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House of Hippolytus

Alcalá de Henares, Cuenca del Henares, Madrid

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House of Hippolytus

Monument · Alcalá de Henares, Cuenca del Henares, Madrid

A college for young men of ancient Roman Complutum, with baths, a garden and a latrine, whose structures were devoted entirely to leisure. It formed part of the Roman city that stretched from the cerro del Viso, a primitive settlement Romanised from the 1st century BC, to the present-day surroundings of Alcalá de Henares. In the main hall, which served as a distribution area, a large mosaic is preserved showing a fishing scene, signed by the mosaicist Hippolytus, probably of North African origin, made for one of the city's most important families. The site, turned into a museum by way of raised walkways, was a pioneer of this type of intervention in the Community of Madrid; the visit centres on what is known as the mosaic of the fish.

Photo: PePeEfe (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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