A Question about Ancient Rome.. Pleeeeeeeeaaaaasssssse Help?!?

Question

Can anyone tell me about how Roman Patrician houses were like or give me any sites? Thank you, I really appreciate it.
Please cite your sources, though.

Answer 1

Go to the website to read the rest of the article and it also has pictures.

The patrician house was called a domus. After you crossed the threshold, a hallway led into the atrium, which was a spacious courtyard that in early antiquity was the heart of the house. Later the center of domestic life passed to the inner garden with a porch running around it, called the peristyle, while the atrium became the formal reception area. In the center of the courtyard is a shallow pool called impluvium, for collecting the rainwater that came in through a hole in the roof created for this purpose, called compluvium. This also had the function of giving light to the space below it. The water drained from the impluvium into a cistern beneath it, from which it could be drawn using a well. After the city was connected to the aqueduct, the impluvium became a decorative element.

Answer 2

Patricians enjoyed special status as Roman citizens. They were better represented in the Roman assemblies. The comitia centuriata, the main legislative body, was divided into 193 voting centuries. The first two classes (which contained largely the patricians) were divided into 98 centuries, a number which was enough to obtain a majority, despite the fact that they were fewer in number. That meant that if the patricians acted in concord, they could always determine the result of the voting of the peoples assembly. So, although it was not forbidden for plebeians to hold magistracies, the patricians dominated the political scene for centuries. Strangely, the founding father of the Roman Republic, Junius Brutus (ancestor of Julius Caesar's assassin) was a plebeian, and the four kings who had Roman gentilic names also came from plebeian families (Numa Pompilius; Tullus Hostilius; Ancus Marcius; and Servius Tullius - i.e., all the kings except Romulus and the foreign Tarquins).

In the beginning of the Republic all priesthoods were closed to non-patricians. There was a belief that patricians communicated better with the Roman gods, so they alone could perform the sacred rites and take the auspices. This view had political consequences, since in the beginning of the year or before a military campaign, Roman magistrates used to consult the gods. Livy reports that the first admission of plebeians into a priestly college happened in 300 B.C. (Liv. X.7.9) when the college of Augurs raised their number from four to nine. After that, plebeians were accepted into the other religious colleges, and by the end of the republic, only minor priesthoods with little political importance like the Salii, the Flamens and the Rex Sacrorum were exclusively filled by patricians.

In the list of the names of the Romans who held magistracies (the Fasti), very few plebeian names appear before the 2nd century B.C. The turning point were two laws, the Licinian - Sextian law of 367 B.C. that ascertained the right of plebeians to hold the consulship, and the Genucian law of 342 B.C. that made it compulsory that one at least of the consuls be a plebeian.

Patrician gentes that were ancient and their members were part of the founding legends of Rome, disappeared as Rome started becoming an empire and new (plebeian) families rose to prominence, like the Decii and the Sempronii. Families such as the Horatii, Lucretii, Verginii and Menenii seem to vanish after the 2nd century B.C. Others, such as the Julii reappear only at the end of the Republic. There are some cases where the same gens name was shared by patrician and plebeian clans (for example the Appii Claudii were patricians and the Claudii Marcelli were plebeians).

Answer 3

Patrician's lived in extravagant villas, usually on the "Palentine" hill - one of the seven hills of Rome directly across from the "Aventine" hill- which was one of the poorer hills of the city of Rome. Usually they were huge and had gardens and fountains.

Answer 4

Pompeii, the city destroyed by the volcano Mt.Vesuvius, ironically has been preserved by the ashes. Going there or reading up on it online should help answer that.

Answer 5

Here's your site.
http://www.crystalinks.com/romebuildings.html
Just scroll down the "Buildings and Homes"