Casa di Orfeo, Pompeii
(above) Orpheus sitting in front of a cave leading to the underworld, enchanting the animals with the sound of his lyre.
(right) Detail showing jagged stones signifying the cave entrance to Elysium (paradise)
A similar jagged stone motif appears all round the upper edge of a wall-painting depicting a paradise garden in the Villa di Livia Drusilla-Augusto, located near Rome at Prima Porta.
The room in which the wall-painting was found was partially sunken and is thought to have been used as a summer triclinium, designed to look and feel like an enchanting cool grotto, the ceiling of which contained emblematic references to the gods.
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