Church of St. Sebastian; but in a subterraneous chapel is a beautiful
bust of the saint, by Bernini, full of expression; and here also is the
entrance to the most extensive catacombs about Rome. They consist of
crooked winding passages in tufo and pozzolana, in three stories, which
as the levels are not always exactly preserved, are easily made into
seven by those who wish to increase the appearance of the marvellous.
The niches for the bodies are mere square recesses, about the length of
a human body, and just big enough to receive it; but there are some
larger ones forming an arch, at the bottom of which the body was placed:
wherever these larger arched niches are found, there is a little
apartment, whose rude sides have been coated with stucco. I will not
however venture to say that there are no stuccoed rooms without niches,
but the two circumstances generally go together. They pretend to have
found here, the bodies of 174,000 martyrs. A collection of itself
sufficient to stock all Europe with relicks.
A little beyond this is the Spoliarium, or Mutatorium; or it is a
temple, according to Palladio, or anything else you please. It has been
generally supposed to have supplied some purpose dependent on the circus
of Caracalla, with which it has however no connexion. It consists of a
round edifice inclosed in a court. The central building is formed by a
circular wall, with an octagonal pier in the middle supporting a vault;
the whole forming doubtless the basement of a large domed hall above,
which no longer exists. The work is of rubble, which within the vault is
faced with bricks, laid regularly, but with a great deal of mortar; the
vault is altogether of rubble. There are niches in the middle pier, and
its octagonal form seems not essential, since the vault rises upon a
circle described within it. The surrounding wall of the court is built
of alternate layers of brick and stone, or rather of tufo, for it hardly
deserves the name of stone. Within it, are remains of piers formed of
brick only, and there are some vestiges of the vaulting with which the
intervening space was covered, forming a continued arcade round three
sides of the court, or perhaps all four, but that towards the road is
quite destroyed. Close on the outside of this court is a sepulchre, long
attributed to the Servilian family, but as the true burying-place of
that family has been since found at a considerable distance, and
determined by inscriptions, this remains without a name. It is of a
square form without and within, and is covered, not with a proper vault,
but pyramidally, on the principle of the _dos d’âne_. There are,
however, rough arches to some of the openings; a passage is carried all
round the building in the thickness of the walls. The whole construction
is certainly very singular, and appears to be of high antiquity, but I
cannot pretend to assign a probable date.
From these remains we pass to the Circus of Caracalla, not that it was
built by that emperor, for it is probably of a much later period, but it
was known from medals that Caracalla erected a circus, and the
antiquaries could not tell where to find it, while here they had a
circus without a name. Whoever built it, it is a very interesting ruin,
because it exhibits more perfectly than any other, the arrangement of
the ancient circus. The surrounding walls are constructed like those of
the court of the mutatorium, with alternate layers of brick and small
stones; the continued vault which supported the seats, is of rubble, but
with large earthen vases in the upper part, to lighten the work. The
line of _Carceres_ which forms the square end, if I may use the word
_square_ so loosely, is oblique in position with respect to the side
walls, and curved in itself, in order to put all the chariots upon an
equality at starting; and the _spina_ for a similar reason is neither
along the middle of the arena, nor exactly parallel to one of its sides,
but so disposed that the passage gets narrower through its whole
progress. At the semicircular end is the _Porta Triumphalis_,[6] through
which the victor left the circus. The obelisk which now embellishes the
Piazza Navona, once decorated the spine of this place.
Overlooking this circus, are various ruins, of which we may reckon five
distinct fragments, each at some distance from the other; and a long
terrace, supported in part upon vaults, to one of which you still find
an entrance. The stucco is still remaining, and we observe painted lines
drawn very neatly and correctly round panels, of which the ornaments in
the middle have been taken away: from what remains, we may conclude that
the whole was well finished. Some of these fragments of edifices have
been supposed to belong to the temple of Honour and Virtue, built by
Marcellus, after the conquest of Sicily, in the year of Rome 544; for
this, however, there is not the shadow of proof, and the style of
construction, of rubble faced with brick, is similar to that of imperial
times.
We will now make a diversion from the road, in order to visit some
antiquities which occupy a retired situation to the left, in or near the
little valley called the Caffarelli. The first we meet with, just on the
brow of the hill, is the little edifice called the Temple of the
Tempest. There are some small buildings about Rome, covered with the
sort of vault which the French call _dos d’âne_, but I do not know that
we have any correspondent English term. The rubble and mortar of which
it is composed, seem to have been laid on planks rising in a triangular
form, and to sustain themselves when these are removed, entirely by the
cement. This little building is one of them. It is said to have been
erected A. U. C. 547, (before C. 206.) by P. C. Scipio, in consequence
of a vow which he made when overtaken by a storm in returning from
Spain; and I have observed two tombs, one of which I have just described
to you, the roof of which is constructed on the same principle, in the
form of the frustum of a pyramid; both very much dilapidated. I am
inclined to attribute to all three a high antiquity, probably as high as
that assigned by tradition to the temple of the Tempest; but of this
building I must observe, that only a small part can by any possibility
boast a claim to the name: additions have been made at different times.
The oldest part is formed of rubble-work, of fragments of lava; the
later (and these walls are built close against the others) of a
rubble-work of tufo, faced with reticulated work, and since that, a
dwellinghouse has been erected on the top, which is now in ruins. At a
little distance is a building called the Temple of Bacchus, or by
Uggeri, and some others, the Temple of Honour and Virtue. Four
Corinthian columns of pretty good design and workmanship form the front,
but they are spaced wide apart, and surmounted by a miserable
architrave. Above this is what may be considered as an enormous frieze,
which, as well as the cornice, is of brick. On one side is a fragment of
a wall of alternate brick and tufo, not close against the wall of the
temple, or parallel to it. The walls of the present building are all
brick, at least as to the facing; and in converting it to a church, the
spaces between the columns have been filled up with an ill-built wall of
brick, and fragments of stone. The original brickwork is neat and good,
but the bricks are not cut to a sharp edge, as they are in some other
examples. Internally, a range of stones projecting from the walls, forms
a series of corbels supporting flat arches of brick: above every
alternate stone is a pilaster, and there were probably columns below, so
that it was a room adorned with two orders of architecture. Some stucco
panels remain on the vault, and along the springing there is a row of
trophies in considerable relief. The columns alone belong to a building
of good time, but the edifice, in its first state, is probably not much
earlier than Constantine, and perhaps later: the alterations and
conversion into a church are not recorded; we only see the fact.
Something was done in 1634, but I do not know what.
Below this, in the valley, is the Grotto of the nymph Egeria, a cavern,
perhaps originally formed by nature in the side of the hill, but
enlarged and made regular by art, and the soft rock everywhere covered
with brick, and reticulated work. It appears to have been formed into a
symmetrical building adorned with niches; in one of which, at the end of
the grotto, is a fragment of a male statue. The supply of water is but
small, but the vault and walls, covered with the beautiful _Adiantum
Capillus Veneris_, show the general moisture of the soil.
Continuing down the valley, we meet with the Temple of Rediculus: the
body of the work is of rubble, but it is faced with very neat brickwork,
in which the horizontal surfaces of the bricks have been rubbed or cut
away, in order to give room for the mortar, when the edges externally
were almost in contact, as in the tomb called the sepulchre of Mars, and
in some others near the mutatorium, which I have not particularly
mentioned. I did not observe that any of the bricks were broken in
consequence of this process, an effect which I think would certainly
follow if a modern architect were to direct such a mode of proceeding.
It has Corinthian pilasters at the back, which is the most conspicuous
part, the foliage of whose capitals is also cut in brick. On one side
are portions of two octagonal columns recessed in the wall, while the
other side is plain. It has windows; and many of the ornaments round
them, and in the cornice, and also a band, ornamented with a fret, which
surrounds the edifice between the pilasters, seem to have been moulded
in the clay, before being burnt. There are evident traces of a portico,
towards the streamlet which waters the valley, so that the whole
together must have formed a complete little prostyle temple. Within, the
vault which separates the basement, from what would have been on such a
supposition the floor of the temple, is broken away; and in this
basement, on the west side, or end, is a row of small arches, which some
antiquaries say are not parts of the building, but have been put up to
support fodder for the cattle. As, however, traces of similar arches may
be observed in the construction of the wall on the south side, whose
surface is destroyed, I suspect that they were for the reception of
cinerary urns. Whatever was the purpose of the erection, there are
several buildings of a similar disposition about Rome, and therefore
probably intended for a similar object. Most of them have been supposed
to be temples, but I believe all contain appearances in the basement
story, (for each has a basement story) of having been used as places of
sepulture after burning: yet they are not placed immediately on the
great roads, as sepulchres usually were, nor is there any certain
sepulchre in which this form has been adopted. This little building was
probably of as correct a design, and of as finished an execution, as any
of them; and by a fortunate coincidence is the best preserved.
[Illustration:
A. B. Clayton del. from Sketches by J. Woods Edwards. Sculp.
TEMPLE OF REDICULUS.
_London. Published by J & A. Arch. Cornhill March 1^{st}. 1828_ ]
Returning to the Appian way, and ascending the ridge, along which it is
carried for several miles, we arrive at the Sepulchre of Cecilia
Metella, the wife of Crassus; probably of the rich Crassus, for after
every allowance for individual wealth, and Roman luxury and ostentation,
we are still, in spite of the inscription, at a loss to believe that
such a mole should have been erected to contain the bones of one woman.
The vast square basement is of rubble, formed of fragments of peperino,
with large blocks of travertine built into the mass, to unite with and
support the facing of travertine, which once covered the whole, but of
which only these heading-blocks remain. In this part there are said to
be three small chambers, (to which however I could discover no entrance)
and in one of these was found the sarcophagus now in the court of the
Palazzo Farnese. The circular part of the edifice rose abruptly, as far
as we can judge from the remains, from this square mass, without any
preparation to reconcile the change of form: this upper circular part
forms a tower about 60 feet in diameter, and of which the walls are 20
feet thick at the bottom, and more higher up, since the opening
diminishes upwards in a conical form. Uggeri assigns 87 French feet to
the whole diameter, and only 20 feet to the circular chamber; perhaps he
is right: I did not measure it. Like all other ruins of any consequence,
this was converted into a fortress, or rather made part of a large
castle, during the wars of the Roman barons, and was the eyry of the
Gaetani family. These sons of rapine and spoil seem to have troubled
themselves little about the mal aria. After leaving this monument, and
the Gothic fortress in which it was afterwards included, the tombs
become very frequent. The fortress occupies exactly the brow of a range
of hill extending in a direct line from Albano, and evidently formed by
a current of lava, and there are considerable quarries just by it, which
supply Rome with paving-stones.
The most simple form of the ancient sepulchre was that of a square, or
circular tower, of no great height or size, on a square basement.
Fragments of white marble remain in sufficient quantity, to shew that a
large proportion of the tombs must have been covered with this material,
but for the most part, the existing ruins are merely indistinct masses
of rubble. Some are of brick, but these are usually of greater extent,
and more complicated forms, with domes and arches; and are probably of
later date. These sepulchral chambers are disposed in a single line on
each side of the Appian way, but a little further on, we find a great
number of fragments scattered over a considerable extent, and called
Roma Vecchia.
There are about Rome several buildings more or less closely resembling
what I have above described under the name of the temple of Rediculus.
Many of these have evident traces of a portico of four columns: one of
them has two orders in height, and there are other trifling differences;
but in the whole, there is a striking similarity both of design and
execution. The facing is uniformly of very neat brickwork, and they are
probably all nearly of the same period. There are three such at this
Roma Vecchia (for there is more than one Roma Vecchia); four more near
the modern road to Naples, one of which has been christened the temple
of Fortuna Muliebris, and two or three, out of the Porta San Lorenzo.
Beyond Roma Vecchia we meet again with tombs, and with a farmhouse, most
of the walls of which seem to be ancient. Near this there has been a
magnificent pyramidal sepulchre, surrounded in its original state by
arches, and probably by a colonnade. I extended my walk to an immense
round mass, which has formed the basement of some spacious mausoleum; it
was unfortunately locked up, nor could I find anybody in the little
cottage with which it is at present crowned to give me entrance. Then
leaving the Appian way, though marked still further by its line of
tombs, and crossing the modern road to Albano and Naples, I found myself
again among the ranges of those aqueducts, of which I have already given
you some description. The Marana, or Acqua Crabra, here runs among them,
conducted on the top of a small mound, and crossing in some places both
lines of aqueducts. In Italy, the Roman roads do not by any means adhere
to the direct straight line which characterizes them in England. Our
country was a forest when these works were undertaken: Italy was highly
cultivated, and divided into private estates, and this perhaps has in
many cases given rise to the windings, both of the roads and aqueducts:
indeed it is difficult to account for the abrupt turns of the latter on
any other principle. By the sides of these aqueducts there are other
ruins occupying a considerable extent, but no one of them announces any
building of much importance. There are vaults, domes, and arches, and
one of those great niches so common in the Roman ruins; where the whole
end of a building, or much the greater part of it, was made
semicircular, and covered with half a dome. In the baths, similar large
niches frequently stand quite insulated, but where they occur in the
position above described, they seem at one time to have been considered
as a decided proof that the edifice to which they belonged, was a
temple, and hardly anything was acknowledged to be a temple, where
enough remained to shew that no such niche had existed. It is
unfortunate that we have only scattered fragments of the temples of
Rome, but it seems probable that this arrangement did form in them a
very usual termination. Nothing of the sort is found in any Greek
temple; but though the Romans borrowed largely from the religious
practices and observances of the Greeks, they must have drawn something
from other sources. Their square cells (not oblong, as in the Greek
buildings), their niches, their vaults, their round temples, and the
windows they made in them, were perhaps derived from the Etruscans,
together with many of the superstitious rites, and the haruspices, which
history teaches us to have been derived from that people.
As I have already mentioned the Basilica, I shall find very little to
describe out of the Porta di San Paolo. There is a place called Tre
Fontane, where there are three churches, and in one of them, three
springs of warm water, or rather I believe, one spring with three
openings. The tradition of the place is, that St. Paul was here
beheaded; that where his head fell, a warm spring burst out; that it
bounded; and where it fell a second time, another spring arose, but not
so warm as the first; it bounded again; and produced a third spring,
which was nearly cold. There is however so little difference, that I
persuaded an English gentleman who was with me that the one said to be
the warmest was the coldest. How I hate these ridiculous additions to a
story not in itself improbable! The great church is long and low, with
some pointed vaulting. That containing the spring is handsome
internally, but the best is an octagonal church by Vignola, which rises
in a very fine pyramidal form.
I have already given you something of the western bank of the Tiber in
my first walk, where I returned by Monte Mario and the Valle d’Inferno.
The only thing remaining on this side is the Villa Pamfili, which is one
of the largest about Rome; that is, not the house, but the grounds and
gardens. On the road are the remains of an ancient aqueduct, which are
frequently brought in to support the modern Acqua Paolina. What in
English we should call the villa, but which is here known by the name of
_casino_, can hardly be called handsome, and yet it pleases, and the
terraces and the flat garden below, cut partly into the hill, the
fragments of architecture, the fountains, the groves of towering stone
pines, and the views in both directions, make it a place to which you
willingly return again and again. The situation of the house is not well
chosen. The pride of the artist was to counteract nature, not to follow
her, and gently bring her into his service; but the situation of the
grounds is very fine. Though high, it has a terrible reputation for mal
aria. To the botanist it has another interest, as being the station of
several rare plants.
It is among the attractions of Rome, that the Studii or workshops of the
artists, and especially of the sculptors, are so easily accessible. That
of Canova is announced by the fragments of sculpture which are about it,
and built up in the walls externally. The great excellence of this
admirable artist lies in female figures, and in those of very young men,
with a character rather of grace, than of strength. Hence his Cupid and
Psyche; Venus and Adonis; the Graces; his Venus; Hebe; Magdalene; and
others of this sort, attract universal admiration. Canova is not a mere
sculptor, he also paints well, and is in all respects a most liberal
man; witness the busts of the great men of Italy put up by him at the
Pantheon. Liberal not only in giving what must cost him a considerable
sum, but still more so, in permitting the young men who perform these
busts under his inspection and direction, to affix their names as
artists. He is about to build a church in his native town. The body of
the building is to be like that of the Pantheon, while the portico will
be imitated from the Parthenon. I asked his architect how much it would
cost, he replied that he could not pretend to say, as in the country
where it was to be erected, the stone is probably cheap, and a
considerable portion of the labour, particularly in the carriage of
materials, would be done gratis by the peasantry, who would consider it
meritorious to forward so good a work; but that such a building could
hardly be erected in Rome for less than 240,000 scudi.
Thorwaldson is celebrated for the grouping of his bas-reliefs, and for
his busts, particularly of the male figures, which are admirable. The
restoration of the marbles found at Egina is committed to his care, and
has required no small attention and judgment to determine the places of
the smaller fragments, but there are a great many still remaining, which
cannot be connected together. The restorations are so perfect, that it
seems to me impossible to distinguish the old work from the new, but I
have already given you my sentiments on this subject. What are capable
of restoration consist of seventeen statues, and the body and the limbs
frequently exhibit very fine sculpture, but the faces are all alike,
with a sort of smirk on each; they are devoid both of individual
character, and of the expression of passion. Some are draped, others
naked, and on some of the draped ones we may trace an appearance of
scales, when exposed in certain positions to the light. The group at the
front of the temple represented a combat, with a Minerva standing
between them, entirely unconcerned at what is going on on each side of
her. This latter is of a very ancient style, almost Egyptian. It
appears, that on the immediate apex of the pediment, a small ornament
was placed with a figure on each side, still small, but taller than the
ornament in the middle, and there are fragments of two griffins,
supposed to have stood on the angles of the pediment, the heads being
turned from the centre of the building, so that in both cases the
disposition of the ornaments contradicts the inclination of the
architectural parts, instead of following it, as has been usually
practised in modern times.
It is worth while, among the scattered objects of curiosity, to visit
the fragments dug up at Veii, belonging to a Sig. Georgi, and now to be
disposed of.[7] There is a remarkably fine sitting statue of Tiberius,
and an erect one, said to be of Germanicus, with many busts, but nothing
later than Nero. It is evident that these fragments have nothing to do
with the ancient Veii. The inscriptions prove the existence of a later
city of that name, which appears to have occupied a small part of the
former site. No regular plan of excavation has been pursued, but the
marbles were found in holes dug here and there. Bronze figures and
medals were also discovered, but many of these are said to have been
stolen.
LETTER XXXV.
TIVOLI.
_Tivoli, 24th May, 1817._