CLASSIC PLEASURE GROUNDS 43 



vaded to such an extent by the country that they are 

 turned into vast gardens. Another derides a fanatical 

 amateur whose garden was made complete by sacrific- 

 ing to it his bedchamber and dining rooms. The 

 poets Horace and Martial, like Pope and Addison in 

 more recent days, wearying of the restraint imposed 

 upon nature and the overluxurious, pompous life estab- 

 lished in the villa pseudo urbana, advocated return 

 to the simplicities of the villa rustica. 



Hadrian's famous villa at Tivoli showed <([|> Hadrian's 



evidence of the degraded but magnificent 

 taste of his time. It was the last word of 

 artificiality and pomposity, and cast the 

 golden house of Nero quite into the shade. 

 Even now the ruins cover an area of about 

 ten square miles. Gardens, groves, colon- 

 nades, shady corridors, high-roofed domes, grottoes, 

 baths, lakes, basilicas, libraries, theatres, circuses 

 built of varicoloured marble and filled with works of 

 art, were crowded together near the imperial palace. 



Here Gregorovius tells us the emperor beguiled 

 his time in recollections of his Odysseus-like travels. 



" For this villa, built according to his own designs, 

 was the copy and reflection of the most beautiful things 

 which he had admired in the world. The names of 

 buildings in Athens were given to different parts of 

 his villa. The Lyceum, the Academy, the Prytaneum, 



