| Picture shows the fresco of Villa San Marco - "Scene with a construction site". This rectangular panel depicts a construction site with a number of miniature figures.
In the centre is a great colonnaded building. To the right, there are labourers building a wall with square blocks. They are unloading the blocks from an oxen-drawn cart. The other labourers are lifting loads, chiselling stone blocks, plastering a fa?ade, transporting materials and breaking up stone blocks with mallets, etc. They are using scaffolding in the centre of the panel to load the blocks to the top. To the far right in the background, a temple can be seen. The unique genre depicted in this fresco provides a complete construction scene for viewers to understand the building methods of the time.
This fresco is from the calidarium, a hot bath of Villa San Marco. The bath was heated by a large bronze cauldron placed in the center of the pool. The bronze cauldron was used to heat water whose vapours warmed the environment. Villa San Marco, with a total surface area of more than 11,000 square metres, is one of the largest of the seaside villas of ancient Campania.
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