DECORATION

Just as the range of materials found on individual bars varies, so too does the way mediante which they were displayed. In general, the caffe counters at Pompeii and Herculaneum are built of masonry, typically fairly rough opus incertum, though wood counters are also attested (Ellis, Reference Ellis 2004c: 41; Reference Ellis 2005: 48). They were then covered in a range of surface treatments, of which marble-cladding was just one option. Plaster was used more widely. Almost all of the well-preserved counters at Pompeii have traces of plaster on their interior faces, while Ellis has noted that 85 were also plastered on their exterior faces (Ellis, Reference Ellis 2005: 49). This plaster was usually painted, a simple red wash being the most popular choice (Kleberg, Reference Kleberg 1957: 116–17; Packer, Reference Packer 1978: 45–7). Painted motifs and figured scenes are attested on the bars at I.6.5, VI.–33 and IX.6.b, while seven counters were decorated with painted imitation : 49; on ).

These panels easily could have been lifted whole from celibe floors

Marble-cladding, when it was used, usually was employed alongside these other surface coverings. Painted plaster, mediante fact, is found on most of the vertical faces of the marble-clad bars. Only nineteen of the 73 bars on which marble is attested had their exterior faces marble-clad. This is perhaps because applying marble panels puro per vertical surface is more difficult than laying them on per horizontal one. Sometimes these vertical faces were painted esatto imitate the marble of the counter-tops, as at VI.1.2, VI. and IX.9.1, but mixage of media also occurred on the same face: at I.–11 verso solo panel of coloured marble was inserted into an otherwise fully-painted scheme (Jashemski, Reference Jashemski 1973: 40). The correlative costs of these different surface treatments can only be guessed. Per simple layer of plaster was probably cheaper than painted plaster, and painted plaster was probably cheaper than marble-cladding, though if expensive pigments were used this might not necessarily have been so. Footnote 12 What is clear, however, is that the deployment of marble-cladding was generally judicious and sparing rather than wholesale. As per result, interior walls, seen only by service personnel, were never marble-ized. While marble is sometimes found elsewhere mediante the bars – on verso niche durante IX.7.24–25 at Pompeii or on the floor of V.9–10 at Herculaneum -, but these instances are rare and marble usually was saved for the counters.

Marble-cladding could have been applied by professionals or amateurs. The haphazard arrangements found on most bars suggest amateurs, but even on these efforts were made sicuro locate panels with straight sides along the edges of counter-tops and faces. On other bars, regular panels were lined up along the punto of the vertical faces puro create per baseboard; grey slates was used for this at IV.15 mediante Herculaneum. On nine bars at Pompeii, however, per more ornate arrangement is apparent, and sopra these cases it is tempting to identify the hands of specialist decorators. Simple schemes are found on the counters at I.9.4 (though it is very damaged) and IX.7.24–25 (see Fig. 5), where the face is carefully covered with alternating rectangular panels above a baseboard.

On seven counters at Pompeii even more ambitious designs, echoing contemporary patterns mediante opus sectile flooring, were attempted. Interestingly, on only one of these, at I.9.11, was attention paid preciso its counter-primo posto, durante this case comprising per row of opus sectile hexagons framed by rectangular slabs. Efforts were instead lavished on exterior vertical faces. On three counters, the face was divided into horizontal zones of decoration. At V.4.6–8 rows of rectangular slabs of white and grey anche verso central bidonville of diamond and triangular polychrome opus sectile, Guidobaldi’s Q2 pattern, bordered by narrow fillets (Fig. 9) (Guidobaldi, Reference Guidobaldi and Pensabene 1985: 182–6). At I.11.1 verso lower baseboard of rectangular slabs is surmounted by a central zone of diamond opus sectile panels set within squares (Guidobaldi’s Q2 pattern), on top of which is verso row of square and diamond panels. A less ornate but carefully structured scheme was employed for the counter at VI .10.1/19, on which the large rectangular panel of granito della sgabello di San Lorenzo discussed above is set into a series of horizontal rows of rectangular panels and alongside a large opus sectile diamond durante nero (Fig. 10).