Room h (corridor)

Thomas Staub

Corridor h conects the atrium with the peristyle. In the easternmost part a door opens up in the north wall, giving acces to room l as well. The floorlevel of the corridor ascends towards the east since the level of the peristyle is 0.08 m above the level of the atrium. The east and west walls are nearly entirely taken up by the doors to the peristyle and the atrium, but some of the two northern door frames made of strechters and runners of Sarno stone blocks indicate an early date of the structure. The southern ones are made of opus testaceum, indicating a later repair, partly restored after the excavation. The two long walls are mainly made up of a somewhat mixed opus incertum with some ancient and some modern repairs. The western frame of the door towards room l is made of smaller blocks of Sarno stone and Tuffa and above the door a relieving arch of blocks of Sarno stones and cruma. Theese two techniques can be observed in several other locations of the house and are probably related to a rebuilding phase around the middle or second half of the first b.C.
Hardly any traces of the wall decoratons are preserved. Large areas of preserved plaster indicate its former decoration, but the only remains from them are some paint stains and the horizontal line deviding the soocle from the middle zone. This line is not paralell to the slightly ascending floor but strictly horizontal.