The thin foliate shaft, perhaps a thymiaterion, is set on a black ground between yellow and red panels and recalls the decorative scheme of the House of M. Lucretius Fronto at Pompeii, a paragon of the second phase of the Third Style of Roman wall painting (see fig. 60 in R. Ling, Roman Painting). As Ling explains (op. cit., pp. 57-58), “The use of yellow, unfashionable in the early Third Style, became increasingly popular. At the same time ornamental detail grew more complex, with a marked tendency to the proliferation of leafy tendrils and similar vegetal motifs, and hints of perspectival recession crept back into the wall.”