Excavated: 1881 (upper level) (no excavation report published; Lanciani), 1913 (lower level) (GdS 1913, 331 (November 1-30); NSc 1914, 72 with 73 fig. 1; Calza).
Mosaic: SO IV, 84-85 nrs. 137-138 with fig. 21.
Inscription: CIL XIV S, 4549 nr. 58.
Date: 190-200 AD; 1-50 AD (lower level) (SO IV, misreading Blake 1930, 101).
Meas. of tesserae: 0.015 (SO IV); lower level: "mosaico bianco a tasselli piccoli limitati intorno da una fascia nera, intorno a questa un fascione bianco a tasselli più ordinari".

Photos and drawings:

Front room and back room (gh)

Front room and back room (gh2)

Front room and back room (tm)

Front room (jthb)

Back room (from the west) (tm)

Back room (from the west) (tm)

Back room (from the west) (tm)

Statio 55 - 59 (from the west) (tm)

Statio 59 + statio 58 (from the south-east; left + right) (tm)

Statio 59 + statio 58 (centre + right) (gh2)

Upper level

Depiction (geometric design) (SO IV)

Lower level

Depiction and text (left) (NSc; also NADIS inv. nr. 635)

Mosaic

The statio was excavated in 1881. In 1913 the lower level of the back room was investigated. Nothing was reported about the layer above the lower level. Apparently the lower level was covered with earth again, although the mosaic was evidently seen by Pohl in 1970 during her excavations. I have not been able to find photos of the lower level, old or modern. The lower floor is today covered with earth.

Most of the west part of the floor of the front room has been preserved, but the west edge is missing and the south part is much damaged. The room is bordered on the north side by a thin band of white marble (on the axis of the central column), next to which, on its south side, is a black band, 3-4 tesserae wide. In the centre of the room are geometric designs that stop at the point where statio 59 begins. Becatti suggests a continuation in statio 59.

On the lower level of the back room is (still in situ?) a double black frame (outside meas. 1.90 x 2.00). It contains a text and a depiction. According to NADIS inv. nr. 644 it is in the front part of the back room, not in the centre, and shifted a bit to the south.

Flanking the depiction are the letters S R (h. of letters 0.11). In view of the depiction Calza suggests stuppatores restiones, as in statio 1.

Suggested reading:

S(tuppatores) R(estiones)

In the west and south part of the front room is a geometric design of shields. The north-east part of the preserved part of the floor has another geometric design, of lozenges. The two designs are separated by a double, black frame, one and two tesserae wide. The two patterns belong to one and the same phase.

The objects in the frame in the back room are interpreted by Calza as a double comb for working flax, flax itself (being worked and tied together in the middle), and a long stick.[1]

Becatti
Instruments. Un fascio di fusti con fogliette lanceolate alternate, legate nel mezzo; a sinistra è uno strumento, costituito da un manico terminante in due dischi sovrapposti e distanziati con specie di chiodi nella faccia inferiore; a destra una verga sottile e appuntita.
Geometric design. Losanghe bianche e nere alternate, disposte a spina di pesce, il resto del campo è invece ornato con un motivo di doppie asce bianche e nere alternate e disposte in file diagonali incrociate.

Masonry

The back wall of the back room is of opus latericium with two rows of oblong tufa stones, resting on opus reticulatum. There is no north wall. The south wall is of opus vittatum simplex. No south wall is indicated on the plans of Vaglieri and Gismondi. No fake, brick plinths have been preserved around the central columns.

Interpretation

The mosaic in the front room, with its two designs, suggests that part of the room was used for a specific purpose. When seen from the side the eastern mosaic produces a 3D-effect of steps leading upwards from east to west.[2]

The design of the western mosaic is also found on the other side of the square, almost exactly opposite this statio, in statio 3. See there for a further interpretation.

(1) See Hermansen 1982 for a description of a workshop of the stuppatores in Ostia, and a description of the production process.
(2) A different effect, changing black and white backgrounds, is described by Swift (2009, figs. 1.2-1.4).