THE VELABRUM AND THE CIRCUS FLAMINIUS.
[Sidenote: Janus Quadrifrons.]
The church of S. Giorgio in Velabro, which stands between the Palatine
Hill and the river near the Piazza Bocca della Verità, retains the ancient
name of this district, formerly a swamp called the Velabrum. This is
perhaps the best point from which to begin our survey of the ruins of the
Velabrum. The most conspicuous ruin near the church is the archway called
Janus Quadrifrons, from its quadrilateral shape. It is a massive square
building of white marble, with four piers supporting as many arches which
are united in the centre, by a vaulted roof. Each pier has on the exterior
twelve niches in two rows, with semicircular shell-shaped crowns. These
two rows of niches were formerly separated by a projecting cornice which
is now nearly destroyed except in the interior. The niches nearest to the
corners on the north and south sides are not hollowed out, but only traced
on the exterior surface, in order not to endanger the solidity of the
angles. The present height of the building is thirty-eight feet, but it
probably had an attica originally upon the top to which the staircase
still extant led, and in which were some small rooms for the transaction
of business. Upon the key-stones of the arches two figures can be still
recognized, one of Rome and the other of the patroness of trade, Minerva.
The exterior surface was doubtless decorated with rows of Corinthian
columns between the niches, a large quantity of remains of such columns
having been found in clearing the base, and in the niches themselves
statues of various deities probably stood.
The purpose of this arch was probably solely ornamental, and it stood by
itself in some part of the Forum Boarium. The rooms in the attica may have
been used for the accommodation of some of the officials of the cattle
market. The builder and date are alike unknown. From the style of its
architecture and sculptures, it has been pronounced decidedly later than
the age of Domitian, to whom from his fondness for building Jani, it might
be attributed. Platner and Becker suggest that it is identical with an
archway called the Arcus Constantini--in the catalogue of the eleventh
region--but a comparison of the style of the remnants of sculptures upon
it with those on the existing arch of Constantine, does not confirm this
conjecture.
[Sidenote: Arcus Argentinorum.]
Close to the Janus Quadrifrons stands a stone ornamental doorway now
partly built into the wall of the church of S. Giorgio in Velabro. It is
constructed of brickwork with marble facings, and consists of two square
piers decorated with pilasters of the Composite or Roman order at the
corners and surmounted by a horizontal entablature of rich carved work.
There is no trace of an attica above. The inscription, still well
preserved, shows that it was erected by the money-changers or bankers, and
other merchants of the Forum Boarium, in honour of Septimius Severus, his
wife Julia, and his son Antoninus (Caracalla). As in the case of the Arch
of Septimius in the Forum, so here the words III. PP. PROCOS. FORTISSIMO
FELICISSIMOQUE PRINCIPI and PARTHICI MAXIMI BRITANNICI MAXIMI were
inserted by Caracalla in place of the name and titles of his murdered
brother Geta.
Not only in the inscriptions of the time of Septimius Severus, but even in
the reliefs we everywhere find Geta’s figure erased.
On the shafts of the pilasters are representations of military ensigns,
which bear upon their circular tablets and above the eagles likenesses in
relief of two Cæsars, Severus and Caracalla. The third likeness, that of
Geta, has been erased in every instance. In each of the spaces between the
pilasters are four panels with sculptures in relief. The lowest of these
represents the merchants of the Forum Boarium bringing cattle as victims
to the altar. The compartment above these exhibits various instruments
used in sacrifice, similar to those found upon the Temple of Vespasian.
Upon the larger central panel are the figures of the imperial family
engaged in sacrificing, and it can easily be seen that from some of these
the figure of Geta has been carefully chiselled away.
In one of these large panels is the figure of a barbarian captive with the
Phrygian cap so common upon the sculptures of the triumphal arches. The
upper compartments contain festooned ornamental work and a few figures of
men. The front of the architrave and frieze is almost entirely occupied by
the inscriptions, and is not highly ornamented, but the cornice, which is
divided into seven ledges, is overladen with various decorative patterns
without purity of design or excellence of execution. The date of the
erection of this monument is stated in the inscription to be the twelfth
year of the tribunitia potestas of Severus and the seventh of Caracalla,
which corresponds to the year A.D. 204. Reber thinks it possible that the
merchants of the Forum Boarium intended it as a testimonial of gratitude
to Severus for having built the neighbouring Janus Quadrifrons to ornament
their quarter of the city.
[Sidenote: Cloaca Maxima.]
The oldest monument of Roman masonry is the remaining portion of a cloaca
in this district, commonly identified with the Cloaca Maxima of Livy,
which reaches from a spot near the church of S. Giorgio in Velabro and the
Janus Quadrifrons to the Tiber bank near the Ponte Rotto. The ancient
archway has been broken open here, and can be reached by descending into a
hollow near the Janus Quadrifrons. Near the Janus Quadrifrons, at the
above-mentioned spot, seven cloacæ unite and pour their waters into the
still extant portion of the Cloaca Maxima, so that a large stream is
constantly flowing through it. These branch sewers are built with solid
brick arches, but the main archway, though fronted with modern brickwork,
consists of massive blocks of tufa, and at short intervals of every few
yards has an arch of travertine introduced, to add to its solidity and
strength. The original size of the archway, one-third of which is now
choked up with mud, was twelve feet four inches high, and ten feet eight
inches wide. Strabo and Pliny say that a cart loaded with hay could pass
through some of the Roman sewers, and certainly in the case of this
cloaca, it would not be impossible to do so were it cleared of mud.
M. Agrippa, the Haussmann of Rome, is said, when ædile, to have traversed
the main sewer in a boat. The whole length of this remaining portion is at
least three hundred and forty yards, and it makes several bends, following
probably the direction of the ancient streets. The mouth is still visible,
when the Tiber is not high, at a spot called the Pulchrum Litus, near the
round temple usually called the Temple of Vesta. The immense size is due
to the fact that it was not only a sewer for refuse, but a drain for the
lake of the Velabrum, and the many land springs of the Forum, and must be
classed with the emissarium of the Alban Lake and other gigantic
undertakings of the kind, such as the cuniculus at Veii, executed about
B.C. 539. For a distance of about forty feet from the mouth the cloaca is
constructed of a triple arch of peperino, mixed with some blocks of tufa,
but throughout the rest of its course it consists of a single arch of tufa
with occasional bands of travertine. The masonry along the embankment of
the shore on each side, is partly of peperino and partly of tufa and
travertine blocks laid along and across alternately.
Livy gives the early history of this extraordinary work in his first Book.
In the thirty-eighth chapter he ascribes the commencement of the
undertaking of draining the Velabrum and Forum to Tarquinius Priscus, and
in the fifty-sixth he says that Tarquinius Superbus completed the Cloaca
Maxima as a receptacle for the refuse of the whole city. Dionysius agrees
in giving the same account of the origin of the system of cloacæ, and
Pliny enumerates the cloacæ among the wonders of the great metropolis, and
expressly mentions Tarquinius Priscus as entitled to the credit of having
first originated this great work of public utility. His words are--“Seven
streams, after traversing the city, are united and their water so
compressed into one channel as to sweep everything along with it like a
torrent, and when a great body of rain-water is added to this the very
walls are shaken by the agitated waters; and sometimes the Tiber rises and
beats back into them, and vast opposing masses of water meet and
struggle, yet the solidity of their masonry resists and stands firm. Huge
weights are carried over them, whole buildings undermined by fire or by
some accident fall upon them, earthquakes shake the very ground around
them, yet they have lasted for seven hundred years from the time of
Tarquinius Priscus almost uninjured, a monument of antiquity which ought
to be the more carefully observed since it has been passed over in silence
by some of our most celebrated historians.”
The Tarquins are said to have compelled the Roman people to work at these
huge structures, just as the kings of Egypt and Assyria exacted task-work
from their subjects; but in palliation of the cruelties alleged against
them by the historians it must be noted that in the one case buildings of
permanent public service were built, while in the other, only the vanity
of a despot was flattered.
[Sidenote: Fortuna Virilis.]
Not far from the Janus Quadrifrons, and close to the Pons Æmilius, or
Ponte Rotto, stands a small temple, now converted into the church of S.
Maria Egiziaca, which presents an unsolved problem in Roman topography.
The substruction of this temple, which has been laid bare, consists of
tufa cased with travertine. The form of the temple is that called
tetrastylos by Vitruvius, having four Ionic columns in front and seven at
the sides. The four front columns and two on each side, forming the
pronaos, originally stood clear, but are now enclosed within the wall of
the church. The remaining five on each side with those at the back were
half columns set against the wall of the cella. The shafts of the half
columns are of tufa, but the bases and capitals, with the entablature and
the columns of the pronaos, are of travertine. On the frieze and cornice
are the remains of ornamental work, which is now rendered almost invisible
by the stucco with which the walls have been covered. The Ionic volutes on
the corner capitals of this temple are in the later style, while the side
capitals are in the usual style.
This building has usually been supposed to be the temple dedicated by
Servius Tullius to Fortuna Virilis, and situated on the bank of the Tiber.
The passage of Dionysius upon which this supposition rests is as follows:
“Servius Tullius built two temples to Fortune, one in the Forum Boarium,
and the other upon the bank of the Tiber.”[81]
It is most probable, as Reber suggests, that we have here the Temple of
Servius dedicated to Fortune without any special title. Dionysius, as we
have seen, places this in the Forum Boarium, and Livy describes it as
intra portam Carmentalem, and mentions it in tracing the course of a
conflagration between the Salinæ near the Porta Trigemina and the Porta
Carmentalis. But there was another temple, that of Mater Matuta which
stood close to the Temple of Fortune, and there is no evidence showing to
which of the two the ruin in question belonged. Both were founded by
Servius, and reckoned among the most venerable relics of ancient Rome.
Becker urges the claims of the Temple of Pudicitia Patricia, which Livy
places in the Forum Boarium near the round Temple of Hercules, to this
site. But this was merely a small shrine, containing a statue and not a
templum. So far as an opinion can be formed of the date of the temple from
the materials and style of architecture, it seems to belong to the later
republic.
[Sidenote: So-called Temple of Vesta.]
On the Piazza della Bocca della Verità, at a short distance from the
temple we have just been considering, stand the remains of a small round
temple commonly called the Temple of Vesta. Perhaps of all the ruins of
Rome this is the most familiar to the eye of the tourist. A considerable
part of the cella is still standing, ornamented with a simple and elegant
cornice. Round this stand nineteen graceful Corinthian columns of white
marble. The entablature is unfortunately destroyed, and the rude modern
tiled roof with which the building has been capped completely spoils the
picturesque effect of the ruin.
[Illustration: Palatine Hill. Æmilian Temple of Hercules, and mouth of
Cloaca Maxima. Bell tower of S. Maria in Cosmedin.]
The name now given to it rests on no other evidence than its circular
shape, and as we have no mention of a Temple of Vesta in the Forum Boarium
it must be at once condemned as a misnomer. It has also been called the
Temple of the Sibyl or the Temple of Cybele without better reason. The
most probable conjecture as to its name is that first suggested by Piale,
that it is the round Temple of Hercules in the Forum Boarium mentioned in
the tenth Book of Livy, and alluded to by Festus as the Æmilian Temple of
Hercules. The appellation Æmiliana certainly seems to point to the
neighbourhood of the Æmilian bridge. The style of its architecture may be
attributed to a restoration in the latter half of the first century A.D.
Formerly, it was called the Church of Madonna del Sole, from a favourite
image of the Virgin in it, and at an earlier period S. Stefano delle
Carozze, from the discovery of a marble model of a chariot in its
neighbourhood, but in 1810 it was cleared out and restored, and since then
it has not been used as a church, but contains a small collection of
marble fragments.
[Sidenote: Temple of Ceres.]
At the entrance of the valley of the Circus Maximus, and on the south side
of the Piazza della Bocca della Verità stands the church of S. Maria in
Cosmedin which is built upon the ruins of an ancient temple. Ten columns
still remain in their original places, seven of which stand in a line
parallel to the entrance, and three others in the left-hand side wall of
the church. Some of the columns are built into the walls of the Sacristies
on the right of the entrance, and reach through the roofs to the upper
story. The material of which they are made is white marble, and the order
to which they belong the Composite. Parts of the wall of the cella may
still be seen in the sacristy, built of tufa which was originally faced
with marble. The design of the capitals and chiselling of the ornamental
work upon them is of the best period of art, and one of them may
conveniently be examined in the room over the sacraria, and in the organ
loft. Behind the apse of the church are some large chambers built of
massive blocks of travertine, which were probably attached to the Carceres
of the Circus as stables or offices of some kind, and the position of
these compels us to assume that the front of the temple faced towards the
Velabrum, and that the seven columns parallel to the façade of the present
church belonged to the side of the temple, while the three in the
left-hand wall formed a part of the front. Otherwise the travertine
chambers at the back must have formed some part of the temple, and it is
difficult to see how this could have been the case, as they are evidently
not the walls of the cella, and cannot be brought into any symmetrical
position with the rows of columns.
The Temples of Pudicitia Patricia, of Mater Matuta, and of Fortune have
been severally identified with these ruins by the writers of Roman
topography. But it has been shown already that the first of these was
probably a mere chapel, and that the other two must be placed nearer to
the Carmental gate, and therefore the conjecture of Canina that the church
of S. Maria in Cosmedin was the Temple of Ceres, Liber, and Libera appears
much more likely to be true. For that temple is included in the eleventh
region by the Curiosum and Notitia, and is placed by Vitruvius, Tacitus,
and Pliny close to the Circus Maximus, while Dionysius expressly says that
it stood just over the barriers of the Circus Maximus. The account of
Vitruvius answers to the ruins which still remain. For he says that the
temple was of the description called aræostyle, i.e. with wide
intercolumnar intervals, and it will be found that the intervals between
the columns now standing are nearly four times their diameter. Vitruvius
also says that it was of the Tuscan order of architecture, and in this
seems to contradict Pliny who, quoting Varro’s authority, speaks of it as
the first temple at Rome which had Greek ornamental work. Their statements
may be reconciled by observing that Pliny is speaking of the decorations
of the temple by Damophilus and Gorgasis, and not of the style of
architecture. The aræostyle arrangement of the columns was probably
preserved even after the complete restoration by Tiberius, at which time,
as Pliny relates, the old Greek frescoes were cut out and framed, and the
terra cotta statues removed from the roof. The temple was first vowed by
A. Postumius, the dictator in the Latin war of B.C. 497, on account of the
great scarcity of provisions which then prevailed. It was dedicated three
years afterwards by the Consul Spurius Cassius, a statesman who showed a
disposition to imitate the great architectural works of the regal period,
contrary to the generally frugal spirit of the early republican fathers.
In the year B.C. 31, a destructive fire, which raged between the Circus
and the Forum Olitorium, destroyed the Temple, and with it some of the
most valuable treasures of Greek art which it contained. Among these,
besides the frescoes of Damophilus and Gorgasis above mentioned, was the
famous pictures of Dionysius by Aristides, for which Attalus bid sixteen
talents, a price which excited the attention of Mummius, and induced him,
although unable himself to appreciate the merits of such works of art, to
suspect its value, and carry it to Rome in spite of the remonstrances of
Attalus.
The restoration was undertaken by Augustus, and finished by Tiberius in
A.D. 17. This temple was to the Plebeian Ædiles what the Temple of Saturn
was to the quæstors, and it was enacted that the decrees of the Senate
should be delivered over to the Ædiles there, an enactment which seems
never to have been carried out.[82]
The medieval names of this church, in Cosmedin, and in Schola Græca, seem
to point to the possession of the church by Greek monks after the division
of the empire, and the piazza in which it stands is called Bocca della
Verità from the strange figure of a head under the modern portico of the
church, in the mouth of which it is said that persons whose veracity lay
under suspicion, were required to place their hands while making oath, in
the belief that the mouth would close upon their hands if the oath taken
was a false one.
[Sidenote: Carceres of the Cirrus Maximus.]
Immediately behind the church are the arched buildings of travertine
blocks which have already been mentioned as belonging to the Carceres of
the Circus. The largest of these is now used as a store-room for articles
of church furniture, and stands on the right side of the tribune of the
church. They are perhaps situated too far towards the river to be portions
of the actual Carceres from which the chariots started, but they may have
formed one side of a courtyard behind the Carceres, in which the
harnessing and preparation for the races took place.
[Sidenote: Theatre of Marcellus.]
The ruins of the Theatre of Marcellus which are still standing in the
Piazza Montanara afford us a fixed point from which to begin our survey of
the region of the Circus Flaminius, which lies to the north-west of the
Velabrum. For it appears certain that the ancient half columns, arches,
and other ruins evidently belonging to a semicircular theatre, which are
now covered by the Palazzo Orsini Savelli, belonged to the theatre of
Marcellus. Suetonius distinctly places this theatre under the Tarpeian
hill, and of the other two stone theatres at Rome we know that the
Pompeian lay further to the north-west, and that the theatre of Balbus was
near the Ponte Sisto. The masonry and architectural details of this
building, though corresponding in many respects with the Coliseum are more
carefully worked, and show an earlier and better period of art.
[Illustration: Theatre of Marcellus.]
There had previously been a stone scena built near this spot by Æmilius
Lepidus, which was perhaps used by Julius Cæsar who first began to build
this theatre. It was not finished until the year B.C. 11 when Augustus
opened it, and named it after his nephew Marcellus, son of Octavia. In the
time of the Flavii the scena was restored, having perhaps suffered from
the fire which burnt the Porticus Octaviæ, and it seems to have again
required repairs in the time of Alexander Severus, who is said to have
wished to restore it.[83]
The Curiosum mentions it as if still in use, and gives the number of
spectators it would contain as 20,000. In the Middle Ages it was, like all
the other great buildings of Rome, turned into a castle by Pietro Leone, a
nobleman of great power in the time of Urban II. and Pascal II., and
celebrated for his factious violence. The shape of the building was thus
completely altered. The great family of the Savelli came into possession
of it in the twelfth century, following Pietro Leone, and after them the
Orsini. The lower stories are now occupied by workshops, small wine
vaults, and rag and bone warehouses, frequented by the rustics of the
Campagna, who are usually to be seen in considerable numbers in the Piazza
Montanara in front of it.
From the piazza two rows of the exterior arcades are visible, each
containing twelve arches and thirteen columns of travertine. The lower
arcade is now buried to the depth of one third of its surface below the
level of the present ground. Its half columns are of the Doric order, with
a Doric entablature and triglyphs, and are surmounted by a low attica with
projecting bases for the half columns of the upper arcade. The height of
this upper arcade was originally somewhat less than that of the lower. It
has half columns of the Ionic order, carrying a simple entablature with
an architrave of three projecting ledges, a plain frieze, and a cornice
with toothed mouldings. No actual remains of a third arcade above these
two are now to be found, but it can hardly be doubted that one existed
originally, and that it was of the Corinthian order. Some parts of the
substructions of the seats are said to be still extant in the cellars of
the Savelli residence, consisting of diverging walls similar to those
still to be seen in the Coliseum. By means of these, the ground plan of
the cavea of the theatre can be completely restored. There are no remains
of the scena. Upon one of the fragments of the Capitoline plan, partly
restored, the name Theatrum Marcelli is legible. There seems, however, to
be some doubt as to the genuineness of this fragment.
[Sidenote: The Ponte Rotto.]
The bridge near the theatre of Marcellus is now called the Ponte Rotto
from its broken condition. The two remaining arches are not ancient, but
probably stand upon the site of an ancient bridge which was called the
Pons Æmilius. Livy mentions this bridge as the first stone bridge built
over the Tiber, and states that it was begun in B.C. 179 by M. Fulvius
Nobilior, and M. Æmilius Lepidus the censor, whose name was given to the
Basilica Æmilia, and that it was finished in B.C. 142 by the Censors
Publius Scipio Africanus, and L. Mummius. The bridge was named after M.
Æmilius Lepidus as Pontifex Maximus, and as a more popular statesman than
Fulvius. The bridge afterwards bore the name pons lapideus, from being the
first stone bridge built over the Tiber, and in contradistinction to the
pons sublicius.
There is abundant evidence as to the position of this bridge, for the
Fasti Capranici place it ad Theatrum Marcelli, and the Cosmographia of
Æthicus ad Forum Boarium, both of which indications point to the Ponte
Rotto.
[Sidenote: Island of the Tiber.]
A short distance above the Æmilian bridge is the island of the Tiber.
According to the legend, this island was formed by the corn belonging to
the Tarquins grown on the Campus Martius, which after their expulsion was
consecrated to Mars. After consecration the corn could not be used for
food, and was therefore cut and thrown into the Tiber, and from this
corn, when collected into heaps by the stream, the island was formed.
Until the fifth century of the city, the island remained consecrated and
uninhabited, but in B.C. 292 a Temple of Æsculapius was built upon it in
consequence, as the story went, of the holy snake brought from Epidaurus
having swum to shore there. The island was probably at this time also
protected with stone embankments, and the two bridges were built, whence
the name inter duos pontes was given to it. A fragment of this ancient
stone embankment, which was in the shape of a ship, may still be seen in
the garden of the Franciscan Monks of S. Bartolommeo, representing part of
the prow of a ship, with a snake and the head of an ox carved in relief
upon it.
The two bridges uniting the island to either bank were probably, as has
been said, first erected in or about the fifth century of the city, but
the existing bridges, though ancient, must be considered as restorations
of the older fabrics.
The bridge on the side towards the Campus Martius was built by L.
Fabricius in B.C. 62, as the inscription still extant on the bridge shows.
In accordance with this we find Dion Cassius giving it the name of Pons
Fabricius, and a coin with the title L. Fabricius gives on the other side
a bridge with a snake, plainly pointing to the island of the Tiber.
Another inscription, also still remaining upon the bridge, states that it
was examined and found in good repair by Q. Lepidus and M. Lollius,
consuls in B.C. 21.
This bridge is the oldest now standing on the Tiber, and the masonry is of
admirable solidity and workmanship. It was called, in the Middle Ages Pons
Judæus, from its proximity to the Jews’ quarter of the city, and now bears
the name Quattro Capi from the jani quadrifrontes which stand upon it.[84]
These jani were formerly the posts which supported the railings of the
bridge, as may be seen by the holes bored in them for the ancient bronze
bars.
The twin bridge on the right-hand side of the river, dates from the
imperial era, and probably, like the Pons Fabricius, replaced a much older
bridge of the same age as the Temple of Æsculapius.
Two inscriptions are still legible on this bridge, from which we learn
that it was finished in the year A.D. 370, and dedicated to the use of the
Roman people in the name of the Emperor Gratianus, by Valentinian, Valens
and Gratianus. These inscriptions must be understood as referring to the
rebuilding of the bridge, though they are so worded as to claim the credit
of its first erection. That there was an older bridge is clear, not only
from the fact that the island was called inter duos pontes before the time
of Gratian, but also from the name pons Cestius, which occurs in the
Notitia, and undoubtedly belongs to that bridge. It is not clear who
Cestius was, but it is generally supposed that a præfectus urbi of that
name in B.C. 46 is the person after whom the bridge was named, and this
agrees with the statement of Dion Cassius about the building of the
Fabrician bridge.
The church of S. Nicola in Carcere, which stands in the Via della Bocca
della Verità close to the Piazza Montanara, contains the remains of two or
perhaps of three temples.
[Sidenote: S. Nicola in Carcere.]
These ruins consist first of three fluted columns of travertine with Ionic
capitals, which stand in the façade of the church of S. Nicola. Above them
is a part of the ancient entablature, and in the room to the left of the
portico of the church are two more columns built into the wall. In the
nave of the church on the left hand are remains of the cella of the
temple, to the pronaos of which the five columns belonged. The walls of
the cella were, as has been discovered by excavations, constructed of
travertine blocks. At the end of this left-hand wall of the cella, there
stood before the last restoration of the church, the remains of a pilaster
of the Doric order with an Attic base, and opposite to this pilaster
another column. The position of the six columns shows that the temple was
of the form called peripteros, i.e., surrounded by a continuous colonnade.
On the right-hand side aisle of the church are five other columns built
into the wall, and a pilaster which evidently belonged to a second temple
standing side by side with the first. These columns are not so high as
those of the first temple described, and their style and the intervals
between them are different. A portion of the entablature, which is of a
simple character, still surmounts them. Two more columns of this temple
are to be seen in the wall of the house which stands to the right of the
church. It was surrounded with colonnades on three sides, but the back of
the cella was ornamented with pilasters only.
On the left-hand side of the church are six more half-exposed columns, and
some remains of an entablature which may have either belonged to a third
and smaller temple standing by the side of the first, or may have been
merely the portico of some other building.
The materials of which these buildings consist are chiefly travertine and
peperino, and their difference of style shows them to have been erected at
different times, probably during the Age of the Republic. It is commonly
assumed, from their position near the theatre of Marcellus, that they are
to be identified with the Temples of Spes and Juno Sospita. As the Temple
of Pietas was removed to make room for the theatre, we cannot suppose that
we have here any part of it, and the Temple of Janus would probably have
assumed a different form.
It is recorded by Livy that M. Acilius Glabrio erected an equestrian
statue near the Temple of Pietas. During some excavations made in 1808 by
the architect Valadier, the pedestal of an equestrian statue was found in
the small piazza opposite to the church of S. Nicola. It appears possible
that when the Temple of Pietas was removed to make way for the theatre,
this statue may have been preserved and set up here as near as possible to
the original site.[85]
[Sidenote: Portico of Octavia.]
In the street called the Via di Pescaria, which runs north-westwards from
the Theatre of Marcellus, stand four fluted Corinthian columns, two on
each side of the street. These formed part of the principal entrance to a
colonnade or portico, some of the other columns of which can be traced at
intervals in the walls of the houses further on in the Via di Pescaria
along which the line of the colonnade ran. The entrance or gateway faced
towards the south-west, and over the arch looking into the little Piazza
di Pescaria will be seen an inscription recording its restoration after a
fire, by Septimius Severus and Caracalla (M. Aurelius Antoninus) in the
year A.D. 203, the eleventh year of the tribunitian power of Severus. No
traces can be found of the erasure of Geta’s name, which Caracalla, as we
have seen, caused to be effaced after his death from all the inscriptions
containing it. There is no doubt, however, that it was originally placed
here after the name of Caracalla, since Severus was careful to pay equal
honour to both of his sons in all respects. The whole inscription may have
been replaced by a new one, or the fourth line may have been completely
effaced and altered. As it now stands the inscription has been restored as
follows: IMP. CÆS. L. SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS. PIUS. PERTINAX. AUG. ARABIC.
ADIABENIC. PARTHIC. MAXIMUS. TRIB. POTEST. XI. IMP. XI. COS. III. P. P. ET
IMP. CÆS. M. AURELIUS. ANTONINUS. PIUS. FELIX. AUG. TRIB. POTEST. VI. COS.
PROCOS. PORTICUM. INCENDIO CONSUMPTAM RESTITUERUNT.
The pediment and tympanum over the inscription are still preserved, but
two of the columns below have been replaced by a high brickwork arch,
probably of the fifth century, which now supports the inscription and
pediment. Passing round again into the street Via di Pescaria, we find
ourselves in the interior of the gateway. It consisted of four columns
placed on each side between two antæ or projecting piers ornamented with
pilasters, and was of larger dimensions than the colonnades to which it
formed the entrance. The brickwork of the antæ was originally faced with
marble, and they supported arches which led into the colonnades along the
line of the street. The bases of the columns are now buried in rubbish,
but parts of the architecture, frieze, and cornice, which are of a simple
description, may be still traced over the front. The inner side of the
gateway, with the exception of the two columns and the pier which stand at
the entrance of the Via di S. Angelo in Pescaria, has been removed to make
room for the church of S. Michaele Archangelo.
If we enter the street just mentioned, the capital of a column may be seen
on the right hand over the wall of the yard belonging to No. 12, and in
the yard itself stand three others, with a portion of the architecture
above them. Their position shows that they formed the corner of a temple.
There is ample proof that we have in the ruins just described, the
entrance gateway of the Porticus Octaviæ and the corner of the temple of
Juno Regina. For Festus states that there were two Octavian porticoes, one
built in honour of Octavia, the sister of Augustus, near the Theatre of
Marcellus, and a second close to the Theatre of Pompeius, built by Q.
Octavius, the conqueror of Perses. The site upon which the former was
built had been previously occupied by the Porticus Metelli, built by Q.
Metellus Macedonicus, proprætor in B.C. 146, and the Octavian portico was
a complete restoration of this by Augustus.[86]
Pliny also mentions two statues of Apollo near the Porticus Octaviæ, which
probably stood in the Temple of Apollo, known to have been situated
outside the Porta Carmentalis between the Forum Olitorium and the Circus
Flaminius. But the principal evidence is derived from the plan of Rome,
now on the staircase of the Capitoline Museum, where the whole design of
this portico is laid down, and the temples which it enclosed are named. We
learn from this plan that the portico was in form an oblong space enclosed
with colonnades, and that the ruins now remaining constituted the
principal entrance to this court, and to the Temple of Juno Regina which
it enclosed. The line of the Via di Pescaria corresponds to one of the
shorter sides of the court, and in the centre of this side the gateway
stood. In two points only the Capitoline map fails to correspond with the
actually existing ruins. The antæ of the gateway are not represented, and
the corner column of the Temple of Juno is omitted. The former of these
two omissions may be explained by supposing that the plan was probably
made before the restoration of the portico by Severus.
The excavations carried on in 1861 by Pellegrini and Contigliozzi,
established the following limits for the Portico of Octavia.
The southern corner of the rectangle was occupied by a quadrifrontal
archway, and this was situated near No. 4 in the Via della Catena di
Pescaria. From this the south-western side of the portico ran nearly along
the line of the street till it reached the gateway to which the present
ruins belong, near the oratory of S. Angelo. The western corner of the
portico was also formed by a quadrifrontal archway.
The north-western side passed through the church of S. Ambrogio a little
below the high altar, and then skirted the Palazzo Righetti near the
Piazza di S. Caterina de’ Funari, where it joined the north-eastern and
shorter side. In this side there was a pediment with pillars corresponding
to the gateway at the opposite end, but not containing the real entrance,
which stood near the angle of the Palazzo Caraletti in the Via de’
Delphini. The eastern angle was near the Palazzo Capizucchi, and the
south-eastern side passed close to the convent of monks of the order of
Madre di Dio, attached to the church of S. Maria in Portico in the piazza
di Campitelli.
The three Composite columns of marble, which still stand in the house, No.
11 in the Via di S. Angelo in Pescaria, belonged to the Temple of Juno,
and stood at the western angle of that temple.
The remains of the Temple of Jupiter are hidden under the church of S.
Maria in Portico, and the street which is now called Via della Tribuna dei
Campitelli occupies the line of the interval between the two temples. A
part of one of the side walls of the Temple of Jupiter rises a little
above the ground at the corner of the church of S. Maria in Portico. The
school or academy of Augustus was behind the temples, and stood near the
centre of the Via della Tribuna di Campitelli. The back of this formed a
part of the northern side of the portico.
The interior of the gateway has of late years been cleared of some of the
buildings which have blocked it up, and the whole is now visible, with all
the columns except one, which has been taken away to enlarge the church
door.
A most interesting relic was found near the side door of the church of S.
Angelo in Pescaria in April 1878, consisting of a pedestal of marble
engraved with the title of Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi. This was
evidently the pedestal of the sitting statue of Cornelia mentioned by
Pliny in his ‘Natural History’ as having been placed in the Portico of
Metellus. The statue was the work of Tisicrates.
Excavations which have been made in the repair of houses and for other
objects during the six years since 1873, have confirmed the conclusions
which have been stated as to the position of the Portico of Octavia, and
the temples near it. Some of the columns of the north side of the portico
were found along the row of houses in the Via di Pescaria, No. 25-34.
The basement of the Temple of Apollo, between the Theatre of Marcellus and
the Portico of Octavia, was found under the Albergo della Catena.
[Sidenote: Crypta and Theatrum Balbi.]
In the Via di S. Maria in Cacaberis, No. 23, there are two Doric columns
of travertine half buried in the around, with a portion of entablature
above them, and between them an ancient brick arch forming the entrance to
a stable. In the interior of the stable are two other similar arches and
columns, and above these there are indications of an upper story. Other
ruins of the same description are built into the next house, No. 22, and
into several other houses near. In the sixteenth century, the Bolognese
architect Serlio saw more ruins here, and he represents in his sketch an
upper story with Corinthian pillars. The name Crypta Balbi, which is found
in the catalogue of places in the ninth region, has been given with much
probability to these ruins. A crypta, or cryptoporticus, according to
Pliny, was a covered corridor with windows, which could be shut or opened
at pleasure. Such a building was used for exercise in wet or hot weather.
Some were open on one side, others closed on both sides. A cryptoporticus
of the latter kind is to be seen in the ruins of Nero’s Domus Aurea under
the baths of Titus. The ruins in the Via di Cacaberis appear to have had
open arches at the sides. This cryptoporticus was probably attached to the
Theatre of Balbus, as the portions Pompeii was to the Theatrum Pompeii,
and Venuti thinks that it extended along the back of the scena, and that
it was intended as a place of shelter for the spectators in case of the
sudden showers of rain peculiar to the Roman climate.[87] The name of
the street Cacaberis or Caccavari has been derived from crypticula. The
Mirabilia, an ancient list of the sights in Rome, calls these ruins
Templum Craticulæ.
[Illustration: The Circus Flaminius from Nolli’s Map, Pl. 19.]
[Sidenote: Circus Flaminius.]
The Circus Flaminius, named from the Flaminian family of ancient Rome, lay
in the quarter traversed by the Via delle Botteghe Oscure, and in the
neighbourhood of the Palazzo Mattei. The Circus was destroyed before the
9th century, and there are now no traces of it left to guide us, but
before the erection, in the 15th century, of the larger houses in this
quarter, some few ruins appear to have been visible in the neighbourhood
of the Palazzo Mattei. These are described by Andrea Fulvio and Ligorio as
having belonged to the Circus Flaminius, and according to their account
the length of the Circus lay in a direction from west to east, and reached
from the Palazzo Mattei, where the semicircular end was situated, to the
Piazzo Margana where the starting-point lay. A tower, now called the Torre
Citrangole, was once called the Torre Metangole, and marked the spot where
the goal of the Circus stood.
[Sidenote: Theatre of Pompeius.]
In the district called by the name Circus Flaminius, stand the ruins of a
vast range of buildings, the theatre, porticus, curia, and domus Pompeii.
That these ruins, which are situated at the back of the church of S.
Andrea della Valle, and are plainly those of a theatre, belonged to the
Theatre of Pompey, is clear if the proofs given of the situation of the
other two theatres in ancient Rome be admitted as sufficient. The place
was so familiar to the Romans that we hardly ever find its locality
indicated even in any such general terms as in campo Martio or juxta
Tiberim, expressions commonly applied to other buildings of less note in
the Campus Martius.
The remains which are now left of these celebrated buildings are to be
seen in the small piazza of S. Maria di Grottapinta behind the church of
S. Andrea della Valle. They consist of ranges of travertine walls,
converging to a centre, similar to those still visible in the interior of
the Theatre of Marcellus and in the Coliseum, and are plainly the remains
of the substructions supporting the cavea of a theatre. Further remains of
piers and converging archways of peperino are visible in the cellars of
the adjoining Palazzo Pio; and during some excavations made in 1837, a
part of the outer walls of the theatre was discovered, with Doric half
columns, and a Doric cornice. Most fortunately the ground plan, not only
of the theatre, but also of the whole adjoining portico, is given upon
some fragments of the Capitoline map.
[Illustration: FRAGMENTS OF PIANTA CAPITOLINA. THEATRE OF POMPEY]
The first idea of building such a magnificent theatre seems to have been
suggested to Pompey by his visit to the theatre at Mitylene, whither he
went after the Mithridatic war to be present at a contest of rival poets
held in his honour. Only one attempt had before been made to build a
permanent theatre in Rome. The Censor C. Cassius Longinus in the year B.C.
154 had entered into a contract for the construction of a stone theatre
near the Lupercal, but the senate, by the advice of Scipio Nasica, a rigid
Puritan of the old Roman school, and jealous of the introduction of Greek
luxury, ordered it when half finished to be demolished, and the materials
sold. The same decree inflicted penalties on any one who should, either in
the city or within a mile of its wails, venture to place any seats for
spectators at the games, or sit down while looking on at them. Tacitus
states that even in Pompey’s time the conservative Romans retained the
same dread lest indolence and luxury should be promoted by the
construction of permanent theatres.[88] In carrying out this grand design
Pompey was assisted by his freedman Demetrius, who had amassed immense
riches during his master’s campaigns, and took this opportunity of paying
his acknowledgments to the author of his wealth. The capabilities of the
theatre must have been very great; nor need we be surprised to hear that
it contained 40,000 seats, for the remaining fragments show that it
comprehended the whole space between the Via de’ Chiavari which
corresponds nearly to the line of the scena, the Via di Giubbonari, the
Campo di Fiore and the Via del Paradiso. Eastwards from the Via de’
Chiavari stretched the long ranges of colonnades of which the Capitoline
plan gives the outline, and beyond them the Curia and a temple, with a
variety of offices and shops, as far as the Via di Torre Argentina,
including the modern Teatro Argentina within their compass. In this
theatre Nero gave the grand entertainment to Tiridates, on which occasion
not only the scena but the whole interior of the theatre and its furniture
was covered with gilding, and a purple velarium stretched over it, upon
which Nero himself was represented driving his chariot in the character of
the Sun God, with golden stars glittering around him. The scena was burnt
in the great fire in A.D. 80, but restored again by Vespasian. Two other
conflagrations and restorations are recorded in the first half of the
third century, one in the reign of Philippus in A.D. 249, and a second in
that of Diocletian.[89] An inscription was found in the Via de’ Chiavari
in 1551, which commemorates the restoration of one of the colonnades under
the name of Jovius, a title which Diocletian often assumed, and in the
time of Ammianus Marcellinus the theatre could still be reckoned among the
Mirabilia Urbis.[90] Another inscription given by the anonymous writer of
the Einsiedlen MS. records a rebuilding by Arcadius and Honorius about
A.D. 395. At the time the Notitia was compiled, the number of seats had
diminished from 40,000, as given by Pliny, to 27,580 or even less, and the
theatre was therefore probably in a ruinous state when the last mentioned
restoration took place. The building naturally suffered much in the Gothic
wars, and we find that it was again restored by Symmachus in the time of
Theodoric, after which it is again mentioned under the right name of
Theatrum Pompeii by the anonymous writer of Einsiedlen in the 9th and by
the Ordo Romanus in the 12th centuries; but in the 13th the Orsini family
had occupied it, and so changed the building that at the beginning of the
14th century it is called in the Mirabilia, Palatium Pompeii. The
Florentine Poggio saw the ruins of the outer wall still standing in the
Campo di Fiore in the 15th century, but the name of Pompey was then no
longer connected with them, until Marliani, Fulvio, and Fauno the
topographers of the 16th century revived the right designation. Canina,
in his work on the buildings of the ancients, has taken the greatest pains
to give a full description of the ruins now left, and it is from him that
most of our information is derived.
[Sidenote: Ponte S. Sisto.]
The bridge now called Ponte S. Sisto, near the ruins of the Theatre of
Pompeius, stands on the site of an ancient bridge, which was most probably
the one named Pons Aurelius in the Notitia. There is no conclusive proof
that this was the Pons Aurelius, but the situation of none of the other
bridges seems to suit this name, while it is peculiarly applicable to the
bridge in question, because it was the principal passage over the Tiber to
the Porta Aurelia and the Aurelian road along the coast to Civita Vecchia.
The name frequently given to it by topographers, Pons Janicularis, appears
to be a mere invention, as it is not found in any trustworthy authority;
and another name Pons Antoninianus, by which we find it called in the
Middle Ages, seems to have arisen from the mistaken name Theatrum
Antonini, formerly given to the Theatrum Balbi, which is not far distant,
and also from the well-known fondness of Severus and Caracalla for the
trans-Tiberine pleasure grounds. Marliani gives an inscription which is
said to have existed formerly upon this bridge commemorating its
restoration under Hadrian by Messius Rusticus, the Conservator of the
Tiber. The bridge must therefore have been originally built before
Hadrian’s time, and cannot be a work of the Antonines.