The largest and grandest private house in Pompeii, covering an entire city block of about 3,000 square metres. The House of the Faun was owned by one of the wealthiest families in the city — its floors were covered in extraordinary mosaics, and the walls were decorated with the finest paintings in the ancient city. The name comes from the small bronze dancing faun in the first atrium, a copy of which stands there today.
Two atria, two peristyle gardens, and a complex of reception rooms speak to a household that entertained on a serious scale. The famous Alexander Mosaic — now in Naples but with a copy in situ — was the floor of the exedra between the two peristyle gardens, designed to be revealed as a surprise to guests proceeding through the house. The mosaic shows Alexander at the Battle of Issus in 333 BC, his face in profile, charging directly at the Persian king Darius. It remains unsurpassed in ancient art.