GEOMETRIC FRESCO, C. 200 CE. DOMUS UNDER S. MARIA MAGGIORE During the Severan period, the large courtyard of the domus of the Painted Calendar under S. Maria Maggiore was divided and an independent room was built in it. Its interior walls were decorated with marble panels, as is evident from the holes and metal pegs that remain, but the exterior was painted with geometric designs in red, yellow, and white, with a sort of op art effect of square piers as seen from above, each square diagonally attached to the background with false perspective. This is a pattern that we find in floor mosaics, especially in borders and frames, but never in fresco and never at the turn of the C3. The corner of the room interrupts this pattern, and around the corner the wall is frescoed in squares that form diamond designs.

#FrescoFriday takes us back under #SantaMariaMaggiore on the #Cispian peak of the #Esquiline in #Rome, into the #domus of the Painted Calendar, where this unusual and striking #geometric #fresco once decorated the exterior of a room built in the middle of a preexisting courtyard.