^Marble floor tiling from the Capitoline Museum in Rome. According to the
Capitoline Museum's website it's from the first half of the 4th century AD,
recovered from the Esquiline Hill in Rome (Basilica lunii Bassi)
Exclusively for Saturated Space, Molly McCormick writes about the complex relationship between coloured marble and Roman Identity.
"Over the course of two
centuries, Ancient Rome evolved from red brick backwater town to the coloured
marble centre of the western world. However it didn't happen without a fight.
To Pre-Imperial Senators, coloured marble was both alluring and dangerous: deathly
cold, hotly debated. So how exactly did it become the covering of the Caput
Mundi? For that, we look at a history of exoticism, misogyny, public relations
and Imperial might that revolved around a seemingly innocuous material. One
that was, eventually, essential to the culture of the eternal city. Both then
and now."
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