Petronius: Satires and the Book of Priapeia

It would take too long to list each detail. We therefore entered the bath, and having been heated by the sweat, we came out to the cold water in a moment of time. Trimalchio, having been anointed with perfume, was being wiped down, not with linen cloths, but with robes made of the softest wool. Meanwhile, three medical attendants iatraliptae specialists in massage and medical anointing were drinking Falernian wine in his sight, and when they spilled a great deal while brawling, Trimalchio kept saying that this was his treat. From there, wrapped in a scarlet cloak, he was placed on a litter, with four bedecked outrunners and a hand-cart chiramaxium a small carriage or hand-cart for invalid or pampered individuals preceding him, in which his favorite was being carried, an elderly boy, bleary-eyed, more deformed than his master Trimalchio. As he was being carried away, a musician symphoniacus a musician playing a flute/pipe with tiny pipes approached his head and sang the whole journey, as if he were whispering something secretly into his ear.

We follow, already sated with wonder, and arrived with Agamemnon at the door, on the doorpost of which a small tablet was fixed with this inscription:
"Whoever slave shall go out without the master's order, shall receive one hundred lashes."

At the very entrance, however, there stood a doorkeeper dressed in green, with a cherry-colored belt, and he was shelling peas into a silver dish. Over the threshold, however, a golden cage was hanging, in which a variegated magpie was greeting those entering. But as I was marveling at everything, I almost fell backward and broke my legs. For on the left as you enter, not far from the doorkeeper's room, a huge dog, bound by a chain, was painted on the wall, and above it, in square letters, was written:
"Beware of the dog."

My companions laughed, but I, having collected my breath, did not stop following the whole wall. It was a slave market venalicium a display or sale of slaves, often depicted in art depicted with titles, and Trimalchio himself, long-haired, was holding a herald's staff caduceum a staff associated with Mercury, symbol of trade/commerce and was entering Rome with Minerva goddess of wisdom/crafts leading him. Next, how he had learned to calculate, and finally how he had been made a steward dispensator a household manager/treasurer. The curious painter had rendered everything diligently with an inscription. In the portico, which was coming to an end, Mercury the messenger god, associated with profit was snatching him up, lifted by the chin, onto a high platform tribunal a raised seat or dais. Fortuna the goddess of luck was present, abundant with her overflowing horn, and three Parcae the Fates were spinning golden threads. I also noticed in the portico a group of runners exercising with their master. Furthermore, I saw a large cabinet in the corner, in the shrine of which silver Lares household gods were placed, and a marble sign of Venus goddess of love, and a not-small golden box pyxis a small container/casket, in which they were saying his beard trimmings were kept.

I therefore began to ask the hall-porter what pictures they had in the middle.