West Wall

Thomas Staub

W wall: width 2.00 m, max. preserved height 2.70 m (in north-east corner, elsewhere 1.70 m). The southern part (for about 0.62 m) has been flaked off for about 0.25 m towards peristyle b and room 12. The doorframe here consists of four Sarno stone blocks, from bottom to top: 0.80 x 0.40 m, 0.55 x 0.38 m, 0.65 x 0.39 m (probably a reused block, since it shows plaster on its northern side going into the wall), and 0.40 x 0.30 m, partly repaired. To the north of the blocks, the wall consists of a mixed opus incertum of lava and Sarno stone (fist large in size), set into a greyish-yellow mortar, in the upper zone containing cruma as well with larger stones (max. 0.20 x 0.15 m), covered with modern concrete. App. 0.55 m from the north-west corner, faint traces of a vertical line of plaster in the wall are visible, at the same place as the modern made line in the concrete on the east wall of peristyle b, maybe an indication for an earlier door, that later was filled up. In the northern part of the wall, a 0.50 - 0.20 (top) m wide zone with opus incertum of lava and Sarno stone, set into reddish mortar, is partly covered by plaster.