KORONI
(modern) Messenia, Greece.
A
large building, 4.8 N of modern Koroni, which was
probably “the villa of a rich man or a gymnasium,” can
be dated in the Early Imperial period. It had three rooms,
while a fourth room was situated ca. 30 m farther to the
E. In the first room (5.7 m each side) a superb mosaic
was discovered, which is now preserved in the Benakeion
Museum at Kalamata. The stones of the mosaic vary in
size, shape, and color. In the center of a simple sixfold
frame was a quadrangular field (3.1 x 3.1 m) divided
by plaited borders into a central circle, four semicircles,
and four quarter circles, the last in the corners. In the
central circle are depicted a Satyr, a panther, and, between them, Dionysos. In the four surrounding semicircles are painted scenes from the amphitheater (bull
with gladiator), lion with gladiator, the scene of a tigerhunt, and a hunter (ill-preserved). Between the central
circle and the corners are square fields with theatrical
masks hung from red ribbons (two male, one female,
one lost) while in the NW, SW corners are painted
kantharoi surrounded by branches, and in the NE a
running female panther. The fourth one (SW), probably
occupied by another panther, is entirely lost. The mosaic
themes of the other rooms form ornamental compositions.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
M. N. Valmin,
The Swedish Messenia
Expedition (1938) 467-75
I; D. Levi,
Antioch Mosaic
Pavements (1947) 42; B. Kallipolitis in
Deltion 17 (1961-62) A, 14, n. 12; M. Chatzidakis, in
Deltion 22 (1967)
19ff
I; P. Themelis, in ibid. 206
I.
G. S. KORRÉS
