TEMPLE OF APOLLO - POMPEII

We know for certain that this temple was consecrated to Apollo thanks to the dedication in Oscan by quaestor Oppius Campanus that was found in the cell. One enters the scared area from Via Marina through a tuff portal from the Samnite period. Interestingly, the view of this sacred building is blocked by the central column of the portico’s short side, which suggests that the main entrance was once directly from the Forum. This hypothesis is confirmed by the fact the main facade of the altar at the bottom of the temple steps faces the Forum. The sacred area is surrounded by a portico with 48 Doric columns, in the centre of which, on a podium in the Italic style, is the actual temple. The cell originally contained a statue of a divinity (not found) and a rock of carved tuff representing the world’s navel, modelled on the one located in the famous sanctuary of Apollo in Delphi. At the bottom of the temple is an altar in Greek Marble dedicated shortly after 80 A.C. by Marcus Portius, Lucius Sestilius, Cneus Cornelius and Aulus Cornelius, quattuorviri of Pompeii.

At the top of the Ionic column to the left of the stairway there once was a meridian (sun dial), which the duumviri Lucius Sepunius Sandilianus and Marcus Erennius Epidianus commissioned. The two bronze statues inside the sacred precincts (Apollo with Bow to the right and Diana to the left) are copies of the originals (now in the National Museum of Naples) and datable to the late Hellenistic period. The temple of Apollo was also being restored at the time of the eruption. It is one of the oldest temples in the city, Apollo being the main divinity in early Pompeii.

 

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This large building (approx. 2,700 sq.m.) was created by joining two residential complexes which covered an area nearly equal to that of the whole insula.
The house can be entered both from Via dell’Abbondanza and from Via Stabiana. It is arranged around two atria and three peristyle, and its name derives from a bronze statue of Apollo playing the lyre (today in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples).
Magnificent paintings and bronze portraits of famous personalities also found in it and are now on shown in the same museum.
As is inferred from electoral propaganda and a number of graffiti, it belonged to the Popidius family.

• 800 g – 1 kg veal
• 2 tblsp honey
• 2 tblsp vinegar
• 100 ml oil
• 100 ml Liquamen (or 100 ml white wine + 1 tsp salt)
• Pepper
• Privet
• Cumin
• Celery seeds to taste
• a little bit of cornstarch

Instructions:
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Cook the veal for about 1 1/2 hour until well done. Mix together honey, vinegar, oil, liquamen and spices in an extra pan. Boil the sauce only shortly and thicken it with cornstarch. Then pour sauce over the veal and let boil on low heat for another 10 minutes. ... continue

Love was a common topic of conversation in Pompeii. Feelings, passions, poetic love, sex, homosexuality, prostitution and so forth were all part of daily life and not a source of prejudice. The concept of “obscenity” seems to have been unknown. Love and sex were considered earthly practices of a man’s life that were encouraged by the benevolence of Venus. The thousands of examples of graffiti found on the town’s walls are unequivocal proof of what the people of Pompeii thought about love and sex.