Abstract
An analysis of the Trajanic wall decoration in the renovated apodyterium of the Terme dei Sette Sapienti (3.10.2-3) at Ostia reveals a sophisticated pun on Roman society itself. In the surviving frescoes on the south wall there are three distinct painted bands with inscriptions accompanying the middle one. Greek philosophers wrapped in robes and seated on bisellia converse with one another in a hand-lettered dialogue, which appears over their heads. The sages, Solon of Athens, Thales of Miletus, and Chilon of Sparta, "talk" about effective bowel relief. Lavish foodstuffs and wine in the topmost band are thereby symbolically consumed and digested into sensible excremental advise in the middle band. In the lowest register, and in the now vanished latrine itself (cf. Calza, Ostia [Rome 1965], and Neudecker, Die Pracht der Latrine [Munich 1994] 38) contemporary Roman cacatores would produce the end-product of the discourse directly into the latrine. The Ostian bath room painter thereby graphically plays upon the relationship between excess at the top of society, and the dregs (faex) at the bottom. His visual pun of words and images compares well to a similarly sophisticated literary trope found in Petronius' Cena Trimalchionis. Petronius uses the language of bodily evacuation to describe a whole parade of succulent foods served at the dinner party of Trimalchio. Ultimately, we come to visualize the food as excrement in disguise, and, as in the Ostian bath room, we understand that such luxuries are merely preparation for a necessary visit to nearby toilet facilities.