ATRIUM

(According to Scaliger, from the Greek aiOptoi, exposed to the air.) In ancient Architecture, the atrium is by some considered the same as the vestibule, and Aulus Gellius intimates that in his time these two words were frequently confounded. There is reason for supposing that the vestibule was not properly a part of the house, but merely a portion of the entrance; for Cicero, in a letter to Atticus, describing the attack made on him in the via sacra, says, lie took refuge to defend himself in the vestibule of Tatius. " Sece i in vestibulum Caii Tatii Dom i on is." If, however, in the time of Aulus Gellius these words were used ambiguously, it is not probable that at this period the question will be settled; and that this was the case is quite certain, for, in describing the spot where the colo al statue of Nero stood, Martial places it in the atri mi, and Suet on i us in the veslibulum. That the atrium was in an inner part the verse of Virgil, " Apparet dom us int us el atria tonga pates cunt." According to the descriptionofVitruvius, it seems to have been a sort of covered portico, composed of two ranks of columns, forming a centre and two side aisles, and to have been beyond the cavasliium or court, and before the tablinium or cabinet. The atrium was decorated with the statues of the proprietor's incest ors. Festus derives its name from its first use at Atria in Etruria. " Dictum atrium qui a id genus edificii primum Atriaa in Etruria sit institutum." [s. 118]