The Houses of Roman Italy, 100 B.C. - A.D. 250. Ritual, Space, and Decoration.

University of California Press, Berkeley (...), 1991. XXVII,3,24,411p. Richly ills.(B&W as well as full colour photographs and line drawings). Original grey gilt titled cloth with dust wrps. Dust wrps slightly worn. 'Much of the book's usefulness lies precisely in bringing together current thought on the subject. (...) His synoptic account of decorative styles in Chapter 2 forms a good short introduction to the four 'Pompeian' styles as well as to second- and third-century A.D. decorative schemes. By considering the paintings in their setting along with the floor treatments, C. at the same time gives the reader a welcome sense of the overall decorative effect, so often absent from straightforward account of Roman wall-painting. The bulk of the text presents 17 case-studies of decorative ensembles from Pompeii and Ostia arranged in six chronological groups divided according to decorative styles. All the houses are previously well-published, which allows C. to concentrate on specific aspects of the decorative schemes such as visual axes, spatial hierarchies, of programmatic organisation of painting and sculpture (...). Throughout the emphasis is on decoration, space and ritual in that order, with the four 'Pompeian' styles providing the chronological framework and well to the fore even in the post-Pompeian periods. The text is well-illustrated, with analytical plans and line drawings of decorative schemes as well as many new photographs. (...) As an attempt to place interior decoration in the wider context of Roman life, this book will no doubt find its way onto many shelves and into many student bibliographies.' (JANET DELAINE in The classical Review (New Series), 1993, pp.397-398).