, 124–43.Goodburn, R. 1972 The Roman Villa, Chedworth, London.Gorges, J.G. 1979 Les villas hispano-romaines, Paris.Grenier, A. 1906 Habitations gauloises et villas latines dans la cité des Médiomatrices, Paris.—— 1934 Manuel d’archéologie gallo-romaine, pt 2: L’archéologie du sol, Paris (= Déchelette VI/2).Grunewald, M. 1974 ‘Spätantike Herrschaftsvillen in den nordwestichen Provinzen des Römischen

Reiches und ihr gesellschaftlichen Hintergrund’, Dissertation, University of Vienna .Gunther, R.T. 1928 The Architecture of Sir Robert Pratt, Oxford.Gunther, R. and H. Kopstein (eds) 1985, Die Römer an Rhein und Donau, 3rd edn, Vienna-

Cologne-Graz.Gurney, D. (ed.) 1986 Settlement, Religion and Industry on the Roman Fen-edge, Norfolk (=

EAA 31).Halbardier, B. and A. Thomas 1987 ‘La villa gallo-romaine de Chaumont à Rulles’, in Lambert

1987, 125–34.Harding, D.W. 1984 Holme House, Piercebridge: Excavations 1969–70 (= University of

Edinburgh Department of Archaeology Project Paper no. 2).Harmand, J. 1951 ‘Sur la valeur archéologique du mot “villa”’, Rev Arch, 2, 155–8.—— 1961 ‘Les origines des recherches françaises sur l’habitat rural gallo-romain’, Latomus 51.Hartley, B. and L. Fitts 1988 The Brigantes, Stroud.Hartmann, M. 1975 Der römische Gütshof von Zofingen (= AFdS 6).Haverfield, F. 1990 ‘Romano-British Hampshire, pt 5: The Villas and Farm Buildings’, VCH

Hampshire I, 293–318.—— 1906 ‘Romano-British Somerset, pt 4: Villas and Rural Dwellings’, VCH Somerset I, 298–

334.Hawkes, C.F.C. 1947 ‘Britons, Romans and Saxons . . . in Cranborne Chase, pt 4: Iwerne ’,

Arch J 104, 48–62.—— (ed.) 1973 Greeks, Celts and Romans, London.Hawkes, C.F.C. and M.R. Hull 1947 Camulodunum, London.Hemp, W.J. and C. Gresham 1942–3 ‘Park, Llanfrothen, and the Unit System’, Arch Cambrensis

97, 98–112.Herrmann, F.-R. and A. Jockenhövel 1990 Die Vorgeschichte Hessens, Stuttgart.Hettner, F. 1878–81 ‘Drei römische Villen bei Leutersdorf, Mechern und Beckingen’, Jahresber

Ges Nützl Forsch Trier 1878–81, 52–63.—— 1883 ‘Zur Kultur von Germanien und Gallia belgica’, Westd Zft 2, 1–26.Hingley, R. 1989 Rural Settlement in Roman Britain, London.Hingley, R. and D. Miles 1984 ‘Aspects of Iron Age Settlement in the Upper Thames Valley’,

in Cunliffe and Miles 1984, 52–71.Hinz, H. 1969 ‘Die Ausgrabungen auf dem Kirchberg in Morken, 4, Die römische Siedlung’

(= Rheinische Ausgrabungen 7, 21–62), Düsseldorf.—— 1970 ‘Zur Bauweise der villa rustica’, Germania Romana, Heft 7/3, 15–25 = Gymnasium,

Beihefte.Hoare, Sir R.C. 1821 Ancient Wiltshire, 2 vols.Hommages Millotte 1985 Elements de pré- et proto-histoire Européenne, Hommages à Jacques-

Pierre Millotte (= Ann Lift Univ Besançon 299).Horn, W. and E. Born 1970 The Plan of St Gall, 3 vols, Berkeley.Jacquemet, M.H. 1857 ‘Etablissements gallo-romains du Morbihan’, Bull Man 23, 175–85.Jarrett, M. and S. Wrathmell 1981 Whitton: an Iron Age and Roman Farmstead in South

Glamorgan, Cardiff.


335

Jeannin, N. and G. Chouquer 1978 ‘Elements pour une géographic historique du Finage(Jura) à l’époque gallo-romaine’, Rev Est 29, 267–91.

Johnston, D.E. 1970 ‘Villas . . . and Other Substantial Buildings’, Current Arch 21, July 1970,280–6.

—— 1978 ‘Villas of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight’, in Todd 1978, 71–92.Jones, G.R.J. 1972 ‘Post-Roman Wales’, Camb Ag Hist 1(2), 281–382.Jones, S. and J.T. Smith 1963–72 ‘The Houses of Breconshire’, 7 parts, Brycheiniog, vols 9–13.Joullin, L. 1901 Les établissements gallo-romaines de la plains de Martres-Tolosanes, Paris.Keller, F. 1864 ‘Statistik der römischen Ansiedelungen in der Ostschweiz’, Mitt Zürich 15, 63–331.Kellner, H.-J. 1971 Die Römer in Bayern, Munich.Kimmig, W. and E. Sangmeister 1983 Die Heuneburg am oheren Donau, 2nd edn, Stuttgart.Koepp, F. 1924 ‘Die villa von Odrang’, Germania 8, 6–13.Koethe, H. 1940 ‘Die Bäder römischer Villen im Trierer Bezirk’, 30 Ber RGK, 43–131.Kolling, A. 1977 ‘Zum Bau- und Siedlungswesen im südlichen Teil der Provinz Belgica’, 24

Ber Saar, 29–67.Kropatscheck, G. 1910–11 ‘Das romische Landhaus in Deutschland’, 6 Ber RGK, 51–78.Kubitschcek, W. 1926 Romerfunde von Eisenstadt (= Sonderschriften des Osterr Archaol

Inst, Bd 11).Lambert, G. (ed.) 1987 Archéologie entre Semois et Chiers, Brussels.Latham, R. and Matthews, W. 1970–83 The Diary of Samuel Pepys, II vols, London.Leday, A. 1980 Rural Settlement in Central Gaul in the Roman Period, 2 parts (= BAR Int Ser 73).Leech, R. 1982 Excavations at Catsgore 1970–3, n.p. (= Western Archaeological Trust

Excavation Monograph no. 2).Leyser, K. 1968 ‘The German Aristocracy from the Ninth to the Late Twelfth Century’, Past

and Present no. 41, 25–53.Lucas, R.N. 1993 The Romano-British Villa at Halstock, Dorset: Excavations 1967–85 (= Dorset

Natural History and Archaeological Society Monograph no. 13).Lugli, G. 1966 Villa d’Orazio, Rome.Luik, M. and F. Reutti 1989 Der Römerpark in Köngen, Stuttgart (= Führer zu den

archäologischen Denkmälern in Baden-Württemberg 12).McKay, A.G. 1975 Houses, Villas and Palaces in the Roman World, London and New York.Mackreth, D. 1978 ‘Orton Hall Farm, Peterborough: a Roman and Saxon Settlement’, in Todd

1978, 209–28.de Maeyer, R. 1937 De Romeinsche Villa’s in Belgie, Antwerp.Marres, W. and J. J.F. W. van Agt 1962 De Nederlandse Monumenten van Geschiednis en

Kunst, Deel 5, iii, Zuid-Limburg, The Hague, 15–20.Meates, G.W. 1979 The Roman Villa at Lullingstone, Kent, Maidstone.Medawar, P. 1967 The Art of the Soluble, London.Mercer, E. 1975 English Vernacular Houses, London.Metzler, J., J. Zimmer and L. Bakker 1981 Ausgrabungen in Echternach (Luxembourg),

Luxembourg.Miclea, I. and R. Florescu, 1980 Stramosii Romanilor: Daco-Romanii, 2 vols, n.p.Miles, D. (ed.) 1982a The Romano-British Countryside, 2 vols (= BAR Brit Ser 103 i–ii).—— 1982b ‘Confusion in the Countryside: Some Comments from the Upper Thames Region’,

in Miles 1982a, 53–78.—— 1986 Archaeology at Barton Court Farm, Abingdon, Oxon (= Oxford Archaeological

Unit Report 3).Millar, F.G.B. 1977, The Emperor in the Roman World, London.Miln, J. 1877 Fouilles faites à Carnac, Paris.Modrijan, W. 1971 Der romische Landsitz von Löffelbach, 3rd edn, Graz.


336

Mylius, H. 1924 ‘Die Rekonstruktion der römischen Villen von Nennig und Fliessem’, BJb129, 109–28.

—— 1933 ‘Zwei neue Formen römischer Gutshäuser (Villa bei Blankenheim)’, BJb 138, 11–21.Naeher, J. 1885 ‘Die römische Bauanlagen in der Zehntlanden badischen Anteiles’, BJb 79, 28–

104.Neal, D.S. 1974 The Excavation of the Romano-British Villa in Gadebridge Park, Hemel

Hempstead (= Soc Ant Res Rept 31).—— 1974–6 ‘Three Roman Buildings in the Bulbourne Valley’, Herts Arch 4, 1–135.Neal, D.S., A. Wardle and J. Hunn 1990 Excavation of the Iron Age, Roman and Medieval

Settlement at Gorhambury, St Albans (= English Heritage Archaeological Report 14).Netzer, E. 1988 ‘Architecture in Palestina prior to and during the Days of Herod the Great’,

Akten des XIII. International Kongresses für Klassische Archäologie, Berlin.Nikolov, D. 1976 The Roman Villa at Chatalka, Bulgaria (= BAR Suppl Ser 17).Oelmann, F. 1921 ‘Die Villa rustica bei Stahl und Verwandtes’, Germania 5, 64–73.—— 1928 Hauptvortrag, ‘Römische Villen in Rheinland’, Arch Anz 43, cols 228–50.—— 1938 ‘Zur Aedicula von Mainz-Kastel’, in Festschrift für August Oxé, Darmstadt 183–91.van Ossel, P. 1992 Etablissements ruraux de l’antiquité tardive dans le nord de la Gaule,

Paris.Ostendorf, F. 1908 Die Geschichte des Dachwerks, Leipzig; reprint, Hanover 1982.Palmer, N. 1982 Roman Stratford: Excavations at Tiddington 1980–1, Warwick.Partridge, C. 1981 Skeleton Green: a Late Iron Age and Romano-British Site, London.Percival, J. 1976 The Roman Villa, London.Philp, B. 1968 Excavations at Faversham, 1965 (= Kent Mon 1).—— 1984 Excavations in the Darent Valley (= Kent Mon 4).Philp, B. et al. 1991 The Roman Villa Site at Keston (= Kent Mon 6).Pollard, S. 1974 ‘A Late Iron Age Settlement and a Romano-British Villa at Holcombe, near

Uplyme, Devon’, Proc Devon 32, 59–161.Potter, T.W. 1987 Roman Italy, London.Precht, G. 1973 Baugeshichtlichen Untersüchung zum römischen Praetorium in Köln,

Cologne.Price, J.E. and F.C. Hilton Price 1883 A Guide to the Roman Villa . . . Brading, Ventnor.Price, J. and P.R. Wilson 1988 Recent Research in Roman Yorkshire (= BAR Brit Ser 193).Raepset-Charlier, M.-Th. and G. Raepset 1975 ‘Vingt-cinq ans de recherches historiques et

archéologiques’, ANRW II Principal 4, 3–299.Rahtz, P.A. and E. Greenfield 1977 Excavations at Chew Valley Lake, London.Ramm, H.G. 1978 The Parisii, London.RCHME 1976 Gloucester I: Iron Age and Romano-British Monuments in the Gloucestershire

Cotswolds, London.Reece, R. 1987 Coinage in Roman Britain London.Reece, R. 1993 ‘British sites and their Roman coins’, Antiquity, 863–9.Reuter, K. 1876 Zur Geschichte des römischen Wiesbadens, Bd 2, Römische Ansiedlung in

der Umgebung von Wiesbaden (= Nassau Ann 5).RGK 1958 Neue Ausgrabungen in Deutschland, Frankfurt.Richmond, Sir I. 1969 ‘The Plans of Roman Villas in Britain’, in Rivet 1969, 49–70.Rippengal, R. 1993 ‘“Villas as a Key to Social Structure?” Some Comments on Recent

Approaches to the Romano-British Villa and Some Suggestions toward an Alternative’, inScott 1993a, 78–101.

Rivet, A.L. 1969 The Roman Villa in Britain, London.Rodwell, W.J. 1978 ‘Buildings and Settlements in South-East Britain in the Late Iron Age’, in

Cunliffe and Rowley 1978, 25–41.


337

Rodwell, W.J. and K.A. Rodwell 1986 Rivenhall: Investigations of a Villa, Church and Village1950–77 (= CBA Res Rept 55).

Rostovtzeff, M.I. et al. (eds) 1952 The Excavations at Dura-Europos. Preliminary report ofthe ninth season of work, Part 3: The Palace of the Dux Ripae and the Dolicheneum, NewHaven.

Rothkegel, R. 1994 Die römische Gutshof von Laufenburg (= Forsch u Ber Bad-Württ 51).Roth-Rubi, K. 1986 Die Villa von Stutheien/Huttwilen TG, Basle.Roymans, N. and F. Theuws (eds) 1991 Images of the Past, Amsterdam.Sanden, W.A.B. van der 1987 ‘Oss-Ussen: de Nederzettingen’, in van der Sanden and van der

Broeke 1987, 53–67.Sanden, W.A.B. van der and P.W. van der Broeke (eds) 1987 Getekend Zand’, Waalre (=

Bijdrage tot de Studie van het Brabantse Heem, Deel 31).Saria, B. 1951 Der Römische Gutshof von Winden am See (= Burgenl Forsch 13).Schindler, R. 1977 Bundenbach-Altburg, Mainz (= Tr Grab Forsch 10).Schmidt, R.A. 1971 Die Villae rusticae ‘Oher der Pfingstweide’ in Ober-Ramstadt und ‘Am

Zahl’, Kreis Darmstadt (= Ober-Ramstädter Hefte 2).Schubert, F. 1994 ‘Zur Mass und Entwurfslehre spätkeltische Holzbauten im Oppidum von

Manching. Untersuchungen zu Grundrisstypen, Bauten und Baustrukturen’, Germania72, 133–92.

Schumacher, K. 1896 ‘Römische Meierhöfe im Limesgebiet’, Westd Zft 15, 1–17.—— 1923, Siedelungs- und Kulturgeschichte der Rheinlande, Bd II, Die römische Periode,

‘Die Meierhofe’, Mainz, 193–209.Scott, E. (ed.) 1993a Theoretical Roman Archaeology: First Conference Proceedings,

Aldershot.—— 1993b A Gazetteer of Roman Villas in Britain (= Leicester Archaeology Monograph 1).Slofstra, J. 1991 ‘Changing Settlement Systems in the Meuse-Demer-Scheldt Area during the

Early Roman Period’, in Roymans and Theuws 1991, 131–99.Smith, J.T. 1963 ‘Romano-British Aisled Houses’, Arch J 120, 1–30.—— 1970 ‘Lancashire and Cheshire Houses: Some Problems of Architectural and Social

History’, Arch J 127, 156–81.—— 1978 ‘Villas as a Key to Social Structure’, in Todd 1978, 149–85.—— 1980 ‘The Roman Villa at Rapsley: an Interpretation’, Surrey Arch Coll 72, 63–8.—— 1982 ‘Structural Reconstruction’, in Drury 1982, 7–19.—— 1983 ‘Flight of Capital or Flight of Fancy?’, Oxf J Arch 2, 225–37.—— 1985 ‘Barnsley Park Villa: Its Interpretation and Implications’, Oxf J Arch 4, 341–51.—— 1987 ‘The Social Structure of a Roman Villa: Marshfield-Ironmongers Piece’, Oxf J Arch

6, 243–55.—— 1992 English Houses: the Hertfordshire Evidence, London.—— 1993 Hertfordshire Houses, London.Smith, P. 1974 ‘Historical Domestic Architecture in Dyfed’, in J. Barnes and N. Yates,

Carmarthenshire Studies: Essays Presented to Major Francis Jones, London, 43–109.—— 1975 Houses of the Welsh Countryside, London.Spitaels, P. 1970 ‘La villa gallo-romaine d’Anthée’, Helinium 10, 209–33.Spitzing, T. 1988 Die römische Villa von Lauffen a.N. (= Forsch und Ber Bad-Württ 43).Sprater, F. 1929 Die Pfah unter den Römern, 2 Teile, Frankfurt.Staehelin, F. 1948 Die Schweiz in römischer Zeit, 3rd edn, Basle.Stanford, S.C. 1974 Croft Ambrey, privately printed.—— 1991 The Archaeology of the Welsh Marshe, privately printed.Stead, I.M. 1976 Excavations at Winterton Roman Villa 1958–67, London.—— 1980 Rudston Roman Villa, Leeds.


338

Steiner, P. 1923 Römische Landhauser im Trierer Bezirk, Berlin.Steinhausen, J. 1932 Ortskunde Trier-Mettendorf, Bonn.Stevens, C.E. 1947 ‘A Possible Conflict of Laws in Roman Britain’, J Roman Stud 37, 132–4.—— 1966 ‘The Social and Economic Aspects of Rural Settlement’, in Thomas 1966, 108–28.Sumner, H. 1924 Excavations at East Grimstead, Wiltshire, London.Swoboda, K. 1918. Römische und romanische Paläste, Vienna; 3rd edn, Vienna-Cologne-

Graz, 1969.Taylor, M.V. 1927 ‘Romano-British Kent, pt 4: Country Houses and Other Buildings’, VCH

Kent III, 102–26.—— 1939 ‘Romano-British Remains, [Section] E: Country Houses and Farms’, VCH

Oxfordshire I, 306–24.Ternes, C.-M. 1975 ‘Provincia Germania Superior im Bilde der jüngeren Forschung’, ANRW

II, Principat 4, 722–1260.Thomas, B. 1964 Römische Villen in Pannonien, Budapest.Thomas, C. 1966 Rural Settlement in Roman Britain (= CBA Res Rept 7).Thomas, C.L. 1903 ‘Das römische Villengebaude bei der Guntersburg und die Bornburg’,

Festchrift des Städtischen Historischen Museums in Frankfurt-am-Main, Frankfurt, 83–101.

Todd, M. 1978 Studies in the Romano-British Villa, Leicester.—— 1992 ‘Aisled Halls in Roman Gaul’, Oxf J Arch 11, 369–72.Trier, B. 1969 Das Haus im Nordwesten der Germania Libera, Munster.Uffler, A.M. 1981 ‘L’habitat rural en Gaule centrale’, Archéologie, November 1981, 71–5.Vasic, M. 1970 ‘Romische Villen vom Typus der Villa rustica auf jugoslawischen Boden’,

Archaeologia Jugoslavia 11, 45–81.Verwers, G.J. 1972 Das Kamps Veld in Haps im Neolithikum, Bronzezeit und Eisenzeit, Leiden.Villes, A. 1985 ‘Que savons-nous des structures d’habitat des Ages du Bronze et du Fer en

France septentrionale?’, in Hommages Millotte, 650–68.Wagner, E. 1908–11Fundstätte und Funde im Grossherzogtum Baden, 2 Teile, Tübingen.Walters, B. and B. Phillips 1978 Archaeological Excavations in Littlecote Park, Wiltshire,

privately printed.Wanner, G. 1899 Die römischen Altertümer des Kantons Schaffhausen, Schaffhausen.Ward, J. 1911 Romano-British Buildings and Earthworks, London.Ward-Perkins, J. 1981 Roman Imperial Architecture, Harmondsworth.Webster, G. and L. Smith 1987 ‘Reply to J.T. Smith’s Suggested Reinterpretation of Barnsley

Park Villa’, Oxf J Arch 6, 69–89.Welter, T. and H.E. Heppe 1908 ‘Die gallo-römischen Villen bei Loerchingen und Saaraltdorf’,

Jahresber Ges Nützl Forsch Trier 20, 152–76.Widrig, W.M. 1987 ‘Land Use at the Via Gabina Villas’, in Ancient Roman Villa Gardens,

Dumbarton Oaks, 225–60.Wightman, E. 1970 Roman Trier and the Treveri, London.—— 1985 Gallia Belgica, London.Wilkes, J.J. 1969 Dalmatia, London.Williams, R.J. and R.J. Zeepfat 1994 Bancroft: the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age Settlements

. . . and the Roman Villa, 2 vols, Aylesbury.Wilson, D.R. 1974 ‘Romano-British Villas from the Air’, Britannia 5, 251–61.Wilson, D.R. andD. Sherlock 1980 North Leigh Roman Villa, London.Winbolt, S.E. 1925 Roman Folkestone, London.—— 1935 ‘Romano-British Sussex, III: Country Houses’, VCH Sussex III, 20–9.Woodward, S. (ed.) 1992 The Archaeology of Chichester and District 1991, Chichester.


339

Wrathmell, S. andA. Nicholson, 1990 Dalton Parlours: Iron Age Settlement and Roman Villa (= Yorkshire

Archaeology 3), Wakefield.Zahn, B. 1991 Die Basilika in Trier, Schriftenreihe des Rheinischen Landesmuseums

Trier no. 6.

340

VILLAS AND OTHER SITESMENTIONED

Only the principal sources used for the plans are listed. Achenheim Hawkes 1973, 48–9Aguilafuente-Santa Lucia Gorges 1979, 355Ahrweiler see Bad-NeuenahrAiseau de Maeyer 1937, 63Albert Agache 1978, 287Albesa-El Romeral Gorges 1979, 278–9Alcala de Guadaira, Casa de Gorges 1979, 358

Pelay CorneaAllenz see MayenAlmenara de Adaja-Villa Gorges 1979, 437–8

RomanaAlphen-Ekeren Roymans and Theuws 1991, 137–45Alpnach-Dorf Mitt Zürich 27, 1909–16, 227–57Altstetten JbSGU 57, 1972–3, 353–5Alresford VCH Essex III, 37–8Ambresin Bull Comm Royales Art 15, 1876, 253–67Anthée Ann Namur 14, 1877, 165ff.; 15, 1881–3, 1–40;

Helinium 10, 1970, 209–41Apahida Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 130–3Apethorpe RCHME Northamptonshire 1, North-East 8–10;

AASR 5, 1859–60, 97–107Arradon-Lodo de Caumont 1870, 385–6, 388Ash VCH Kent III, 103–4; Kent Arch Rev 20, Summer

1970, 13–20Ashtead Surrey Arch Coll 37, 1926, 144–64; 38, 1930, 132–48Asthall-Worsham VCH Oxfordshire I, 319–21Athies Rev Nord 1967, 715–20; Agache 1978, 323Atworth Wilts Arch 49, 1940–2, 46–95; Britannia 7, 1976, 362

— List of villas —

341

Aulfingen Schr Baar 8, 1893, 61–7Aylesford-Eccles Arch Cant 78, 1963–88, 1973, annually; Detsicas

1983, 120–6Babworth-Dunston’s Current Arch 85, 1982, 43–8

ClumpBadajoz-Dehesa de la Gorges 1979, 189–90

CocosaBadbury Wilts Arch [M5]Bachenau Schumacher 1896, 13–17Bad Dürkheim-Ungstein RiRhld-Pf, 317–19; Mitt Pfalz 79, 1981, 40–1Badgeworth RCHME 1976, 5–6Bad Godesberg BJb 158–9, 1959, 380–2Bad Homburg vor der RiHessen, 235; Mitt Bad Homburg 18, 1935, 16–30

HöheBad Kreuznach RiRhld-Pf, 321–3Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler RiRhld-Pf, 324–5; van Ossel 1992, 227–8Bad Rappenau-Zimmerhof FdbaBad-Württ 3, 1977, 474–84; RiBad-Württ,

215–16Bancroft see Milton KeynesBargen im Hegau Bad Fdb 1, 1925–8, 170–4Barnsley Park Trans Bristol 99, 1981, 21–78; 100, 1982, 65–190Barton Court Farm see RadleyBasel-Gasfabrik JbSGU 58, 71–5Basse-Wavre Ann Bruxelles 19, 1905, 303–29Beadlam Yorks Arch 43, 1971, 178–86Beckingen Jahresber Ges Nützl Forsch Trier, 1878–81, 59–63Bedburg-Garsdorf BJb 159, 1959, 382–4Beegden ROB no. 356Befort-Aalburg Germania 26, 1942, 26–34; Hémecht 21, 1969, 37–50Bellersheim see HungenBelleuse-les Mureaux Agache 1978, 328, Fig. 21Bellikon Zft Schw Arch 5, 1943, 86–122Bennwil JbSGU 32, 1940, 128–30; RiSchw, 361–2Bergen-Holzhausen Bayer Vgbl 49, 1984, 99–112Beringen-Lieblosental Anz Schw Altkde 19, 1886, 331–3; Wanner 1899, 31–3

RiSchw, 362–3Bertenbreit see GunzenheimBetting Grenier 1906, 79–86; 1934, 810Betzingen FdbaSchw 13, 1905, 63–70Biberach RiBad-Württ, 244–5Biberist-Spitalhof JbSGU 69, 1986, 199–220Bierbach 15 Ber Saar, 1968, 7–39Bierlingen see SturzachBignor Britannia 13, 1982, 135–95; Black 1987, 153 and

passimBihac-Zalo�je Wilkes 1969, 404


342

Bilsdorf Ann Lux (Arlon) 45, 1910, 354–66Birkenfeld-Elchweiler Westd Zft 6, 1887; Korrbl WdZ, no. 187Bistrica Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969, 510Blankenheim-Hulchrath BJb 123, 1916, 136–7, 210–26; 1932, 281–2; Mylius

1933; RiNordrh-Westf, 360–3Bledlow-cum-Saunderton Records Bucks 13, 1934–40, 398–426; 18, 1966–70,

261–76Blieskastell-Altheim 24 Ber Saar, 1977, 29–67Bocholtz-Vlengendaal Int Archiv Ethnog 24, 1918, 1–22; van Es 1972,

146–7Böckweiler 8 Ber Saar, 1961, 80–104Bollendorf Tr Jahresber 12, 1923, 1–59; RiRhld-Pf, 338–40Bondorf Gaubatz-Sattler, 1994Boos-Le Bois Flahaut Bull Rouennais 1907, 41–50Börstingen FdbaSchw NS 2, 1924, 28–9Bouchoir Agache 1978, 287, 338 Fig. 31Box Wilts Arch 33, 1904, 236–69; 81, 1987, 19–51Boxted see UpchurchBözen Anz Schw Altkde 27, 1925, 65–108Bradley Hill see SomertonBrain-sur-Allonnes CAG 49, Le-Maine-et-Loire, 77–8Bramdean Black 1987, 50, 226Braughing-Skeleton Green Partridge 1981Bray-sur-Somme Agache 1978, 287Bregenz Mitt Central-Comm Hist Denkmale NS 12, 1886, 72–

84Brewood-Engleton Hist Coll Staff 1938, 267–93Brighstone-Rock Britannia 7, 1976, 367–9Brioni Grande-Val Catena Ward-Perkins 1981, 196–7; Jahrb Altkde 2, 1908,

124–43Bristol-Brislington Barker 1901; Proc Somerset 116, 1972, 78–85Bristol-Kingsweston Trans Bristol 69, 1959, 5–58Brixworth J Northampton Mus 8, 1970, 3–102Broichweiden BJb 177, 1977, 577–80Brombach see LörrachBruchsal-Ober-Grombach Röm-Germ Korrbl 5, 1912, 35–40Brücken Sprater 1929, 122, 125Bruckneudorf-Parndorf Burgenl Heimatbl 13, 1951, 49–65; 14, 1952, 97–

102; 41, 1979, 66–87; Wiss Arb Burgenld 35, 1966,252–7; Thomas 1966, 177–92

Buchs Drack 1976Buchten Oudheidk Med NS 9–11, 1928–30, 1Budakalász Thomas 1966, 214–15Budapest-Aquincum Bud Rég 16, 1955, 393, 421–5; 18, 1958, 71–7Budapest-Csúcshegy Thomas 1966, 216–24Budapest-Testvérhegy Thomas 1966, 232–7Bundenbach-Altburg Schindler 1977


343

Burgweinting see RegensburgByfield RCHME Northamptonshire III, 33–4Cabo de Palos-El Castillet Gorges 1979, 309Cachy Agache 1978, 339 Fig. 32Canterbury Cunliffe and Rowley 1978, 29Cardiff-Ely J Roman Stud 11, 1921, 67–85Carisbrooke VCH Hampshire I, 316–17Carnac Miln 1877Castle Dykes see North StainleyCenero-Murias de Belono Gorges 1979, 330Cerbois-Les Coudraits Leday 1980, Pl. XIXChampagnole Gallia 44, 1986, 246Champdivers Jeannin and Chouquer 1978, 270La Chapelle-Vaupelteigne Rev Est 21, 1970, 261–330Chassemy World Arch 1, 1969, 106–35Chastres Ann Namur 24, 1900, 27–32Chastrès-lez-Walcourt Ann Namur 24, 1901, 121–8Chatalka-Delimonyova Nikolov 1976, 26–35

NivaChatalka-Lambata Nikolov 1976, 40–7Châtillon-sur-Seiche Gallia-Inf 1990, 42–5; CAG Ille-et-Vilaine no. 347Chedworth RCHME Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 24–8Cherington RCHME Gloucestershire, 29Chew Park see Stowey SuttonChichmanovtsi Nikolov 1976, 168Chiddingfold Surrey Arch Coll 75, 1984, 58–82Chilgrove see West DeanChiragan see Martres-TolosanesCincis Acta Mus Napoc 2, 1965, 163–93Citernes Agache 1978, 326Ciumafaia Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 133–6Civray-Le Poirier Molet Leday 1980, Pl. XXIClairy-Saulchoix Agache 1978, 330 Fig. 23Clanville see WeyhillClaydon Pike see LechladeCléry-sur-Somme Agache 1978, 336 Fig. 29Clinchamps de Caumont 1830, Atlas (iii) Fig. 8Cobham Park Arch Cant 76, 1961, 88–109Colchester-Camulodunum Hawkes and Hull 1947, 89–92; Cunliffe and Rowley

1978, 25–41Colerne Arch J 13, 1856, 327–32Collingham-Dalton Wrathmell and Nicholson 1990

ParloursColsterworth Frere 1960, 23–5Combe St Nicholas- VCH Somerset I, 333

Wadeford


344

Comunion-Cabriana Gorges 1979, 177Compton Dando-Littleton VCH Somerset I, 323–4Condé-Folie Agache and Bréart 1975, Fig. 41; Oxf J Arch 6, 1987

249Cosa Potter 1987, 107Courcelles-sur-Nied- Jb Lothring 18, 1906, Table 15

FrécourtCourcelles-sur-Nied-Urville Jb Lothring 18, 1906, 413; Grenier 1904, 807Cox Green see MaidenheadCrain Rev Est 28, 1977, 117–32; Hist et Arch 58, 1981, 72Croft Ambrey Stanford 1974Cromhall Proc Soc Ant Lond 2nd ser., 13, 1912, 20–3; Bristol

and Avon Archaeology 6, 1987, 60–1Crookhorn see PurbrookCsúcshegy Thomas 1964, 216–24Cuevas de Soria-Dehesa de Gorges 1979, 398–9

SoriaCwmbrwyn see LaugharneDalton Parlours see CollinghamDanebury Cunliffe 1991a; Cunliffe and Rowley 1978, 32Darenth Arch Cant 22, 1897, 49–84; Philp 1991Davenescourt Agache 1978, 287Deanshanger Reports Northants 63, 1960–6, 22–6; Britannia 4,

1973, 294Démuin Agache 1978, 287, 338 Fig. 31Denton Lincs Rep 10, 1964, 75–104Deutschkreutz Thomas 1966, 128–3Deva Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 136–40Dicket Mead see WelwynDietfurt a.d. Altmühl Arch Jahr Bayern 1985, 75–7Dietikon Arch Schw 14, 1991, 250–6Dirlewang Bayer Vgbl 11, 1933, 77–87Ditchley Oxon 1, 1936, 24–69Doische-Vodelée Arch Belg 3, 1987, 153–64Downton Wilts Arch 58, 1961–3, 303–41Dracevica WMBH 5, 1897, 163–7; Wilkes 1969, 397Dragonby see Roxby-cum-RisbyDraughton Frere 1960, 21–3Drax Yorks Arch J 41, 1963–6, 620–86Dreieich-Götzenhain RiHessen, 257–9Druten ROB no. 133Dura Europos – palace of Rostovtzeff 1952

Dux RipaeDury Agache 1978, 287, 338 Fig. 31East Dean-Holbury VCH Hampshire I, 1, 300East Grimstead Sumner 1924


345

Eaton-by-Tarporley VCH Cheshire I, 210–11; Cheshire Arch Bull 9, 198367–73

Eccles see AylesfordEching-Autobahn Arch Jahr Bayern 1983, 65–7Eching-Neufahrn Arch Jahr Bayern 1980, 84–5Echternach Metzler, Zimmer and Bakker 1981Eckartsbrunn Röm-Germ Korrbl 4, 1911, 86–9L’Ecluse-Leckbosch Wavriensia 29, 1980, 1–27Ecoust-Saint-Mein Agache 1978, 324Egregy Thomas 1964, 33Ehingen am Ries Christlein and Braasch 1982, 61Eisenstadt Kubitscheck 1926; Thomas 1966, 137–51Elchweiler see BirkenfeldEllesborough-Terrick Records Bucks 2, 1863, 53–6Elsted-Batten Hanger Woodward 1992, 27–32Ersigen Jb Bern 45–6, 1965–6, 373–407Estrées-sur-Noye Agache 1978, 319Etalle Arch Wallonne 2, 1994, 110–11L’Etoile Agache 1978, 287Euskirchen- Kunstdenkmaler der Rheinprovinz 4/iv, 187–91;

Kreuzweingarten RiNordrh-Westf 426–7Evelette Bull Hesbaye-Condroz 6, 1966, 15–17Ewhurst-Rapsley Surrey Arch Coll 65, 1968, 1–70Exning-Landwade Proc Cambridge 76, 1987, 41–66Ezinge Germania 20, 1936, 40–7Famechon Cahiers Picardie 1981, 147–56; Bull Soc Ant Picardie

1976, 314–31Farmington-Clear Cupboard Trans Bristol 88, 1969, 34–67Farningham-Manor House Arch Cant 88, 1973, 1–21Faversham Philp 1965Feddersen Wierde Germania 34, 1956, 125–41; 40, 1962, 280–317Feltwell East Anglian Arch 31, 1–48Ferpicloz RiSchw 394–5Finkley see St Mary BourneFischamend-Katharinenhof RLiO 5, 1904, cols 12–14; Thomas 1966, 244–5Fishbourne-Palace Cunliffe 1971b; Sussex Arch Coll 124, 1986, 51–77Fishtoft Lincs Hist Arch 12, 1977, 73Fitten 18 Ber Saar, 1971, 7–25Fliessem-Otrang Germania 8, 1924; TrZft 4, 1928, 75–83; Cüppers

1979Flocques Agache 1978, 287Flumenthal Jb Solothurn 30, 1957, 228–33Folkestone Winbolt 1925; VCH Kent III, 114Fontaine-le-Sec Agache 1978, 287, 333 Fig. 26Fontoy-Moderwiese Gallia-Inf 1989, ii, 107Francolise-San Rocco Cotton and Métraux 1985


346

Frankfurt-Bergen-Enkheim Archiv Fft 3rd ser., 12, 1920, 313–26Frankfurt-Bornheim Thomas 1903; RiHessen, 297–8Friedberg-Fladerlach Arch Jahr Bayern 1990, 94–7; Zft Hist Ver

Schwaben 72, 1978, 40ff.Friedberg-Pfingstweide RiHessen, 307–9Friedrichdorf-Seulberg Saalb-Jb 7, 1930, 92–109; RiHessen, 312Frilford Arch J 54, 1897, 340–54Frocester Court RCHME Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 56–8; Trans

Bristol 89, 1970, 15–89Fromentières Gallia 39, 1981, 336–7Furschweiler 16 Ber Saar, 1969, 123–39Gadebridge Park see Hemel HempsteadGambach see MunzenbergGarden Hill see HartfieldGargrave-Kirk Sink Hartley and Fitts 1988, 75–8Gayton Thorpe Norfolk Arch 23, 1926–8, 166–209Geislingen-Heidegger Hof Wagner 1908–11 (ii), 133–4Génimont see Villers-sur-LesseGentelles Agache 1978, 339Gerpinnes Doc Charleroi 7, 1875, 93–140Goodrich-Huntsham Trans Woolhope 37, 1962, 179–91; J Roman Stud

55, 1965, 208; 56, 1966, 205–6Gorhambury see St MichaelGornea Miclea and Floresu 1980, 2, 187Graux Ann Namur 29, 1910, 137–44Graz-Thalerhof Bl Heimatkunde 33, 1959, 9–19Great Casterton Corder 1954Great Staughton J Roman Stud 49, 1959, 118Great Weldon Northants Arch 22, 1988–9, 23–67Great Witcombe RCHME Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 60–1Grémecey Gallia 24, 1966, 286–8Grenchen JbSGU 32, 1940, 133–4; Jb Solothurn 40, 1967, 444–

66Grivesnes Agache 1978, 336Groesbeek-Plasmolen Oudheidk Med NS 15, 1934, 1–13GrossSachsenheim see SachsenheimGuadaira-Alcala/Casa de Gorges 1979, 358

Pelay CorreaLa Guerche-Le Grand ChausseroiLeday 1980, Pl. XXIIGuiry-Gadancourt Gallia 16, 1958, 266–80Gunthersburg Park see Frankfurt-BornheimGunzenheim-Staatsforst- Schwab Mus 1930, 159–60

SulzGyuláfiratót-Pogánytelek Thomas 1964, 34–49Haamstede-Brabers van Es 1981, 168–9Habay-Rulles see Rulles-Chaumont


347

Haccourt Arch Belg no. 132, 1971Hales North Staffs J 9, 1969, 104–17Halstock Lucas 1993Hambach see NiederzierHamblain-les-Prés Rev Nord 66, 1984, 181–205Hambleden-Yewden Manor Archaeologia 71, 1921, 141–98Ham Hill see MontacuteHaps Verwers 1872; Roymans and Theuws 1991,

137–57Harbonnières Agache 1978, 287, 337 Fig. 30Harburg-GrossSorheim Arch Jahr Bayern 1988, 105–10Harding-Mingies Ditch Cunliffe and Miles 1984, 62Hartfield-Garden Hill Britannia 8, 1977, 339–50Hartlip VCH Kent 3, 117–18Haunstetten Arch Jahr Bayern 1990, 80–1Haut Clocher-St Ulrich Jb Lothring 6, 1894, 313–17; 10, 1898, 171–94;

Gallia 29, 1971, 17–44; 30, 1972, 41–82Hechingen-Stein RiBad-Württ, 306–9; Arch Ausgrab Bad-Württ 1980,

82–6; 1981, 137–40; 1992, 177–8; Dmpfl Bad-Württ11, 1982, 171–3

Heerlen-Boventse Caumer Marres and van Agt 1962, 18Hemel Hempstead- Neal 1974–6, 53–110

BoxmoorHemel Hempstead- Neal 1974

Gadebridge ParkHeppenheim RiHessen, 346–7Hérouville-Lebisey Grenier 1934, 800Herschweiler-Pettersheim Mitt Pfalz 80, 1982, 320–1Herten-Warmbach see RheinfeldenHeuneburg Kimmig and Sangmeister 1983High Wycombe Records Bucks 16, 1953–60, 227–57Hirschberg-GrossSachsen Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1986, 153–8Hobita Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 142–4Hoheneck see LudwigsburgHohenfels-Im Keller TrZft 24–6, 1956–8, 543–7Holbury see East DeanHolcombe see UplymeHolme House see ManfieldHölstein Baselb Hmtb 5, 1950, 1–52Hombleux Agache 1978, 340 Fig. 33Hoogeloon Roymans and Theuws 1991, 137–52Horath TrZft 30, 1967, 114–43; RiRhld-Pf, 395–7Hornchurch Cunliffe and Rowley 1978, 32Hosszúhetény Thomas 1966, 272–8Houdeng-Goegnies de Maeyer 1937, 83–5Houthem-Vogelsang Oudheidk Med NS 6, 1925, 40–79


348

Hucclecote Trans Bristol 55, 1933, 323–76; 79, 1961, 159–73;80, 1962, 42–9

Hummetroth-Haselburg RiHessen, 360Hungen-Bellersheim Archiv Hess 11, 1865–7, 157–73Huntsham see GoodrichHüssingen see WestheimHüttwilen see StutheimIllogan-Magor J Brit Arch Ass NS 39, 1933, 117–75Inzigkofen FdbaBad-Württ 3, 1977, 402–42; RiBad-Württ, 347–8Irsch see VierherrenbornIskar-Gara Bull Inst Arch Bulgare 11, 1937, 407–9;

Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969, 505Isola d’Istria Not Scavi 6 ser. 6, 1928, 412–14Izel Arch Belg 223, 1980, 57–9Izernore see PerignatJemelle-Neufchâteau Ann Namur 21, 1895, 403–49Jublains-la-Boissière CAG 53 Mayenne, 63–5Jumilla-Los Cipreses Gorges 1979, 311Kaalheide-Krichelberg van Es 1972, 151Kadin Most Dremsizova-Delcinova 1969, 507Kaisersteinbruch-Königshof RLiO 6, 1925, cols 6–10, 34–50; 18, 1937, 154–8;

Thomas 1966, 152–74Katzenbach RiRhld-Pfalz 407–9Kempten-Loja Allg Geschfrd 40, 1937, 51–71Kernen-Rommelshausen FdbaBad-Württ 2, 1975, 193–204Keszthely-Fenékpuszta Thomas 1966, 60–9Kethel Ber ROB 23, 1973, 149–58Keynsham-Cemetery Archaeologia 75, 1926, 109–35Keynsham-Somerdale Archaeologia 75, 1926, 136–8; Bristol and Avon

Archaeology 4, 1985, 6–12Kingsweston see BristolKingweston-Littleton VCH Somerset I, 323–4Kinheim TrZft 40–1, 1977–8, 414–15; RiRhld-Pf, 414–15; Tr

Grab Forsch 14, 1979, 263–9Kirchberg see KüttingenKirkel-Frost 19 Ber Saar, 1972, 89–98Kleinsteinhausen Mitt Pfalz 80, 348–51Koerich-Goeblingen Hémecht 25, 1973, 375–9Köln-Braunsfeld BJb 135, 1930, 109–45Köln-Mungersdorf Fremersdorf 1933Köln-Praetorium Precht 1973Köngen FdbaSchw NS 19, 1971, 230–53; Luik and Reutti,

1989Königsbrunn Arch Jahr Bayern 1988, 78–9Königshof see KaisersteinbruchKonken Mitt Pfalz 81, 1983, 74–7


349

Konska Bull Inst Arch Bulgare 14, 1940–2, 267–9;Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969, 504

Konz-Lummelwies van Ossel 1992, 250Konz-Pfalz Germania 19, 1935, 40–53; 39, 1961, 204–6;

RiRbld-Pf, 649–53Kösching Christlein and Braasch 1982, 200Kralev Dol Acad Bulg Fouilles Rech 14, 1985, 9–26, 148–9Kran Arheologija (Sofia), 1977, 47–53Kulm Keller 1964, 128–31Küttigen-Kirchberg Anz Schw Altkde NS 10, 1908, 24–30Laboissière-en-Santerre Agache and Bréart 1975, 81Lalonquette Gallia 31, 1973, 123–55Lamargelle-Versingue Mem Côte d’Or 20, 1933–35, 99–106Landen-Betzveld Bull Liégeois 11, 1872, 117–21Landshut-Sallmansberg Arch Jahr Bayern 1982, 26–32, esp. 31Langenau-Osterstetten Württ Vierteljahresh 11, 1888, 29–36Langton Corder and Kirk 1932Laperrière-sur-Saône Chouquer 1979, 56 Fig. 4Latimer-Chenies Branigan 1971Laufen-Müschag Helv Arch 9, 1978–9, 2–66Laufenburg Germania 24, 1940, 32–6; Gnomon 1939, 40–1;

Rothkegel 1994Lauffen am Neckar Spitzing 1988Laugharne-Cwmbrwyn Arch Cambrensis, 6 ser., 7, 1907, 175–209Lavans-les-Dole Rev Est 19, 1968, 257Lazenay-Les Sales Leday 1980, Pl. IXLechlade-Claydon Pike Hingley and Miles 1984, 61Leicester-Norfolk Street Britannia 12, 1981, 337–8Leiwen-Bohnengarten TrZft 24–6, 1956–8, 583–93Lemiers Oudheidk Med NS 15, 1934, 18–28Lendin Mém Normandie 10, 1836, 387–91Leutersdorf-Maiweiler TrZft 24–6, 1956–8, 546–9Leutersdorf Jahresber Ges Nutzl Forsch Trier, 1878–81, 52–8Levet-Champ des Pois Leday 1980, Pl. XXVILevroux-Trégonce CAG Indre, no. 143Liédena Gorges 1979, 343Liestal-Munzach Ur-Schweiz 17, 1953, 1–13; JbSGU 46, 1957, 113–15

RiSchw, 430–4Lisi�ici Wilkes 1969, 401Littlecote see RamsburyLittle Milton J Roman Stud 40, 1950, 102; 43, 1953, 94Littleton see Compton DandoLjubsko-Proboj WMBH 3, 1895, 280–3; Wilkes 1969, 397Ljusina Wilkes 1969, 404Llantwit Major Arch Cambrensis 102, 1952–3, 89–163; Britannia 5,

1974, 225


350

Lockington Wilson 1974, Pl. 22Lockleys see WelwynLodo see ArradonLöffelbach Modrijan 1971Loja see KemptenLondon-Cannon Street Trans London and Middx 26, 1975, 1–102Lörrach-Bromach Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1981, 160–2; RiBad-Württ,

428–9Ludwigsburg-Hoheneck FdbaSchw 19, 1911, 90–118; Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ

1992, 179–83Ludwigsburg-Pflugfelden Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1988, 168–71Lullingstone Meates 1972Lussas-et-Nontronneau Gallia 31, 1973, 463; 41, 1983, 445–6Madara Nikolov 1976, 169Magor Farm see IlloganMaidenhatch see PangbourneMaidenhead-Cox Green Berks Arch 60, 1962, 62–91Maidstone-Loose Road VCH Kent III, 100Mailhac-Cayla Dedet 1987, 186, Fig. 167Maillen-Al Sauvenière Ann Namur 19, 1891, 345–75Maillen-Ronchinne Ann Namur 19, 1891, 345–75; 21, 1895, 177–208Mainz-Kastel, ‘Aedicula’ Oelmann 1938Majdan Wilkes 1969, 404Malguenac-Guilly Bull Morbihan 1899, 137–43Mali Mo�unj Wilkes 1969, 404Mamer-Gaschtbierg Hémecht 32, 1980, 465–79Manching Schubert 1994; Germania 40, 1962, Supplement 3, 4Manderscheid BJb 39–40, 1866, 256–64Manerau Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 144–7Manfield-Holme House Harding 1984Mansfield Woodhouse Archaeologia 8, 1787, 363–76; Trans Thoroton 53,

1949, 1–14Marboué-Mienne Mém Soc Ant Fr NS 2, 2, 1836, 153–73; Gallia 39,

1981, 63–83Marchelepot Agache 1978, 287, 335, Fig. 28Mareuil-Caubert Agache 1978, 276Maria Ellend-Ellender Hof RLiÖ 4, 1903, cols 9–13; Thomas 1966, 248Maria Ellend-Ellender RLiÖ 4, 1903, cols 13–14; Thomas 1966, 249

WeingärtenMarkt Pongau-Urreiting FdbÖ 3, 1941, 64–7Marquivilliers Agache 1978, 287Marshfield Blockley 1985Martigues Dedet 1987, 186–7, Fig. 169Martres-Tolosanes, Joullin 1901

ChiraganMatagne-la-Petite Arch Belg 253, 1983, 65–8


351

Maulévrier Mém Normandie 10, 1836, 369–87Mauren Jb Schwaben 12, 1847, Supplement, 25–30Mautern a. Donau JÖAI(B) 29, 1935, cols 221–36Mayen-Allenz BJb 36, 1864, 55–71Mayen-Im Brasil BJb 133, 1928, 51–152Meckel Steinhausen 1932, 180–2Mehring Kurtr Jb 25, 1985, 33–9Meonstoke-Shavards Farm J Roman Arch 1990, 195–204Merdingen RiBad-Württ, 441–2Merklingen Paret 1932, 117Le Mesge Agache 1978, 325Les Mesnuls Gallia 35, 1977, 333–4Messkirch-Altstadt BJb 74, 1882, 52–6; Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1977, 51–5Mettet-Bauselenne Ann Namur 33, 1919, 49–117Metz-Sablon Drack 1990, 61; Koethe, 23 Ber RGK, 1933, 78–9Mezières-en-Santerre-La Agache 1978, 337 Fig. 30

Croix-Saint-JacquesMezières-en-Santerre-Le Agache 1978, 290, 294, 332 Fig. 25

ZiepMichelstadt-Steinbach Jahresber Hessen 2, 1912, 56–8Mihajlovgrad Izv Muz Severozapadna Balgarija 4, 1979, 9–64Mileoak see TowcesterMilton Keynes-Bancroft Williams and Zeepfat 1994Minerau Acta Mus Napoc 10, 1973, 144–7Mogilets Arheologija (Sofia) 11, 1969, 26–35Monchy-Humières Agache 1978, 294, 327Moncrabeau-Bapteste Congr Arch 41, 1874, 40–7Monréal BJb 143–4, 1938–9, 408–23Mons-en-Chaussée Agache 1978, 286Montacute-Ham Hill J Roman Stud 3, 1913, 128–33Mont Beuvray Bulliot 1899 2, 166–72; Grenier 1934, 827Montmaurin Fouet 1969Montrozier-Argentelle Congr Arch 1863Morken Hinz 1969Morthommiers-le-Crot Leday 1980, Pl. 49Mühlacker-Lomersheim Fdba Bad-Würrt 16, 1991, 175–201München-Denning Czysz 1974Mundelsheim FdbaSchw NS 11, 1935–8, 105–11; Arch Ausgr Bad-

Württ 1988, 183–7Munzenberg-Gambach Germania 29, 1951, 150–3; RiHessen, 445Nadrin Arch Wallon 1980, 101Nagold Aus dem Schwarzwald 33, 1925, 3–4Namps-au-Mont Agache 1978, 332Neckarrems FdbaSchw 15, 1907, 42–5Neckarzimmern- Schumacher 1896, 9–12

Stockbronner Hof


352

Neerharen-Rekem Bull Comm Roy Art 27, 1888, 325–74; Arch Belg 253,1983, 56–60; 1, 1985, ii, 53–62

Nemesvámos-Balácapuszta Thomas 1966, 73–107Nempont-Saint-Firmin Agache 1978, 131, 161

(Somme)Nennig Wightman 1970, 145–7Neuburg a.d. Donau Bayer Vgbl 26, 1961, 128–34Neuhausen auf den Fildern FdbaBad-Württ 3, 1977, 355–73Neumagen- TrZft 40–1, 1977–8, 424–5

Dhron-PapiermühleNeuss Neue Ausgr Deutld 1958, 294–5Newel TrZft 34, 1971, 143–225; RiRhld-Pf, 503–6Newport, I.o.W. Arch J 9, 1929, 141–51Newton St Loe Proc Somerset 112, 1968, 104–5Niedereschach-Fischbach FdbaBad-Württ 13, 1988, 351–93Niederzier-Hambach 59 Ausgr Rhld 1985/6, 40

69 Gaitzsch 1986, Abb. 6, 411–12; Ausgr Rhld 1981–2,142–5

77/264 BJb 180, 1980, 467–91 403 Gaitzsch 1986. Abb. 6 512 Gaitzsch 1986, Abb. 7

North Cerney-The Ditches Britannia 17, 1986, 412Northchurch Neal 1974–6, 1–52North Leigh VCH Oxon I, 316–18; Wilson and Sherlock 1980North Leigh-Shakenoak Brodribb, Hands and Walker 1968–73North Stainley-Castle Arch J 32, 1875, 135–53

DykesNorth Warnborough see Odiham-Lodge FarmNorth Wraxall Wilts Arch 7, 1862, 59–74Norton Disney Ant J 17, 1937, 138–78Novi Šaher WMBH 6, 1899, 531–3Noyers-sur-Serein Gallia 20, 1962, 464–7; 22, 1964, 331–2Nünschweiler Mitt Pfalz 80, 365–7Nuth-Vaasrade Oudheidk Med NS 15, 1934, 28–32Oberentfelden Argovia 50, 1939, 153–9; Ur-Schweiz 22, 1958, 33–43

RiSchw, 457–9Oberesslingen see EsslingenOber-Grombach see BruchsalOberlunkhofen Anz Schw Altkde 2, 1900, 246–57Ober-Ramstadt-Pfingstweide Schmidt 1971; RiHessen, 459–60Oberweis TrZft 9, 1934, 20–56Oberweningen RiSchw, 460–1Odell Current Arch 66, 1979, 215–18Ödheim BJb 39–40, 1866, 213–16; Schr Württ Alt-Ver 7, 1866,

19–29Odiham-Lodge Farm Proc Hants 10, 1931, 225–36


353

Odrang see FliessemOld Durham Arch Aeliana 4th Ser., 29, 1957, 203–12Olfermont de Caumont 1870, 385, 387Olveston-Tokington Park Trans Bristol 13, 1888, 159–69; 1889, 196–202Orazio Lugli 1966Orlandovtsi Dremsizova-Nelcinova 1969, 509; Nikolov 1976, 169Ormalingen Basler Zft 9, 1910, 77–93Orton Longueville-Orton Todd 1978, 209–28

Hall FarmÖschelbronn Bad Fdb 3, 1933–6, 321–9Oss-Ussen van der Sanden and van der Broeke 1987Osterfingen Schaff Beitr 14, 1937, 313–24; JbSGU 28, 1936, 73–4Otford Arch Cant 42, 1930, 157–71Overasselt Oudheidk Med NS 15, 1934, 13–18Overstone Northants Arch 11, 1976, 100–33Ovillers Agache 1978, 287Pangbourne-Maidenhatch Berks Arch J 65, 1970, 57; Britannia 2, 1971, 284Panik Glasnik Sarajevo 15–16, 1961, 132–8Park Street see St StephenParndorf see BruckneudorfPeiting Bayer Vgbl 22, 1957, 223–5Perignat-Izernore Bull Arch Com Trav Hist 1909, 3–13Petersfield-Stroud Arch J 65, 1908, 58–60Pforzheim-Hagenschiess BJb 79, 1884, 28–104Piddington Friendship-Taylor 1989Pilsdon Pen Proc Prehist Soc 43, 1977, 263–86Pitney VCH Somerset I, 326–7Plachy-Buyon-Les Trois Agache 1978, 287, 338 Fig. 31

CornetsPlasmolen see GroesbeekPleven-Kailuka Dremsizova-Delcinova 1969, 509; Bull Inst Arch

Bulgare 14, 1940–2, 275Plomelin-Perennou Bull Mon 3, 1837, 165–74Plouventer-Kerilien Ann Bret 77, 1970, 285–94Port-le-Grand Agache 1978, 331 Fig. 24Proboj WMBH 3, 1895, 280–3; Wilkes 1969, 397Primelles-Champ Chiron Leday 1980, Pl. XL VIIIPuig de Cebolla-El Vilar Gorges 1979, 433Pulborough Proc Soc Ant Lond, 2 ser., 23, 121Pully-Prieuré Arch Schw 1, 1978, 87–92; RiSchw, 471–3Quarteira Gorges 1979, 482–3Quevauvillers Agache 1978, 287, 329 Fig. 22Quintanilla de la Cueza Gorges 1979, 338Quinton J Northampton Mus 11, 1972, 1–21Radley-Barton Court Farm Miles 1986Rainecourt Agache 1978, 287


354

Ramsbury-Littlecote Britannia 20, 1989, 315–17; Walters and Phillips 1978Rankovici See TravnikRapsley see EwhurstRavensbosch see Schimmert op den BilikRaversbeuren BJb 61, 1877, 128–34Reach RCHME Cambridgeshire North-East, 88–9Redlands Farm see StanwickRegelsbrunn – larger villa Thomas 1966, 257–9Regelsbrunn – smaller villa Thomas 1966, 259–60Regensburg-Burgweinting Röm-Germ Korrbl 7, 1914, 54–7; Verhand Hist Ver

Oberpfalz 67, 1917, 24–30Reimlingen Bayer Vgbl 11, 1933, 89–90Remmingsheim Paret 1932, 38–9, 363Rheinbach-Flerzheim Ausgr Rhld 1982–3, 154–8; van Ossel 1992, 219–22Rheinfelden-Herten/ Archaeol Ausgrab Bad-Württ 1984, 144–7

WarmbachRheinfelden-Salzbrünnele Bad Fdb 3, 1933–6, 210–19Ribemont-sur-Ancre Agache 1978, 287, 329 Fig. 22Ridgewell VCH Essex III, 170–1Rielves Gorges 1979, 422–3Rijswijk-de Bult Bloemers 1978Ringstead Northants Arch 15, 1980, 12–34Rivenhall Rodwell and Rodwell 1986La Roche-Maurice-Valy Ann Bret 79, 1972, 215–51

CloistreRockbourne Arch J 140, 1983, 129–50Rodmarton Archaeologia 18, 1817, 116; RCHME

Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 98–9Rognée Doc Charleroi 21, 1897, 3–75Rohrbach (Aus.) JÖAI(B) 1966, 23–5Rome-Domus Augustana Ward-Perkins 1981, 78–84

(Flavian Palace)Rome-Via Gabina Widrig 1987Romegoux-La Vergnée Rev Arch 6th ser., 16, 1940, 46–61Rommelshausen see KernenLa Roquebrousanne Gallia 44, 1986, 477–8Rothselberg Pfalz Mus 29, 1912, 31–3Rottenburg am Neckar Archaeol Ausgrab Bad-Württ 1981, 141–5Le Roux-lez-Fosse Ann Namur 29, 1910, 144–50Roxby-cum-Risby, Ant J 50, 1970, 222–45

DragonbyRudston Stead 1980Rulles-Chaumont Lambert 1987, 125–33Saaraltdorf Jb Lothring 20, 1908, 157–76Sachsenheim- Arch Ausgr Bad-Württ 1982, 127–34

GrossSachsenheim


355

Saint-Acheul Bull Picardie 57, 1977–8, 293–306Saint-Aubin-le-Mazaret Gallia 46, 1989, 285; Todd 1992Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer Gallia 6, 1948, 365–75Saint-Frégant-Keradennec Ann Bret 79, 1972, 168–99Saint-Germain-lès-Corbeil Gallia-Inf 1993, i–ii, 43–4Saint-Herblain Gallia 41, 1983, 320–1Saint-Julien Gallia 27, 1969, 318–21St Lythans-Whitton Jarrett and Wrathwell 1981St Mary Bourne-Finkley VCH Hampshire I, 302–3St Michael-Gorhambury Neal, Wardle and Hunn 1990Saint-Pierre-la-Garenne CAG 27 Eure, 186, no. 374; Coutil, 1898–1921, II,

272–7Sainte-Solange Leday 1980, 2, Pl. 23St Stephens-Park Street Arch J 102, 1945, 21–110; 118, 1961, 100–35Saint-Ulrich see Haut ClocherSalzburg-Liefering Mitt Salzburg 108, 1968, 341–60Santa Colomba de Gorges 1979, 276–7

Somoza-MaragateraSarajevo-Stup Glasnik Sarajevo 42, 1930, 212–25Sarica Baumann 1983, 124Sarmentsdorf Anz Schw Altkde 32, 1930, 15–25Sarmizegetusa Miclea and Florescu 1980, 1, 62Sarratt VCH Hertfordshire IV, 1914, 163Saunderton see BledlowSauvenière Ann Namur 24, 1900, 11–32Schaanwald Jb Liechtenstein 29, 1929, 149–55Schambach Jahresber Bayer Bodendenkmalpfl 6–7, 1955–6,

14–34Schimmert-op den Bilik Oudheidk Med 2, 1908, 25–44Schleidweiler see ZemmerSchleitheim Wanner 1899, 21–3; RiSchw, 505–6Schuld Eiden 1982, Tafelband, 101–11Schupfart-Betburg JbSGU 23, 1931, 77–9Selongey Leday 1980, Pl. 23Serville Ann Namur 24, 1900, 21–6Sette Finestre Carandini and Settis 1979Settrington Ramm 1978, 76–7Shakenoak see North LeighShipham-Star Proc Somerset 108, 1963, 45–93Sigean-Pech-Maho Dedet 1987, 186, Fig. 167Sigmaringen-Laiz FdbaBad-Württ 16, 1990, 441–508Sigmaringen-Steinäcker Mitt Hohenzollern 16, 1882–3, 104–6; RiBad-Württ,

556–7Silchester Proc Prehist Soc 53, 1987, 271–78Sinsheim Wagner 2, 364–6Sivry Lambert 1987, 143–4


356

Skeleton Green see BraughingSmarje-Grobelce Thomas 1966, 344–9Sofia-Obelja Arheologija (Sofia), 1981, 52–6Somerton-Bradley Hill Britannia 12, 1981, 177–252Somerton-Catsgore Leech 1982Sontheim an der Brenz- FdbaBad-Württ 3, 1977, 334–54

Beim kleinen SeeSotzweiler see TholeySouthwick Sussex Arch Coll 73, 1931, 13–32; 123, 1985,

73–84Sparsholt Britannia 4, 1973, 318–19; 22, 1991, 288Spoonley Wood see SudeleyStadtbergen Bayer Vgbl 39, 1974, 114–26Stahl BJb 62, 1878, 1–7Stammheim see StuttgartStanwick-Redlands Current Arch 122, 1993, 52–5; South Midlands Arch

21, 1991, 76–9Starzach-Bierlingen Württ Vierteljahresh 10, 1887, 77–80; FdbaBad-

Württ 1, 1974, 501–26Stein Oudheidk Med 9, 1928, 4–9Steinbach im Odenwald see MichelstadtStockbronner Hof see NeckarzimmernStolac 1 WMBH 1, 1893, 287–90; Wilkes 1969, 397Stolac 2 WMBH 1, 1893, 290–1; Wilkes 1969, 397Stolac 3 WMBH 1, 1893, 291–5; Wilkes 1969, 397Stolac 5 WMBH 3, 1895, 272–80; Wilkes 1969, 397Stolac 6 WMBH 5, 1897, 169–72Stowey-Sutton-Chew Park Rahtz and Greenfield 1977Stratford-upon-Avon- Palmer 1982

TiddingtonStroud see PetersfieldStrupnic Wilkes 1969, 404–5Stutheien-Huttwilen Roth-Rubi 1986Stuttgart-Stammheim FdbaSchw 19, 1911, 84–9; FdbaBad-Württ 5, 1980,

140–2Sudeley-Spoonley Wood Archaeologia 52, 1890, 651–8; RCHME

Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 113–14Sudeley-Wadfield J Brit Arch Ass 2nd ser., 1, 1895, 242–50; RCHME

Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 112–13Suippes Villes 1985, 656, Figs 6–8Sumeg Thomas 1966, 111–16Swindon-Okus Wilts Arch 30, 1898–99, 217–21Szentkirályszabadaja- Thomas 1966, 118–22

RomkútSzilágy-Arnyoldal Thomas 1966, 297–9Tác-Fövenypuszta Thomas 1966, 299–326


357

Tailly-L’Arbre-à-Mouches Agache 1978, 139, 156Tarrant Hinton Proc Dorset 104, 1982, 184–6; 105, 1983, 146–8;

Britannia 13, 1982, 386–7Tavaux Jeannin and Chouquer 1978, 271Telita Pence 9, 1984, 51–65; Baumann 1983, 125–46Tengen-Busslingen RiBad-Württ, 582–4Terrick see EllesboroughTéting-sur-Nied Grenier 1906, 159–67Thalerhof see GrazTholey-Sotzweiler Germania 39, 1961, 474–8Thoraise Villes 1985, Fig. 5Thuit de Caumont 1870, 388–9Tiddington see Stratford-upon-AvonTiefenbach Schumacher 1896, 6–9Titelberg, ‘Aedicula’ Hémecht 22, 1970, 378–80Titsey Surrey Arch Coll 4, 1869, 214–37; VCH Surrey IV,

1912, 367–9Tockington Park see OlvestonTollard Royal Proc Prehist Soc NS 34, 1968, 102–47Towcester-Mileoak Northants Arch 13, 1978, 28–66Travnik-Rankovici Glasnik-Sarajevo 10, 1955, 134–7Treuchtlingen-Weinbergshof Arch Jahr Bayern 1984, 113–15; Bayer Vgbl 51,

1986 326–32Trier-Basilica Zahn 1991Trouey Leday 1980, Pl. 56Upchurch-Boxted Arch Cant 15, 1883, 104–7; VCH Kent III, 1932,

106–8Uplyme-Holcombe Proc Devon 32, 1974, 59–162Urreiting see Markt PongauUxheim-Ahutte Tr Zft 24–6, 1956–8, 552–60Val Catena see Brioni GrandeValladolid-Prado (or Granja Gorges 1979, 444

de Jose Antonio)Vallenay-Patureau Leday 1980, Pl. VIII

FourneauVaux-sur-Somme-Bosquet Agache 1978, 287; Agache and Bréart 1975, 126

DuvalVerberie Rev Arch Picardie 1983, 96–126Verneuil-en-Halatte Gallia-Inf 1989, 244–6

Le BufosseVesqueville Arch Belg 159, 1974Vicques Gerster 1983; RiSchw, 531–3Vierherrenborn-Irsch TrZft 14, 1939, 248–53Vieux-Rouen-sur-Bresle Agache 1978, 297Vila de Frades Gorges 1979, 477Ville-sur-Ancre Agache 1978, 328


358

Villeneuve-sur-Cher, Les Gallia 42, 1984, 290–1Augerets

Villeneuve-Saint-Germain Gallia 37, 1979, 307–8; Villes 1985, Fig. 9Villers-sous-Ailly Agache 1978, 294Villers-Bretonneux Agache 1978, 294Villers-sur-Lesse-Génimont Ann Namur 30, 1911, 190–1; de Maeyer 1937, 67–8Vix Villes 1985, Fig. 5Voerendaal-Ten Hove Oudheidk Med NS 34, 1953, 48–79; ROB 266, 278

,286Voerendaal-Ubachsberg Oudheidk Med NS 4, 1923, 65–77Vouneuil-sous-Biard-Les Gallia 37, 1979, 405–6; Aucher and Aucher 1984

CassonsWachenheim Nordrh.-Westf. Wadfield see SudeleyWahlen RiSchw, 535Walsbetz de Maeyer 1937, 106–7Walton-on-the-Hill, Surrey Arch Coll 2, 1864, 1–13

The HeathWancourt Agache 1978, 287Warfusée-Nord Agache 1978, 331 Fig. 24

(-Abancourt)Warfusée-Sud (-Abancourt) Agache 1978, 321Watergate see West MardenWeeze-Baal BJb 166, 1966, 379–432Weitersbach TrZft 24–6, 1956–8, 511–26Wellow VCH Somerset I, 312Welschbillig TrZft 40–1, 1977–8, 443–4Welwyn-Dicket Mead Herts Arch 9, 1987, 79–165Welwyn-Lockleys Ant J 18, 1938, 339–76West Blatchington Sussex Arch Coll 90, 1952, 221–40West Dean-Chilgrove Down 1979

(Sussex)West Dean (Wilts.) see West TytherleyWesterhofen Sammelbl Ingolstadt 55, 1937, 3–35Westheim-Hüssingen Arch Jahr Bayern 1980, 134–5West Marden-Watergate Britannia 16, 1985, 314West Meon-Lippen Wood Arch J 62, 1905, 62–4West Tytherley-West Dean Wilts Arch 22, 1885, 243–50Weyeregg 80 Jahresber Oberösterr Musver, 1922–3, 63–80Weyhill-Clanville Archaeologia 56, 1898, 1–20Whippingham-Combley Britannia 7, 1976, 364–5Whittington RCHME Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 126–8; Trans

Bristol 71, 1953, 13–87Whitton see St LythansWhitwell Britannia 8, 1977, 392, 395Wickford Cunliffe and Rowley 1978, 29


359

Wiesbaden-Höfchen Nassau Ann 3, 1876, 22–7Wiesendangen-Steinegg JbSgU 57, 1972–3, 343–5Winden am See Burgenl Forsch 13, 1951, 3–47; Thomas 1966, 201–10Winkel-Seeb Drack 1990Winterton Stead 1976; Todd 1978, 93–103Wittlich Westd Zft 25, 1906, 458–61; TrZft 16–17, 1941–2,

229–35Wollersheim-Am Hostert Germania 34, 1956, 99–125Woodchester RCHME Gloucestershire Cotswolds, 132–4;

Britannia 13, 1982, 197–228Woolaston-Chesters Arch Cambrensis 93, 1938, 93–125Worsham see AsthallWraxall Proc Somerset 105, 1960–1, 37–51The Wrekin Arch J 141, 1984, 61–90Zalo�je see Biha�Zazenhausen BJb 39–40, 1866, 210–12Zemmer-Schleidweiler Jahresber Ges Nutzl Forsch Trier 1900–5, 31–9Zijderveld Ber ROB 23, 1973, 103–7Zofingen Keller 1864, 150–2; Hartmann 1975

360

GENERAL INDEX

agriculture 10, 30, 33, 36, 45, 144, 151,275

aisled farmhouses 30, 45aisled house: cattle accomodation 45,

222–3; and decline of hall 263;definition 26; development 15;distribution of 220–2; hall 36–9;interpretation of 222–6; three aisles225–7; row house characteristics 263;two aisles 228

alignment 186, 279, 300altar 289alternate development, principle of 15anteroom 76, 79apartment 48–9, 76, 87, 89–91, 105apse 200, 207, 214arches in porticuses 131architects and diffusion of ideas 284,

288articulation 77, 83, 91assimilation to Roman rule 278asymmetry 49, 102–3, 120–3audience hall 176–8, 180, 182, 193axial posts 36, 39, 93, 223–4, 226axial symmetry 136axiality 18–19 back-to-back: halls 115–16; houses

109–12; lobby 60, 290bailiff 5, 74, 301

bank and ditch 152, 213, 230–1barracks, slave 295–6, 300basilica 163, 173, 176, 183, 185, 214,

257, 301; ‘basilican’ building, 40baths 18, 24, 89, 129, 138, 163, 190,

197–8, 213–14, 238–9, 263, 301bay length 223–5block plans 204boundaries: house built over 239–43,

249–50; land redistribution 277;permanent 285

breadth 26building: techniques 257, 278; transition

and change in 279buildings: block grouping, 209–11;

square 227–8, 232; trapezoidal 227–8byre 26, 30, 36, 223–5, 229 cattle accomodation 30–1, 33, 35, 37,

45, 222–3cellar 24, 33–4, 41–2, 81, 87, 101, 118circulation 17, 63, 82, 89, 92Clarendon, his house 5classification, problems of 26, 46closet 79, 124, 127coin lists, interpretation 20colonialism 278colonnade 117–18, 131, 134complex houses 231

— General Index —

361

continuity of settlement 116, 228,243–9, 254, 271, 273, 284

cooking 27, 29, 31, 32; and see kitchen36

corridor 202, 204, 263; axial 112–15;inappropriate term, 142–3

cost 45, 110, 151, 156, 193, 219cottage-house, cottages 5, 8, 26, 56, 74country houses 5, 18courtyard: distribution of types 283;

divided 148–51; domestic 162–5; fan-shaped 156–7; forms of 212–13;geometrical 151; hall 101–2; houses18; irregular 144–9; for kin/slaves295–300; long rectangular 159–62;open 24; rectangular 281; rectilinear213; rhomboidal 158–9; asRomanisation 250–2; open or roofed42; small house with? 94–100; socialchange and 285–8; sub-triangular157–8; tapering 152–5; trapezoid 281;variety of shape 144; villa 106,214–15, 281–2

crafts 30–1, 45cultural values, Roman 233 dais, medieval, as place of privilege 29–

31demolition of early villas 253design, common approach to 204dining room 120display, architectural 5, 7, 13, 79, 80,

130, 254ditches 149, 152, 213, 230–1, 240,

249–50, 277domestic work 30, 45doorways 14, 34, 37, 70, 72, 74, 77, 79,

83dower houses 106drainage 30, 42, 83duality: architectural 57–9; of

household 48, 50, 56, 88–9, 137–9;of occupation 6, 44, 45, 59, 87, 90,102–3, 119, 208, 208–9, 282, 284; ofuse 75

elongation of buildings 211

emperors, travels 172–3, 182enclosure 144, 158, 212, 213, 230, 239,

277; earthwork 219end rooms: around lobbies 83–5; in

broad halls 100–1; as byres 82–3;Inzigkofen and analogues 86–8;narrow 80–2, 88

entertainment 178, 268entrance: axial 202–5; indirect, to

dominant house 156; end 199–200,289; hearth relationship 14, 29;lobby 56; one end 54–6; open endedporticus 130, 132–4; porticus andpavilion 119–20, 121, 125, 138;position 26; right angle 148; roomfunction and 75; square house 228;two 17; two front 59–60; villa 220

equality: of household 74; andinheritance 276–7

estates, alleged; growth 285, 301 facade 117; detached 166–9family 32, 45, 48, 76, 102, 105, 204,

208, 228, 231farm: as food source 278; tasks 143farmers 5, 57farmhouse 5–6, 15, 30, 118farmyard 99, 144, 158, 171, 212–13feasting 178, 268–9flooring 36, 80, 201focal points 27, 32, 69, 131, 152, 156,

203fragmentation of land holding 276–7,

285, 300function of rooms: end 86; hall 36–7,

80–2, 89–91; hall or yard 41–2, 99–100; mosaic and 4; public/private178–9, 182; size difference and 65;social, of architecture 283; state/citizen 173; typology and 13, 15

gallery, porticuses 138, 140, 143gardens 42, 147, 189gender division and occupancy 48ghost pavilions 140–1government, palace as seat of 172–3,

176–8, 181


362

granary 227grouping of buildings 208–11; linear

208–9grouping of rooms, social significance

of 91–3“gwely”, clan 277, 279, 284, 299 Hale, Sir Matthew; mean house, 4hall: activities in 102; aisled 36–7, 40–1;

axial entrance 202–5; broad 26, 29,31–2, 33, 35–6, 45, 288; classificationand problems 26; decline 301;development 80–93; distribution of283; divided 43–5; double ended 34,35–6; early 253; elements andanalysis 14; function and layout 26–8,200; hearth position 29, 31–3, 136;lack of 65; medieval 15, 17, 23, 26,29, 86, 225, 261; narrow 26, 32–3,80–2; oblong 201; open 23–4, 100,106, 257–62; pavilions 118; plananalysis 13; porticus unified with 43;as principal room 46; ridge posts37–9; in row-house 62; S.E. Europe199–200; single-ended 33–4; socialchange and 285–8; square 200–1; 25;transition to row house 285, 288;tripartite 114; unrectilinear 252;wide-nave 26, 39–40, 93; or yard 8,41–2, 94–101, 202

halls: divided 43–5hearth: central 23, 29, 30, 33;

communal 33; entrance relationship14, 29, 75; more than one 31–2;off centre 29; open 27; or oven 26,32–3; pavilion 129; position 36;roofs and 41; secondary 142

Herrenhaus, -sitz 138honour, place of 29, 31hospitality: Elizabethan 172; justice and

179house: courtyard 162–5; double depth

106–12; five room 50, 75; four room60–2; L-shaped 211–12; multiplesmall room 65, 207–8; one room 23,104–6; small, or yard 94–9; three

room 102, 105, 126; two room 204–5, 208

household: complexity of units 67;division and status 86–7, 89, 91;duality of 48, 50, 56, 88–9, 137–9;hierarchy 68–9, 119; kin group andstatus 76; more than one 43–4;religion 290; row-house 46; size androoms 102; status 79; two in rowhouse 102–3; two and symmetricalentrances 136–7

hypocaust 101, 213, 301hypocauston 59 industrial production 275inheritance, partible 16, 276–7, 279,

281, 284–5, 299–300intercommunication of rooms 6, 14, 42,

47–8, 55, 76, 82, 117–20, 129Iron Age: pre-Roman houses,

settlements 219–32, 277 justice: private 178–9justice, administration from villa 106,

172, 193 kin group: cooperation 209; dominant

household 132; entertainment 178;equality of household 74; head 119;and house type 278–9, 281–2, 283,288, 290, 292, 295; lobby size 79;occupation 6; possession of land275, 277, 284, 300, 302; loss of status271; Romanisation 233, 238;round-house 231; social hierarchy149, 151, 156–8, 163, 167, 238;status 254; in late villas 299, 301

kitchen 265–9, 273 land holding 275–7, 281, 284–5;

fragmentation of 276–7, 285, 300landed proprietorship 74, 87lighting 78, 90, 110, 113–14, 131, 141living rooms 46, 123lobby: and circulation 90–2; distribution

75; L-shaped 70–4, 91; La Roche-


363

Maurice 74–5; longitudinal 56–8, 70,78; oblong 75; position of 51; orroom 68–9, 73–5, 76; small 48, 50;square 72, 75, 284; transformation78–9; transverse 48, 50, 72, 76, 78,204, 284; types 70–9; widened 74

lodging, official 176long-house 15, 83lordship 57, 149, 200; hereditary 300;

and joint proprietorship 195–8lugs, on porticus 139–41luxury: and formality 193–5;

Romanisation and 238–9; socialhierarchy and 172; villa 190–3, 301

manor house, Elizabethan and

Jacobean 140; later 65, 67, 123mansiones, see staging-postsmatters ignored: chronology 19–20;

surroundings 20monospan buildings 36, 228–30, 232mosaic 4, 129, 141–2, 213, 300–1 naves 36; and aisles of equal width

40–1; division 263nobility and partible inheritence 276nomenclature, room 11North, Roger, and buildings 5 ornament 18, 65, 79, 80, 123, 131, 193,

278 palaces 172–7palisade 230parlour 86, 118, 124partitions 36, 99, 101, 201, 221, 231passage room 35, 75–6, 80, 92, 100–1,

204, 208pavilion corner projection: as addition

13, 48; asymmetry 120–1; asymmetryand status 120–2; classic form 117–19; detached wings or quasi-pavilions 128; difference and socialsignificance 123; entrance 119–20;ghost 140–1; lack of 111; minimal125–6; not rectangular 124–5; oblong123–4; round 254–6; in row-house

126–8; in S.E. Europe 214; single132; storeyed 128–9

peristyle villas 184–90, 193, 214–15, 283pilasters 89, 121plan analysis, origins of 13–14pool, ornamental 89, 167population stability of villa 271–3,

293–5porticus: as architectural display 13;

compact row-house 63; as entranceto pavilion 119; functions 139–43;as link 166; as living space 141–2;lobby and 56; as open screen 118;open–ended 130–4; splayed andtapering 134–5; two households and136; wide or continuous 142–3

porticus with pavilions: as additions 33,35–6; distribution 283; duality ofoccupation 45; as feature of villa 7;front and rear 137–9; hall houses 24,80; Romanisation 41, 117; S.E.Europe202, 209, 214; symmetry 19; yardand 97, 115

posts: axial 36, 39, 93, 223–4, 226;internal 97; king and queen 42, 95,97–9; ridge 26, 36–9, 220–1, 223–9,232

power: and planning 178; relations 116,151, 160; and representation 278

privacy, use of lobby 48privilege, place of 29, 31proportion 26, 33, 35, 75–6; dis-, in end

rooms 88proto-villas 11public/private space 86 quasi-pavilions 128 range: end rooms in broad halls 100–1;

parallel 106–9, 114, 166–7; width 212rebuilding 13, 15, 18, 171, 250, 253recreation, porticus as space 138–41regionalism 102, 171religion, domestic 14, 91removal to a new site 250representational room 46, 60, 75,

91, 290


364

reverse symmetry 57–9, 63, 70, 212, 283Romanisation: definition 251; hall

houses and 23; modes of 233–56;pavilion and 117, 126; plans and18; porticus with pavilions 41, 134,138; settlement 279, 288

roof: construction 10, 23; monospan41–2; open halls 23–4; span 95, 97,99, 110, 228, 257–8; support 26, 36;trusses 225

rooms: additional 26, 33, 80, 89–90;ancillary and halls 261–3; blocks ofsmall 77–8, 207–8; development 15;division 268; enclosed 24; five roomhouse 75; groupings 6, 14; groupingsand social significance 91–3; L-shaped 201; minimum number forliving 57; sequence and power 178;size 49; state 173, 176; subdivision35; subsidiary 23; three and lobbyunits 65–7; use 6, 15–16, 46

round-houses 228, 230–2, 254–6, 277row-house: articulation or separate

rooms 76–7; Bierbach units 68–9;blocks of small rooms 77–8; compact61–4, 78, 134, 195, 209, 211;development 65–79, 240; distributionof 283; Downton 49–51; early 290;elaboration of units, Laufen-Müschag67–8; end entrances 54–6; equallydivided 136; four cell 60–2; hall or23, 84–7, 91; interconnecting rooms,Newport and Lamargelle 47–9;Kirchberg, three room and lobbyunits 65–7; lobby transformation78–9; lobby types 70–5; longitudinallobby 56–7; pavilions 126–8; porticusand pavilion front and rear 139;pre-Roman 232; reverse symmetry57–9; room proportions 75–6;S.E.Europe 202–3; size 100, 102, 111;size and form of units 51–4; smallest102–5; Sparsholt 49; two frontentrances 59–60; unit significance 79;wide porticus 142; workhall 228

sampling 11–12

sequence of rooms 49–50servants 30, 45, 76, 143, 183service quarters 86settlement: consolidation 279–82;

dispersed 277; evidence of pre-Roman 219–20

shrines 48, 63, 106; freestanding 291–2;as unifying device 288–91

slaves 295–6, 299social circumstances and villa design

219social development: of hall 257;

prosperity and 274; of row-house270–1; of villa 264–70

social hierarchy: kin group 60social hierarchy: buildings and 56–7,

121–3, 149, 156, 214–16; buildingsand rooms 16; halls and yards and285–8; justice and 178–9; lobby and68; luxury and 172, 193; organisation85, 87; rooms and 117

social history and architecture 4social meaning: of axial corridor

114–15; of courtyard 151social stratification 87, 115–16, 277, 289,

300social structure: plans and 16–18;

porticus and 130–2; set of hearth29; siting of shrines 291; symmetryand 136; terminology 5; and villatrsansition 281–2

‘squatter occupation’ 142staging posts 172staircases 65, 67, 128standard of living 90, 271status of house 124, 134, 208, 228, 278,

289status, social: asymmetry as 121–3; of

household 72, 79, 86; populationand decline in 271; porticus withpavilions as 7; rooms and 48; sizeand 65, 67; space and 16; within kingroup 275, 278–9, 299

stone footings 23, 37, 42, 132, 227, 232,253–6, 279, 281

storage 143


365

storeys 10, 24, 40, 128–9superior/inferior ends: difference 37,

79; division 263; equality 86–8;family and servants 45; function and26–8; lower end 30–1; porticus and130; square rooms 75

surveying place 73symmetry 14, 18–19, 50, 62, 65, 67,

87–8, 90–1, 102, 118, 128, 131–2,136–7, 152, 252, 289–90

temples 106, 291–2terminal rooms 111, 127, 129terrace 87tie-beams 95, 131timber: buildings 10–11, 144, 227–8,

231, 250–2, 258, 279; staircase 128title, legitimacy of 254towers, fortification 215–16transition, native to Roman 233–8, 250,

253–4, 279–81travellers 172type of house: hall 23–45; and range

available 219; row-house 46–64typology: objections to 4–5; of Roman

villas 4, 6–8, 13 unification of buildings 240–1unit: cells 55; conjugal 228;

consumption 92; disparate 79;Downton 55, 59, 65, 102, 109, 136,150, 185, 202, 261, 267, 279, 288;elaboration 67–8; four cell and twohousehold 61; row type villa 68–9;size and form 51–4; symmetry 290;system 46, 48, 50, 52–4, 57

ventilation 110

veranda, timber 130, 132vernacular architecture, relevance of

4, 14viewing places 141villa: architecture 9–10; classification,

history of 6–9; constituents of 10–11;courtyard 163, 214–15; definition of251–2; difference 292–3; diffusion oftypes 282–4; emergence of 278–81;fortification 215–16; hall type 199–200; Iron Age preRoman 219–32;linear 167–71; luxury 173, 190–3;obsolesence 301; patterns ofdevelopment 257–74; peristyle184–90, 193; replacement of timberbuilding 252–3; S.E. Europe 199–216;seat of lordship 178–83, 193–4;system development 284, see partibleinheritence

wage labour 114–15waiting places 73, 79walking indoors, Pepys and Clarendon

140–1wall: construction 95, 97–8, 220;

enclosure 149, 152, 158, 213;supporting 23, 128

warmth 14, 24, 27, 29, 31, 33water cult 291wings 80, 91, 106, 117, 126–7, 262, 282,

284; cross205–7, 288; detached 128;halls and 288

workhalls 57, 79, 87, 89, 91–2, 157–8,163, 228

366

SITE INDEX

Achenheim (Alsace) 231Aguilafuente-Santa Lucia (Segovia) 179,

182Ahrweiler see Bad-NeuenahrAiseau 119Albesa-El Romeral (Lérida) 183Allenz see MayenAlmenara de Adaja-Villa Romana

(Valladolid) 179, 180Alpnach-Dorf (Switz.) 96, 100, 105Alresford (Essex) 55Altstetten (Switz.) 252Ambresin (Belg.) 108, 111Anthée (Belg.) 66, 76–7, 78, 110, 159,

292–3, 294, 296, 299Apahida (Rom.) 207, 208Apethorpe (Northants.) 149Arradon-Lodo (Morbihan) 166, 169Ash (Kent) 40Ashstead (Surrey) 111, 112Ashwell-Ducklake Farmhouse (Herts.)

109–10Asthall-Worsham 288Aston Bury (Herts.) 65, 67, 123Athies 159, 299Atworth (Wilts.) 158Aulnat (Puy-de-Dôme) 231

Ault (Picardy) 131Aylesford-Eccles (Kent) 55, 59, 87, 110,

130–1, 167, 240, 242, 265, 289, 290,293, 294, 300

Babworth-Dunston’s Clump (Notts.)

229Bachenau 127Bad Dürkheim-Ungstein (Bad.-Württ.)

112, 113–14Bad Godesberg-Friesdorf (Nordrh.-

Westf.) 190, 301Bad Homburg vor der Hohe (Hessen)

44, 149, 158, 213, 284Bad Kreuznach (Rhld-Pf.) 301Bad Nauheim 219Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler 258, 261Bad Rappenau-Zimmerhof (Bad.-

Württ.) 96, 100, 299Badajoz-Dehesa de la Cocosa 181, 194,

214Badbury (Wilts.) 163Badgeworth (Glos.) 123Bancroft see Milton KeynesBargen im Hegau (Bad.-Württ.) 24, 25, 157Barnsley Park (Glos.) 11, 18, 237, 238–

9 240, 248

— Site Index —

367

Barton Court Farm see RadleyBasel-Gasfabriek (Switz.) 220Basse-Wavre (Brabant) 14, 107, 108,

110–11, 112, 116, 182, 194, 214,292, 301

Beadlam (Yorks.) 57–8, 60, 72, 135,241

Beckingen (Saarld) 127Bedburg-Garsdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) 39

221, 224, 247, 251, 252Beegden (Neth.) 221, 228Befort-Aalburg (Lux.) 222, 226Bellersheim see HungenBelleuse-les Mureaux (Somme) 162,

164, 300Bellikon (Switz.) 248, 253Bennwil (Switz.) 40Bergen-Auf-dem-Keller 141Betzingen (Bad.-Württ.) 82, 83Biberach (Bad.-Württ.) 120, 124Biberist-Spitalhof (Switz.) 104, 106Bierbach (Saarld) 63, 64, 66, 68–9, 79,

90, 123, 134Bierlingen see StarzachBignor (Sussex) 155, 158, 163, 179,

181, 182, 240Bihac-Zalo�je (Yugosl.) 143, 201Bilsdorf (Lux.) 97Birkenfeld-Elchweiler (Rhld-Pf.) 278Bistrica (Bulg.) 199, 200, 216Blankenheim (Rhld-Pf.) 8–9, 19, 42,

54–5, 69, 73, 89–93, 95, 97, 131,134, 140, 161, 182, 215, 261–2,264–70, 273, 288–91

Blieskastell-Altheim (Saarld) 30, 33Bocholtz-Vlengendaal (Neth.) 39, 85,

89–90, 91, 92, 93, 134, 150, 170,221, 262, 263, 293

Böckweiler 30, 33Bollendorf (Rhld-Pf.) 27, 29, 30, 32,

274Bondorf (Bad.-Württ.) 95, 96, 97, 99,

100, 118, 124, 143, 286Boos-Le Bois Flahaut (Seine-Mar.) 51,

53, 60, 62, 79Börstingen 27, 29

Böttger 195Bouchoir (Somme) 102, 103, 126Box (Wilts.) 55, 163, 178–9, 180, 182,

301Boxted see UpchurchBözen (Switz.) 248, 253, 261Bradley Hill see SomertonBrain-sur-Allones (Main-et-Loire) 31Bramdean (Hants.) 51, 132Braughing-Skeleton Green (Herts.) 227,

228Bray-sur-Somme 139Bregenz (Aus.) 114Brewood-Engleton (Staffs.) 124–5, 128,

158Brighstone-Rock 127, 128, 289Brioni Grande-Val Catena (Yugosl.)

190, 191Bristol-Brislington (Avon) 63Bristol-Kingsweston (Avon) 43, 122,

124, 125, 141, 206, 241, 259, 261,288

Brixworth (Northants.) 51, 60, 101,185, 241, 255, 299

Broichweiden 127, 135Brombach see LörrachBruchsal-Ober-Grombach(Bad.-Württ.)

27, 31, 145, 149, 150, 151, 159, 167,185, 285

Brücken (Rhld-Pf.) 34, 35Bruckneudorf-Parndorf (Aus.) 42, 97,

201, 207, 213, 259, 261–2, 301Buchs (Switz.) 87Buchten (Neth.) 36, 84, 87Budakalász (Hung.) 200, 203Budapest-Aquincum 175, 177, 182, 190Budapest III-V Csúcshegy (Hung.)

132–4, 204, 265Budapest III-Testvérhegy (Hung.) 171,

208Bundenbach-Altburg (Bad.-Württ.) 221,

228Burgweinting see RegensburgByfield (Northants.) 28, 31, 121 Cachy (Somme) 152, 153

— Site Index —

368

Caerwent 7Canterbury (Kent) 229Carisbrooke (I.o.W.) 37, 38Cartagena-El Castillet (Murcia) 66, 69Castle Dykes see North StainleyCenero-Murias de Belono (Ovieido)

19, 52, 57Champagnole (Jura) 72Champdivers (Jura) 200La Chapelle-Vaupelteigne (Yonne) 167Chassemy (Aisne) 226–7Chastres (Belg.) 27Chastres-lez-Walcourt (Belg.) 135Chatalka-Delimonyova Kale (Bulg.) 296Chatalka-Delimonyova Niva (Bulg.)

143, 213Chatalka-Lambata (Bulg.) 214Châtillon-sur-Seiche/La Guyomerais 41,

165Chedworth (Glos.) 17, 48, 136, 152,

157, 162, 163, 212, 214, 251, 289,291, 300

Cherington (Wilts.) 83, 140Chew Park see Stowey SuttonChichmanovtsi (Bulg.) 208Chiddingfold (Surrey) 107Chilgrove see West DeanChiragan 194Cincis (Rom.) 205Citernes (Somme) 152Ciumafaia (Rom.) 207, 208Civray-Le Poirier Molet (Cher) 61Clairy-Saulchoix (Somme) 152Clanville see WeyhillClaydon Pike see LechladeCléry-sur-Somme 51, 60Clinchamps (Calvados) 31Cobham Park (Kent) 50Colchester-Camulodunum (Essex) 226Colerne 83Collingham-Dalton Parlours 101, 110,

114, 209, 239, 243, 245, 246, 248Colsterworth (Lincs.) 231Combe St Nicholas-Wadeford (Som.)

60Compton Dando-Littleton (Som.) 55

Condé-Folie (Somme) 159, 240, 241,242

Cosa (Italy) 215Courcelles-sur-Nied-Urville 29, 81, 83Cox Green see MaidenheadCrain (Yonne) 30Croft Ambrey (Herefs.) 227Cromhall (Glos.) 152Cuevas de Soria-Dehesa de Soria

183–4, 215Cwmbrwyn see Laugharne Dalton Parlours see CollinghamDanebury (Hants.) 227, 228Darenth (Kent) 37, 50, 153, 156, 251,

291Davenescourt (Somme) 155, 162, 164Deanshanger (Northants.) 50Démuin 132, 133Denton (Lincs.) 36, 37, 38, 263Deutschkreutz (Aus.) 211, 213Deva (Rom.) 201, 282, 283Dicket Mead see WelwynDietfurt a.d. Altmuhl (Bay.) 225Dietikon 299, 300Dirlewang (Bay.) 137, 138–9Ditchley (Oxon.) 47, 50, 79, 128, 185,

250, 253Doische-Vodelée (Belg.) 34, 137, 138Downton (Wilts.) 47, 49–50, 54, 55, 57,

59, 65, 67, 79, 102, 109, 127, 132,150, 152, 202, 261, 267, 288, 289,290

Drac?evica (Yugosl.) 202, 203, 204Dragonby (Lincs.) 27, 241, 277Draughton (Northants.) 230Drax (Yorks.) 85, 166, 288Dreieich-Götzenhain (Hessen) 34Druten-Klepperhei (Neth.) 11, 251, 252Dura-Europos-palace of Dux Ripae 177Dury (Somme) 102, 103, 288 East Dean-Holbury (Hants.) 41East Grimstead (Wilts.) 37, 38, 263Eaton-by-Tarporley (Cheshire) 56,

134–5

— Site Index —

369

Eccles see AylesfordEching-Autobahn 221, 222, 225, 228–9Eching-Neufahrn (Bay.) 221Echternach (Lux.) 19, 183, 190, 278,

284Eckartsbrunn (Bay.) 96, 100L’Ecluse-Leckbosch (Belg.) 66, 79Ecoust-Saint-Mien (Picardy) 152, 153,

299Edwinsford 16Egregy (Hung.) 204Ehingen-am-Ries (Bav.) 253Eisenstadt (Aus.) 183Elchweiler see BirkenfeldEllesborough-Terrick (Bucks.) 51, 60Ersigen (Switz.) 124Estrées-sur-Noye (Somme) 159, 162,

299, 300L’Etoile (Somme) 103, 277Euskirchen-Kreuzweingarten(Rhld-Pf.)

190, 278Evelette (Belg.) 84Ewhurst-Rapsley (Surrey) 55, 145, 149,

284, 289Exning-Landwade (Suffolk) 36, 38, 263Ezinge (Neth.) 30 Famechon (Somme) 291, 293Farmington-Clear Cupboard (Glos.) 28,

31–2, 33, 34, 45, 119, 249, 261Farningham-Manor House (Kent) 54–5,

77, 91–2, 131, 289, 290, 301Faversham (Kent) 50, 51, 60, 70, 79,

241, 299Feddersen Wierde (NiederSachsen) 30Ferpicloz (Switz.) 65, 141Fischamend-Katherinenhof (Aus.) 205Fishbourne Palace (Sussex) 140, 174,

176, 177, 182, 194, 278Fishtoft (Lincs.) 39, 221Fitten (Saarld) 79Fliessem-Odrang (Rhld-Pf.) 7, 125, 140,

161, 195, 196, 197, 198, 262, 284,292, 293

Flocques (Somme) 142Flumenthal (Switz.) 288

Folkestone (Kent) 72, 163Fontaine-le-Sec (Somme) 152, 288Fontoy-Moderwiese (Lorraine) 71, 72Francolise-San Rocco (Italy) 58, 257,

258, 261Frankfurt-Bergen-Enkheim (Hessen) 35,

140Frankfurt-Bornheim (Hessen) 111, 112,

140Friedberg-Fladerlach 259, 262, 288Friedberg-Pfingstweide 89, 147, 150–1,

159, 211Friedrichsdorf-Seulberg (Hessen) 125Frilford (Berks.) 107, 109, 111Frocester Court (Glos.) 75, 76, 82, 92,

158, 185, 201, 258, 259, 261, 262,288

Fromentières (Mayenne) 63Furschweiler (Saarld) 119 Gadebridge Park see Hemel

HempsteadGambach see MunzenbergGarden Hill see HartfieldGargrave-Kirk Sink 48, 50, 52, 55, 56,

60 106, 109Gayton Thorpe (Norfolk) 82, 119, 137,

139, 282, 290, 301Geislingen-Heidegger Hof (Bad.-Württ.)

113, 114, 284Gentelles (Somme) 149Gerpinnes 83Goodrich-Huntsham (Herefs.) 56, 261Gorhambury see St MichaelGornea (Rom.) 215–16Graux (Belg.) 115, 116, 259, 261, 288Graz-Thalerhof (Aus.) 191, 192Great Staughton (Cambs.) 35, 63, 118,

141–2Great Weldon (Northants.) 140, 254,

267, 270–1Great Witcombe 139, 166Grémecey (Moselle) 31, 32, 35Grenchen (Switz.) 81, 82, 88, 121Grivesnes (Somme) 149GrossSachsenheim see Sachsenheim

— Site Index —

370

Guadaira-Alcala/Casa de Pelay Correa(Seville) 128

La Guerche-Le Grand Chausseroi(Cher) 62

Gunthersburg Park see Frankfurt-Bornheim

Gunzenheim-Staatsforst-Sulz 107, 109Gyulafirátót-Pogánytelek (Hung.) 199,

200 Habay-Rulles (Belg.) 138Haccourt (Belg.) 70, 71, 75, 107, 173,

192, 194, 195, 196–7, 292Hales (Staffs.) 72Halstock (Dorset) 131, 167, 170Ham Hill see MontacuteHambach see NiederzierHamblain-les-Prés (Pan-de-Calais) 72,

241, 244Hambleden-Yewdon Manor (Bucks.)

153, 156–7Haps (Neth.) 221, 222, 223, 224, 225Harbonnières (Somme) 103, 105Harburg-GrossSorheim 100Harding-Mingies Ditch (Oxon.) 230Hartfield-Garden Hill (Sussex) 11, 18,

231, 237, 239, 251Hartlip (Kent) 60, 89Haunstetten (Bay.) 221, 222, 225Haut Clocher-Saint Ulrich (Moselle) 7,

197-8, 284, 292Hechingen-Stein (Bad.-Württ.) 98, 100Heerlen-Boventse Caumer (Neth.) 43,

44Heidelsheim (Bad.-Württ.) 39Hemel Hempstead-Boxmoor (Herts.)

50, 248, 250, 282, 300Hemel Hempstead-Gadebridge Park

(Herts.) 53, 60, 82, 136, 241, 244Heppenheim (Hessen) 34, 35, 81Hérouville-Lébisey (Calvados) 51, 53,

54, 60, 62, 89Herschweiler-Pettersheim 136, 137Herten-Warmbach see RheinfeldenHeuneberg (Bad.-Württ.) 222, 226, 228High Wycombe (Bucks.) 58-9, 72, 84

Hirschberg-GrossSachsen (Bad.-Württ.)42

Hobita-Gradiste (Rom.) 204, 209, 213Hoheneck see LudwigsburgHohenfels-Im Keller (Rhld-Pf.) 112,

113, 115, 142Holbury see East DeanHolcombe see UplymeHolme House see ManfieldHölstein (Switz.) 38, 40, 41, 93, 249Hombleux (Somme) 70Hoogeloon 221, 224, 225Horath 139Hornchurch 227, 228Hosszuhetény (Hung.) 125, 215Houdeng-Goegnies (Neth.) 128Houthem-Vogelsang (Neth.) 44, 45, 291Hucclecote (Glos.) 102Hüfingen (Bad.-Württ.) 122, 125Hummetroth-Haselburg (Hessen) 64,

75, 140, 204Hungen-Bellersheim (Hessen) 161, 171,

213Huntsham see GoodrichHüssingen see WestheimHüttwilen see Stutheim Inzigkofen (Bad.-Württ.) 41, 86, 87, 88,

94, 97, 98, 100Irsch see VierherrenbornIskar-Gara (Bulg.) 210, 212Isola d’Istria (Yugosl.) 204, 209, 210Izel (Belg.) 104, 105Izenore see Perignat Jemelle-Neufchâteau 64, 114, 170Jublains-La Boissière (Mayenne) 241,

244Jumilla-Los Cipreses (Murcia) 183, 184 Kaalheide-Krichelberg (Neth.) 229Kadin Most (Bulg.) 214Kaisersteinbruch-Königshof (Aus.) 93,

201, 204, 205, 208, 210, 245, 249,21340

Katzenbach 156, 185, 255

— Site Index —

371

Kempten-Loja Kapelle (Bay.) 100, 101,103

Kernen-Rommelshausen (Bad.-Württ.)107, 109

Keszthely-Fenékpuszta (Hung.) 202–3,207, 208, 215

Kethel (Neth.) 229Kinheim (Rhld-Pf.) 69, 85, 90–1, 92,

93, 112, 262, 263, 269Kirchberg see KüttigenKirkel-Forst (Saarld) 100Kleinsteinhausen (Hessen) 139Koerich-Goeblingen (Lux.) 24, 25, 85,

104, 106, 110, 148, 201, 285, 286Köln-Braunsfeld 27Köln-Mungersdorf (Nordrh.-Westf.) 8,

68, 73–4, 77, 132, 136, 142, 143,253, 262, 271, 272, 273, 274, 279,282, 293, 295

Köln-Praetorium 190Köngen (Bad.-Württ.) 80, 116, 185,

285, 287Königsbrunn (Bay.) 222, 226Königshof see KaisersteinbruchKonken (Rhld-Pf.) 27, 31Konska (Bulg.) 208, 210, 212Konz-Lummelweis (Rhld-Pf.) 24Kralev Dol (Bulg.) 210, 212Kran (Bulg.) 202Kulm (Switz.) 77–8Küttigen-Kirchberg (Switz.) 65, 66, 67,

68, 70, 78, 79, 84, 85, 87, 134, 141,288

Lalonquette (Pyr.-Atl.) 31, 183, 184–6,

187, 188, 189, 191Lamargelle-Versingue (Côte d’Or) 47,

48, 50, 62, 79, 102, 105, 159Landen-Betzveld (Belg.) 67, 68Landshut-Sallmansberg (Bay.) 227, 228,

253Langenau-Osterstetten(Bad.-Württ.) 126Langton Dwelling House (Yorks) 28,

33, 57, 85, 115, 262, 282Laperrière-sur-Saône (Côte d’Or) 44,

282

Latimer-Chenies (Bucks.) 72Laufen-Müschag (Switz.) 66, 67–8, 75,

124, 252Laufenburg (Bad.-Württ.) 97, 134, 135Lauffen am Neckar (Bad.-Württ.)

119–20, 125, 150, 171, 206Laugharne-Cwmbrwyn (Dyfed formerly

Pembs.) 28, 33, 242Lavans-les-Dole (Jura) 29Lazenay-Les Sales (Cher) 62Lechlade-Claydon Pike (Oxon.) 36Leiwen-Bohnengarten (Rhld-Pf.) 89,

253, 279, 280Lemiers (Neth.) 138Lendin (Seine-Mar.) 108, 109, 110Leutersdorf (Rhld-Pf.) 86, 158, 167,

169, 262, 273Levroux-Trégonce (Indre) 162, 298,

299Liédena (Navarra) 41, 295–6, 297, 299Liestal-Munzach (Switz.) 40, 71, 76, 77,

158, 159, 162, 297, 299Limerlé (Belg.) 83Lisi�ici (Yugosl.) 201, 202, 210, 213Little Milton (Oxon.) 50, 241Littleton see Compton DandoLjubsko-Proboj (Yugosl.) 206, 207Lju�ina (Yugosl.) 183, 211, 214Llanfrothen, Park 16Lockleys see WelwynLodo see ArradonLoja see KemptenLörrach-Brombach 42, 99Ludwigsburg-Hoheneck (Bad.-Württ.)

97, 145, 148–9, 150, 251Ludwigsburg-Pflugfelden (Bad.-Württ.)

24, 87, 120Lussas-et-Nontronneau 61, 63, 64, 204 Madara (Bulg.) 215Maidenhatch see PangbourneMaidenhead-Cox Green (Berks.) 34,

259 261Maidstone-Loose Road (Kent) 50Mailhac-Cayla (Aude) 227Maillen-Al Sauvenière (Belg.) 170, 208

— Site Index —

372

Maillen-Ronchinne (Belg.) 114, 170–1,211

Mainz-Kastel, ‘Aedicula’ 55, 131, 133Majdan (Yugosl.) 200, 203Malguenac-Guilly (Morbihan) 171Mali Mo�unj (Yugosl.) 201Mamer-Gaschtbierg (Lux.) 27, 31Manching 220Manderscheid 81, 88, 124, 136, 137,

138, 139, 152, 214Manerau 204, 207, 210Manfield-Holme House (Durham) 132,

247, 254, 255Mansfield Woodhouse (Notts.) 37, 38,

50, 51, 152, 153, 159, 206Marboué-Mienne (Eure-et-Loir) 163,

165Marchelepot (Somme) 126, 160Mareuil-Caubert (Somme) 131Maria Ellend-Ellender Weingarten

(Aus.) 204, 205Marquivilliers (Somme) 139Marshfield (Glos.) 74, 110, 149, 159,

203, 209, 284, 289Marshfield-Ironmonger’s Piece (Avon)

143, 240, 241, 243, 245, 249Martigues-L’Arquet (Bouches-du-Rhone)

227Maulévrier 17, 41, 53, 59, 62, 72, 136,

152, 159, 163, 214, 282, 284Mauren (Bay.) 84, 86–7, 200, 201Mautern a. Donau (Aus.) 202, 208Mayen-Allenz (Rhld-Pf.) 8–9, 26–7, 29–33,

41, 46, 69, 83, 93, 95, 99–100, 118,152, 154, 228, 233, 250, 253, 262, 269,274, 291–2, 301

Mayen-Im Brasil (Rhld-Pf.) 23, 24Meckel (Rhld-Pf.) 159, 162, 293, 300Mehring 35, 258, 262, 284Merdingen (Bad.-Württ.) 139Le Mesge (Picardy) 152, 154, 156Les Mesnuls (Yvelines) 77Messkirch-Alstadt (Bad.-Württ.) 96, 99,

146Mettet-Bauselenne (Belg.) 209, 215Metz-Sablon (Moselle) 291

Mézières-en-Santerre/La Croix Saint-Jacques (Somme) 112, 113, 152

Mézières-en-Santerre/Le Ziep (Somme)143, 159, 161, 299

Michelstadt-Steinbach (Hessen) 35Mikhailovgrad (Bulg.) 200Mileoak see TowcesterMilton Keynes-Bancroft (Bucks.) 206,

241, 244, 255, 293Mogilets (Bulg.) 214Monchy-Humières 131Moncrabeau-Bapteste (Lot-et-Garonne)

182Monreal (Rhld-Pf.) 104, 106Mons-en-Chausée (Picardy) 202Montacute-Ham Hill (Som.) 148, 171,

208Montmaurin (Haute Garonne) 188–90,

191, 193Montrozier-Argentelle (Aveyon) 183,

193, 194–5, 215Morthommiers-Le Crot (Cher) 62München-Denning (Bay.) 239Mundelsheim (Bad.-Württ.) 81, 88, 119Munzenberg-Gambach (Hessen) 109,

110, 111, 116, 139, 203, 284, 292 Neckarrems (Bad.-Württ.) 44, 299Neckarzimmern-Stockbronner Hof

(Bad.-Württ.) 83, 98, 119Neerharen-Rekem (Belg.) 40Nemesvámos-Balácpuszta (Hung.)

181–2, 183, 213Nennig (Rhld-Pf.) 7, 18, 140, 173, 190,

194, 292Neuburg a.d. Donau (Bay.) 112, 113,

115Neuhausen auf den Fildern-Horb

(Bad.-Württ.) 106Neumagen-Dhron-Papiermühle (Rhld-

Pf.) 29, 119, 138, 248, 252–3Neuss 29Newel (Rhld-Pf.) 77, 84, 85, 92, 93,

142, 171, 263, 271, 273, 288Newport (I.o.W.) 47–8, 49, 58, 61, 62,

— Site Index —

373

63, 67, 70, 85, 105, 132, 156, 195,203, 214. 265, 268, 289

Newton St Loe (Wilts.) 51, 128Niedereschach-Fischbach 96, 101, 102,

103, 201Niederzier-Hambach (Nordrh.-West.)

83, 152, 153, 158, 159, 229, 284, 291North Cerney-The Ditches (Glos.) 50,

53North Leigh (Oxon.) 155, 163, 167,

180, 182, 214, 289, 299North Leigh-Shakenoak (Oxon.) 70, 71,

72, 77, 301North Stainley-Castle Dykes 28, 32North Wraxall (Wilts.) 72, 162, 165Northchurch 109, 132Norton Disney (Lincs.) 37, 159, 209,

263, 293, 295Novi Saher (Yugosl.) 209, 210Noyers-sur-Serein (Yonne) 105, 106,

253, 254, 255, 279, 280, 282, 297,299

Nünschweiler (Rhld-Pf.) 44, 299Nuth-Vaasrade (Neth.) 36, 84, 88 Ober-Gambach see BruchsalOber-Ramstadt-Pfingstweide (Hessen)

106Oberentfelden (Switz.) 162, 291, 292,

298, 299, 300Oberweis (Rhld-Pf.) 7, 14, 18, 90, 161,

292, 293Ödheim 288Odiham-Lodge Farm (Hants.) 37Odrang see FliessemOlfermont (Haut-Rhin) 78, 100, 147,

151Oplontis 10Orazio (Italy) 74Orbe (Switz.) 215Orlandovtsi (Bulg.) 125, 183, 211, 214,

215Ormalingen (Switz.) 54, 55–6, 59, 87,

131Orton Longueville-Orton Hall Farm

167, 168

Öschelbronn (Bad.-Württ.) 252Oss-Ussen (Neth.) 221, 222, 223, 224,

226Osterfingen (Switz.) 121, 248, 252Otford (Kent) 261Overasselt (Neth.) 34, 35Overstone (Northants.) 255Ovillers (Somme) 105, 141, 142, 201,

202 Pangbourne-Maidenhatch (Berks.) 50Panik 211, 214–15Park Street see St StephenParndorf see BruckneudorfPeiting (Bavaria) 140Penshurst Place (Kent) 23Perignat-Izernore (Ain.) 31Petersfield-Stroud (Glos.) 37, 38, 263Pforzheim-Hagenschiess 285, 286Piddington (Northants.) 72, 301Pilsdon Pen (Dorset) 221, 230, 231Pirton, Walnut Tree Farm 67, 123Pitney (Som.) 162Plachy-Buyon-Les Trois Cornets

(Somme) 132, 288Pleven-Kailuka (Bulg.) 214Plomelin-Perennou (Fin.) 166, 168Plouventer-Kerilien (Fin.) 102, 103, 105Port-le-Grand (Picardy) 247, 250Primelles-Champ Chiron (Cher) 61, 62Proboj see LjubskoPuig de Cebolla-El Vilar (Valencia) 71,

75Pulborough (Sussex) 140, 156, 168Pully-Prieuré (Switz.) 191 Quarteira (Faro) 184Quinton (Northants.) 34, 35, 79, 87,

126 Radley-Barton Court Farm 139, 231,

241, 246, 248–9, 261Rainecourt (Somme) 126, 127Rankovici see TravnikRapsley see Ewhurst

— Site Index —

374

Ravensbosch see Schimmert op denBilik

Raversbeuren (Rhld-Pf.) 90, 93, 123,140

Reach (Cambs.) 55Redlands Farm see StanwickRegelsbrunn (Aus.) 206, 213Regensburg-Burgweinting (Bay.) 125,

144, 145, 148, 149, 150, 251, 285Reimlingen (Bay.) 101Remmingsheim (Bad.-Württ.) 8, 96, 99Rheinbach-Flerzheim (Nordrh-Westf)

84, 88Rheinfelden-Herten/Warmbach

(Bad.-Württ.) 103, 105Rheinfelden-Salzbrünnele (Bad.-Württ.)

143Ribemont-sur-Ancre 143, 159, 161Ridgewell (Essex) 55, 70Rielves 179, 180Rijswijk-de Bult (Neth.) 36, 37, 95, 115,

220, 226–7, 229–30, 232, 233–4, 235,238, 239, 240, 243, 249, 250, 251

Ringstead (Northants.) 247, 255Rivenhall 19La Roche-Maurice-Valy Cloistre (Fin.)

71, 74–5, 87Rockbourne (Hants.) 51, 139, 154, 157,

158, 167, 299Rodmarton 83Rognée (Belg.) 163Rohrbach (Aus.) 201Rome-Domus Augustana (Flavian

Palace) 173–4, 176, 177, 178, 179,182

Rome-Via Gabina 41Romegoux-La Vergnée (Charente-Mar.)

50, 53, 54, 59, 110, 136, 142, 299Rommelshausen see KernenLa Roquebrousanne (Var.) 79Rothselberg (Rhld-Pf.) 34, 35, 79,

120–1, 126, 140Rudston (Yorks.) 39, 221, 244, 249–50 Saaraltdorf (Moselle) 24, 25, 39Sachsenheim-GrossSachsenheim

(Bad.-Württ.) 100, 138

St Lythans-Whitton (Glam.) 55, 56, 57,140, 234, 236, 238, 240, 243, 248

St Michael-Gorhambury (Herts.) 55,226, 230, 231, 277, 282

St Stephens-Park Street 51, 61–2, 69,70, 263, 267, 270, 271

Saint-Acheul (Somme) 74Saint-Aubin-le-Mazaret 40, 41Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer (Pas-de-Calais) 44,

110, 124Saint-Germain-lès-Corbeil 167, 253, 287Saint-Herblain (Loire-Atl.) 253Saint-Julien et Aubigny (Somme) 78Saint-Pierre-la-Garenne (Eure) 31Saint-Ulrich see Haut ClocherSainte-Solange (Cher) 70Salzburg-Liefering (Aus.) 214Santa Colomba de Somoza-Maragatera

(León) 183, 184Sarajevo-Stup (Yugosl.) 204, 205Sarica (Rom.) 204, 205Sarmentsdorf (Switz.) 78, 79Sarmizegetusa (Rom.) 19, 202, 203Sauvenière (Belg.) 83Schaanwald (Liechtenstein) 283Schambach 87, 98Schimmert-op den Billich (Neth.) 33Schleitheim 260, 262Schuld 91, 93Schupfart-Betberg (Switz.) 65, 77, 84,

85, 92, 271, 272, 274, 288Selongey (Côte d’Or) 72Serville (Belg.) 8, 24, 25, 26, 29, 31,

32, 36, 37, 87, 118, 120, 121, 126,127, 138

Sette Finestre (Italy) 215Shakenoak see North LeighShipham-Star (Som.) 127, 132, 133, 171Sigean-Pech Maho (Aude) 230, 231Sigmaringen-Laiz (Bad.-Württ.) 96, 98–

9Sigmaringen-Steinäcker (Bad.-Württ.)

43Silchester 229Sinsheim (Bad.-Württ.) 17, 43, 136,

141, 284

— Site Index —

375

Skeleton Green see BraughingSmarje-Grobelce (Hung.) 107Sofia-Obelja (Bulg.) 214Somerton-Bradley Hill (Som.) 26–7Somerton-Catsgore 28, 33, 34, 107, 116Sontheim an der Brenz (Bad.-Württ.)

102, 105, 106, 112, 142, 285, 287Sotzweiler see TholeySouthwick (Sussex) 278Sparsholt (Hants.) 49, 59, 63, 127, 152,

157, 167, 183, 209, 246, 250Spoonley Wood see SudeleyStadtbergen (Bay.) 71, 72, 77, 125Stahl (Rhld-Pf.) 8, 24, 25, 29, 32, 34,

41, 44, 94, 97, 99, 118, 122, 123–4,125, 134, 138, 139, 199

Stammheim see StuttgartStanwick-Redlands Farm (Northants.)

128Starzach-Bierlingen (Bad.-Württ.) 94Stein (Neth.) 34Steinbach im Odenwald see MichelstadtStockbronner Hof see NeckarzimmernStolac (Yugosl.) 201, 205–7, 213Stowey Sutton-Chew Park (Avon,

formerly Som.) 28, 32–3, 34Stratford-upon-Avon-Tiddington (War.)

31, 126Stroud see PetersfieldStutheim-Huttwilen (Switz.) 253Stuttgart-Stammheim 86, 87, 88, 98,

100–1, 107Sudeley-Spoonley Wood 11, 37, 114,

116, 162, 163, 165, 212, 262, 263,266, 268–70, 301

Sudeley-Wadfield 11Suippes (Marne) 229Sümeg (Hung.) 202Swindon-Okus (Wilts.) 31Szentkiralyszabadja-Romkut (Hung.)

115, 199, 213Szilágy-Arnyoldal (Hung.) 213 Tac-Fövenypuszta (Hung.) 215Tarrant Hinton (Dorset) 251Tavaux (Jura) 200

Telita (Rom.) 200Tengen-Büsslingen (Bad.-Württ.) 99Terrick see EllesboroughTéting-sur-Nied (Moselle) 191–2Thalerhof see GrazTholey-Sotzweiler (Saarld) 84, 282, 283Thoraise (Doubs.) 221Thuy (Eure-et-Loir) 190Tiddington see Stratford-upon-AvonTiefenbach 25, 29Titelberg, ‘Aedicula’ 121–2, 126Titsey 83Tollard Royal (Dorset) 230Towcester-Mileoak (Northants.) 111Travnik Rankovicí (Yugosl.) 202, 203Treuchtlingen-Weinbergshof 100, 291Trier-‘Basilica’ 161, 171, 172, 177, 257,

273Trouey (Cher) 79, 240 Upchurch-Boxted (Kent) 55, 72Uplyme-Holcombe 34, 240, 242, 245 Val Catena see Brioni GrandeValladolid-Prado 184Vallenay-Patureau Fourneau (Cher)

62–3Vaux-sur-Somme-Bosquet Duval 103Verberie (Oise) 222, 226Verneuil-en-Halatte-Le Bufosse (Oise)

39, 167, 289Vesqueville (Belg.) 43–4, 134Vicques (Switz.) 67, 68, 84, 85, 139Vierherrenborn-Irsch (Rhld-Pf.) 106,

253, 254, 255, 285, 287Vieux-Rouen-sur-Bresle (Seine-Marne)

279, 300Vila de Frades (Portugal) 128Villeneuve-St Germain (Aisne) 230,

231, 232Villeneuve-sur-Cher, Les Augerets

(Cher) 37Villers-sous-Ailly (Picardy) 141Villers-Bretonneux (Somme) 107, 108,

110–11, 116, 263Vix (Côte d’Or) 221

— Site Index —

376

Voerendaal-Ten Hove (Neth.) 43, 44,211, 289

Voerendaal-Ubachsberg (Neth.) 34, 118Vouneuil-sous-Biard-Les Cassons 70,

103 Wachenheim (Nordrh.-Westf.) 288Wadfield see SudeleyWahlen (Switz.) 81, 82, 88, 142, 201Walsbetz (Belg.) 109, 115, 234Walton-on-the-Hill-The Heath 50, 255Wancourt (Somme) 102, 143, 201, 261Warfusée-Nord (-Abancourt) 11, 159,

161, 282, 299Warfusée-Sud (-Abancourt) 11, 159,

163, 299Watergate see West MardenWeitersbach 81, 82, 119, 185, 190, 260,

262, 263, 284, 288Wellow (Som.) 56, 57, 70, 78Welwyn-Dicket Mead (Herts.) 11, 150Welwyn-Lockleys (Herts.) 11, 19, 51,

60, 109, 132, 226, 250West Blatchington (Sussex) 37, 38, 263West Dean-Chilgrove (Wilts.) 37, 60,

132West Marden-Watergate (Sussex) 255

Westerhofen (Bavaria) 140Westheim-Hüssingen (Bay.) 101Weyeregg (Aus.) 208, 209Weyhill-Clanville (Hants.) 37Whittington (Glos.) 122, 125Whitton see St LythansWickford (Essex) 229Wiesbaden-Höfchen (Hessen) 152, 165Wiesendangen-Steinegg (Switz.) 252Winden am See (Aus.) 203, 207Winkel-Seeb (Switz.) 19, 39, 40–1, 50,

59, 280, 282, 284, 291Winterton (Lincs.) 36, 40, 166–7, 168,

178, 179, 263Wittlich (Rhld-Pf.) 190–1Wollersheim-Am Hostert (Rhld-Pf.) 40,

101Woodchester (Glos.) 175, 182–3, 193,

195, 292, 301Worsham see AsthallWraxall (Som.) 28, 33, 140The Wrekin (Salop) 227

Zalo�je see BihacZijderveld (Neth.) 222, 223Zofingen (Switz.) 68, 73

377

INDEX OF AUTHORS

Agache, Roger 9, 11, 102, 161Anthes, E. 7Applebaum, S. 20, 82, 83, 288-9, 302 Baatz, D. 94-5Baxter, Richard 4-5Biro, M. 9Black, E.W. 77, 279de Boë, G. 224Böttger, B. 292Boon, George 241Branigan, K. 8 Castro, Maria Cruz Fernando 9, 179,

188de Caumont, Arcisse 6Claudius 278, 279Collingwood, R.G. 8, 251Collis, J.R. 220Cremo�nik, I. 202 Drack, W. 9, 46, 65, 68, 79Drury, P.J. 14, 77 Fellmann, R. 93Ferdière, A. 59Fremersdorf, F. 8, 73, 273Friendship-Taylor, R.M. and D.E. 35 Gaubatz-Sattler, A. 95, 143

Gorges, J.-G. 9Grenier, Albert 8, 9, 59, 191, 198 Hale, Sir Matthew 4Harding, D.W. 254Harmand, J. 8Haverfield, F.J. 7Hawkes, C.F.C. 8Hettner, Felix 7 Jones, Glanville R. 276 Klein, M. 148, 149Koepp, F. 117, 292Koethe, H. 14Kolling, A. 69Kropatscheck, G. 7 McKay, A.G. 3de Maeyer, R. 8, 83, 118Mansuelli, G.A. 9Medawar, Peter 275Mylius, H. 9, 19, 30, 194, 264, 291 Naidenova, V. 212Nash-Williams, V.E. 8Neuffer, Eduard 105Nikolov, D. 9North, Roger 4-5

— Index of Authors —

378

Oelmann, Franz 8, 9, 10, 13, 14, 23, 2427, 30, 41, 42, 73, 83, 84, 94, 95, 199264, 301

Paret, O. 8, 81, 99, 148Percival, John 3, 10 Reece, Richard 20Reim, H. 41-2, 94, 97Reutti, F. 77Richmond, Sir I. 8, 9Rostovtzeff, M.I. “et al” 10 Samesreuther, E. 8Schumacher, K. 7Sontheimer, L. 83Stead, I.M. 249Steiner, P. 30, 167

Stevens, C.E. 300, 301Stone, Lawrence 57Swoboda, Karl 7, 8, 9, 13, 14, 24, 117,

125, 127, 138, 143 Thomas, B. 208, 249Thomas, E. 9Truhelka, C. 205 Vasie, M. 9Veblen, Thorstein 193 Wagner, H.O. 101, 103Ward, J. 7, 8Ward-Perkins, J.B. 19Webster, Graham 3, 9aus’m Weerth, E. 138Wichmann, K. 198Wightman, Edith 10-11, 190, 195

roman villas a study in social structure

Documents

rowtype houses

divided halls

broad halls

narrow halls

villa architecture

developed forms of hall

forms of units

aisled houses