Walks in Rome. Augustus J. C. HareЧитать онлайн книгу.
government always displayed the most extraordinary apathy about extending them, and, when a large excavation was made in the winter of 1869—70, by the British Archæological Society, in front of the Church of Sta. Martina, insisted on its being immediately filled up again, instead of extending it, as might easily have been done, to join the excavation which had long existed on the Clivus Capitolinus. Lately the excavations have been considerably increased, but were the roads leading to the Forum to be closed, and a large body of efficient labourers set to work, the whole of the Roman Forum and its surroundings might be laid bare in a month, without any injury to the interesting churches in its neighbourhood. At present, even that part which is disinterred is cut up by a number of raised causeways, which distract the eye and mar the general effect, and the excavations, recommenced by the Italian government, are slowly and inadequately carried on.
If we stand on the causeway in front of the arch of Septimius Severus, and turn towards the Capitol, we look upon the Clivus Capitolinus, which is perfectly crowded with historical sites and fragments, viz.:—
1. The modern Capitol, resting on the Tabularium. This is one of the earliest architectural relics in Rome. It is built in the Etruscan style, of huge blocks of tufa or peperino placed long-and cross-ways alternately. It was formerly composed of two stages called Camellaria. Only the lower now remains. It contained the tables of the laws. The corridor which remains in the interior is used as a museum of architectural fragments. The Tabularium probably communicated with the Ærarium in the temple of Saturn.
2. On the right of the excavated space, and nearest the Tabularium, the site of the Tribune, in front of which were the Rostra, to which the head of Octavius was affixed by Marius, and the head and hand of Cicero by Antony, and where Fulvia, the widow of Clodius, spat in his dead face, and pierced his inanimate tongue with the pin which she wore in her hair. In front of the rostrum were the statues of the three Sibyls called Tria Fata.
3. Below, a little(**typo? little?) more to the right, is the site of the Comitium, where the survivor of the Horatii was condemned to death, and saved by the voice of the people. Here, also, was the trophied pillar which bore the arms of the Curiatii. In the area of the Comitium grew the famous fig-tree which was always preserved here in commemoration of the tree under which Romulus and Remus were suckled by the wolf, and beneath which was a bronze representation of the wolf and the children.
4. A little more to the left, is the site of the Vulcanal, so called from an altar dedicated to Vulcan, a platform (still defined) where, in the earliest times, Romulus and Tatius used to meet on intermediate ground and transact affairs common to both; and where Brutus was seated, when, without any change of countenance, he saw his two sons beaten and beheaded. Adjoining the Vulcanal was the Græcostasis, where foreign ambassadors waited before they were admitted to an audience of the senate.
5. Below the Vulcanal, and just behind the Arch of Severus, is the site of the Temple of Concord, dedicated, with blasphemous inappropriateness, B.C. 121, by the consul Opimius, immediately after the murder of Caius Gracchus. Here Cicero pronounced his orations against Catiline before the senate. A pavement of coloured marbles remains. At its base are still to be seen some small remains of the Colonna Mænia, which was surmounted by the statue of C. Mænius, who decorated the rostra with the iron beaks of vessels taken in war.
6. The three beautiful columns which are still standing were attributed to a temple of Jupiter Tonans, but are now decided to belong to the Temple of Vespasian. The engravings of Piranesi represent them as buried almost to their capitals, and they remained in this state until they were disinterred during the first French occupation. The space was so limited in this part of Rome, that in order to prevent encroaching upon the street Clivus Capitolinus, which descends the hill between this temple and that of Saturn, the temple of Vespasian was raised on a kind of terrace, and the staircase which led to it was thrust in between the columns. This temple was restored by Septimius Severus, and to this the letters on the entablature refer, being part of the word Restituere. Instruments of sacrifice are sculptured on the frieze.
7. On the left of the excavated space, close beneath the Tabularium, a low range of columns recently re-erected represents the building called the School of Xanthus, chambers, for the use of the scribes and persons in the service of the curule ædiles, which derived their name from Xanthus, a freedman, by whom they were rebuilt.
8. The eight Ionic columns still standing, part of the Temple of Saturn, the ancient god of the Capitol. Before this temple Pompey sate surrounded by soldiers, listening to the orations which Cicero was delivering from the rostrum, when he received the personal address, "Te enim jam appello, et ea voce ut me exaudire possis." Here the tribune Metellus flung himself before the door and vainly attempted to defend the treasure of the Ærarium in this temple against Julius Cæsar. The present remains are those of an indifferent and late renovation of an earlier temple, being composed of columns which differ in diameter, and a frieze put together from fragments which do not belong to one another. The original temple was built by Tarquin, and was supposed to mark the site of the ancient Sabine altar of the god and the limit of the wood of refuge mentioned by Virgil.
9. Just below the Temple of Saturn is the site of the Arch of Tiberius, erected, according to Tacitus, upon the recovery by Germanicus of the standards which Varus had lost.
10. The remains of the Milliarium Aureum, which formed the upper extremity of a wall faced with marbles, ending near the arch of Severus in a small conical pyramid. Distances without the walls were inscribed upon the Milliarium Aureum, as distances within the walls were upon the pyramid (from which in this case they were also measured) which bore the name of Umbilicus Romæ. The Via Sacra, which is still visible, descended from the Capitol between the temples of Saturn and Vespasian—being known here as the Clivus Capitolinus, and passed to the left of—
11. The Arch of Septimius Severus, which was erected by the senate A.D. 205, in honour of that emperor and his two sons, Caracalla and Geta. It is adorned with bas-reliefs relating his victories in the east—his entry into Babylon and the tower of the temple of Belus are represented. A curious memorial of imperial history may be observed in the inscription, where we may still discern the erasure made by Caracalla after he had put his brother Geta to death in A.D. 213, for the sake of obliterating his memory. The added words are OPTIMIS FORTISSIMISQVE PRINCIPIBUS—but the ancient inscription P. SEPT. LVC. FIL. GETÆ. NOBILISS. CÆSARI, has been made out by painstaking decipherers. In one of the piers is a staircase leading to the top of the arch which was formerly (as seen from coins of Severus and Caracalla) adorned by a car drawn by six horses abreast, and containing figures of Severus and his sons. It was in front of this arch that the statue of Marcus Aurelius stood, which is now at the Capitol.
"Les proportions de l'arc de Septime-Sévère sont encore belles. L'aspect en est imposant; il est solide sans être lourd. La grande inscription où se lisent les épithètes victorieuses qui rappellent les succès militaires de l'empereur, Parthique, Dacique, Adiabénique, se déploie sur une vaste surface et donne à l'entablement un air de majesté qu'admirent les artistes. Cette inscription est doublement historique; elle rappelle les campagnes de Sévère et la tragédie domestique qui après lui ensanglanta sa famille, le meurtre d'un de ses fils immolé par l'autre, et l'acharnement de celui-ci à poursuivre la mémoire du frère qu'il avait fait assassiner. Le nom de Géta a été visiblement effacé par Caracalla. La même chose se remarque dans une inscription sur bronze qu'on voit au Capitale et sur le petit arc du Marché aux bœufs dont j'ai parlé, où l'image de Géta a été effacée comme son nom. Caracalla ne permit pas même à ce nom proscrit de se cacher parmi les hiéroglyphes. En Egypte, ceux qui composaient le nom de Géta ont été grattés sur les monuments."—Ampère, Emp. ii. 278.
(The excavations in thé Forum are open to the public on the same days as the Palace of the Cæsars—Thursdays and Sundays.)
The platform on which we have been standing leads to the Via della Consolazione, occupying the site of the ancient Vicus Jugarius, where Augustus erected an altar to Ceres, and another to Ops Augusta, the goddess of wealth. (In this street, on the left, is a good cinque-cento doorway.) Where this street leaves the Forum was the so-called Lacus Servilius, a basin which probably