Part 8
"Augustus lived at first near the Roman Forum, above the Ringmaker's Stairs, in a house which had once been occupied by Calvus the orator" (Suetonius, "Augustus," lxxii.). Calvus the orator, a friend of Cicero, lived on the Palatine; and the Scalæ Annulariæ was a flight of stairs that led from the east end of the Forum up the north side of the Palatine to the Clivus Victoriæ.
On the 12th of April 1882, a piece of the marble plan was found here which, curiously enough, represents this part of the Forum, showing the side of the Temple of Castor and the Ringmaker's Stairs.
HOUSE OF THE VIRGINS.
Between the Temple of Vesta and the Sacra Via was the original dwelling-place of the Vestals, of which little remains beyond tufa walls beneath the more recent level. These walls were again exposed to view in some excavations made in the spring of 1886. They are marked in black on our Plan (page 61), being now again covered up.
Martial (i. 70), in addressing his book which he sends to Proculus, says, "You will pass by the Temple of Castor, near that of ancient Vesta, and that goddess's virgin home."
Dionysius (ii. 67) says: "They live near by the temple of the goddess."
VESTA'S DUST-BIN.
By the side of the temple is a pit four feet square, where the ashes and sweepings of the temple were deposited; which were cleared out on the 15th of June, and thrown down the Porta Stercoraria, on the Clivus Capitolinus, into the Cloaca. (Ovid, "F." vi. 237, 712; Varro, "L. L." v.; Festus.)
THE SHRINE OF MERCURY.
Beyond the Temple of Vesta, on the right, is a small brick shrine. The base of the statue of this shrine was fortunately found telling us the name.
DIO MERCVRIO
On the flank of the base is another inscription, giving us the date of its erection, April 26, 275 A.D.
The brick podium of the shrine was cased with marble, one piece, one foot four inches high, being _in situ_ on the side towards the steps. It supported an entablature of Carrara marble formed by two half-columns at the rear and two columns in front, of the fluted composite order. On the frieze is the inscription, in beautifully cut letters five inches high, recording its erection by the Roman senate and people--
SENATVS . POPVLVSQVE . ROMANVS PECVNIA . PVBLICA . FACIENDAM . CVRAVIT.
The podium is 4 feet 7 inches high, 9 feet 9 inches wide, 8 feet 2 inches deep. The fragments found are to be built up in their original sites, and so the shrine will be preserved. It was originally erected by Antoninus Pius, and is represented on a bronze coin of his--the pediment being supported by four Hermes (the Greek name for Mercury) busts. In the tympanum are the tortoise, cock, ram, winged cap, caduceus, and the magic purse. When it was restored in the consulship of Aurelian and Marcellino, columns and composite capitals took the place of the Hermes busts.
_The travertine steps by the side of the Shrine of Mercury led into_
THE ATRIUM VESTÆ.
After the destructive fire of 192, the Forum and edifices on the Sacra Clivus were rebuilt by Septimius Severus and Julia Domna (Spartianus, Dion Cassius, Eutropius), the empress taking upon herself the special work of rebuilding the temple and residence of the Vestal Virgins; and although the original podium of the temple was used, it was considerably raised by rubble being placed on the top of the ancient tufa platform. This was necessary owing to the raising of the level from _débris_.
For the Atrium Vestæ a different site was selected, more to the south under the Palatine; in fact the whole disposition of the edifices about here was changed, as proved by comparing the earlier with the later classical notices, and the excavations of 1883-4.
[Illustration: DEDICATION OF THE TEMPLE.]
To commemorate this rebuilding a silver coin was struck by the empress, bearing her head on the obverse; and on the reverse is the Temple of Vesta in the background, in front of which stands an altar, and on either side are three virgins, two of whom are pouring an oblation over the altar.
This new arrangement of the buildings is thus exactly described by Servius (in "Æn." vii. 153): "By the Temple of Vesta was the Regia of Numa Pompilius, but near to the Atrium of Vesta, which was distinct from the temple."
Standing just inside, at the top of the steps, we have the whole Atrium Vestæ, as their residence was named, uncovered before us--a large peristylium paved with black and white mosaic, 222 feet long by 76 feet wide. Standing out thirteen feet from the boundary wall of the Atrium, and extending all round the court, were forty-four columns of various marbles, whilst under the colonnade were the pedestals bearing honorary inscriptions and statues of High Vestals: sixteen on each side, six at the top, and six at the bottom. Of these, thirteen honorary inscriptions have been found dedicated to six different High Vestal Virgins, the Lady Superiors of the nunnery. Four slight fragments of other inscriptions were also found, making seventeen in all. Twelve of the statues, more or less perfect, have also been found: likewise an honorary pedestal to Caracalla; and a statue to Vettius Agorius Prætextatus, erected to this champion of paganism, 367 A.D., by Cœlia Concordia, the last of the High Vestal Virgins.
At the east end of the Atrium is the fountain, beyond which is a step up on to a tesselated pavement, and from that four steps lead into the tabularium, or reception-room, having on each side three chambers, in which most probably the Vestals deposited those objects intrusted to their sacred keeping.
On each side of the Atrium were the residential chambers of the High Vestals, the simple Virgins, and their domestics, two stories high. Those on the south side are best preserved.
From the tesselated pavement a door gives access into a corridor, once paved with white and black mosaic; at the end, on the left, is a bath-chamber; and opening out from the corridor are several chambers showing traces of marble pavements, frescoed and marble-cased walls. In the second chamber are the remains of the mill for grinding the salt used in sacrifice. (See Virgil, "Buc." viii. 82; Horace, "O." iii. 23; Festus.) Pliny (xxxi. 41) says, "It is in our sacred rites more particularly that the high importance of salt is to be recognized, no offering ever being made unaccompanied by crushed salt."
This corridor does not run the whole length of the Atrium, but turns off to a flight of stairs leading to the upper chambers. The remainder of the chambers on this side were reached direct from the Atrium by steps. The first one contains a hexagonal pedestal to Flavia Publicia. From the marble and fresco decorations found here, these rooms were most probably the apartment of the High Vestal Virgin.
[Illustration]
The inscriptions to the High Vestals found, date between 180 and 364 A.D., and were erected in return for some advantage derived from the patronage of the High Vestal. Historically they are of no great importance, giving us only names of Vestals that were already known. The most important inscriptions are those found here which do not refer to the Virgins. Commencing with the first pedestal at the top of the entry steps, they read as follows:--
Flavia Publicia. Erected July 9, 283 A.D.
Concordiæ. Dedicated June 9, 364. She was the last High Vestal, and her name was erased because she became a Christian.
Cœlia Claudiana. 253-7 A.D.
Caracalla pedestal. July 2, 114 A.D.
Prætextata Crassi. 180-200 A.D.
Flavia Publicia. 257-284.
Numisia Maximilla. 201-216.
Statue of an unknown Vestal; no head.
Flavia Publicia. 257-84.
Another pedestal to her, with statue adjoining.
Pedestal to Trentia Flavola. About 350.
Blank pedestal, with statue of Ceres adjoining.
Pedestal to Flavia Publicia. September 30, 257.
Statue of Vettius Agorius Prætextatus. 380.
Fragment of a seated statue.
Statue unknown.
Statue and pedestal to Flavia Publicia.
This part of the city was finally destroyed by the great fire, when Robert Guiscard burned Rome from the Lateran to the Capitol, in 1084. During this long period of nearly seven hundred years the Atrium Vestæ underwent many changes and received other tenants, for the new excavations show that it had been inhabited after the Vestals were abolished.
At the rear of the first pedestal a terra-cotta jar was discovered, containing a brooch bearing the name of Pope Martin III., 943-46; a gold coin of the Eastern Emperor Theophilus (827-42); and eight hundred and thirty Anglo-Saxon silver coins of Alfred the Great (871-900), Edward (900-24), Edgar Athelstan (925-41), and Edmund I. (941-48)--four kings of Northumbria--and of Plegmund, Archbishop of Canterbury (889-923). We may presume that this money was brought to Rome by some English tourist, who left his all and fled when the building was finally destroyed by fire; or that it formed part of a donation of "Peter's Pence." Ethelwulf, the English king during the time of Leo IV. (845-57), was the first English prince who gave tribute to the See of Rome; and as such his portrait is to be seen in _chiaro-oscuro_, by Caravaggio, in the Stanze of the Incendio del Borgo in the Vatican.
After running a course of one thousand and eighty years, Gratian in 367 "refused the office of Pontifex Maximus, and abolished the functions of the Vestal Virgins" (Zosimus, iv.), which were finally suppressed by Theodosius in 392. "Theodosius directed his attention towards the suppression of idolatry, and issued a law commanding the demolition of idolatrous temples." "The faithful emperor Theodosius interdicted these rites and consigned them to disuse" (Theodoret, v. 21).
The Bishop of Rome and his clergy came by right, as heads of the established religion, into the possessions of the defunct faiths, and inhabited the quarters of the Vestals, assuming the title of the head of the ancient religion, Pontifex Maximus, a title held to the present day--a dignity two thousand six hundred and forty years old, the oldest title in the world.
THE PALLADIUM.
In the centre of the peristylium, just coming to the surface and occupying the whole of the width of the open court, are the foundations of an octagonal edifice in brick, with ribs running from the angles to a central circle. Here, doubtless, was the shrine in which was kept the Sacred Palladium, or fatal token of the empire of the Romans. "Fatale pignus imperii Romani" (Livy, xxvi. 27). "Kept under the safeguard of Vesta's temple" (_ibid._ v. 52). This was a statuette of "Minerva, by no male beheld" (Lucan, ix. 994). "The Vestals alone were permitted to behold the Trojan Minerva" (_ibid._ i. 598). "That fell from heaven" (Dionysius, ii. 67). It seems it was originally kept in the Temple of Vesta itself (Pliny, vii. 45; Ovid, "T." iii. 1, 39).
"The sacred image of Minerva, to which the Romans pay uncommon veneration, and which, as they say, was brought from Troy, was exposed to public view (during the fire of 192), so that the men of our age beheld the Palladium, never seen by any before since the time it came from Ilium into Italy. For the Vestal Virgins laid hold on it in the hurry and confusion, and carried it openly through the Sacred Way into the Imperial Palace" (Herodian, in "Commodus").
"Elagabalus, wanting a wife for his sun-god, sent for the sacred image of Pallas, which the Romans worship in secret from human eyes, and had it brought into his own bed-room. Thus he dared to displace the Palladium, that had never been moved since the time it came from Ilium, except when the temple was destroyed by fire, and they conveyed the goddess into the Imperial Palace" (_ibid._ in "Antoninus;" Lampridius, in "Elagabalus," iii.).
Fragments of a statuette of Minerva were found in the excavations.
THE VICUS VESTÆ.
From the Via Sacra, above the Arch of Titus, a street, passing along a ledge on the northern side of the Palatine, runs into the Vicus Tuscus at the back of the Temple of Castor. This was the street of the Vestals, separating their house from the Imperial Palace. Asconius ("ad Ciceronem pro Scauro,") speaks of it.
We now cross over to the Sacred Way.
_The first object that attracts our attention is the_
CHURCH OF SS. COSMO AND DAMIANO,
_on the left_, occupying the site and built out of the remains of two temples by Felix IV., 527 A.D. The subterranean church contains a spring said to have been called forth by S. Felix. Upon the apse of the upper church is a mosaic of the time of Felix.
THE TEMPLE OF ROMULUS,
son of Maxentius, forms the vestibule of the present church. It was a circular building, and fronted towards the Via Sacra. The second temple Felix made into the nave of the church; it was quadrangular, and built of brick, but the western wall was of blocks of Gabii stone, forming part of the second wall of Rome, which was here utilized for the temple. It is thirty feet in diameter, and was erected in 302 A.D. Ligorio ("Vatican Codex," 3439) has preserved the inscription:--
IMP . CAES . AUGUSTUS . MAXIMUS . TRIUMPH PIUS . FELIX . AUGUSTUS.
The two porphyry columns and the cornice belong to the temple; but the bronze doors are Etruscan, having been sent from Perugia by Urban VIII. in 1630. The wings on either side of the doorway were added in 772-95 by Hadrian I.; the niches, which still show traces of frescoing, being for relics of the saints. At the same time the present flooring of the church was inserted some feet above the ancient level.
_On the left are slight remains of_
THE TEMPLE OF VICAPORTA, VICTORY.
Remains of this temple have been discovered in the recent excavations on the Sacra Via, between the Temple of Antoninus Pius and the Temple of Romulus. From the slight remains found, it seems that three of its sides were formed by deep apses, the fourth side fronting towards the Via Sacra, and entered by a portico.
[Illustration]
Dionysius (v. 19), Plutarch in "Publicola," and Livy (ii. 7) record that Publius Valerius, surnamed Publicola, built a house on the Velia overlooking the Forum; but owing to the invidious remarks made he pulled the house down, and re-erected it at the foot of the Velia. Plutarch adds, "upon the spot where the Temple of Victory now stands." Livy also says, "The house was built at the foot of the hill where the Temple of Victory now stands." Dionysius (v. 48) says, after speaking of the poverty of Publicola, "The senate decreed that he should be buried at the expense of the public, and appointed a place in the city, under the hill called Velia, near the Forum, where his body was burnt and buried."
[Illustration: PLAN OF THE NORTH SIDE OF THE SACRA VIA.
A Temple of Antoninus Pius. B Temple of Victory. C Temple of Romulus. D Temple of Venus and Roma. E Temple of the Penates. F Mediæval Portico. G Arch of Titus.]
This Temple of Victory was dedicated, B.C. 295, by the consul Lucius Postumus. "He dedicated the Temple of Victory, for the building of which he had provided, when curule ædile, out of the money arising from fines" (Livy, x. 33).
This temple is represented on a coin of Gordianus III., 240 A.D., who restored it after his Persian victories.
TEMPLE OF VENUS AND ROMA,
erected by Hadrian in 134 A.D. It was the largest and most sumptuous in Rome. It was designed by Hadrian himself, who sent the drawings to the celebrated architect Apollodorus, whom he had banished, to ask his opinion. He replied, "That Hadrian ought to have made it more lofty, and with subterraneous accommodation for receiving, as occasion might require, the machinery of the theatre, and for giving it a more imposing aspect towards the Via Sacra. That as to the statues, they were so disproportionate, that if the goddesses desired to get up and walk out, they would not be able" (Dion Cassius; Xiphilinus, "Hadrian").
For this criticism Apollodorus lost his head; and we learn that the temple was _not_ on a lofty platform, that there were _no_ subterranean chambers, and that it was _not_ imposing towards the Via Sacra. The front was towards the Forum of Peace. What is now the back of the church, in a stone-cutter's yard, was originally the front of the temple. It is mentioned by Prudentius as being in the vicinity of the Via Sacra.
"The Sacred Way resounded (_they say_) with lowings before the shrine of Rome; for she also herself is worshipped with blood after the fashion of a goddess, and the name of the place (_Rome_) is regarded as a divinity. The temples also of the city and of Venus rise with a like roof; and at one and the same time frankincense is consumed to the twin-gods."
It could not have faced the Via Sacra, or Maxentius would not have built the temple of his son against it, 311 A.D.
The bronze doors of the Round Temple were found at Perugia by Urban VIII. The two columns of porphyry, with the cornice, are supposed to have been found amongst the ruins when it was turned into a church. On the right side of the present church is a piece of wall of Gabii tufa stone of _opus quadratum_. At the back of the church is the brick front wall of the temple, on which the celebrated _Pianta Capitolina_ was originally attached (see page 185) by means of cement and cramps, and which was found below the soil under the wall, having been thrown down by an earthquake.
Suetonius tells us that Nero's colossus stood in the vestibule of his palace.
Martial says, "It was removed by Vespasian, when he built the Temple of Peace, to where the atrium (a more inward part) was."
It was a second time removed, for Spartianus informs us that "Hadrian removed it with twenty-four elephants _from_ the place where now stands the Temple of the City."
Thus we learn that the spot where the Temple of Rome is, was formerly the atrium of Nero's Golden House, and that the Temple of Peace occupied the vestibule.
"Maxentius restored the Temple of Venus and Rome, which had been damaged by fire" (Aur. Victor, "Cæs." xl.).
The Emperor Heraclius gave permission to Pope Honorius I. to remove the bronze tiles of this temple in order to use them for the roof of S. Peter's; whence they were stolen by the Saracens in 846.
Dion Cassius (lxxi. 31) tells us that "Cleopatra's statue in gold is to be seen in the Temple of Venus to this day." Also that "the senate ordered two statues of silver to be erected in the Temple of Venus; one in honour of Faustina, and the other in honour of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius. They likewise ordered an altar to be set up before it, on which every contracted couple were to sacrifice before marriage."
Mr. J. H. Parker, C.B., made some excavations under the wall of Gabii stone in 1868-9, and found that a street ran from the Sacred Way along the side of the wall, in which was a small doorway into the temple. This has now been re-excavated by the Government (1880), who have taken possession of the Round Temple.
The government have recently pulled down the chapel of the burial society adjoining the Temple of Romulus, and on the two thousand six hundred and thirty-third anniversary of the foundation of Rome, April 21st, 1880, the two cipollino columns were found to have belonged to the
TEMPLE OF THE PENATES.
As the Lares were the departed spirits of the ancestors of each family who watched over their descendants, so the Penates were the gods selected by each family as its special protectors. And as there were the Lares of the city, so there were the Penates, whose chapel was termed Ædes Deum Penatium, and the gods were called Penates Populi Romani. These Penates were supposed to have been the gods brought from Troy by Æneas.
We learn from the "Monumentum Ancyranum," that Augustus rebuilt the Ædem Deum Penatium in Velia; and Solinus (i.) tells us that Tullus Hostilius lived on the Velia, where afterwards was the Chapel of the Penates. Dionysius thus describes it:--"For the things which I myself know, by having seen them, and concerning which no scruple forbids me to write, are as follows. They show you a temple at Rome, not far from the Forum, in the street that leads the nearest way to the Carinæ, which is small, and darkened by the height of the adjacent buildings. This place is called by the Romans, in their own language, _Veliæ_; in this temple are the images of the Trojan gods exposed to public view, with this inscription, ΔΕΜΑΣ , which signifies Penates. For, in my opinion, the letter Θ not being yet found out, the ancients expressed its power by the letter Δ. These are two youths, in a sitting posture, each of them holding a spear; they are pieces of ancient workmanship" (Dionysius, i. 68).
THE RECENT EXCAVATIONS.
In the new excavations upon the line of the Via Sacra a monumental cippus has been found, with the following inscription,--FABIUS. TITIANUS.--V. C. CONSUL.--PRAEF. URBI.--CURAVIT.
He was consul and prefect of the city, A.D. 339 to 341, under the Emperor Constans I. This was one of three bases recorded as having stood in front of the Temple of Romulus in the sixteenth century, one of which is in the Museum of the Villa Borghese, and the other is in the Naples Museum.
Another base was found, dedicated to the Emperor Constantius II. by Flavius Leontius, prefect of Rome in 356 A.D. This is similar to the one in the Capitoline Museum.
The inscription reads,--TOTO. ORBE. VICTORI.--DN. CONSTANTIO. MAX.--TRIUMFATORI.--SEMPER. AUG.--FL. LEONTIUS. V. C.--PRAEF. URBI. ITERUM.--VICE. SACRA. INDICANS.--D. N. M. Q. EIUS.
Remains of Roman and medieval buildings and a fountain have been uncovered in the course of excavating, also some architectural fragments. The whole length of the Via Sacra has been now uncovered as far as the steps leading up to S. Bonaventura.
THE HOUSE OF JULIUS CÆSAR.