Next to sculpture came painting, and in this art Romans themselves appear to have often acquired a technical skill which rivalled that of the Greeks.  There is also plenty of evidence that among the pictorial artists there were no few women.  For us practically the only painting of the time which has been preserved is that upon the walls of private houses, and it is probable that we see some of the worst specimens of the kind as well as some of a high order of excellence.  It is not difficult to distinguish between the truly artistic design and colouring of wall-pictures in the House of Vettii or of the “Tragic Poet” and the crude journeyman work in sundry other Pompeian houses which must have belonged to anything but connoisseurs.  Paintings, it must be remembered, were the ancient wall-papers, as well as the ancient pictures.  Here, as in sculpture, we find the same or similar motives and groupings repeated in a way which shows that the painter—­or rather the collaborating painters—­must have been reproducing or adapting an original which was particularly admired or had obtained a fashionable vogue.  The wall-pictures, done in fresco or distemper and in various dimensions, fall into four main classes.  There are landscapes, from a pretty realistic garden scene to a fantastic stretch of sea and land diversified with woods, rocks, figures, and buildings.  There are subjects from mythology and from poetical “history” or legend, chiefly representing “moments of dramatic interest.”  There are genre-pictures, such as those of the Cupids acting as goldsmiths, oil-dealers, or wine-merchants.  Finally there are pictures of still-life—­of fishes, birds, fruits, and other objects—­often admirable in their kind.  Serving as frame or setting to many of the scenes there are architectural paintings—­sometimes in complicated but highly skilful perspective, but often extremely unreal and confusing in conception—­representing columns and pediments of buildings.  It must here suffice to offer one or two characteristic examples out of the multitude of wall-paintings which have been found (see also Figs. 43, 44).

Though Romans themselves, and even persons of standing, sometimes dabbled in the fine arts, it is unquestionable that they commonly regarded the professional artist as only a superior tradesman.  They admired his skill, but rendered little esteem to the man.  A Roman knight or a Roman lady might occasionally paint for pleasure; Nero himself might model a figure or handle a brush; but so soon as art ceased to be dilettante and became a calling, so soon as its work was produced for payment, the artist ranked with other hirelings, however superior he might be in kind.  Seneca expresses an open contempt, although he is perhaps, here as elsewhere, judging by a standard more severe than that of his contemporaries in general.  To some extent this attitude is explained by the very abundance of objects of art, and by the immense number of artists, now nameless, belonging to the period;