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 In December 1738, his Sicilian majesty being at Portici, and some fragments of marble having been found in the well which the duke di Belbofi had sunk, the king gave immediate orders for the bottom of it to be searched: whereupon the workmen cutting by the hole which the duke had made, found several fragments of statues, &c. seventy feet below the present surface.£

On pursuing their work, new discoveries opened upon them,—a theatre, temple, streets, &c. Most of the houses were found to be decorated both within and without with paintings, which with the statues form the most valuable part of these subterranean treasures. The grounds of the paintings were seldom bright, but generally of some dark colour, black, green, yellow, or dusky red. The stucco was very thick, and the workmen contrived to cut it from the walls without the least injury to the paintings. They were done in pannels, with grotesque ornaments round them ; not in fresco, as was first supposed, but in distemper; that is, the colours were not mixed up with water, and incorporated with the wall itself, by laying it on while the stucco was wet; but with size, or some other glutinous matter, and laid on superficially.