828 in 135 Apollod ROME [TOPOGRAPHY AND
- the design was criticized rather severely by the architect
lorus (Diou Cass., Ixix. 4 ; Spart, Hadr., 19). 1 The temple STATUE IOOOOOOOOOOOOOO DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" o COLUMNS OF PERIBOLUS. Fio. 23. Temple of Venus and Rome. was probably finished by Antoninus Pius ; it was partly burned in the reign of Maxentius, who began its restoration, which was carried on by Constantine (Amm. Marcell., xvi. 10). The existing remains of the two cellse are mainly of Hadrian's time, but contain patches of the later restorations. Between the south angle of this temple and the arch of Constantine stand the remains of a fountain, usually known as the Meta Sudans. This was a tall conical struc- ture in a large circular basin, all lined with marble. From its brick facing it appears to be a work of the Flavian period. That part of the Crelian Hill which is near the Colosseum is covered with very extensive remains, a great peribolus of brick- faced concrete, apparently of Flavian date, and part of a massive travertine arcade, somewhat similar to that of the Colosseum ; most of the latter has been removed for the sake of the stone, but a portion still exists under the monastery and campanile of SS. Giovanni e Paolo. What this extensive building was remains doubtful till further excavations are made. According to one theory it is the temple of Claudius, built by Vespasian (Suet, Vesp., 9) ; but Bunsen's suggestion is much more probable (Besch., iii. p. 476), that it was the house of Vectilius, bought and probably enlarged by Commodus (Hist. Aug.: Comm., 16), and connected with the Colosseum by a subterranean passage. Such a passage actually exists, and has been partly cleared out. The so-called temple of Minerva Medica on the eastern slope of the Esquiline (so named from a statue found in it) is probably part of some baths. It is a curiously planned building, with central decagonal domed hall, probably of the time of Gallienus 263-268 (see Canina, Lid. Top., p. 161). Somewhat similar ruins beside the neighbouring basilica of S. Croce have been supposed to belong to a nymphaeum of Severus Alexander, mentioned in the Notitia, Kegio v., but are more probably part of the Sessorium, a court of justice on the Esquiline. The remains on the Quirinal in the Colonna gardens of massive marble entablatures richly sculptured were formerly thought to belong to Aurelian's great temple of the Sun, but it now appears certain that they belong to the very extensive thermae of Constantine, part of the site of which is now occupied by the Quirinal palace and neighbouring buildings. 2 The excavations of recent years have brought to light, and in many cases destroyed, a large number of domestic buildings ; 1 The existence of some chambers in the podium near the Colosseum and the great platform by which this temple is raised above the Sacra Via mako it appear that the criticisms of Apollodorus were made before Hadrian's design was carried out, and that the emperor had the good sense to adopt the sugges- tions of his professional critic. 2 See Palladio (Terme dei Romani, London, 1732), who gives the plan of this enormous building, now wholly hidden or destroyed. many of these are recorded in the Notizic degli Scavi and the Jii'Il. Comm. Arch. Rom., 1872-1876. The extensive euttin- away of the Tiber bank for the new embankment exposed s.nnr very ornate houses near the Villa Farnesina, richly decorated with marble, fine wall-paintings, and stucco reliefs, equal in beauty to any works of the kind that have ever been found. Some of tln-s.- were cut off the wall, and will be exhibited in a new museum about to be formed to contain all ancient works of art found in Rome ; but the houses themselves have been destroyed. The laying out of the new Quirinal and Esquiline quarters also has exposed many fine buildings. One handsome villa, built over the Servian wall, may possibly be the house of Maecenas. A very remarkable vaulted room, decorated with paintings of plants and landscapes, has liem shown to be a greenhouse ; 3 at one end is an apse with a series of step-like stages for flowers. This one room has been preserve! I, though the rest of the villa has been destroyed ; it is on the road leading from S. Maria Maggiore to the Lateran. The walls are a very fine specimen of tufa opus reticulatuin, unmixed with brick, evidently earlier than the Christian era. Among the numerous buildings discovered in the Horti Sallustiani near the Quirinal is a veiy fine house of the 1st century A.D., in concrete faced with brick and opus reticulatuin. It has a' central circular domed hall, with many rooms and staircases round it, rising several stories high. This house was set in the valley against a cliff of the Quirinal, so that the third floor is level with the upper part of the hill. It is nearly on the line of the Servian wall, which stood here at a higher level on the edge of the cliff. This is identified as the house of Sallust, which at his death became crown property, and was used as a residence by Nero (Tac., Ann., xiii. 47) and other emperors till the 4th century. 4 In 1884, near the Porta S. Lorenzo, a long line of houses was discovered during the making of a new road. Some of these were of opus reticulatuin of the 1st century B.C. ; others had the finest kind of brick- facing, probably of the time of Nero ; all had been richly decorated with marble linings and mosaics. The line of the street was parallel to that of the later Aurelian wall, which at this part was built against the back of this row of houses. At the same time, behind the line of houses, were uncovered fine peperino and tufa piers of the aqueduct rebuilt by Augustus, one arch of which forms the Porta S. Lorenzo. These interesting remains have all been completely destroyed. A fine house of the end of the 1st century A.D., with richly decorated walls, was exposed in June 1884 against the slope of the Quirinal, near the Palazzo Colonna j it was immediately destroyed to make room for new buildings. The praetorian camp was first made permanent and surrounded with a strong wall by the emperor Tiberius (Suet., Til., 37). Owing to the camp being included in the line of the Aurelian wall a great part of it still exists ; it is a very interesting specimen of early imperial brick-facing. The wall is only 12 to 14 feet high, and has thinly scattered battlements, at intervals of 20 feet. The north gate ( Porta Principalis Dcxtra) is well preserved ; it had a tower on each side, now greatly reduced in height, in which arc small windows with arched heads moulded in one slab of terra- cotta. The brick-facing is very neat and regular, the bricks being about 1 inches thick, with |-inch joints. On the inside of the wall are rows of small rooms for the guards. Part of the Porta Decumana also remains. This camp was dismantled by Constan- tino, who removed its inner walls ; the outer ones were left because they formed part of the Aurelian circuit. The present wall is nearly three times the height of the original camp wall. The upper part was added when Aurelian included it in his general circuit wall round Rome. The superior neatness and beauty of Tiberius's brick-facing make it easy to distinguish where his work ends and that of the later emperors begins. Owing to the addition of the later wall it requires some care to trace the rows of battle- ments which belong to the camp. The Pantheon is the most perfect among existing classical build- ings in Rome (see fig. 24). It was built by Agnppa in 27 B.C., as is recorded on the frieze of the portico. What its original pur- pose was is not clear ; on the one hand, it forms part of the great thermfe built by Agrippa, and in position and design closely resembles the great circular calidarium in the thermae of Caracalla ; on the other hand, it has no hypocaust or hot-air flues, and was certainly consecrated as a temple, to Mars, Venus, and other sup- posed ancestors of C r esar's family very soon after it was built (Dion Cass., liii. 27) ; it was used as the meeting-place of the Fratres Arvales before they began to meet in the temple of Concord (see Henzen, Ada Frat. Arval., 1868, No. 71). s It had the name Pantheum apparently from the first ; Pliny (H.N., xxxvi. 4) meu- 8 Bull. Inst., 1875 ; see also Bull. Comm. Arch., 1874, where drawings are given. 4 During excavations made here in 1876 lead pipi-s wen.' l'<mn<l insci-iln ! with the name of the estate, the imperial owner (Severus Alexander), an-1 tli>'. plumber who made them HORTORVM . S ALL VSTIAN . IMP . SEV . ALEXANDRI . AVG . NAEVIVS . MANES . FECIT. B The demolition of the block of houses which was built against i( at tli" back has exposed the point of junction between the Pantheon and tln> UHTHI:'-. It is now apparent that the Pantheon originally was an isolated building, and that the union of it and the thernue was a later alteration. Prater- ian cam] Par- tlnon.
