The House of Ceres stands in Regio I, Insula 9, with its main entrance at I.9.13 on the Via di Castricio. It is one of the most interesting residential buildings in the southern part of Pompeii. Excavated between 1951 and 1953, the house retains an original layout dating from between the third and second centuries BC. Numerous later alterations transformed both its rooms and decorative schemes. The conventional name derives from a terracotta bust of the goddess Ceres, deity of the earth's fertility and the harvest, found in one of the cubicula opening off the atrium. The object reproduces a sculptural type dating to the late fourth century BC and probably belonged to a setting for domestic worship.
The principal rooms are arranged around the atrium, while the innermost part of the house opens towards the garden. Its decoration records several phases: some rooms preserve First Style paintings, while others were redecorated first in the Second Style and later in the Third Style, revealing the building's long history of use. Cubicula, living rooms and reception rooms open off the atrium. Their pavements include cement-based floors, monochrome and polychrome mosaics, surfaces decorated with stone chips, and geometric designs. Thresholds and passageways were often emphasised with ornamental bands and mosaic compositions.
Of particular interest is the tablinum, aligned with the entrance and later converted into a triclinium. It preserves evidence of Third Style decoration combined with a polychrome mosaic pavement. Beyond it lies the viridarium, overlooked by rooms used for relaxation and dining. The garden portico retains Third Style decoration and a painted dado with garden views, designed to create visual continuity between the painted imagery and the real vegetation.
Research and conservation work carried out by the Archaeological Park of Pompeii have made it possible to reconstruct certain aspects of the ancient garden. On the basis of the surviving evidence, the sequence of colonnade, reed screen and planting has been reinstated, restoring the original relationship between the portico and cultivated area. The planting of emmer and ancient varieties of wheat also evokes Ceres symbolically through her association with fields and grain.
The House of Ceres thus preserves evidence from several periods within a single complex. Its First-, Second- and Third-Style paintings, varied pavements, altered rooms, and relationship between interior and garden document the building's development over the centuries. Conservation work has addressed the paintings, mosaics, roofs and green spaces, making the complex easier to understand and providing a clearer picture of the changes made before the eruption of AD 79.
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