Hadrians Villa

South of the baths there is a valley with a long pond surrounded by a splendid colonnade. At the bottom end stands a nymphaeum that is recognizably a temple of Serapis (Serapeum).

It consists of a semicircular exedra with a ribbed cupola, extended by a long vaulted corridor. This ensemble, which is decorated with fountains and statues, was for a long time believed to be an evocation of the Egyptian town of Canopus, linked to Alexandria by a canal from the Nile and famous for its Temple of Serapis.

A more recent interpretation gives it another meaning: the pond is not the canal but the Mediterranean, which explains the presence of Greece (symbolized by copies of the caryatids from the Erechtheion in Athens) and of Asia (represented by copies of two Amazons by Phidias that adorned the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus and a copy of Praxiteles' renowned Venus of Cnidus).

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• Bree
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• Italy