The walls of elite Roman houses were often covered with fresco paintings whose designs ranged from imitation colored marbles and architectural vistas to landscapes and mythological stories. These two panels, once contiguous, were part of the decoration of a room that opened off a colonnaded courtyard, or peristyle, in the seaside Villa at Fondo Bottaro about half a mile south of Pompeii, which was buried and preserved in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius on August 24, A.D. 79. The MFA's collection also includes sections of wall painting from the peristyle and other rooms of the house, as well as additional elements of the domestic décor (see p. 168).

The panels illustrated here, whose polished black pigment was produced from charcoal or soot, exemplify what is commonly known as the third style of Roman wall painting, characterized by whimsical simulated architecture and isolated figures and motifs floating against large expanses of a single color. Extremely popular in the early Imperial period, paintings similar to these also adorned the walls of a villa associated with the family of Augustus, Rome's first emperor.

On the left panel, a tragic mask hangs from a doorway, indicating an interest in illusion and the theater. The right panel features a golden tripod supporting a structure topped by an elongated drinking cup (kylix) and a basket (liknon) containing a phallus wrapped in cloth. An ibis, an Egyptian bird, crosses a lace-like architrave of lotus and palmette design, reflecting the Roman fascination with the Nile region after the death of Cleopatra in 30 B.C. This subtle political, religious, and social imagery relates to the interests and beliefs of the master of the house and suggests how domestic decoration expressed personal identity and status.

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