#BathsofTrajan
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anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
We are starting the week on the Oppian for #MosaicMonday. These late C1 CE wall #mosaics from beneath the #BathsofTrajan show Roman maritime villas. But they look like ghosts, because Trajan's engineers despoiled the glass tesseræ of the water. #AncientBluesky 🏺
MOSAIC OF A MARITIME VILLA, 64-98 CE. MUSEO DELLE TERME DI TRAIANO This is part of the lower register of the Great Mosaic, one of a row depicting maritime villas, seemingly floating on a rough, blank mortar background. The structure features long colonnaded porticoes extending into the sea on two moles, terminating in tower like pavilions known as diaetae. This architectural pincer enclosed a private harbour, creating a protected mooring that displays the extreme luxury of the C1 rich. The villa appears to float in empty white space because the original background was destroyed. The ocean and sky were likely made of expensive glass paste tesseræ. These were picked out for recycling by Trajan's demolition crews, a state-sanctioned salvage operation also evident in the Polyphemus mosaic of the Domus Aurea. Only the less valuable stone and terracotta pieces forming the architecture were left behind before the hall was walled up to serve as foundations for the Baths of Trajan.
September 21, 2026 at 8:47 PM
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
For #MosaicMonday, a colossal discovery. This is the Great #Mosaic, which I visited last Tuesday beneath the #BathsofTrajan in #Rome. Though fragmentary, this wall mosaic almost defies comprehension due to its quality and vastness. Let's have a look. #AncientBluesky 🏺🧵
HALL OF THE GREAT MOSAIC, 64-98 CE. MUSEO DELLE TERME DI TRAIANO A steep downward perspective into a subterranean space beneath heavy brick vaulting. A vast vertical wall dominates the centre, covered in the remains of a monumental mosaic. This hall measures 10 by 15 metres and is 12 metres tall. The ground level has not yet been excavated, and the lower three metres, still buried, were originally faced with marble slabs. At the centre of the long wall, part of a rectangular niche is visible, which must once have contained a statue. It is far too large to be part of a private domus and is built on lands expropriated by Nero for the Domus Aurea, whose main Oppian pavilion is nearby. The gigantic size and high quality of the surviving mosaic suggest an imperial commission, but of what? And was it a Neronian building or a Flavian or Domitianic one? At the very bottom right edge, a modern blue metal railing provides a sense of the staggering scale.
September 14, 2026 at 9:53 PM
anthonymajanlahti.bsky.social
#MosaicMonday brings us (📸 CSR Restauro Beni Culturali) back under the #BathsofTrajan in #Rome to see a marvel discovered in 2011, a detail of a huge wall #mosaic, probably #Flavian, from the exterior of a large public building buried by order of #Trajan.
MUSE IN ARCHITECTURAL SETTING, 64-105 CE. MUSÆUM UNDER THE BATHS OF TRAJAN In 2011, explorations behind the "Painted City" fresco in a cryptoporticus under the Baths of Trajan discovered a gigantic mosaic, 16 metres long by 6 metres tall, which showed female figures in an architectural setting rather like a scenæ frons, with one heroically nude male figure, Apollo. The fragmentary mosaic, the largest mural mosaic ever found in the Roman world, must have belonged to an important public building which archaeologists have hypothesised as a Musæum, a place for concerts, poetry readings, and other events. The area pictured shows one of the Muses, nude but for a blue drapery over one knee, standing against a background of columns, including one decorated with a male comic mask. This is a tiny part of the mosaic. The rest, very damaged but still impressive, stretches across the whole exterior wall, and, given that it's facing an already-excavated nymphaeum, it extends for another 6-10 metres under the earth. We will have to wait for this marvel to be open to the public, but it will be stunning.
December 30, 2024 at 3:19 PM
ooearth.org
Earth Observation　08 SEP 2026　Italy

Rome Capital City government announces completion of restoration work on the south-western exedra and underground gallery of the Baths of Trajan (Terme di Traiano)

#Rome #BathsofTrajan #restoration #exedra #news
Rome Capital City government announces completion of restoration work on the south-western exedra and underground gallery of the Baths of Trajan (Terme di Traiano)
Rome Capital City government announced that restoration work on the south-western exedra and underground gallery of the Baths of Trajan (Terme di Traiano) had been completed. The underground gallery of the Baths of Trajan contains the La Città Dipinta and Grande Mosaico, among other works. The government said that the exedra and underground gallery would be opened to the public on a trial basis from 12 September.
eo.ooearth.com
September 9, 2026 at 2:18 PM
edwardsdna.bsky.social
Ancient Rome’s Largest Fresco and Mosaic Complex, Featuring Depictions of a Mysterious Maritime City, Opens to the Public After 2,000 Years: The massive artworks, created in the first century C.E., were discovered in the 1990s… @SmithsonianMag #AncientRome #Fresco #Mosaic #BathsOfTrajan #RomanArt
Ancient Rome’s Largest Fresco and Mosaic Complex, Featuring Depictions of a Mysterious Maritime City, Opens to the Public After 2,000 Years
The massive artworks, created in the first century C.E., were discovered in the 1990s during excavations of the Baths of Trajan
dlvr.it
September 13, 2026 at 1:21 PM