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This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ (Re)framing the Hortus an analysis of the boundaries of the Roman garden in the Late Republic and Early Empire Austen-Perry, Victoria Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 26. Sep. 2021 1 (Re)Framing the Hortus: An Analysis of the Boundaries of the Roman Garden in the Late Republic and Early Empire By Victoria Austen-Perry Submitted in Fulfillment of the Requirements for a PhD in Classics, Arts & Humanities, King’s College London. July 2019 2 Abstract Transculturally, the garden is understood as a marked-off, often bounded, and cultivated space. Distinct from other surroundings, gardens are material and symbolic spaces that constitute both universal and culturally specific ways of accommodating the natural world and expressing human attitudes and values. For the ancient Romans of the Late Republic and Early Empire (c.100BC – AD150), the garden was, just as it is today, a recognisable and defined space that provided a setting for, and a backdrop to, a whole range of horticultural, artistic, social, and even political activities and practices. However, despite the two basic requirements of cultivation and enclosure, when we actually analyse individual garden sites, we find that the distinction between ‘garden’ and ‘not-garden’ is anything but straightforward. We define the space explicitly through the notion of separation and division, and yet, in many instances, we are unable to make sense of that divide. In response to this ambiguity, this thesis interrogates the notion of the ‘boundary’ as an essential characteristic of the Roman garden, and explores the perception of the space in response to its limits. Using case studies from both literature and material and visual culture, my cross-disciplinary study examines the status of different gardens as they relate to, or are framed by, their contexts. These case studies are formulated as three sets of comparative pairs, each representing a different ‘type’ of garden: Virgil Georgics 4.116-148 and Columella Book 10 (agricultural); the Ara Pacis and Livia’s Garden Room (sacred); and Pliny Ep. 2.17/5.6 and Villa A at Oplontis (elite villa). My analysis demonstrates how the Romans of the Late Republic and Early Empire constructed garden boundaries specifically in order to open up or undermine the division between a number of oppositions, such as inside/outside, practical/aesthetic, sacred/profane, art/nature, and real/imagined. This, in turn, highlights how Roman gardens of this period are always attached or supplementary, either conceptually or literally; and how, despite their bounded presentation, they also remain transitional and permeable. By examining the ambiguities of Roman gardens across a number of different registers, this thesis thus highlights the importance of an interdisciplinary approach to garden space whilst still maintaining nuanced critical analysis of individual garden sites. By following this approach, I demonstrate that what is important is not so much a matter of what all the individual gardens have in common – in that they have some form of boundary – but how we use that particular characteristic as a standpoint from which to analyse them. In this way, it becomes clear that what is significant is not necessarily the boundary itself, but, rather, the delight in playing with concepts of boundedness and separation. 3 Acknowledgments PhDs are never easy. Logistically, I could have probably made it easier - two countries, three cities, four houses, and countless transatlantic flights later, and I have finally made it! I am incredibly grateful to have received the support of several institutions and societies throughout my time as a graduate student. Thank you to the Classics Department at King’s College London, for agreeing to support and facilitate my move to Canada mid-PhD; and to the Department of Greek and Roman Studies at the University of Calgary, and the Department of Classics at the University of Ottawa, for providing me with visiting scholar status. Thank you also to the Garden and Landscape Studies program at Dumbarton Oaks, for awarding me a pre-doctoral fellowship - the time I spent in Georgetown had a profound effect on my research and it allowed me the space and time to make huge strides forward during a critical time in my writing process. It is, of course, impossible to name every single person who has contributed to my journey, but I would like to give a special shout out to some key individuals and groups whose support, love, and laughs have enabled me to reach this point: firstly, to my parents, who have never once questioned my mad journey into the world of academia; to Becky, Hannah, and Sophie, for being with me every step of the way; to Lisa Hughes, for being my personal academic cheerleader and picking me up when I thought everything was lost; to Michelle and Kristy, for all the essential coffee breaks; to the members of Ottawa City Run Club, for keeping me sane and providing me with daily inspiration; to #ClassicsTwitter, for the gifs, the memes, the motivation, and for letting me know I was not alone; to the staff and athletes at Swimming Canada, for the honour of being your Open Water team manager over the past four years; to the members of the Classical Association of Canada, for welcoming me in to your corner of the Classics world with open arms; to Danielle Frisby, for mentoring me during my time as a teaching assistant; and to my supervisors, William Fitzgerald and Michael Squire, for always pushing me to be the best scholar I can be. Finally, to Mark – simply put, without you this would not be complete. I dedicate my thesis to you. 4 Table of Contents Abstract 2 Acknowledgments 3 Figure List 5 Introduction 8 Part One: Setting the Framework Chapter 1 Defining Garden Space 12 Chapter 2 Approaching Ancient Roman Garden Space 33 Part Two: Case Study Analysis Chapter 3 Virgil, Columella, and Hortus Poetry 54 Chapter 4 Augustus’ Garden Room? Reframing the Ara Pacis 97 Chapter 5 The Framed View: Villa A at Oplontis and Pliny the Younger 138 Conclusion 175 Bibliography 182 Image Appendix 211 5 Figure List Unless otherwise stated, all images are authors own. Fig. 3.1 Map of Campus Martius (from Rehak 2006) Fig. 3.2 Front (east) entrance of Ara Pacis. Fig 3.3 Rear (west) entrance of Ara Pacis. Fig. 3.4 Interior wall decoration of Ara Pacis complex – representation of hanging garlands above wooden panelling. Fig. 3.5 Detail of Ara Pacis interior garlands, with bucrania at either side. Fig. 3.6 Plan of Ara Pacis (adapted from Rehak 2001). Fig. 3.7 Floral frieze panel, Ara Pacis. Fig. 3.8. Plan of Livia’s Garden Room, with panel identification (from Kellum 1994, following Gabriel 1955). Fig. 3.9 Panel I, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig. 3.10 Panel II, left side of recessed niche, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig. 3.11 Panel II, right side of recessed niche, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.12 Panel III, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.13 Panel IV, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig. 3.14 Panel V, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.15 Panel VI, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.16 Central oak tree, Panel II, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.17 Central spruce tree, Panel III, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig. 3.18 Auditorium of Maecenas (copyright Troels Myrup). Fig 3.19 Recessed niche with garden painting, Auditorium of Maecenas (copyright Troels Myrup). Fig. 3.20 Multiple perimeters, Livia’s Garden Room. 6 Fig 3.21 North wall, ‘Red Room’, Villa of Agrippa Postumus at Boscotrecase (from Wikimedia Commons). Fig 3.22 Acanthus detail, Ara Pacis. Fig 3.23 Flowering plant detail at end of spiralling tendrils, Ara Pacis. Fig 3.24 Procession featuring imperial family wearing laurel crowns, Ara Pacis. Fig 3.25 An ‘Apolline’ swan, Ara Pacis. Fig. 3.26 Pruned fruit tree, Panel I, Livia’s Garden Room. Fig 3.27 Entrance archway into reconstruction of Livia’s Garden Room, at National Roman Museum – Palazzo Massimo. Fig 4.1 Watercolour rendering of House of the Golden Bracelet (VI. 17) triclinium- nymphaeum complex (produced by Victoria I). Fig 4.2 Garden fresco, House of the Golden Bracelet (VI. 17), north chamber of triclinium-nymphaeum complex (from Wikimedia Commons). Fig 4.3 Plan of Villa A at Oplontis (produced by Victoria I and James Stanton- Abbott). Fig 4.4 Visual axis through atrium, Villa A at Oplontis (modified from Fig.