Mansion Pergola and Garden

View looking down and west at what was a covered "Pergola" with a nave, that was in the center of the "Sunken Garden" of the Byzantine mansion.  The gardens themselves were to the right and left of this central pergola—where the column on the right (north) and vegetation on the left (south) were located.

Part of the staircase that led up to the mansion is visible on the far right of the image.  In the upper portion of the image, the surface of the excavated hippodrome is visible, and beyond it is the blue of the Mediterranean sea.

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This was a splendid three-story seafront mansion that was built in the 6th century A.D.  The "sunken garden" was built out over a portion of the old Western Hippodrome—the northern portion of which had been out of use for hundreds of years.