Asa Paulini
ASA PAULINI a place on the road from Lugdunum (Lyon) to Augustodunum (Autun). It is placed in the Antonine Itin. x Gallic leagues, or xv M.P. from Lugdunum, and this distance corresponds to the site of Anse. Asa, in the Itin., perhaps ought to be Ansa.
[G.L]A station mentioned in the Antonine Itinerary, in Gallia Lugdunensis near the confluence of the Saône and the Azergues. Traces of a pre-Roman settlement have been excavated on this site, a focus of roads and waterways.
Some mosaics were first discovered, then a large Gallo-Roman villa (owned by Paulinus?) which has been under excavation since 1964. The villa is of a type frequently found in Gaul, with a galleried facade (175 m long at least) to the E. The colonnades are of brick faced with stucco and covered with tiles. Eleven of its rooms have been excavated, several of them with frescos and mosaics. In the middle of the facade is room IX, the oecus of the villa, where the main mosaic was found in 1843 (now in the Hôtel de Ville at Anse). There are several apsed rooms that probably served to receive guests. Each end of the gallery is extended by a perpendicular wing containing rooms with mosaics and painted walls. Room VII of the S wing, which contained an Early Christian tomb, is decorated with stuccos painted in different colors, with flower and bird motifs. The finds, the construction of the buildings, and the style of decoration indicate two periods: a 1st c. rustic villa was replaced by a villa urbana in the early 2d c.; the latter was torn down at the end of the 2d c., then partly rebuilt and lived in until the 4th c.
An oval-shaped castellum was built to the E in the Late Empire.
BIBLIOGRAPHYL. B. Morel, La station romaine d'Ansa Paulini (1925); Grenier, Manuel I (1931) 445-46; J. Guey & P. M. Duval, “Les mosaïques de la Grange-du-Bief,” Gallia 18 (1960) 83-102; R. Perraud, “La villa gallo-romaine de la Grange-du-Bief,” Activités beau Jolaises 22 (Dec. 1965); M. Leglay, “Informations,” Gallia 24 (1966) 498; 26 (1968) 576-78.
M. LEGLAY