This villa has the most complex, richest and largest collection of Roman mosaics. It’s so impressive that everything you see after you will think “What is that?”
The patrician Villa Romana del Casale lies just a few kilometers outside of Piazza Armerina, already a nice and historic town.
Me and my friends arrived on a rainy day but like nearly all days in Sicily this winter it stopped right the moment we wanted to visit a site.
There is a little cafeteria with a kind of souvenir shop. The entrance to the villa complex has a gate and a box office. The entry was 10 €.
The UNESCO World Heritage Site villa was constructed on a pre-existing villa in the 4th century. It was the heart of a huge agriculture estate, a so called latifundium. The villa itself maybe was left less than a 150 years later and a small village grew around. The villa was destroyed or at least significantly damaged by the invasion of the Vandals and Visigoths.
In the 12th century there was a devastating landslip that covered the villa. People surviving the movement of earth moved to the nearby hill Piazza Armerina.
Nearly completely covered by earth the area was used for agriculture (imagine you grow your crops on Roman mosaics! Precious crops!). Of course they knew something would be underneath their fields as some of the tallest parts still were visible. But only in the 19th century some pieces of mosaics and columns were found. In the end of the century finally someone started an archeological excavation.
The last excavation was done in the fifties and sixties. This period a cover was built over the area in order to protect the mosaics.
The Sicilian hinterland had a lot of agriculture estates used by Roman patricians. They were called latifundia (sing=latifundium). The Villa Romana del Casale was such a latifundia and because of its size and richness it must have been an important one. It could be by a senator or even by the ruling, imperial family.
It seems to be very clear that the villa was only for private use. It has a lot of private rooms, some for official purposes and a few that are not clear wherefore. Here was the administrative center, where the patron lives and direct works of the lands. Until now they have not found any slaves’ home, stables, workshops and similar.
Nearly all the floors are covered by amazing mosaics. They built walkways on higher points so visitors can have a perfect look on these amazing floors and see the whole beauty.
The covered area is huge and it takes a lot of time to go and see all. We spent there a little more than two hours. Little information boards explain in Italian and English what you look at, which room probably it would have been, why they chose that kind of depiction and what it means.
The single-story construction was built around a peristyle around which all rooms where organized. There is even a huge basilica!
From all the mosaics maybe the ‘Bikini Girls’ are the most impressive for me (and maybe everyone). No one expects to see such an early bikini depiction. Young women playing ball, lifting weights, running and doing varies sports. A kind of female Olympics in private?
The marbled floor of the church is beautiful even if not anymore complete.
I was very impressed by the mosaics. But I was also very moved by the waving floors. It seems someone had took the carpet and is waving it.. like for throwing dust and dirt away. Gave me a strange feeling..
The walls seem to be painted once. So all in all I think it was a super rich and also joyful house. The base of the construction is unusual and not comparable with ‘normal’ Roman villas, also it seems to be built all in once and not in more stages. So maybe the house was designed by a woman’s wish or the owner had a different and unusual way to see things, was out of ‘normality’. Would have been my guy.. with such a villa. Oh YES!
And here are some more photos of the Villa del Casale in Piazza Armerina. The mosaics are so beautiful and it’s impossible to get all of them if you don’t stay a whole day there. Enjoy!
Piazza Armerina, Sicily/Italy:
For further information:
Website about Sicily
Villa Romana del Casale
