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METAULOS 100.00%

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See HOUSE (Greek).
 
HOUSE 100.00%

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The Greek house (see plan, fig. 1) was divided into two chief parts, one of which was assigned to the men (andronitis) and the other to the women (gynaikonitis or gynaikeion). The women's division was situated at the back of the house, and sometimes in the upper story if there was one. The door of the house opened inwards. It was placed sometimes in a line with the facade, sometimes in a small recess called the prothyron or propylaion. In front of this there often stood an altar belonging to the house and consecrated to Apollo Agyieus, or the god of streets. In the interior, on both sides of the vestibule, were the doorkeeper's room and other chambers for work and business. The vestibule led into an open court (aule) surrounded on three sides with columns. In the middle of this was the altar of Zeus Herkeios, the patron deity of domestic life. At the sides were chambers for eating and sleeping, storerooms, and cells for slaves, which, like the front rooms, opened into the court. But the slaves sometimes lived in an upper story, co-extensive with the whole house. On the side of the court opposite the vestibule there were no columns, but two pilasters at some distance from each other marked the entrance of a hall called prostas or parastas, which measured in breadth two-thirds of the distance between the pilasters. Here the family met at their common meals and common sacrifices; here, too, in all probability stood the hearth or sanctuary of Hestia. On one side of the parastas was the thalamos or sleeping room for the master and mistress of the house. On the other side was the amphithalamos, where the daughters probably slept. In the under wall of the parastas was a door called metaulos or mesaulos, which led into the workroom of the female servants. Large houses bad a second court, peristylon, entirely surrounded by columns. The roof of the Greek house was generally, though not always, flat; the rooms were mostly lighted through the doors which opened into the court. The ancient Roman dwelling house (fig. 2) consisted of a quadrangular court called atrium (from ater, black), because the walls were blackened by the smoke from the hearth. The atrium was entered by the door of the house, and was the common meeting place for the whole family. It was lighted by an opening in the tiled roof, which was four-sided and sloped inwards. This opening was called the compluvium, and served both as a chimney for the hearth and as an inlet for the rain, which fell down into the impluvium, a tank sunk in the floor beneath. There was also, in more ancient times, a subterranean cistern (puteus) into which the rain out of the impluvium was collected. But in later times the water was carried off by pipes underground. At the back of the impluvium was the hearth with the Penates. At the side of the atrium was the room used for cooking, for meals, and for sacrifices. In the wall fronting the entrance was the marriage-bed and the master's money-chest. The mistress of the house sat in the atrium with her maids, spinning, weaving, and generally superintending the household. It was in the atrium that the family received their clients and friends, that the dead were laid out in state, and memorials of the departed were hung on the wall. Gradually it became the fashion to attach small rooms to the two sides as far as the hearth. These rooms had no light except that obtained from the atrium. But the space at the back was left quite free, and extended in its full width in two wings (aloe) behind these side chambers on right and left. In aristocratic houses the busts of the ancestors were set up in these wings. The marriagebed was also removed from the wall against which it stood; the wall was broken through, and the tablinum erected against it originally a wooden shed, which This was open at the back in summer, but closed in winter by a partition. The tablinum was used as the master's office. In later times a garden, surrounded. by side buildings and covered colonnades, was added at the back of the house. This was called peristylium, and was, as the name and the whole plan of it shows, an imitation of the Greek arrangement. The dining rooms, sleeping apartments, and living rooms (triclinium, cubiculum, dioeta) were transferred into the side buildings, as were also the entertaining room (exedra) and the hall (oecus), and above all the storerooms, hearth, and kitchen. The private chapel (sacrarium or lararium, see LARES) was also generally situated in the peristylium. The entrance into this from the atrium was through corridors (fauces) situated near the tablinum. The atrium now served merely as a state reception-room. It was splendidly decorated with pillars and other ornaments, and had a table (curtibulum) in the middle to represent the hearth. If the roof was simply supported on beams, the atrium was called tuscanicum (fig. 3); if the compluvium was supported on four columns, tetrastylum; if the roof-beams were let into the wall on one side, and supported on a column apiece on the other, it was styled corinthium. Great houses, like temples and large tombs, generally had a kind of entrance-hall or vestibalum [ve, stabulum, or an outside standing-place], raised above the street and approached by steps. This space was often adorned with arms taken in war, statues, colonnades, and flower-beds. It was here that visitors assembled for morning calls. In ordinary houses there was either no vestibulum or only an indication of one, effected by throwing the door a few steps back into the house. The door opened outwards, and generally consisted of two wings; but sometimes, if the entrance was a wide one, of several folds. It did not move on hinges, but on pegs let into the threshold above and below. The door led immediately into the ostium, a space opening directly into the atrium. At the side of the ostium was the room of the doorkeeper (ianitor,) with other rooms, which were sometimes let out as shops. The Roman house was originally calculated only for one story, but in course of time a second story became usual. As the dining-room was generally in this part of the house, all the rooms in the upper story were called cenacula. The upper story was approached by steps in the form of a ladder, and was lighted by openings which could be closed by shutters. Some of these windows were pierced in the outer wall, and some in the inner wall, carried round the roofs of the atrium and peristylium. There were three-storied houses in Rome as early as the end of the Republic. The upper stories were let to tenants, and as early as the time of Augustus it was found necessary to limit the height of the street frontage to 70 Roman feet, a maximum which was afterwards lowered to 60 feet. The roof was of tiles, and sometimes pointed and sloping on the four sides, sometimes flat, in which case it was often ornamented with flowering plants and shrubs. A flat roof of this sort was called solarium. The ancients heated their houses by means of portable fireplaces, braziers, and sometimes stoves. The Romans in the north of Italy, Gaul, and Germany used hot air for the purpose. (See BATHS.) Large lodging-houses were found both in Greek and Roman cities, the Greek name for such a house being synoikia and the Latin name insula.
 
ALA 82.80%

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A back room in a Roman house. See HOUSE.
 
PUTEUS 81.22%

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The fountain in a Roman house. (See HOUSE.)
 
HYPEROON 81.17%

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The upper story of a Greek house. (See HOUSE.)
 
ANDRONITIS 70.23%

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The men's apartments in a Greek house. See HOUSE.
 
VESTIBULUM 60.71%

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An entrance-court before a Roman house. (see HOUSE.)
 
TABERNA 49.08%

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a shop (see HOUSE);
 
THALAMUS 43.91%

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The Greek term for a commodious room in a house, and especially the nuptial chamber. (See HOUSE.)
 
SACRARIUM 40.12%

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The domestic chapel. (See HOUSE, Roman)
 
TABLINUM 36.92%

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A room in a Roman dwelling-house. (See HOUSE.)
 
CUBICULUM 36.57%

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A bed-chamber. See HOUSE.
 
SYNOECIA 36.36%
The Greek name for a lodging house which held several families.
 
ATRIUM 31.88%

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The original name for a Roman house, the interior of which consisted of a single chamber open at the front. Afterwards the term was applied to the large hall which extended along the whole breadth of the house, and was lighted by an opening in the roof. The atrium was entered by the floor of the house, and the other chambers were attached to it. (See HOUSE.) Other buildings, sacred or profane, possessing halls of this kind with dwelling-rooms attached, were known by the name of atria, from the resemblance of their form to that of an ordinary house. The Atrium Vestoe, or abode of the Vestal Virgins, is an example of a consecrated atrium. The Atrium Libertatis was secular. This was the official residence of the censor, and it was here that Asinius Pollio established the first public library known to have existed at Rome. Auction-rooms were also called atria, and halls of this description were often attached to temples, and used for the meetings and festivals of societies.
 
OSTIUM 31.55%

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The entrance hall in the Roman dwelling-house. (See HOUSE.)
 
OECUS 31.50%

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The dining-room of a Roman dwelling-house. (See HOUSE.)
 
AMPHITHALAMOS 29.18%

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A bedroom in a Greek dwelling-house. See HOUSE.
 
ELECTRA 27.84%
One of the Pleiades, the mother (by Zeus) of Dardanus, ancestor of the royal house of Troy.
 
SOLARIUM 22.24%

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A sundial (see GNOMON); also the flat roof of the Roman dwelling-house (see HOUSE, 2).
 
IMPLUVIUM 21.56%

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A depression in the floor of the Roman atrium made for the, purpose of receiving the rain which came in through the open roof. (See HOUSE.)
 
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