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Welcome back to the virtual tour of the Archaeological Museum of Cagliari!
Today we tell you about the mosaics on display at the Museum,
In the last appointment we talked to you about the housing construction about Cagliari of the roman period, anticipating that in the Bonaria area Antonio Taramelli the Superintendent of Antiquities of Sardinia for thirty years, unearthed the remains of a thermal plant.
In 1907 Cavalier Ravenna, owner of the land near the current via Nuoro, financed the archaeological excavation of the structures found during the construction of a building. The excavation, followed directly by Taramelli, led to the discovery of the frigidarium, that is the room for the cold baths of an extra-urban thermal plant, probably connected to a rich private villa. The absence of suspensurae, that is the pillars that allowed the hot air to pass under the floor and heat the environment, are proof that it was the frigidarium.
The thermal baths of Predio Ravenna can be dated to the 3rd century AD.
The floor of the frigidarium was all decorated mosaic, composed of 25 paintings with schematic floral motifs and figured scenes with marine thiasus (nereids, tritons, cupids on dolphins, sea monsters) surrounded by a multiple polychrome braid.
Taramelli ordered the detachment of all the panels of which 5 are currently exhibited on the 1st floor of the Museum. In one panel, part of the band that formed the square with a braid motif and an external Greek border is preserved. In two others there are schematized flowers. The remaining two depict a procession of marine creatures: a hero armed with a harpoon riding a dolphin and a bare-chested Nereid sitting on a marine bull.
On this last panel you can recognize a clumsy restoration from ancient times made with a large fragment of green marble.
