Insula

History

The insulae are structures of dwelling which appear at the end of the II E century, inspired by the high houses of Carthage which reached to six stages. They multiply during all the end of the Républicaine period to become a characteristic of the urban center of Rome at the beginning of the Empire.

Appearance of these buildings

The multiplication of the number of insulae in Rome is due, initially, with the increase in the Roman population. The number of inhabitants of Rome indeed was in constant increase during the first centuries of the history of the city, on the one hand because the rate of increase in the population was exponential, on the other hand because of political and economic phenomena such as for example the laws frumentaires of IIe S before J.C, the naturalization of Italy or the pax romana founded by Auguste, and the extension of the empire, which involved a rise of the immigration.
This addition of population, concentrated little by little in the urban center of the capital, and the newcomers increasingly more should have been placed.

In addition, if it is admitted that the city extended on a surface from 2000 hectares, at the beginning of the Empire, it acts of an insufficient surface to place a population estimated at 1,2 million inhabitants, more especially as all the sectors were not specific to the construction of dwellings. It is indeed necessary to exclude in great majority all the places reserved for the public edifices, in particular the forum, the zone included/understood in the bed of the the Tiber, too marshy to be arranged, all the zones of gardens, the Champ de Mars of which the 200 ha are inconstructibles (in any case for all that relates to the habitat) by respect for the gods.

It also should be held account owing to the fact that as from the time augustéenne, the hill of the Palatin becomes the reserved domain of the emperor and his famille.
The pressure born of the need for space thus creates the need for finding news solutions.
It is important to announce that moreover, the city cannot develop in width. It is useless to too remotely build social center and monk, because displacements are limited taking into account the inexistence of effective means of transport. The only possibility is thus to build in height.

Vue the importance of the city and the extreme density of the population, it is necessary that one multiplies of incalculable number the residences. As residences at only ground floor could not accommodate such a mass of population in the city, forces, was had regard to this situation, to resort to constructions in height.
Vitruve summarizes this situation clearly

With Rome, under Constantin Ier|Constantin I {{er}}, one counts 46.000 Insulae for 2000 domus .

Insula, a term, multiple significances

The direction of the word insula knew several evolutions before indicating l'" building of habitation". Etymology " île" (in the middle of water), one passes to the concept of " ground portions out isolated by rues" ( vici ) then with the more precise direction of " land and buildings with dwellings collectives" (by analogy in the name of the ground). A insula is thus a collective residential building, appeared early in the town planning of Rome and which largely developed there.

In many works, the insula is a building or a group of buildings delimited by a way ( ambitus ) making it possible to make the turn of it

To this significance come to be added others of them what proves polysemantic term.

At the end of the Republic , for Cicéron, insula always has the direction of real estate which one can rent or sell, one of his/her friends, Mr. Caelius Rufus lived in a insula heard within the meaning of " building divided into apartments of location".
Starting from half of I er, the concept of insula takes the direction of a building divided into apartments to rent, at ends speculative, and put in opposition with the term Domus which is not useful that to indicate the employers' residence.
the authors of imperial time continue to use the word insula to correspond to two realities: the small island and the apartment house of hiring.

Often, whenever one mentions the insulae , appears the canonical opposition domus/insula

the insula is a residence having lost all the architectonic characteristics of the domus, not only whereas this one develops in surface, the insula develops in height, but in more first is intended for only one family whereas the second is a habitat of hiring thus intended for several family groups. In addition, whereas the domus, because of its characteristics and its statute seigneurial is insulated enough, the insula is to it almost never (…)"

In the texts of legal nature of the time of the the Lower Empire, the direction of insula is not ambiguity: it acts above all of a cadastral entity, i.e. tax, of a real complex of a certain dimension forming a divisible single property in sections of variable size being able to be rented or transmitted by heritage.

The insulae are blocks architecturalement unit but which comprise parts or portions whose extension, functions and destination can be rather varied. The distinction insula/domus results from other passages of the texts: . The various parts are rented with tenants under contract ( locatio conductio ).

In all these cases, the insula term cannot thus correspond to the definition of a whole urban small island. During all the Empire, the investment properties, which as one saw can be described as insula with the proviso of keeping in mind the space and legal definitions of them, did not cease multiplying.

Various types of insulae

On the architectural level, one can distinguish three main categories of insulae , although classification remains rather general and that there exists certainly a greater number of solutions:

Insulae with tabernae

In these insulae the ground floor consists of tabernae (shops) and the upper floors are apartments rented independently.
It is the model in the past attested and most common. In the tabernae , staircases lead to a tiny room which is used as residence to the trader who is only very seldom owner of the shop in which he works. In all the cases, that he is free worker or slave, the tenant of the shop had at his disposal only one part, where all its family lived, cooked, ate and slept. These mezzanines offered only little intimacy and no comfort, the space its inhabitants had was extremely reduced. A insula of this kind often comprises as many entries as of housing units inside. One thus finds in general two or three doors serving the first second and third stage.

Insulae without Tabernae

The second type of building is represented by the insulae entirely made up of apartments with louer.
This kind of insulae was much less widespread, because the shops were essential to the economy of the ville.
In this case, the ground floor is not reserved any more for the shops but for private hirings, which explains why the first windows are placed at two meters of the ground: it was the only means of preserving the intimacy of its occupants.
The ground floor of the building of this kind often luxurious and was occupied by a single owner. Only the rich characters could allow this type of hiring whose price could reach until: 30000 Sesterce S per annum.

These apartments had the prestige and the advantages of a house seigneuriale, and they are indicated besides under the name of domus in opposition to the cenaculae of the upper floors.

Insulae with gantry

The last type of insula car its characteristic owing to the fact that he east girds of a gantry. This model of construction appeared only after the fire of Rome under Néron (64). The goal of these gantries was, if one believes Suétone of it, to limit the propagation of fires. This appendix which is grafted on the frontages protected the pedestrians who made their purchases in the tabernae possible falls of objects, and it constituted a strong foundation for the construction of terraces ( solaria ).

Seen outside, all these insulae presented a resemblance: the stages were generally distributed in a symmetrical way, of the staircases giving access the upper floors. In much of buildings, the access on the highest floors was made by the means of scales which the insularius (the manager of the building) had the possibility of withdrawing if the tenant did not pay his rent. The apartments giving on the broadest streets were equipped with loggias ( pergulae ) or with wood balconies ( maenianae ), which one finds sometimes the beams of support embedded in the walls. It happened that they are built out of brick, and rest on a series of barrel vaults supported by large travertine beams.

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