There is not much left of the paintings which had to adorn public and private buildings in Roman Sardinia. Many of the decorated walls discovered between the XIX and the start of the XX century have been lost; but more recent discoveries enable us to say that many homes were decorated with paintings.

Walls usually have large divisions with one colour edged by another one (fig. 1), but there are also plant paintings, architectural reproductions and geometrical layouts (figs. 2-3). 

Fig. 1 - NNora. Reconstruction of a decoration in a home-shop of the III cent. A.D.  (courtesy Fulvia Donati).

Fig. 2 - Nora. Remains of a painted decoration in a house of the III cent. A.D. (from Ghedini, Salvadori 1996 tab. I)

Fig. 3 - Cagliari, Villa of Tigellio: female face (from Angiolillo 1987, fig. 120)

The figurative scenes are rarer, present more in places of worship, like at San Salvatore di Cabras, where we have the portrayal of a series of divinities (fig. 4).

Fig. 4 - Hypogeum of San Salvatore di Cabras (OR). Face of Venus (from Donati-Zucca 1992, p. 29)