0:00:04 > 0:00:08I'm continuing my quest to change the way we view ancient Rome.
0:00:11 > 0:00:14The collapse of the republic shortly before the birth of Christ
0:00:14 > 0:00:17unleashed a new era of imperial magnificence.
0:00:18 > 0:00:21Rome's empire was built on the might of its legions
0:00:21 > 0:00:22and genius of its engineers.
0:00:22 > 0:00:24We all know that.
0:00:24 > 0:00:26But there was something else equally important.
0:00:26 > 0:00:28The power of art.
0:00:28 > 0:00:32And you can't understand the history of Rome until you understand its monuments.
0:00:32 > 0:00:34Like Trajan's Column.
0:00:37 > 0:00:40Emperors like Trajan were the masters of this new type
0:00:40 > 0:00:43of strident, declamatory art.
0:00:44 > 0:00:50They transformed their public monuments into big, brash billboards,
0:00:50 > 0:00:52boasting of their conquests.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00But there was another side to Roman art,
0:01:00 > 0:01:02the private world of the emperors
0:01:02 > 0:01:06who collected art overflowing with mythological fantasy,
0:01:06 > 0:01:11unimaginable cruelty and red-hot eroticism.
0:01:11 > 0:01:17For all of those mad, bad and dangerous emperors of the first century AD,
0:01:17 > 0:01:19people like Caligula and Nero, art of the highest quality
0:01:19 > 0:01:23offered a backcloth for their hedonistic debauchery.
0:01:26 > 0:01:28To the modern eye, much of what we'll see is shocking and
0:01:28 > 0:01:33depraved, and it tells us much about the emperors and their many vices.
0:01:35 > 0:01:39By dropping in on the emperors at home in their lost
0:01:39 > 0:01:43pleasure palaces, we'll see how art dominated their lives.
0:01:44 > 0:01:49"History" always gives the wrong sense of the word - something in the past that's done and dusted.
0:01:49 > 0:01:54But it's not - it's a beautiful unfolding story that's continuing.
0:02:00 > 0:02:04This was an era of exuberance and of great artistic triumphs.
0:02:04 > 0:02:10And one man presided over a cultural golden age that crystallised
0:02:10 > 0:02:13the look of the Roman empire at its zenith for ever more.
0:02:13 > 0:02:15The emperor Hadrian.
0:02:47 > 0:02:48The first emperor, Augustus,
0:02:48 > 0:02:53had brought peace and prosperity to Rome after years of civil war.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57He also killed off the republic and replaced it with a new
0:02:57 > 0:03:01political and artistic vision for an imperial future.
0:03:06 > 0:03:09The big question was what would happen after his death.
0:03:09 > 0:03:13It's something Augustus had planned for.
0:03:15 > 0:03:17This is the Maison Carree,
0:03:17 > 0:03:20it's one of the best-preserved Roman temples anywhere in the world.
0:03:20 > 0:03:24And it was dedicated to Augustus's grandsons,
0:03:24 > 0:03:27Gaius and Lucius Caesar, who'd been anointed as his heirs,
0:03:27 > 0:03:31but they died early, long before he did.
0:03:31 > 0:03:34And you can see it's a stunning building in its own right.
0:03:34 > 0:03:38But, despite its splendour, it isn't anywhere near Rome.
0:03:38 > 0:03:43In fact, this was built in Nimes, in the south of France.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48Just imagine the kind of message that buildings like this must
0:03:48 > 0:03:51have sent out to the people who lived in Roman colonies.
0:03:51 > 0:03:56The Maison Carree is a gleaming marble-clad vision of the future.
0:03:56 > 0:04:00All sorts of details of it proclaim a new era of peace
0:04:00 > 0:04:05and prosperity, like these abundantly carved Corinthian capitals
0:04:05 > 0:04:07you can see at the tops of the columns.
0:04:07 > 0:04:11And their lush acanthus foliage you can see scrolling right round the temples,
0:04:11 > 0:04:13sumptuous and very crisp, frieze.
0:04:16 > 0:04:19The temple was also the beginning of something new,
0:04:19 > 0:04:22because above the entrance, you had the names of members
0:04:22 > 0:04:26of Augustus's family, emblazoned in big bronze letters, and today
0:04:26 > 0:04:30you can still see the holes where those letters were attached.
0:04:30 > 0:04:32So the Maison Carree was the beginning of what would
0:04:32 > 0:04:36become essentially a cult that spread right across the empire
0:04:36 > 0:04:37with astonishing speed -
0:04:37 > 0:04:41honouring and celebrating the emperor and his dynasty.
0:04:43 > 0:04:47After the death of Augustus in AD 14, temples like this
0:04:47 > 0:04:52were decorated with statues of emperors as gods.
0:04:52 > 0:04:56Augustus himself was deified by the senate
0:04:56 > 0:04:59and depicted as the most important god of them all, Jupiter.
0:04:59 > 0:05:01It was the start of an imperial cult
0:05:01 > 0:05:05which played an important role in uniting the empire
0:05:05 > 0:05:08that sprawled all the way across three continents, from Gaul
0:05:08 > 0:05:13in the north, to Asia Minor in the east, and Egypt in the south.
0:05:16 > 0:05:20Augustus had created the Julio-Claudian dynasty.
0:05:20 > 0:05:23Everything now depended on his successors,
0:05:23 > 0:05:28starting with his adopted son, Tiberius, Rome's second emperor.
0:05:28 > 0:05:34When we think of Roman art, most of us think of galleries of busts and sculptures.
0:05:34 > 0:05:36But in the late republic, in the early empire,
0:05:36 > 0:05:40there was another art form which was very exquisite and prized,
0:05:40 > 0:05:43actually more highly by the Romans themselves,
0:05:43 > 0:05:46which was the carving of gemstones, semiprecious stones.
0:05:46 > 0:05:49And there's a piece here in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris,
0:05:49 > 0:05:53which is the biggest gem to have survived from antiquity,
0:05:53 > 0:05:54and this is it.
0:05:54 > 0:05:57It's known as the great cameo of France.
0:05:57 > 0:05:59And as you can see, it is ginormous.
0:06:06 > 0:06:11It's made of an Indian stone called sardonyx.
0:06:11 > 0:06:14This is a layered semiprecious stone.
0:06:14 > 0:06:16And this is a cameo, which means it's been carved in relief,
0:06:16 > 0:06:20so the artist who's created it
0:06:20 > 0:06:23has taken advantage of the different colours of the layers of the stone
0:06:23 > 0:06:27to achieve the effect of the brightness of the figures in the foreground,
0:06:27 > 0:06:29versus the darkness of the background.
0:06:29 > 0:06:33And there's a great deal of subtlety in-between as well.
0:06:33 > 0:06:35And this piece shows in the centre
0:06:35 > 0:06:39the emperor Tiberius enthroned as Jupiter.
0:06:39 > 0:06:42Above him you can see his ancestors, there's Augustus,
0:06:42 > 0:06:46veiled with a crown, being taken up towards the gods.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49And beneath him you see a bunch of barbarians huddled together,
0:06:49 > 0:06:54so there's a very clear demarcation between the enemy beneath,
0:06:54 > 0:06:56the Roman court in the middle,
0:06:56 > 0:06:59and their proximity to the world of the gods up above.
0:07:02 > 0:07:05We know quite a lot about Tiberius
0:07:05 > 0:07:09and the other 11 of the first 12 Caesars from this.
0:07:09 > 0:07:14This is Suetonius. My granny first recommended this book to me,
0:07:14 > 0:07:17she loves it, and I always find that quite amusing
0:07:17 > 0:07:19because when you read it, it's so compelling
0:07:19 > 0:07:22because it feels like a red-top expose of these different Caesars.
0:07:22 > 0:07:24It's, to be honest, completely scabrous,
0:07:24 > 0:07:26scandal-filled, salacious filth.
0:07:26 > 0:07:30And we hear a little more about the kind of man that Tiberius was.
0:07:30 > 0:07:33He was quite cruel, he was very cruel.
0:07:33 > 0:07:36He was quite superior and proud, saturnine.
0:07:36 > 0:07:38He wasn't the most affable person.
0:07:38 > 0:07:41He had a load of pimples.
0:07:41 > 0:07:45Next to Tiberius, as well, you can see his mother Livia.
0:07:45 > 0:07:47Supposedly he quarrelled openly with Livia.
0:07:47 > 0:07:50And, in fact, their quarrels were so intense and
0:07:50 > 0:07:54he was so upset by her overbearing presence in the politics of Rome,
0:07:54 > 0:07:58that eventually he left the city altogether
0:07:58 > 0:08:00and retired to a pleasure palace.
0:08:00 > 0:08:03So this vision of domestic harmony and bliss
0:08:03 > 0:08:05is really a far cry from the truth.
0:08:08 > 0:08:10During the early years of the empire
0:08:10 > 0:08:13cameo carving enjoyed a boom
0:08:13 > 0:08:16and cameos were among Rome's most prized artistic treasures.
0:08:18 > 0:08:22The artists were bigger names than sculptors and painters.
0:08:22 > 0:08:25Ciro Accanito is a modern-day cameo carver.
0:09:06 > 0:09:10There was another side to Tiberius's taste in art,
0:09:10 > 0:09:14which we can revel in at a very special private place
0:09:14 > 0:09:17where he came to get away from his domineering mother.
0:09:18 > 0:09:22Anyone who assumes that Roman art is the stuff of
0:09:22 > 0:09:25monochromatic marbles in boring old stuffy museums
0:09:25 > 0:09:28needs to come here to this spectacular place, Sperlonga,
0:09:28 > 0:09:32which is 60 miles south of Rome, on the coast.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35And it was once the setting for this luxurious seaside villa,
0:09:35 > 0:09:40where Tiberius used to come, and retreat from public life.
0:09:40 > 0:09:44And back in the '50s there was an amazing archaeological discovery
0:09:44 > 0:09:48in a grotto just over there, which yields so much insight into how art
0:09:48 > 0:09:52was actually viewed by the Romans themselves. Rather than seeing
0:09:52 > 0:09:56the pieces in museums, this place is all about the context of the art.
0:10:00 > 0:10:03The centrepiece of Tiberius's villa here at Sperlonga
0:10:03 > 0:10:07was this craggy grotto where Tiberius hosted what must have been
0:10:07 > 0:10:10these breathtaking dinner parties, banquets.
0:10:10 > 0:10:14Imagine how spectacular they must have been with the sea crashing outside,
0:10:14 > 0:10:18and in here, a bunch of cosmopolitan guests, stuffing their faces.
0:10:21 > 0:10:23And it's a famous location, this,
0:10:23 > 0:10:26because Tiberius was almost killed here in this cave,
0:10:26 > 0:10:28when there was a rock fall.
0:10:28 > 0:10:31In fact, the story gets another outing in good old Suetonius,
0:10:31 > 0:10:35who talks about Tiberius's dinner party here at the cavern -
0:10:35 > 0:10:37"spelunca" in Latin -
0:10:37 > 0:10:39when some huge rocks fell from the roof,
0:10:39 > 0:10:41killed several guests in attendance close to him
0:10:41 > 0:10:43and he miraculously survived.
0:10:43 > 0:10:45And I imagine that many of those guests would have been a bit
0:10:45 > 0:10:48disappointed that he did survive because, by all accounts,
0:10:48 > 0:10:54Tiberius was a very dour, cruel-hearted, cold-blooded emperor.
0:10:55 > 0:10:58Supposedly one of Tiberius's ways to get off
0:10:58 > 0:11:03was that he trained little boys, whom he called his minnows - brilliant detail -
0:11:03 > 0:11:05to chase him while he went swimming
0:11:05 > 0:11:07and get between his legs to lick and nibble him.
0:11:07 > 0:11:11Each to his own, I guess! But the important point for us,
0:11:11 > 0:11:14aside from all of the colour in Suetonius,
0:11:14 > 0:11:18is that this cavern was an art gallery as well as a social space,
0:11:18 > 0:11:21and it shows how art was used socially.
0:11:38 > 0:11:39Back in the '50s
0:11:39 > 0:11:43they salvaged around 7,000 scraps of marble statuary
0:11:43 > 0:11:45whilst they were excavating Tiberius's cavern.
0:11:45 > 0:11:48And the most important have been meticulously reassembled
0:11:48 > 0:11:52here in the museum at the site, alongside these colossal
0:11:52 > 0:11:56recreations of the sculptural centrepieces of the grotto.
0:11:56 > 0:12:00And this is a piece known as the Blinding Of Polyphemus.
0:12:00 > 0:12:03It presents a scene from The Odyssey, in which Odysseus and his followers
0:12:03 > 0:12:07have become trapped in the cave of the Cyclops Polyphemus,
0:12:07 > 0:12:09who's started eating some of the followers.
0:12:09 > 0:12:11He had a couple for dinner one night,
0:12:11 > 0:12:13next morning he ate a couple more for breakfast.
0:12:13 > 0:12:15Understandably, Odysseus wants to leave.
0:12:15 > 0:12:19So he hatches a cunning plan, which is to get the Cyclops drunk,
0:12:19 > 0:12:23so you can see one of Odysseus' followers is carrying a leather wine skin.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27Polyphemus himself has been drinking a load of wine in his wine bowl,
0:12:27 > 0:12:32and it's just slipped from his fingers and he falls back in a drunken stupor on this rock,
0:12:32 > 0:12:36with his single Cyclops eye closed, ready to be blinded
0:12:36 > 0:12:39as Odysseus, with great drama, frenzy on his face,
0:12:39 > 0:12:42commands his followers to pick up a burning stake
0:12:42 > 0:12:45and shove it right into Polyphemus's eye.
0:12:46 > 0:12:49What a wonderfully ironic piece to have
0:12:49 > 0:12:52for the middle of a banquet setting in a cavern.
0:12:52 > 0:12:53You can't help but speculate
0:12:53 > 0:12:56that some of the guests who were in the cavern in real life
0:12:56 > 0:12:58would have looked at this group and thought,
0:12:58 > 0:13:03"I'd really like to stick a stake of my own, right into Tiberius's eyes."
0:13:07 > 0:13:12One person who wouldn't have been welcome at one of his raunchy cave parties was his mother Livia.
0:13:13 > 0:13:16She had a villa of her own at Prima Porta near Rome.
0:13:16 > 0:13:21Her taste was somewhat more refined than her son's.
0:13:44 > 0:13:46I really feel that this is one of the gentlest
0:13:46 > 0:13:52and most beautiful works of art to have survived from the Roman world.
0:13:52 > 0:13:56And it's extraordinary to think it was painted 2,000 years ago
0:13:56 > 0:14:01for a windowless room, a triclinium or dining room in the house of Livia
0:14:01 > 0:14:05which would have been used as a refuge from the summer heat.
0:14:05 > 0:14:09And what you see is this magical, transporting woodland fantasy.
0:14:09 > 0:14:16Oaks and laurels and pomegranates and quinces and cypresses, date palms.
0:14:16 > 0:14:19There are poppies, there are cabbage roses.
0:14:19 > 0:14:22And replete with all of these exotic songbirds
0:14:22 > 0:14:25which are luminescent in the foliage.
0:14:25 > 0:14:29And the whole thing's been suffused with this beautiful greeny-blue,
0:14:29 > 0:14:33murky, magical early-morning mist so that the trees in the foreground
0:14:33 > 0:14:37are so sharp you could practically lean over these fences
0:14:37 > 0:14:40and pluck the fruit off the bough and take a bite.
0:14:40 > 0:14:43But in the distance, it's much more shadowy and indistinct,
0:14:43 > 0:14:47which creates that sense of depth and a feeling of wellbeing, really.
0:14:47 > 0:14:49It makes you feel very happy and calm.
0:14:49 > 0:14:54I want to dive into this strange, magical fantasy land
0:14:54 > 0:14:56on the other side of the fence.
0:15:17 > 0:15:21Most of the paintings that survive from antiquity are frescoes.
0:15:21 > 0:15:24That's because they're literally part of the walls.
0:15:26 > 0:15:28The fresco is a technique
0:15:28 > 0:15:31in which you paint on the wall
0:15:31 > 0:15:35so for this we need to apply plaster made with sand and lime.
0:15:35 > 0:15:40And on the top of this layer we paint with the pigments
0:15:40 > 0:15:43mixed with water only.
0:15:43 > 0:15:47The pigment soaks into the pores of the plaster and hardens.
0:15:50 > 0:15:55Pigment mixed with wax is used to paint the fine details.
0:16:06 > 0:16:11I think the Romans were very natural painting.
0:16:11 > 0:16:15In the houses, to decorate on the walls is fantastic.
0:16:22 > 0:16:26Tiberius outlived his mother but by the time of his death,
0:16:26 > 0:16:31he'd withdrawn entirely into his own private world, with his minnows.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34He was succeeded in AD 37 by his great-nephew
0:16:34 > 0:16:38Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus,
0:16:38 > 0:16:40better known as Caligula.
0:16:40 > 0:16:43Probably the most scandalous Roman emperor of all.
0:16:45 > 0:16:47I've come to Lake Nemi just outside Rome,
0:16:47 > 0:16:50to investigate a story of depravity,
0:16:50 > 0:16:53modern-day tomb raiders, and a lost masterpiece.
0:16:53 > 0:16:57Caligula got his nickname because when he was growing up
0:16:57 > 0:16:59he spent a great deal of time with the Roman army.
0:16:59 > 0:17:03And he used to have this miniaturised soldier's uniform.
0:17:03 > 0:17:06The soldiers had standard-issue boots
0:17:06 > 0:17:08and the Latin word for boots is "caligae",
0:17:08 > 0:17:11and the diminutive is "caligula",
0:17:11 > 0:17:14so it was quite an affectionate, sweet name, really,
0:17:14 > 0:17:17quite endearing imagining this little boy in his soldier's outfit,
0:17:17 > 0:17:19trying to be one of the big boys.
0:17:19 > 0:17:23Of course it doesn't bear witness remotely
0:17:23 > 0:17:27to the extent of his cruelty and debauchery.
0:17:27 > 0:17:31And we get a very good sense of that from Suetonius.
0:17:31 > 0:17:36You know, we think that Berlusconi had these debauched bunga bunga parties,
0:17:36 > 0:17:40I tell you, he didn't have anything on these 1st century AD emperors.
0:17:40 > 0:17:43I mean, the section on Caligula goes on and on.
0:17:43 > 0:17:45Well, for one thing, when he was having dinner,
0:17:45 > 0:17:47he enjoyed breaking it up by having sex with his sisters,
0:17:47 > 0:17:49he was really into incest.
0:17:49 > 0:17:52All three of his sisters had to sleep with him at regular intervals.
0:17:52 > 0:17:55There was probably something actually wrong with him mentally.
0:17:55 > 0:17:58He really enjoyed watching people being executed in a very slow fashion.
0:17:58 > 0:18:05Apparently his familiar order, "Make him feel that he is dying," soon became proverbial.
0:18:09 > 0:18:13There's been a recent and exciting new twist in the story of Caligula.
0:18:13 > 0:18:18Tomb raiders struck gold, or rather marble, near the lake shore.
0:18:18 > 0:18:21Broken fragments of a rare statue of Caligula.
0:18:22 > 0:18:26The police arrested the thieves as they tried to smuggle the statue
0:18:26 > 0:18:29to Switzerland, en route for Japan.
0:18:31 > 0:18:35Their discovery confirms that Caligula did, in fact, have
0:18:35 > 0:18:37a palatial villa on Lake Nemi.
0:18:37 > 0:18:41The statue's now safely installed in the museum,
0:18:41 > 0:18:45next to replicas of two of Caligula's ships.
0:18:45 > 0:18:49The originals were salvaged from the lake in 1932,
0:18:49 > 0:18:50on the orders of Mussolini,
0:18:50 > 0:18:53only to be destroyed in a fire 12 years later.
0:18:55 > 0:18:57Say this had been sold on the black market,
0:18:57 > 0:18:59how much would it have fetched?
0:18:59 > 0:19:05We don't know for sure, that kind of sculpture have a lot of appeal
0:19:05 > 0:19:09so it's a thousand, over a million maybe.
0:19:09 > 0:19:11A million euros?
0:19:11 > 0:19:15- Yes.- But it's so weathered and it's so fragmentary.
0:19:15 > 0:19:17The antique market is like this, you know.
0:19:17 > 0:19:21How excited did you feel? I mean, this must be quite a rare discovery.
0:19:21 > 0:19:23SHE SPEAKS ITALIAN
0:20:22 > 0:20:25To me there's a contradiction that someone as debased as Caligula
0:20:25 > 0:20:28could represent himself as a god.
0:20:28 > 0:20:32It's a paradox that runs right through Roman art and society.
0:20:32 > 0:20:35On the one hand Rome is the last word in ancient civilisation,
0:20:35 > 0:20:38but at the same time it had a shocking blood lust
0:20:38 > 0:20:42and taste for cruelty that's played out in the artistic arena.
0:20:44 > 0:20:48This is one of my favourite works that survived from antiquity.
0:20:48 > 0:20:51It's the sculpture of what's called the Hanging Marsyas,
0:20:51 > 0:20:54and Marsyas was a character from ancient myth.
0:20:54 > 0:20:57He was a satyr who played the pan pipes,
0:20:57 > 0:21:00and he challenged the god Apollo, who played a lyre,
0:21:00 > 0:21:01to a musical contest,
0:21:01 > 0:21:05and obviously that was a contest he was doomed to lose.
0:21:05 > 0:21:07And as a result Apollo condemned him
0:21:07 > 0:21:10to be executed for the temerity of challenging him
0:21:10 > 0:21:14to this contest in the first place, by being flayed alive.
0:21:14 > 0:21:16So here he is, his feet tied together,
0:21:16 > 0:21:19possibly his shoulders have already been dislocated,
0:21:19 > 0:21:23he's strung up, and we know about the Hanging Marsyas because
0:21:23 > 0:21:27about 60 copies of the sculpture from the Roman world have survived.
0:21:27 > 0:21:29This one is particularly grizzly,
0:21:29 > 0:21:33because the marble that was used to carve it
0:21:33 > 0:21:36is known as pavonazzetto, it's a red streaked marble,
0:21:36 > 0:21:40you can see there's a violet crimson-ish tinge to the stone
0:21:40 > 0:21:43which in a way prefigures the punishments about to be enacted.
0:21:43 > 0:21:47All of the blood and guts and sinews and veins that would have been seen
0:21:47 > 0:21:51after the executioner started flaying Marsyas alive
0:21:51 > 0:21:54is there already in that red sheen to the stone. It's very gruesome.
0:21:54 > 0:21:57This particular one was discovered in a garden in Rome,
0:21:57 > 0:22:01gardens belonging to a very wealthy man called Maecenas
0:22:01 > 0:22:03who was the patron of the poet Virgil.
0:22:03 > 0:22:06And, in a sense, the Hanging Marsyas gets right to the heart
0:22:06 > 0:22:09of Roman art, because it illustrates the whole conundrum about it.
0:22:09 > 0:22:13How could such a gruesome scene of punishment
0:22:13 > 0:22:15produce pleasure for the Romans,
0:22:15 > 0:22:18so that they would have things like this hanging up in their gardens?
0:22:29 > 0:22:32Another stunning example of the Romans' love of violence
0:22:32 > 0:22:38is the Farnese Bull, which was found in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome.
0:22:38 > 0:22:42Astonishingly carved out of a single piece of marble,
0:22:42 > 0:22:46it shows the punishment of Dirce, a character from Greek mythology
0:22:46 > 0:22:51as she's tied to the horns of a bull, then gored to death.
0:22:51 > 0:22:55Just what you want from a piece of public art.
0:22:55 > 0:22:58Cruelty was one side of the coin,
0:22:58 > 0:23:02on the other was no-holds-barred debauchery.
0:23:02 > 0:23:05This can be seen in one of the most controversial works
0:23:05 > 0:23:07to have survived from ancient Rome.
0:23:12 > 0:23:16So if ever you doubted that the past can be a foreign country,
0:23:16 > 0:23:18then the Warren Cup provides the proof.
0:23:18 > 0:23:21It's a silver wine goblet,
0:23:21 > 0:23:25and it's very distinctive because it's decorated with these two scenes,
0:23:25 > 0:23:29really quite raunchy scenes celebrating gay sex.
0:23:29 > 0:23:32I guess the thing that's proved controversial to modern people
0:23:32 > 0:23:36is just that the two scenes are quite eye-wateringly explicit.
0:23:36 > 0:23:39So on one side on this side you've got a young man,
0:23:39 > 0:23:40who's holding a strap,
0:23:40 > 0:23:44and he's lowering himself onto an older bearded man.
0:23:44 > 0:23:48You can see a small boy, slave, a peeping Tom, who's just
0:23:48 > 0:23:50poking his head round the door to watch the action.
0:23:50 > 0:23:53On this side you've got two younger men,
0:23:53 > 0:23:56and one of them's entering the other from behind,
0:23:56 > 0:24:01and again you can just make out his silver testicles, which
0:24:01 > 0:24:05have been very lovingly picked out by whoever's made this work of art.
0:24:05 > 0:24:09It's a really beautiful, very high-status object,
0:24:09 > 0:24:12but that's not really why this cup's so interesting.
0:24:12 > 0:24:14It's interesting to imagine how this was used socially.
0:24:14 > 0:24:17What was the context for something like this?
0:24:17 > 0:24:20Would it have raised eyebrows in the ancient Roman world?
0:24:20 > 0:24:22We don't know, but presumably not.
0:24:22 > 0:24:26Something like this must have been an erotic centrepiece
0:24:26 > 0:24:29for the sorts of lavish parties and banquets that
0:24:29 > 0:24:34would have been held by Tiberius at Sperlonga or Caligula at Lake Nemi.
0:24:34 > 0:24:38You can readily imagine that downing a load of wine from this goblet
0:24:38 > 0:24:41would really help get you in the mood
0:24:41 > 0:24:44for whatever Tiberius was expecting.
0:24:51 > 0:24:55After Caligula had been murdered by his own soldiers,
0:24:55 > 0:24:59he was succeeded by Claudius, and now I'm on his trail.
0:25:01 > 0:25:04I'd like to introduce you to my new best buddy.
0:25:04 > 0:25:06Sergio here has brought me to Baia,
0:25:06 > 0:25:08which is just north of the Bay of Naples,
0:25:08 > 0:25:12because back in the '60s there was an extraordinary discovery when a big storm churned up the sea bed,
0:25:12 > 0:25:16and people looking down through the surface of the sea
0:25:16 > 0:25:19suddenly glimpsed some, what looked like, classical statues.
0:25:19 > 0:25:22And it began this huge period of marine archaeology,
0:25:22 > 0:25:25and they excavated here something called a Nymphaeum,
0:25:25 > 0:25:28which was a sort of fantasy grotto, if you like,
0:25:28 > 0:25:30part of a big pleasure villa complex
0:25:30 > 0:25:34that belonged to one of the emperors from the 1st century AD, Claudius.
0:25:34 > 0:25:38You can, in fact, see just above the cliff there the remains of his villa.
0:25:38 > 0:25:41And I thought, before we actually go diving to explore his Nymphaeum,
0:25:41 > 0:25:45there's just time to have a look at Suetonius's
0:25:45 > 0:25:48Twelve Caesars, because somewhere around here we learn about his...
0:25:48 > 0:25:50the way he looked, the way he behaved.
0:25:50 > 0:25:53He was apparently quite tall, he was well built and handsome,
0:25:53 > 0:25:56but he had various strange tics, he had this uncontrolled laugh,
0:25:56 > 0:25:59and this horrible habit that stuck in my imagination,
0:25:59 > 0:26:04under the stress of anger, he used to slobber at the mouth and run at the nose.
0:26:04 > 0:26:08He had a stammer and a persistent nervous tic that grew so bad
0:26:08 > 0:26:11under emotional stress that his head would toss from side to side.
0:26:11 > 0:26:16It's not really what you expect of someone who leads the Roman empire.
0:26:16 > 0:26:18He also had quite lavish tastes,
0:26:18 > 0:26:20they all did really in the 1st century AD, all the emperors.
0:26:20 > 0:26:23He gave many splendid banquets, usually in large venues,
0:26:23 > 0:26:26and at times invited no fewer than 600 guests.
0:26:26 > 0:26:30And it's tempting to imagine that 2,000 years ago, here,
0:26:30 > 0:26:35beneath the waves, Claudius would have hosted some extraordinary parties,
0:26:35 > 0:26:38big banquets, lavish, opulent affairs
0:26:38 > 0:26:42with hundreds of guests visiting his Nymphaeum.
0:26:44 > 0:26:45OK!
0:26:53 > 0:26:55It's hard to believe
0:26:55 > 0:27:00but we're actually swimming through the lost world of a Roman emperor.
0:27:00 > 0:27:04You can imagine carts trundling along the cobbled Roman road.
0:27:06 > 0:27:08My favourite moment comes as we're swimming along
0:27:08 > 0:27:12and Sergio starts pushing away sand and stones from the sea bed.
0:27:12 > 0:27:17Underneath is this beautiful red-stained marble flooring
0:27:17 > 0:27:20that looks like a piece of delicious Italian bresaola.
0:27:20 > 0:27:24It's the closest I'll ever come to uncovering real treasure.
0:27:25 > 0:27:29It starts getting eerie as figures appear suddenly out of the blue.
0:27:32 > 0:27:35This one is Dionysus, the god of wine.
0:27:36 > 0:27:40The statue's a copy, the original's now in a museum.
0:27:44 > 0:27:47Next, we meet what's left of Odysseus,
0:27:47 > 0:27:49and one of his friends,
0:27:49 > 0:27:52carrying a wine skin ready to get Polyphemus drunk.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55So this time, perhaps wisely,
0:27:55 > 0:27:59Polyphemus hasn't stuck around to get another stake in his eye.
0:28:01 > 0:28:05There are also members of Claudius's family. I get to say a quick hello
0:28:05 > 0:28:10to his mum Antonia Minor before coming up for air.
0:28:28 > 0:28:31That was very, very magical.
0:28:31 > 0:28:35That was cool, there was... Oh, God, I've come a bit like Claudius.
0:28:35 > 0:28:39I've got a runny nose, I'm slobbering, but that was beautiful.
0:28:39 > 0:28:40Really beautiful.
0:28:46 > 0:28:50Claudius supposedly died after eating poisonous mushrooms,
0:28:50 > 0:28:51as Roman emperors do.
0:28:51 > 0:28:54He was succeeded by his great-nephew,
0:28:54 > 0:28:58the last of our mad, bad and dangerous emperors, Nero.
0:28:58 > 0:29:01While the other emperors cultivated the arts,
0:29:01 > 0:29:04Nero actually took to the stage and performed.
0:29:04 > 0:29:07His passion for theatre can be seen in this villa,
0:29:07 > 0:29:10reputedly owned by his wife Poppaea.
0:29:17 > 0:29:21During Nero's rule, the arts became infused with all sorts of theatrical
0:29:21 > 0:29:25flourishes that blurred the borders between reality and illusion.
0:29:26 > 0:29:30How rare... I mean, what sort of a find is this?
0:29:30 > 0:29:32This is really an extraordinary find.
0:29:32 > 0:29:36These second style paintings are the largest and most complete
0:29:36 > 0:29:39that have ever been found or associated with an atrium.
0:29:39 > 0:29:42And in fact, the whole ensemble of painted works of art here
0:29:42 > 0:29:44is really unsurpassed.
0:29:44 > 0:29:50Vitruvius tells us that one of the subjects that the wall paintings took were stage facades.
0:29:50 > 0:29:54So there was probably a kind of cross-fertilisation
0:29:54 > 0:29:56between theatrical painting and domestic painting.
0:29:56 > 0:29:58The theatre was hugely important
0:29:58 > 0:30:01and was made particularly important in the last days
0:30:01 > 0:30:04of this villa because Nero himself was a patron of the theatre.
0:30:04 > 0:30:10He acted, he performed for the first time, we're told by the Roman historians, in Naples,
0:30:10 > 0:30:13so in a sense it all became super respectable then.
0:30:13 > 0:30:18What could be better than having the Emperor himself saying, yes, theatre is great and good?
0:30:18 > 0:30:22Didn't he lock the doors so people couldn't escape when he was performing?
0:30:22 > 0:30:23The ultimate captive audience!
0:30:23 > 0:30:27One of the Roman historians says that his performances were so long
0:30:27 > 0:30:30and tedious that people used to fake dying to be carried out,
0:30:30 > 0:30:34to be relieved of this tedious performance.
0:30:34 > 0:30:37I wonder whether that's why you've got the closed doors.
0:30:41 > 0:30:44Along the whole eastern side of the villa
0:30:44 > 0:30:47is this enormous great swimming pool.
0:30:47 > 0:30:48And not just for the swimming,
0:30:48 > 0:30:50but along that side of the villa,
0:30:50 > 0:30:54they built a number of reception rooms, pleasure rooms,
0:30:54 > 0:30:56rooms for dining, rooms for relaxation,
0:30:56 > 0:31:00rooms for, you know, enjoying the ambiance.
0:31:00 > 0:31:04But then, as you turn, you see again and again and again
0:31:04 > 0:31:09this series of apertures, each one with a garden,
0:31:09 > 0:31:13which had real flowers, real plants, real fountains on it.
0:31:13 > 0:31:16And then along the walls of those rooms,
0:31:16 > 0:31:19you had painted flowers and gardens.
0:31:19 > 0:31:22So in the middle of this there would have been a garden?
0:31:22 > 0:31:25There would have been plants and probably some kind of a fountain.
0:31:25 > 0:31:28- The artists have replicated it. - You're looking at the real thing
0:31:28 > 0:31:30but you're actually looking at the unreal thing,
0:31:30 > 0:31:35and because this is enclosed space, you can't actually get into it.
0:31:35 > 0:31:37Your mind's eye is being drawn into both the real world
0:31:37 > 0:31:41and the illusionistic, imaginary world at the same time.
0:31:41 > 0:31:43I love some of the details. There's a tiny bird there.
0:31:43 > 0:31:45But think how more evocative it would be
0:31:45 > 0:31:47when there were real birds flittering around here.
0:31:47 > 0:31:50On a summer's day, while you were lounging by the pool.
0:31:50 > 0:31:52Do you think this is a kind of Roman sensibility,
0:31:52 > 0:31:55this double-edged thing between nature and artifice somehow,
0:31:55 > 0:31:58- that they liked being on the cusp? - They revelled in it.
0:31:58 > 0:32:01They wrote about the delight in basically art imitating nature...
0:32:01 > 0:32:03- There IS a bird! - There's a bird indeed!- Sorry.
0:32:03 > 0:32:06Bird has returned to its lair!
0:32:06 > 0:32:11No, artifice and... Art and artifice and life and nature
0:32:11 > 0:32:13constantly suffusing, intermingling.
0:32:13 > 0:32:15Which is what we see here.
0:32:15 > 0:32:17The garden, and then garden all around.
0:32:17 > 0:32:19Real garden, painted garden. Yeah.
0:32:19 > 0:32:20Wonderful!
0:32:30 > 0:32:32Nero's suicide in AD 68
0:32:32 > 0:32:35signalled the end of a dynasty.
0:32:35 > 0:32:38And for Rome, things could only get better.
0:32:38 > 0:32:40To understand how it changed,
0:32:40 > 0:32:43we need to look at a very different kind of art.
0:32:43 > 0:32:47The art of pomp and power.
0:32:53 > 0:32:56The great historian of ancient Rome, Edward Gibbon,
0:32:56 > 0:32:58once described the second century as
0:32:58 > 0:33:01"The period in the history of the world
0:33:01 > 0:33:04"during which the condition of the human race
0:33:04 > 0:33:06"was most happy and prosperous".
0:33:06 > 0:33:09It was the golden age of the Roman empire.
0:33:09 > 0:33:11The era of the good emperors.
0:33:11 > 0:33:15People like Trajan and Hadrian and Antoninus Pius.
0:33:15 > 0:33:16And also this man.
0:33:16 > 0:33:18Marcus Aurelius,
0:33:18 > 0:33:20Rome's 16th emperor,
0:33:20 > 0:33:23who ruled from 161-180 AD.
0:33:23 > 0:33:26And this colossal gilt-bronze portrait
0:33:26 > 0:33:27of him mounted on horseback
0:33:27 > 0:33:30is one of the great glories of Roman art.
0:33:35 > 0:33:36It doesn't take much, though,
0:33:36 > 0:33:40to be awestruck by the thunderous authority
0:33:40 > 0:33:42of this monster-sized masterpiece,
0:33:42 > 0:33:46because Marcus Aurelius is SO enormous.
0:33:46 > 0:33:47He's a superhuman.
0:33:47 > 0:33:52He's far bigger in relation to his steed than any ordinary man.
0:33:52 > 0:33:55And he feels like a commander of a race of giants,
0:33:55 > 0:34:00descended onto Earth, who can easily command our pygmy-like human realm.
0:34:00 > 0:34:04I feel quite cowed looking up at him.
0:34:04 > 0:34:08And immediately, this is an expression.
0:34:08 > 0:34:11This is the creation of a supremely self-confident society.
0:34:11 > 0:34:12You can feel that.
0:34:20 > 0:34:23The thing about Roman art of the high empire
0:34:23 > 0:34:27is it's the sort of stuff that can only be produced
0:34:27 > 0:34:28by a totalitarian regime,
0:34:28 > 0:34:32colossal works pushed through by the will of one man.
0:34:32 > 0:34:35And one innovation epitomises this.
0:34:35 > 0:34:39The Triumphal Arch is one of Rome's greatest legacies to art.
0:34:39 > 0:34:42Arches, they're such a prominent feature of modern cities.
0:34:42 > 0:34:45Think of Marble Arch in London, Arc de Triomphe in Paris.
0:34:45 > 0:34:48But they wouldn't exist if it wasn't for the ancient Romans,
0:34:48 > 0:34:51who decorated their monuments with historical reliefs,
0:34:51 > 0:34:55turning them into these enormous marble billboards,
0:34:55 > 0:34:57if you like, of imperial propaganda.
0:34:57 > 0:34:59And this one is one of the greatest of all.
0:34:59 > 0:35:02It's the Arch of Titus at the entrance of the Roman Forum.
0:35:06 > 0:35:09It celebrates the crushing of the Jewish revolt
0:35:09 > 0:35:13by the emperor Vespasian and his son Titus in AD 70.
0:35:13 > 0:35:17On the inside of the arch there are two stunning reliefs
0:35:17 > 0:35:21featuring Roman soldiers carrying the spoils of war
0:35:21 > 0:35:23from the temple in Jerusalem,
0:35:23 > 0:35:27including the sacred menorah or candelabrum.
0:35:29 > 0:35:32The carvings are worn, but still dynamic.
0:35:32 > 0:35:35This one, typically triumphalist,
0:35:35 > 0:35:39shows Titus accompanied by the goddesses Victoria and Roma.
0:35:42 > 0:35:45Monumental arches sprung up all over the empire
0:35:45 > 0:35:48and became the artistic symbol of imperial Rome.
0:35:56 > 0:35:59It may not look like much, but on the other side of this door,
0:35:59 > 0:36:02there's going to be an extraordinary Roman masterpiece
0:36:02 > 0:36:04and we're going to get a very special view. So...
0:36:06 > 0:36:08Buongiorno. Alastair.
0:36:14 > 0:36:16Grazie! Well rehearsed!
0:36:18 > 0:36:20OK, so we're going into a church.
0:36:23 > 0:36:27What we're about to see is one man's bid for immortality.
0:36:28 > 0:36:30Getting a bit out of breath!
0:36:33 > 0:36:35Yeah, maybe this one.
0:36:35 > 0:36:37HE TURNS KEY
0:36:39 > 0:36:40Eccoci qui.
0:36:40 > 0:36:43Ci troviamo sul terrazzo della cupola.
0:36:43 > 0:36:45Prego...
0:36:45 > 0:36:47I think that means "the terrace of the dome."
0:36:47 > 0:36:50Somewhere around...well, up there. So which way?
0:36:50 > 0:36:52- Oh, yes. Thank you.- Thank YOU!
0:36:56 > 0:37:00This is going to be... This really is going to be a good view, I think.
0:37:00 > 0:37:03Oh, my God! Look! Check this out!
0:37:03 > 0:37:07This really is genuinely an exciting moment!
0:37:13 > 0:37:17Trajan's column was dedicated in AD 113,
0:37:17 > 0:37:20and it commemorates two successful campaigns
0:37:20 > 0:37:23that the emperor Trajan waged against the Dacians,
0:37:23 > 0:37:25a barbarian tribe from modern-day Romania.
0:37:29 > 0:37:33This is a magnificent view!
0:37:33 > 0:37:37On the column itself there are 2,639 figures.
0:37:37 > 0:37:40Trajan himself appears 59 times.
0:37:40 > 0:37:43The other thing to remember about this column
0:37:43 > 0:37:45is that nothing like it had ever appeared before
0:37:45 > 0:37:46in the history of art.
0:37:46 > 0:37:51So this is bona fide Roman, right to the bone.
0:37:51 > 0:37:54I mean, this piece, Trajan's Column,
0:37:54 > 0:37:56that's how you do monumental sculpture.
0:37:56 > 0:38:00Trajan's Column was made by a team of sculptors
0:38:00 > 0:38:02from 29 different blocks of marble,
0:38:02 > 0:38:04each weighing up to 77 tonnes.
0:38:04 > 0:38:08Whoever designed it was a real genius in the art of storytelling.
0:38:08 > 0:38:10There are 155 scenes,
0:38:10 > 0:38:14that spiral up for 200 metres.
0:38:17 > 0:38:20It's only when you see the scenes in close-up
0:38:20 > 0:38:23that you really appreciate the full effect.
0:38:23 > 0:38:26And the place to do that is the Museum of Roman Civilisation,
0:38:26 > 0:38:29which has a cast of the whole shebang.
0:38:30 > 0:38:33So, Vito, this gallery really gives us a sense
0:38:33 > 0:38:36of just how monumental the column was, because you can see
0:38:36 > 0:38:38it stretches down, I guess, for 100 metres that way,
0:38:38 > 0:38:41and 100 metres back, and there's the frieze on either side.
0:38:41 > 0:38:44- It's amazing, yeah. - So this is the base of the column,
0:38:44 > 0:38:47and they've done it in sections that it takes us up,
0:38:47 > 0:38:51but it's quite a good opportunity to talk about the way
0:38:51 > 0:38:53that the narrative has been structured.
0:38:53 > 0:38:55Well, it's a big narration.
0:38:55 > 0:38:58It's an epic narration, 200 metres long.
0:38:58 > 0:39:03And it's sort of a long movie about History with a capital H.
0:39:03 > 0:39:05And it seems that, at the beginning,
0:39:05 > 0:39:08the Trajan Column was in colour.
0:39:08 > 0:39:10So it was in colour
0:39:10 > 0:39:12and 3-D, we could say today.
0:39:12 > 0:39:14As a matter of fact, we can notice
0:39:14 > 0:39:17that it there are some holes in many hands,
0:39:17 > 0:39:19like this, for example.
0:39:19 > 0:39:23Here, the soldier was supposed to hold weapons,
0:39:23 > 0:39:24stuff like that,
0:39:24 > 0:39:29so it's contributed to give that three-dimensional effect.
0:39:29 > 0:39:31In here, we can see by the way
0:39:31 > 0:39:34this is beautiful in terms of art.
0:39:34 > 0:39:35Pure art.
0:39:35 > 0:39:38Look at the composition of this, round circles.
0:39:38 > 0:39:40What's happening here?
0:39:40 > 0:39:43Here the Romans are defending themselves.
0:39:43 > 0:39:46They're throwing stones against the Dacians,
0:39:46 > 0:39:50and the whole story is seen from the point of view of Decebalus.
0:39:50 > 0:39:52He's the chief of the Dacians?
0:39:52 > 0:39:55He's the chief of the Dacians.
0:39:55 > 0:39:57"They're crazy," this Roman says. Very angry here.
0:39:57 > 0:39:59And he looks to the long shot,
0:39:59 > 0:40:01where many dramatic things are happening.
0:40:01 > 0:40:05That feels like a cartoon! He's going, "Oh, you pesky Romans!"
0:40:05 > 0:40:07Yeah, exactly!
0:40:07 > 0:40:09Sometimes it is a little ironical.
0:40:09 > 0:40:11Sometimes, it's like a horror movie.
0:40:11 > 0:40:13And later, you will see that Decebalus fights,
0:40:13 > 0:40:15and finally, he kills himself.
0:40:15 > 0:40:18You know, not to be a prisoner. You know, he kills himself.
0:40:18 > 0:40:20You're giving away the ending of the film!
0:40:20 > 0:40:23Oh, sorry! But it's not a detective story!
0:40:23 > 0:40:28The Roman soldiers try to catch him but he doesn't want to be caught,
0:40:28 > 0:40:30and he kills himself with a knife.
0:40:30 > 0:40:33So this is the big climax. The money shot.
0:40:33 > 0:40:37Yeah, but after the big climax, the real ending of the movie, quote-unquote,
0:40:37 > 0:40:42will be the Dacian people slowly abandoning their land.
0:40:42 > 0:40:45And then it fades to black. The end.
0:40:45 > 0:40:46After that, you see the sky and the moon.
0:40:46 > 0:40:49Of course. That's the technical, cinematical term.
0:40:49 > 0:40:52- It's a dissolve we're seeing there. - Yeah, exactly!
0:40:59 > 0:41:04So far, we've seen two sides of Roman imperial art,
0:41:04 > 0:41:06one private and perverted,
0:41:06 > 0:41:08the other public and propagandist.
0:41:08 > 0:41:12One emperor had a vision of how to bring these two together
0:41:12 > 0:41:15and create a coherent imperial vision,
0:41:15 > 0:41:18that would inspire loyalty as well as awe.
0:41:18 > 0:41:22When Hadrian became emperor in AD 117, he inherited
0:41:22 > 0:41:25one of the mightiest empires that the world had ever seen,
0:41:25 > 0:41:26stretching all the way
0:41:26 > 0:41:29from the Scottish lowlands to the Sahara Desert,
0:41:29 > 0:41:32from the Atlantic Ocean to the River Euphrates.
0:41:32 > 0:41:34By the time that he died, 21 years later,
0:41:34 > 0:41:37and you can see his majestic mausoleum behind me,
0:41:37 > 0:41:40he'd presided over an artistic renaissance
0:41:40 > 0:41:44that would shape our image of the Roman world for ever.
0:41:49 > 0:41:53Hadrian has a reputation as peace-loving emperor
0:41:53 > 0:41:55who set the empire's borders in stone,
0:41:55 > 0:41:58with Hadrian's Wall in the north of Britain,
0:41:58 > 0:41:59and the "limes" in North Africa.
0:41:59 > 0:42:02In portraits he wears a beard,
0:42:02 > 0:42:06supposedly to portray himself as a Greek-loving intellectual.
0:42:06 > 0:42:09But he was more complex than that.
0:42:09 > 0:42:12In other works, he's shown hunting,
0:42:12 > 0:42:16or as a military strongman, crushing the enemy underfoot.
0:42:16 > 0:42:20During his rule, he undertook two grand tours
0:42:20 > 0:42:25and visited almost all his provinces in an attempt to promote stability.
0:42:25 > 0:42:27It enabled him to create an inclusive
0:42:27 > 0:42:29and pan-imperial artistic style,
0:42:29 > 0:42:33influenced by the most distant corners of his empire.
0:42:36 > 0:42:40And of all the monuments from this Hadrianic golden age,
0:42:40 > 0:42:45none bears his imprint more than this vast temple to all the gods.
0:42:48 > 0:42:50The most miraculous achievement
0:42:50 > 0:42:52of Hadrian's architectural renaissance
0:42:52 > 0:42:54was the famous Pantheon in Rome.
0:42:54 > 0:42:57At first sight, you see this temple facade,
0:42:57 > 0:43:02and it seems relatively conventional, if monumental.
0:43:02 > 0:43:05There are one or two quite spectacular details, though,
0:43:05 > 0:43:09not least these enormous eight grey granite shaft columns here,
0:43:09 > 0:43:11supporting the facade.
0:43:11 > 0:43:13And all of them are monolithic,
0:43:13 > 0:43:15which means they weren't constructed
0:43:15 > 0:43:18out of several different drums put on top of one another.
0:43:18 > 0:43:20They are one piece of rock.
0:43:20 > 0:43:22And they didn't even come from Italy.
0:43:22 > 0:43:25They were hewn out of a quarry in the eastern desert of Egypt.
0:43:25 > 0:43:27So here you have the emperor
0:43:27 > 0:43:30almost supernaturally snapping his fingers,
0:43:30 > 0:43:32and he can command the natural world
0:43:32 > 0:43:35and things are brought to Rome, suggesting Rome's mastery.
0:43:35 > 0:43:38But that sense of majesty that's in the porch
0:43:38 > 0:43:41is just a mere appetiser, compared to what happens
0:43:41 > 0:43:43through the bronze doors in the main centre of the space.
0:43:50 > 0:43:52I have visited the Pantheon once before,
0:43:52 > 0:43:56but I imagine that it doesn't matter how many times you come,
0:43:56 > 0:44:01nothing can lessen the extraordinary impact of entering this space
0:44:01 > 0:44:04which has this almost stupefying splendour.
0:44:04 > 0:44:09You can see that every element bespeaks the majesty,
0:44:09 > 0:44:12the imperial might of ancient Rome.
0:44:12 > 0:44:17The surfaces are covered with all sorts of coloured marbles,
0:44:17 > 0:44:19other stones, including porphyry, serpentine,
0:44:19 > 0:44:22that come from many different places in the empire.
0:44:22 > 0:44:23Egypt, Tunisia, Thessaly...
0:44:25 > 0:44:28But the real tour de force,
0:44:28 > 0:44:31the centrepiece of the rotunda, is up above.
0:44:31 > 0:44:34This enormous, coffered, cast-concrete dome.
0:44:35 > 0:44:39Look, there's no doubt, of course, that this is an engineering marvel.
0:44:39 > 0:44:42This is a feat of Roman architecture and building.
0:44:42 > 0:44:44But it's more than that.
0:44:44 > 0:44:48If feels like a big, bejewelled bauble.
0:44:48 > 0:44:50This is a kind of electrifying arena
0:44:50 > 0:44:53where imperial spectacle would have been played out.
0:44:53 > 0:44:55And it has this spiritual power,
0:44:55 > 0:44:59a sense of a kind of proximity to some sort of divinity,
0:44:59 > 0:45:02up through there, through the infinity of the oculus,
0:45:02 > 0:45:03that makes it, for me, a work of art.
0:45:03 > 0:45:06This is one enormous work of art.
0:45:06 > 0:45:09It truly is one of the most spectacular treasures
0:45:09 > 0:45:10of ancient Rome.
0:45:32 > 0:45:34Previous emperors had kept their passions private,
0:45:34 > 0:45:39but Hadrian realised that he could exploit his to win over his people.
0:45:39 > 0:45:44In doing so he created one of the most intimate icons of art history.
0:45:46 > 0:45:50This melancholic youth is someone very, very special indeed.
0:45:50 > 0:45:52He's the last pagan god of antiquity
0:45:52 > 0:45:56who once gave Jesus Christ a run for his money.
0:45:56 > 0:45:59And more portraits of this fellow have survived
0:45:59 > 0:46:02than of any other figure from the Roman world,
0:46:02 > 0:46:04bar Hadrian and Augustus, both emperors.
0:46:04 > 0:46:06Around 100 marble images and counting, in fact.
0:46:06 > 0:46:11In the Roman era, he enjoyed almost unparalleled posthumous celebrity,
0:46:11 > 0:46:14and his cult offered very vigorous competition to Christianity
0:46:14 > 0:46:16in the early years of the religion.
0:46:16 > 0:46:19And yet today, most people haven't heard of him.
0:46:19 > 0:46:22His name is Antinous, and his story,
0:46:22 > 0:46:26involving a grand affair of the heart on the part of an emperor,
0:46:26 > 0:46:30and also an unsolved mystery surrounding his death in the Nile,
0:46:30 > 0:46:32is totally spellbinding.
0:46:36 > 0:46:39The love story between Hadrian and Antinous
0:46:39 > 0:46:43has all the makings of a Shakespearean tragedy.
0:46:43 > 0:46:46The emperor doted on the beautiful young man
0:46:46 > 0:46:48from Bithynia, modern Turkey,
0:46:48 > 0:46:49and was left brokenhearted
0:46:49 > 0:46:52when he mysteriously drowned in the Nile.
0:46:52 > 0:46:54He was only 19.
0:46:54 > 0:46:59Hadrian built a new city close to where Antinous died
0:46:59 > 0:47:01and named it Antinopolis.
0:47:01 > 0:47:05A cult worshipping the beautiful but tragic young man
0:47:05 > 0:47:08flourished there and spread around the empire.
0:47:13 > 0:47:18I've come to the Louvre to meet Ernest Gill,
0:47:18 > 0:47:21a priest in the modern-day cult of Antinous.
0:47:21 > 0:47:23This is one of them.
0:47:23 > 0:47:26Oh, this is one of my favourites.
0:47:26 > 0:47:28Antinous Aristeos.
0:47:28 > 0:47:31Aristeos is a totally forgotten god now,
0:47:31 > 0:47:36but he introduced farming to mortal human beings,
0:47:36 > 0:47:40and every farmer in ancient Rome knew exactly who this was.
0:47:40 > 0:47:43He's holding a cluster of olives here
0:47:43 > 0:47:46and he's holding a rake or something, and has a farm hat on.
0:47:46 > 0:47:48Before we go any further,
0:47:48 > 0:47:51I just wanted to see whether I should be calling you Ernest,
0:47:51 > 0:47:55or Hernestus, because I've been told that that is your official title.
0:47:55 > 0:47:57Yes, well, Hernestus is my priestly name.
0:47:57 > 0:47:59You can call me Ernest.
0:47:59 > 0:48:01- That's fine.- Thank you.
0:48:01 > 0:48:05- You are a priest of the cult of Antinous.- Yes.
0:48:05 > 0:48:08- With a straight face, seriously? - Absolutely, absolutely.
0:48:08 > 0:48:10He's always been,
0:48:10 > 0:48:15not so much worshipped, but admired, by homosexuals throughout history.
0:48:15 > 0:48:18- He's a gay icon.- He's a gay icon.
0:48:18 > 0:48:23All the gay aristocrats in the 18th century wanted statues of Antinous.
0:48:23 > 0:48:26And a cardinal in Rome, Cardinal Albani,
0:48:26 > 0:48:31had a huge villa full of Antinous statues and other things.
0:48:31 > 0:48:34And he had a German friend of his who was an art collector,
0:48:34 > 0:48:36Johann Joachim Winckelmann,
0:48:36 > 0:48:39who went out and would scour everything
0:48:39 > 0:48:42looking for Antinous statues, basically.
0:48:42 > 0:48:45Winckelmann is known as the father of art history, so you're suggesting
0:48:45 > 0:48:47that we have Antinous to thank
0:48:47 > 0:48:49for the entire discipline of the history of art?
0:48:49 > 0:48:53And it was rumoured that they were secretly priests of Antinous.
0:48:53 > 0:48:57But throughout history it was sort of a coded way of saying,
0:48:57 > 0:48:59HE WHISPERS "I'm one of these people,"
0:48:59 > 0:49:01you know, without actually saying it.
0:49:01 > 0:49:04"Oh, you have a lovely statue of Antinous." "Yes, indeed!"
0:49:04 > 0:49:05And that sort of thing.
0:49:05 > 0:49:08This really does remind me quite strongly of the pure Antinous,
0:49:08 > 0:49:11which is over here. Let's have a look.
0:49:11 > 0:49:13It's a bust of just Antinous, not as a farmer,
0:49:13 > 0:49:16not as Dionysus or Osiris.
0:49:16 > 0:49:19This is him, and the most interesting part is the hair.
0:49:19 > 0:49:23You can always tell exactly what this is based upon.
0:49:23 > 0:49:26Doctoral theses have been written about the curl.
0:49:26 > 0:49:29This curl goes this way, this curl goes that way.
0:49:29 > 0:49:31That's how experts know,
0:49:31 > 0:49:34"Ah, yes, that's a statue of Antinous."
0:49:34 > 0:49:37And, I mean, do you feel when you look at this
0:49:37 > 0:49:39he must have been a very beautiful youth?
0:49:39 > 0:49:41To me, he always looks a little bit sulky.
0:49:41 > 0:49:46He looks sulky, and that's another one of the great mysteries.
0:49:46 > 0:49:47Why is he looking downward,
0:49:47 > 0:49:50and why is he looking somewhat melancholy?
0:49:50 > 0:49:53Of course, homosexuals throughout the ages have said,
0:49:53 > 0:49:56"Oh, yes, we understand. He was misunderstood."
0:50:00 > 0:50:03Well, here he is as the Egyptian god Osiris.
0:50:03 > 0:50:05Now, I know that he drowned in the Nile.
0:50:05 > 0:50:07That's an Egyptian association.
0:50:07 > 0:50:10But do you think there were any political implications
0:50:10 > 0:50:14for Hadrian to show Antinous dressing up as an Egyptian god?
0:50:14 > 0:50:17Oh, absolutely, because Hadrian, as emperor,
0:50:17 > 0:50:19was also Pharaoh of Egypt.
0:50:19 > 0:50:22There had been a terrible, terrible drought,
0:50:22 > 0:50:26and the Egyptians had been begging for a miracle.
0:50:26 > 0:50:31And after Antinous died, the Nile rose up in a bountiful flood.
0:50:31 > 0:50:37That was called his first miracle, and Hadrian was saying,
0:50:37 > 0:50:40"Yes, of course. Antinous has risen from the dead,
0:50:40 > 0:50:42"just as Osiris rose."
0:50:42 > 0:50:45So it was a canny way for Hadrian to ensure loyalty
0:50:45 > 0:50:47- from his Egyptian subjects?- Yeah.
0:50:47 > 0:50:50And I imagine that for you,
0:50:50 > 0:50:53this must be like confronting the holy of holies!
0:50:53 > 0:50:55The Mondragone head that got Winckelmann so excited.
0:50:55 > 0:50:58Absolutely! It got all of Europe excited.
0:51:03 > 0:51:06It is, of course, Antinous in the form of Dionysus or Bacchus.
0:51:06 > 0:51:10It's so big! I mean, it's just magnificent.
0:51:10 > 0:51:11Is this your favourite one?
0:51:11 > 0:51:15Mustn't tell the others, but it's one of my favourites, yes.
0:51:15 > 0:51:17They're all magnificent.
0:51:17 > 0:51:21Do you feel like you're tending a flame in a time of heathens?
0:51:21 > 0:51:24Although, of course, he's a pagan god. But you know what I mean?
0:51:24 > 0:51:26- No-one really knows about poor Antinous.- Yeah.
0:51:26 > 0:51:29But more and more people are knowing about him,
0:51:29 > 0:51:32and I think that was Hadrian's goal,
0:51:32 > 0:51:35to create the perfect society
0:51:35 > 0:51:40based on Hellenistic principles of peace, learning, understanding.
0:51:40 > 0:51:45And I think he's a very good god for the 21st century.
0:51:49 > 0:51:54Hadrian had a flair for melding the private with the public,
0:51:54 > 0:51:57and this vision culminated in a villa unlike any other.
0:51:57 > 0:52:00It was at once a personal playground
0:52:00 > 0:52:02and the political nerve centre of the Western world.
0:52:02 > 0:52:05To call this place Hadrian's villa,
0:52:05 > 0:52:07in a sense, is just a total misnomer.
0:52:07 > 0:52:09It's a red herring.
0:52:09 > 0:52:11Because what was actually constructed,
0:52:11 > 0:52:13this sprawling complex here
0:52:13 > 0:52:16in the foothills of the Tiburtine mountains
0:52:16 > 0:52:19about 30-odd kilometres east of Rome,
0:52:19 > 0:52:20was just colossal.
0:52:20 > 0:52:22The site has barely been excavated yet,
0:52:22 > 0:52:25but already, just from the known structures,
0:52:25 > 0:52:27there are 900 rooms and corridors.
0:52:27 > 0:52:31The grounds would have extended for about 120 hectares.
0:52:31 > 0:52:34There would have been hundreds, possibly even thousands of staff,
0:52:34 > 0:52:36who would have scurried around the site
0:52:36 > 0:52:39using these underground hidden passageways and corridors
0:52:39 > 0:52:43so that the visiting dignitaries from abroad and Rome's elite
0:52:43 > 0:52:46who came here for informal gatherings,
0:52:46 > 0:52:48would never have had to encounter them.
0:52:48 > 0:52:49And just over this drawbridge
0:52:49 > 0:52:52is one of the earliest structures on the site,
0:52:52 > 0:52:55which is known as the maritime theatre.
0:52:55 > 0:52:58And this may have been Hadrian's private quarters.
0:52:58 > 0:53:00And so you can imagine him
0:53:00 > 0:53:05following those extensive travels all around the empire,
0:53:05 > 0:53:08returning here to relax and recuperate.
0:53:08 > 0:53:10But in Hadrian's day,
0:53:10 > 0:53:12this would have been sumptuously, lavishly decorated.
0:53:12 > 0:53:15Every surface would have been covered
0:53:15 > 0:53:18with the finest-quality mosaics and paintings and marble.
0:53:18 > 0:53:21You can actually see where the marble was clad to the walls.
0:53:21 > 0:53:25The holes would have taken the iron supports for the marble cladding.
0:53:25 > 0:53:29The eye would have been dazzled and ravished by what was inside here.
0:53:29 > 0:53:32There would have been phenomenal sculptures
0:53:32 > 0:53:35and the very best art that could possibly be acquired.
0:53:35 > 0:53:37And it was surrounded by this canal,
0:53:37 > 0:53:40which doubled as a swimming pool,
0:53:40 > 0:53:43and was linked to a private bathing suite for Hadrian.
0:53:43 > 0:53:48So it's very easy to be impressed by the grandeur of the Pantheon.
0:53:48 > 0:53:51Of course. But it's very formal, in a sense.
0:53:51 > 0:53:54What you have here is something much more private, much more informal.
0:53:54 > 0:53:59It's the material representation of Hadrian's character.
0:53:59 > 0:54:02I like to think of this specific place
0:54:02 > 0:54:04as the epicentre of the Roman empire.
0:54:04 > 0:54:07This was the fortress of Hadrian's mind,
0:54:07 > 0:54:10the resting place, if you like, of his artistic soul.
0:54:13 > 0:54:15Hadrian's villa was full of art
0:54:15 > 0:54:18inspired by masterpieces from around the empire.
0:54:20 > 0:54:22This marble fawn is exquisite.
0:54:24 > 0:54:25The Doves of Sosos
0:54:25 > 0:54:28is one of the most celebrated mosaics from antiquity.
0:54:28 > 0:54:30And these two centaurs,
0:54:30 > 0:54:33carved from a smoky grey marble,
0:54:33 > 0:54:35represent the highs and lows of love.
0:54:35 > 0:54:40The perky young centaur contrasts with his sorrowful companion,
0:54:40 > 0:54:44perhaps reflecting Hadrian's grief for Antinous.
0:54:44 > 0:54:46Hadrian recreated many
0:54:46 > 0:54:50of the artistic highlights from his grand tours.
0:54:50 > 0:54:53As befits his nickname, Graeculus, or, "Greekling,"
0:54:53 > 0:54:56he commissioned perfect copies of Greek statues.
0:54:59 > 0:55:02Here, Rome meets Egypt.
0:55:02 > 0:55:04The Tiber, this bearded river god,
0:55:04 > 0:55:06leans on Rome's iconic she-wolf.
0:55:06 > 0:55:10And this is the Nile, resting on a sphinx.
0:55:10 > 0:55:14All very symbolic of the wider empire.
0:55:14 > 0:55:18The Egyptian theme is completed with this scary crocodile.
0:55:18 > 0:55:21Carved from Cipollino marble, it brilliantly brings to life
0:55:21 > 0:55:24the croc's rough and scaly hide.
0:55:26 > 0:55:31Many of Hadrian's finest sculptures adorn this magical pool,
0:55:31 > 0:55:34a homage to the canal that cut through northern Egypt
0:55:34 > 0:55:37from Alexandria to Canopus.
0:55:37 > 0:55:40Since the death of Antinous, it was a corner of an empire
0:55:40 > 0:55:43that held a very special place in Hadrian's heart.
0:55:45 > 0:55:47We know that Hadrian liked magnificence,
0:55:47 > 0:55:52but I feel that here, he surpassed himself
0:55:52 > 0:55:54by creating this spectacular setting,
0:55:54 > 0:55:56essentially for dinner parties.
0:55:56 > 0:55:58We know he loved dinner parties,
0:55:58 > 0:56:00it says that in the ancient literature.
0:56:00 > 0:56:03And imagine this long canal, a colonnaded extravaganza
0:56:03 > 0:56:06where guests would have been reclining
0:56:06 > 0:56:07in-between the pillars, eating.
0:56:07 > 0:56:12Apparently there was sometimes food actually in the middle of the canal that could have come over,
0:56:12 > 0:56:14controlled by slaves on little ships.
0:56:14 > 0:56:15You pluck the food off.
0:56:15 > 0:56:18And I like it particularly at this point,
0:56:18 > 0:56:21because the pillars which elsewhere are just ordinary columns
0:56:21 > 0:56:24are replaced by these caryatids,
0:56:24 > 0:56:26which are an allusion to very famous statues
0:56:26 > 0:56:28that supported a building on the Athenian acropolis.
0:56:28 > 0:56:31And on either side of these four caryatids,
0:56:31 > 0:56:34two drunken Silenae, this old soak character from ancient myth,
0:56:34 > 0:56:38with a pot belly and a beard,
0:56:38 > 0:56:40and he's a bit pissed, basically.
0:56:40 > 0:56:41And I quite like the idea
0:56:41 > 0:56:43that that would help get you in the party spirit.
0:56:43 > 0:56:47Here's the pillar. Sprouting out of his head would be a load of grapes
0:56:47 > 0:56:49cascading down, like the top of a Corinthian capital.
0:56:49 > 0:56:52And if you were a guest, you just had to look up there
0:56:52 > 0:56:55and there's your example for how to behave at a Roman dinner party,
0:56:55 > 0:56:56the convivium that Hadrian loved.
0:56:56 > 0:57:00Hadrian himself would have sat right at the end there,
0:57:01 > 0:57:03in that semi-dome,
0:57:03 > 0:57:07which would have been covered with sparkling mosaics.
0:57:07 > 0:57:09There was a podium in there with spaces for seven people.
0:57:09 > 0:57:11And Hadrian would have come out,
0:57:11 > 0:57:13sat right in the centre, looked straight down this canal,
0:57:13 > 0:57:17which goes for about 120-odd metres,
0:57:17 > 0:57:19and I think if you were a guest
0:57:19 > 0:57:22at one of those parties thrown by Hadrian here in the Canopus,
0:57:22 > 0:57:26you must have felt like the most urbane, chic, glamorous person
0:57:26 > 0:57:28it would be possible to be,
0:57:28 > 0:57:32as if you were at the very centre, not just of the world,
0:57:32 > 0:57:34but the whole universe.
0:57:38 > 0:57:42Under Hadrian, the Roman empire stretched across three continents
0:57:42 > 0:57:44and Roman art was also at its zenith,
0:57:44 > 0:57:47because the great classical tradition
0:57:47 > 0:57:50which the Romans had inherited, and reinvigorated,
0:57:50 > 0:57:53by tailoring it to their own society,
0:57:53 > 0:57:55was at its most stunning and urbane.
0:57:55 > 0:57:58Roman culture was the envy of the known world.
0:57:58 > 0:58:00And there are some traditionalists
0:58:00 > 0:58:03who suggest that the quality of Roman art from this period
0:58:03 > 0:58:04would never be surpassed.
0:58:04 > 0:58:07There's definitely something in that argument,
0:58:07 > 0:58:10but it's not entirely true.
0:58:10 > 0:58:13The aesthetic achievements under Hadrian are brilliant,
0:58:13 > 0:58:17but they're not the final chapter in the story of Roman art.
0:58:19 > 0:58:24In the next episode, the empire strikes back.
0:58:24 > 0:58:26How far-flung provinces transformed the look of Rome,
0:58:26 > 0:58:29and an obscure cult emerged,
0:58:29 > 0:58:32to seize the mantle of art history.
0:58:47 > 0:58:51Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd