No. =490= is an example of a dated brick--_Imp. Antonino II (= iterum)
et Br(u)ttio Co(n)s(ulibus)_ _i.e._, 139 A.D. The stamp was first
engraved by error with the name of Balbinus, consul of 137 A.D., and
afterwards corrected by re-engraving +RTTIO+ on +ALBIN+. No. =491=
refers to the _portus_, _i.e._, the depot of Licinius.
Many of the bronze accessories of building are shown here, such as two
pairs of bronze door-knockers from Syria (No. =492=).
The bronze dowels (No. =493=) were employed for fastening together
stone sections, such as the drums of columns. They are often in the
form of truncated cones placed base to base, the thickest part being
thus in the position where the strain was greatest (fig. 203_a_).
Other dowels from the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos are in the form
of bronze cylinders in collars of bronze, rigidly fixed by three
key-pieces. The cylinders were set in the great stone which closed the
entrance of the Mausoleum, and were intended to drop half their length
into the corresponding sockets in the lower sill of the entrance (Nos.
=494-495=).
[Illustration: FIG. 203.--BRONZE DOWEL AND DOOR-PIVOT (NOS. 493, 496).
1:2.]
A series of bronze coverings (No. =496=) for the pivots of doors
reminds us of the fact that in ancient times most of the doors worked
on a different principle from our own. The bronze-covered pivots (fig.
203_b_), rigidly fixed to the door by a key-piece, turned in bronze
sockets(_c_) fitted into the lintel or threshold. This arrangement
explains the allusions to the grating of doors met with in ancient
writers.[53] Hinges of the modern type were, however, well known.
Examples are to be seen in Cases 47, 48, among them a hinge with the
fragments of the wood, to which it was originally attached, still
adhering (No. =497=).
Towards the end of the Republic and under the Empire the Romans
devoted much attention to the adornment of their buildings, public and
private. For this purpose marbles of every variety were imported from
all parts of the world, while an elaborate system of wall-painting was
also developed. Mamurra, an officer of Julius Caesar, is said to have
been the first to veneer the walls of his house with marble. A few
selected examples from the Tolley collection of polished specimens of
the materials used in ancient Rome are here exhibited (No. =498=). The
whole collection comprises some 700 specimens, so that we cannot be
surprised that Pliny declines to enumerate the varieties known in
his day, on account of the vastness of their number.[54] The simpler
building materials used at Rome were, besides the tiles or bricks
already mentioned, the hard limestone rock known as travertine and the
volcanic tufa and peperino. A specimen of the last is shown here.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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