rome and its ruins - william forsyth (1865) with maps

7/28/2019 Rome and Its Ruins - William Forsyth (1865) With Maps

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Victorian914.563F775r1865

Joseph Earl andGenevieve Thornton

ArlingtonCollection of 19thCentury AmericanaBrigham Young University Library

BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY

3 1197 21993 3204


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ROME AND ITS RUINS.BY

WILLIAM FORSYTH, M.A. Q.C. M.P.Late FeUovj of Trinity College, Cambridge.

AUTHOR OF "HORTFXSIUS;" " HISTORY OF TEIAI, BY JURY ;" "THE LIFF.OF CICERO," ETC.

titjj P'ap mtb numerous Illustration*,

PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION' OFTHE COMMITTEE OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION,APPOINTED BY THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING

CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE.

LONDONSOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGESOLD AT THE DEPOSITORIES :

77, GREAT QUEEN STREET, LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS;4, ROYAL EXCHANGE; 48, PICCADILLY;AND BY ALL BOOKSELLERS.


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ROME AND ITS "RUINS.

Eome Pagan and Eome Papal ! How much iscontained in these four words ! How we are car-ried back to the days of our early youth, whenpainfully at school we were taught the earlyhistory of Eome ! We see JEneas and his com-panions, the wandering fugitives from Troy, land-ing at the mouth of the Tiber,which was then,as Virgil describes it, but is now no longer,shaded by leafy groves,and sending a peacefulembassy to King Latinus. Afterwards, when warbroke out between the Trojans and the Latins, wesee zEneas himself sailing up the Tiber to solicitthe friendship and aid of Evander, the agedArcadian king, whose city of Palantium was inthe low ground beneath the Palatine Hill. We seethe furious contest raging between the strangersand the inhabitants of Latium, in which Turnus,the king of the Eutulians, on the one side, andiEneas on the other, fought for the hand of

a2


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4 ROME AND ITS RUINS.Lavinia. We see the infant city of Eomnlustraced out by a ploughshare ; and Eemus, his twinbrotherwho, like him, had been suckled by theshe-wolfstruck down and killed, because in con-tempt he leaped over the rising wall, and daredthus to insult the future majesty of Eome. Theseare, indeed, but fables ; but they are fables sointerwoTen in our memories that no cold historicalcriticism will ever be able to efface them ; and, evennow, when we wander on the Aventine Hill wehalf expect to discover the cave of that famousold robber, Cacus, the son of Vulcan, and linealancestor of the Highland caterans, whose careerwas cut short by Hercules, who strangled him forstealing his cattle,a feat which he had accom-plished by dragging them backwards by their tailsinto his den.

But it is not my purpose here to dwell on thehistory of the past; and we must confine ourattention to the city as it exists at the present day.

First, however, we must get to Eome, and to dothis we have the choice of several routes. Theshortest and most expeditious and least fatiguingjourney is to go from Paris to Marseilles, and thereembark on board the French steameran ex-tremely good onewhich sails direct to Civita


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EOME AND ITS EUINS. 5Vecchia. It performs the voyage in about thirty-eight hours, so that the whole distance fromLondon to Eome may be easily accomplished infour days* Another route is this : You go from

CIVITA VECCHIA.

Marseilles to Nice by land, having the advantageof the railway as far as Cannes, and from Nice bythe beautiful Corniche Boad, between the footof the Maritime Alps and the Mediterranean, as


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6 ROME AND ITS KUINS.far as Genoa, from which place there is a steamerto Leghorn and Civita Vecchia. Or you may, ifyou prefer it, avoid Marseilles altogether, and gofrom Paris by railway to Chambery, and thencecross the Mont Cenis to Turin, from which placethere is a railway direct to Genoa. I have triedall these routes, and I think I give the preferenceto that by way of Nice and the Corniche Eoad.

Let us, however, suppose that we have reachedCivita Vecchia by a steamer, either from Genoa orMarseilles,and before we land you may observethe navy of the Pope, consisting of a single steam-boat lately built for him in England, at anchor inthe harbour. I must do the Pope the justice tosay that the arrangements made for landing andembarking at Civita Vecchia, the only port on theMediterraneanas Ancona was on the Adriaticside of the Papal States, are admirable. For-merly it was notorious for extortion and dis-comfort, and the unhappy traveller was the preyof a host of harpies who exist in Italy under thename of facclmii, of which the translation, asgiven in the dictionaries, is " porters" and " scoun-drels," and who seize upon your luggage and treatyou very much as a keeper would a maniac.Nothing of the kind, however, is now allowed at


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ROME AND ITS KUINS. 7Civita Vecchia. There is a fixed and moderatetariff of chargesone franc for landing in a boa,tat the pier, and another franc for the carriage ofluggage, no matter how large, to the omnibuswhich conveys it to the railway, It is a great anduseful reform, to be lauded by all travellers ; and Iea'n only say of it, with reference to the generalgovernment of the Papal States, si sic omnia !

The distance from Civita Vecchia to Eome by therailway is forty-two miles, but it took me two hoursand a half to accomplish it. On leaving the town,we enter at once upon the Campagnathat im-mense plain which spreads on every side aroundRome like a sea of desolation. Not that it is alla level plain : in many places it is a successionof low swelling downs with deep ravines, and hereand there they rise to the dignity of small hills ;but at a distance, or seen from the top of any loftybuilding in Eome, it looks, as a friend with whomI travelled remarked, just like Eomney Marsha barren and deserted waste. It is not, however,altogether barren, for portions are cultivated ; andI saw, in several places, large grey oxen, with hugehorns like those of buffaloes, ploughing the soil.But the Campagna is notoriously unhealthy, andone of the most curious of physical problems is to


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8 EOME AND ITS KUINS.discover the cause of this. In old times it wasvery different. ThenI speak of the times anteriorto the foundation of Kome, and also long after thatperiodit swarmed with a busy population. Cities,of some of which the very site is now a matter

THE CAMPAGXA.

of controversy, were then built and inhabited,such as Fidenae and Antemnae and G-abii and Col-latia and Veii and Crustumerium and Ardea, andmany others. But towards the end of the Eepublic,if not before, it was considered, in parts at allevents, as pestilential ; and the malaria, the curse


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 9that broods over it, was as well known to theancient as to the modern Eomans.Now what is the cause of this unhealthiness ?The theories on the subject are various, but themost satisfactory seems to be that adopted byDr. Arnold, in his History of Eome, who attributesit to the want of moisture, and says,* " If, then,more rain fell in the Campagna formerly than isthe case now ; if the streams were full of water,and their course more rapid ; above all, if owingto the uncleared state of Central Europe, and thegreater abundance of wood in Italy itself, thesummer heats set in later, and were less intense,and more often reduced by violent storms of rain,there is every reason to believe that the Campagnamust have been far healthier than at present ; andthat formerly, in proportion to the clearing andcultivation of Central Europe, to the felling of thewoods in Italy itself, the consequent decrease in thequantity of rain, the shrinking of the streams, andthe disappearance of the water of the surface, hasbeen the increased unhealthiness of the countryand the more extended range of the malaria/'

To this, however, must be added the fact of theabsence of animal life in later times, except to an

* History of Rome, i. 505.


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10 EOME AND ITS KUINS.inconsiderable extent, and of fires, both whichcircumstances have no doubt contributed greatlyto the unhealthiness of the district *As we get our first sight of the Tiber, close

beside which during part of the latter half of ourjourney the railway runs, we see at once why itwas called Flavus Tiberis, or the "Yellow Tiber"

* There is a curious confirmation of this in the account givenof some parts of India by Count de Warren in his work," L'Inde Anglaise in 1843," vol. iii. p. 63 :

" Des lieux celebres de l'lnde autrefois pour la purete deFair et la salubrite du climat, exhalent aujourd*hui des mi-asmes pestilentiels et sont litteralement inhabitables ; on disaitque comme au temps de Sodome et de Gomorrhe, la terres'ouvrepour laisser echapper des gaz qui devorent la population.Tel a ete le sort de Ghouty, tel sera celui de Bellary. Ce quiest encore plus extraordinaire, c'est que ce changement a eulieu generalement en raison inverse des causes qui auraient dupurifier ces localites ; il a suivi la substitution de la proprete etde la ventilation d'un cantonnement Europeen a l'entassementet. a la salete de la population native. Ainsi, tant que les fortsde Ghouty, Kundidroog, Guigi, Seringapatam, presentaientchacun une fourmiliere humaine entassee dans des huttes fetides,le cholera et les fievres typhoids etaient des maladies inconnues.On ne trouve aujourd'hui dans ces memes lieux que des casernesabandonnees et en mines ; tout y est d'une proprete exquise, etcependant une seule nuit passee dans une de ces casernes estgeneralement suffisante pour developper le germe d'une maladiesinon mortelle au moins destructive du temperament. Observonsencore que trois d'entre elles sont sur des montagnes a une grandeelevation au dessus des plaines environnantes, eloignees de toutmarecage, et presque absolument privees d'eau."


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HOME AND ITS KUINS. 11although I think that " muddy yellow" would bea more appropriate epithetfor the colour is verymuch like that of water in a marl-pit, especiallyafter any considerable quantity of rain. Itsaverage breadth seems to be about two thirds of

THE TIBER.

that of the Thames at Westminster Bridge ; but insome places it is wider, as, for instance, where it-flows on each side of the island in Eome calledIsola di Roma, which reminds one of the islandin the Seine at Paris on which stands the Cathe-


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12 EOME AND ITS RUINS.dral of Notre Dame, and the whole of the cityoriginally stood.

The view of Borne as we approach the city isvery much interfered with, and, in fact, partlyhidden, by an elevated ridge in front to the left.This is the Janiculum Hill, and behind it, to theeast, are St. Peter's and the Vatican. But in thedistance on the right we see a long line of brokenarches stretching south along the Campagna likethe leg of a gigantic spider. These are the ruins ofthe famous aqueduct constructed by the Emperor

AQUEDUCT.

Claudius to supply Borne with water. For it is


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 13said that the Eomans were ignorant of the hydro-static law that water confined in a tube rises tothe level of its source, and they therefore went tothe enormous expense of building an open aque-duct to convey water from the Alban hills to thecity. Between these arches and the railway thereis another dark line of dotted ruins, not continuous,like the aqueduct, and low in heightall exceptone. Those ruins are the tombs of the Appian Way,and that one is the tomb of Cecilia Metella, ofwhich we shall say more by and by. Beyond allthese, on the right, that is, towards the east, is theglorious range of the Latin Hills.

The railway-station is about half a mile fromthe walls, and you have to traverse an uninterest-ing suburb before you enter the gate and findyourself actually in Eome. I entered by thePorta S. Pancraza, but there is one nearer thestation called Porta Portese, through which theroad leads across the island of the Tiber to theleft bank on the other side where the city stands.

It is seldom safe to judge by a first impression,and I must candidly confess that my first impres-sions on entering the city were those of disappoint-ment. The streets seemed mean and common-place ; and, except the majestic dome of St. Peter's


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14; ROME AND ITS RUINS.on my left, I looked in vain for anything to indi-cate that I was in the Eternal City, until I passedthe Column of Antonine in the Piazza Colonna,which opens into the Corso. But I soon foundthat I was wrong ; and every day I spent in Eomemade me feel more and more that I was on classicground, and increased the interest I felt in ever37-thing around me. Those dull streets throughwhich I had passed in an omnibus were part ofthe Campus Martius, once a verdant plain outsidethe ancient wall, interspersed with noble monu-ments, where the Eoman generals, who demandeda triumph, remained with their armies, not beingallowed to enter the city until the Senate hadpassed their decree respecting it. The CampusMartius was originally the domain land of theTarquins ; and when Tarquinius Superbus wasexpelled from Eome it was confiscated, and dedi-cated to Mars as a public park. Hence the name.Gibbon says,* " Amidst his other great designsfor embellishing the city, Augustus did not forgetthe Campus Martius. He adorned it with beauti-ful buildings, and arranged for the grandees ofEome to follow his example. None imitated himmore eagerly than his son-in-law Agrippa, of

* Miscellaneous Works, p. 482.


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 15whose magnificence the septa/ baths, gardens,lake or basin, and above all the Pantheon, wereconspicuous proof. In the time of Strabo thesuburb of the Campus Martius was but littleinferior to the city itself. Its populousness, how-ever, was never proportional to its extent ; thepublic garden occupied much ground, and therewas still an empty space for the military exerciseof the Eoman youth." The bulk of the moderncity now stands on this site, and modern Eomemay be said to be comprised betwreen the PincianHill and the Tiber, that girdles the western side ofthe Campus Martius. The Corso, a long straightstreet, which is one of the main arteries of Eome,occupies the ground of the Via Lata, or Broadway,which ran between the Porta Flaminia (now the.Porta del Popolo) on the north, and the PortaEatumena on the south in the old wall of ServiusTullius at the foot of the Capitol.

I had often heard that, owing to the changesthat had taken place in the conformation of theground, and the accumulation of rubbish duringthe lapse of ages, it was now difficult to make outthe Seven Hills ; but this is a mistake. They aredistinctly visible if care is taken to select theproper point of view; but the traveller who goes to


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16 ROME AND ITS RUINS.Eome under the idea that these hills ever were ofa considerable height will be disappointed. TheEomans, with perhaps pardonable pride, calledthem monies, but they had no more dignified term

THE SEVEN HILLS.

to apply to the Alps themselves. They had aword (colles) for hills as distinguished from moun-tains ; but it is very seldom used by the Latinwriters when speaking of the hills of Eome. Thethree most conspicuous, and of which the features Z.are the most plainly marked, are the Aventine,the Palatine, and the Capitoline ; next to these I


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EOME AND ITS EUINS. 17would place in order the Coelian, the Quirinal, andthe Esquiline ; and last the Viminal, which is lowand flat, and by no means easy to discover. Indeedwithout the aid of a guide book and local informa-tion I could never feel sure that the Viminal wasa hill at all ; and it is not certain that it was oneof the Seven Hills, and not rather merely a part oradjunct of the Esquiline. But we must disabuseour minds of any exaggerated idea as to the sizeand height of any of these famous hills. Some ofthem, such as the Coelian, the Viminal, and theEsquiline, are rather what we should call risinggrounds than hills. I rode one day to the MonsSacer, about three miles from Rome to the north-east, famous as the place to which the Plebs re-tired in the year 493 B.C. whentheir patiencehaving been utterly exhausted by the oppressivetyranny of the Patricians, into whose power mostof them had fallen as debtors, according to theterribly severe law of debtor and creditor at Eomethey determined not to return to the city untilthey obtained some guarantee for their rightsand liberties. It was then, according to theaccount given by Livy, that Menenius Agrippainduced them to come back by relating tothem the well-known fable of the belly and the

B


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18 HOME AND ITS RUINS.members ; but in reality the sedition was appeasedby the concession on the part of the Patriciansthat magistrates called Tribunes, armed withimmense powers, should be created, to defend theinterests of the Plebeians. I found this cele-brated Mons or hill to be a mere swelling on theright bank of the Anioup which it was easy tocanter. The most abrupt of the seven hills arethe Aventine, the Palatine, and the Capitolineand of these the two former are the least changedin shape, and are most like what they were inappearance when Eome was first founded. Thereis no hill to compare with the Castle Eock atEdinburgh. The Palatine is not so high as theCarlton Hill there, and Clifton rises above Bristolto a greater elevation than any of the seven hillsabove the level of Eome. I once went up to thetop of St. Peter's and stood in the ball there, fromwhich the view is most magnificent. But as Iascended, and long before I reached even the dome,all appearance of the hills which lie to the south-east of the cathedral had vanished.The best place to take your stand in order to

get a good idea of Eome is the Tower of theCapitol ; and I propose that we should go theretogether, and I will point out the principal features


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HOME AND ITS KUINS. 19of the view, and say a few words on the differentobjects in the panorama around lis.But first let me try and give some idea of theCapitol itself.

It consists of a saddle-backed ridge runningeast and west, of which the side to the west,known by the name of Monte Caprino, on whichstands the Palazzo Caffarelli, is the highest. Thatto the east is crowned by the curious old Churchof Ara Coeli, and between these two more elevatedportions of the hill is a depression, called by someauthors the Intermontium,* where the Palace of theSenator now stands, with the tower in the centre,on which we are supposed to have taken up ourposition. In order to reach the Capitol from thenorth or city side we enter an open square calledthe Piazza d'Ara Coeli, from which a flight of stepsascends to a small courtyard or square called Piazzadi Campidoglio (the modern name for the Capitol),with the Palace of the Senator opposite in our front,and two wings on each side. The Campidoglio, orw Pield of Pain/' was so called from its being usedin the middle ages as the place for the executionof criminals ; and the word " Capitol " has been

* It was here that Romulus placed his Asylum, a place ofrefuge for outlaws.

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20 KOME AND ITS KUINS,derived (though it is hardly necessary to remarkthat this is a fabulous etymology suggested by thename) from Caput Toli, "the head of Tolus ;" becausein digging the foundations of the Temple of Jupiterthere, in the reign of one of the Tarquins, a bleedinghead was discovered, which was said to have beenthe head of a man named Tolus. The wing onthe right in the Palace of the Conservators containsa gallery of pictures, the Bronze Wolf, and many

THE BRONZE WOLF.

curious antiquities ; and the one on the left hand,called the Museum of the Capitol, is appropriatedto ancient sculpture. Here we find, among othercelebrated statues, the Dying Gladiator, the An-tinous, and the Capitoline Venus. The Palace ofthe Senator and both the wings of the courtyard


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BOME AND ITS RUINS. 21were built from the designs of Michael Angeiobut I confess their appearance greatly disap-pointed me, and they are hardly worthy of occu-pying so famous a spot, which was in old timespre-eminently distinguished by the sumptuousmagnificence of its buildings. At the top of thesteps which lead up to the court or piazza, whichis faced on the north side by a balustrade, are twocolossal statues in marble of Castor and Pollux,each standing bv the side of a horse ; and inthe centre of the court is the noble equestrianstatue of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius. Boththe horse and the rider are of bronze, which wasoriginally gilt, and Michael Angeio was so struckwith the action of the horse, which looks as if itwould prance off the pedestal on which it stands,that as he gazed upon it he exclaimed, {i Cammina /"" It walks ! " I ought to have mentioned thatbefore ascending the stairs we observe on our lefthand a long flight of marble steps leading up tothe Church of Ara Coeli, or Altar of Heaven, withits unfinished fagade of plain and unadorned bricklike the front of a huge barn. It is generallysupposed to occupy the site of the Temple ofJupiter Capitolinus, and it was in this church thatGibbon first conceived the idea of writing the


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22 ROME AND ITS RUINS." Decline and Fall ofthe Eoman Empire/' It wouldbe difficult to imagine a more appropriate spot.He says that it was on the 15th October, 1764, ashe sat there musing amidst the ruins of theCapital, while the bare-footed friars were singingvespers, that the idea of writing the work firstoccurred to his mind.The Palace of the Senator is so called becauseit is the official residence of the Senatorthehead of the municipal body at Eome. I met himone day in his state equipage, which remindedme very much of the Lord Mayors carriage. Thepalace rests upon the substruction of a very ancientbuilding, the Tabularium, in which the archivesof the State were kept when Eome was yet arepublic. From an inscription which has beenfound there, it appears that the Tdbularium ofwhich the remains now exist (for possibly therewas a still older building on the same site) wasbuilt by Lutatius Catulus, about eighty yearsbefore Christ. It formed a kind of face to thesouth side of the Capitol, rising up from thenorthern extremity of the Forum, with which itcommunicated by a large door or gate and a flightof steps leading down from it to the Forum.There is a very interesting account in Tacitus


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EOME AND ITS RUINS. 23of an attack made on the Capitol by the soldiersof the Emperor Vitellius when it was occupied bythe partisans of Vespasian, his rival for the throne ;and in the conflict the Temple of Jupiter Capi-tolinus was set on fire, and with the adjacentbuildings destroyed. Tacitus mentions that whenthe door of the Capitol (by which I suppose himto mean the door of the Temple) was burnt, theentrance was barricaded by statues which werepulled down from their pedestals for the purpose,and so the assailants were prevented from rushingin at that part ; but they climbed up in two otherplaces, one by the Tarpeian Bock, and the othernear what he calls the Lucus Asyli, and madethemselves masters of the Capitol.

But where was the Temple of Jupiter Capi-tolinus ? Was it on the eastern or westernsummit of the Capitoline ridge ? In other words,was it on the site of the modern church of AraCoeli, or was it where the Palazzo Caffarelli standson the Monte Caprino ? Upon the correct deter-mination of this spot depends many a topo-graphical problem at Eome. The space betweenthe two heights which, following later authorities,I have called the Intermontium, was known by thatname to the ancients. Those two heights (the


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24 ROME AND ITS RUINS.Ara Coeli and the Monte Caprino) were originally,covered with wood, and they are spoken of as" the two groves "one of which seems afterwardsto have been the Ara Coeli, and the other theCapitolium, properly so called. The intermediatespace was the Asylum Eomuli. Thus Strabo saysEomulus established an " asylum " between the Araand the Capitolium. Livy (i. 8) speaks of it as aplace between the two groves. Dionysius (ii. 27)says, " the space between the Capitol and the Arais now called by the Eomans ( between the twogroves/'' Bunsen, after reviewing the conflictingauthorities, decides against the Ara Coeli, and infavour of the Monte Caprino, or western height, asthe site of the Temple of Jupiter, and he placesthe Temple of Juno Moneta where the Church ofAra Coeli now stands. The Ara, according to him,embraced more than any one particular point, andincluded the eastern summit. He therefore exactlyreverses the positions which have been usuallyassumed. It seems certain that the words Ara,and Capitolium were loosely used by the ancientwriters sometimes to designate particular parts ofthe hill, and sometimes the whole of it. Hencemuch confusion arises, and it is difficult to recon-cile apparently conflicting passages. The cele-


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 25brated antiquary Canina, whose opinion is entitledto great weight, has no hesitation in placing theTemple of Jupiter on the Ara Coeli, and he saysthat discoveries have been made there which seemto place the matter beyond a doubt. There is,however, a good deal of difficulty in understand-ing the exact positions of the buildings to whichTacitus refers. It would, I think, be removed bysupposing that the Temple of Jupiter stood overthe Tabularium, but I know of no authority tosupport this view. Tacitus (Hist. iii. 71), in de-scribing the attack which caused the conflagration,says that the Vespasian party who defended theCapitol against the Vitellians mounted the hill asfar as the first door of the arx of the Capitol.Now the arx was on the west side of the Inter-montmm, just above the Tarpeian Eock, and at aconsiderable distance from the Temple of Jupiteron the east. He then says that some porticoes onthe right hand of the Clivus Capitolinus as youascend were set on fire, and the Vitellians followedthe course of the flames, and would have forcedtheir way through the burnt doors of the Capitolif Sabinus had not barricaded the entrance withsome statues which were pulled down for thepurpose. Afterwards, he says, the flames caught


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26 ROME AND ITS RUINS.the wooden figures of some eagles, which supportedthe roof, but he does not explain of what building ;and he immediately adds, " Thus the Capitol, withits doors closed, and neither defended nor pluiirdered, became a prey to the conflagration." Hethen goes on to mourn over this destruction ofthe Capitolium, of which he says the foundationshad been laid by Tarquinius Priscus, in conse-quence of a vow in the Sabine war, and whichServius Tullius and Tarquinius Superbus hadafterwards completed out of spoils taken fromthe enemy, but Horatius Pulvillus, when Consulfor the second time, had consecrated. He thereforeclearly uses the word Capitolium to signify theTemple. If so, the " burnt doors of the Capitolcannot be the same as the " doors of the arx ofthe Capitol ; " and if the Temple occupied the siteof the Church of Ara Cceli, as is always assumed,the fire must have mounted up from the porticoesto the building above them, and so spread east-ward to the Temple. The truth is, that the wordCapitolium is used loosely by the Latin writersin different senses. Sometimes it designates thewhole of the buildings on the hill, sometimes theAra, on the western summit, sometimes the Tem-plum, on the eastern. I may add that we learn


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EOME AND ITS RUINS. 27from the interesting account which Tacitus givesus (Hist. iv. 53), of the laying of the foundationsof the new temple to replace that which had beenburnt down, that it was dedicated not to Jupiteralone, but to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva.

The door leading to the Tabularium from theForum was afterwards walled up, and the Templeof Vespasian was erected in front of it, wherethe stairs connecting it with the Forum formerlystood.The lower part of the Tabularium has only

within the last twenty years been excavated and ex-plored. It was built of massive masonry, consistingof enormous blocks of the kind of stone which iscalled tufa, sl volcanic formation; and as I wasasked by the guide to apply my tongue to thefragment, and found it was decidedly saltish, I atfirst fancied that the stone was some sort of salinedeposit, until he informed me that part of theancient corridor where we were standing had beenused in the middle of the fifteenth century as amagazine of salt, which, if true, may perhapsaccount for the taste of the stone. I need notgive a description of the plan of the building,with its subterranean chambers, and galleries, andstairs. It will be enough to say that no one can


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28 HOME AND ITS RUINS.fail to be struck with the vast size and strengthof the walls, and the rude magnificence of theinterior.

I have mentioned the Tarpeian Bock ; and, as itis in the immediate neighbourhood of the spotwhere I suppose ourselves to be placedthat is,.on the tower of the Capitol, and facing southwill endeavour to point it out. But this is not soeasy as might be imagined. Everybody knowsthat it was the place where criminals were hurleddown in the stern old times of Bepublican Borne,but the exact spot is matter of controversy, andtwo places claim the honour of what we canhardly call the Lover's Leap. The one is behindus, on the north-west side of the Capitol, wherethere is a villanously dirty little streeta cul desacfull of unutterable abominations, and calledVicolo della Rupe Tarpeia. I came upon it ac-cidentally one day with a friend, and we venturedto pick our steps up for a few yards until wereached a precipitous face of rock, which, sup-posing the mass of houses and accumulateddeposit below to be cleared away, would seemvery well fit for the purpose of breaking one'sneck by a fall ; and therefore, so far as height andsteepness were necessary for that object, this might


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HOME AND ITS RUINS. 29have been the Tarpeian Eock, as it professes to be.But it cannot have been the real place of execu-tion, for we know that that fronted the Forum, whichis on the otherthat is, the southside of theCapitol. We learn this fact from many passages

TARPEIAN RUCK.

in the Latin writers, but especially from whatDionysius tells us, in relating the account ofthe execution of Spurius Cassius, namely, that hewas taken to the precipice that overhangs theForum, and in the presence of the multitude throwndown the rock ; " for this," he adds, " was thenthe usual capital punishment with the Eomans."And he says in effect the same when speaking ofthe proceedings against Coriolanus. When the


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30 ROME AND ITS RUINS,Gauls had captured Koine, and a band of thesebarbarians was climbing up to the Capitol bynight, M, Manlius Capitolinus was awakened bythe cackling of some geese, which were kept in theTemple of Juno ; and, having given the alarm,hurled down the assailants, and so saved theCapitol. The French now occupy Eome ; and notlong ago there appeared a caricature representinga French soldier on the Capitol plucking thefeathers of a goose, with the words beneath, " AGaul's revenge/'* There can be no doubt, there-fore, that we must look for this famous rock onthe south or Forum side of the Capitol ; and aplace is shown at the edge of some gardens on theMonte Caprino, to the west of the tower of theCapitol, which is called, and very probably is, thereal Tarpeian Bock. Wherever it was, Tacitusmentions that in his time it was approached bya flight of a hundred steps,t all trace of which hasentirely disappeared ; but very probably, if proper

* This story is told in Ampere's EIHstoire Romaine aRome, a very instructive and amusing work. The followingepigram, which I wrote, may serve to express the same senti-ment :

*' A Gallis anser Romam servavit ; ab ipsisRomanis Romam Gallica servat avis."

t Hist. iii. 71.


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EOME AND ITS RUINS. 31excavations were made, remains of them would bediscovered. Thus then in the words of Milton

1 ' There the Capitol thou seestAbove the rest lifting his stately headOn the Tarpeian Rock, her citadelImpregnable."

Before leaving the subject of the Capitol, atten-tion should be directed to another very interesting

THE MAMERTTNE PRISON

part of it the Mamertine Prison, which liesbelow us on the left hand, at the north-west ex-tremity or corner of the Forum. While I was


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32 EOME AND ITS RUINS.standing on the steps of the Capitol, and in-quiring my way of an Italian to this spot, hetook the opportunity of picking my pocket ofmy handkerchief. I have called it the MamertinePrison, but Dungeon or Dungeons would be amore appropriate name. It is a terrible place.It is underground in what was once the side ofthe hill on the south face of the Capitol. It con-sists of two subterranean chambers or vaults, intowhich you now descend by stone stairs ; butanciently there were no steps leading to the lowerdungeon, but the unhappy victims were let downinto it through a hole in the roof, which stillexists. It is difficult to make out at first sightwhether these dungeons are cut out of the solidrock or built of enormous blocks of stone in thestyle of Etruscan architecture. At all events thereis no doubt that they are an Etruscan work, andare generally attributed to Ancus Martius. Butothers think that Servius Tullius ought to havethe honour of being considered the builder of thishorrible gaol*. Not however that it is now usedas such. Probably it was commenced by the first-named king and enlarged by the second, fromwhom it took the name of Tullianumfor it wasnot called the Mamertine until the Middle Ages,


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HOME AND ITS RUINS. 33and for what reason it is difficult to say. Thesmall Church of S. Guiseppe dei Falguami nowstands above it, on the ground which, in the courseof ages, has been heaped up against the declivityof the hill. That it wTas originally high above thelevel of the Forum is not only plain to the eye, bycomparing the excavated portion of the Forumofwhich I shall speak presentlywith its presentsurface ; but is also proved by the fact thatfrequent mention is made by the classic writers ofsome stairs leading up to it called Gcerrionice, fromwhich ordinary criminals were thrown and killed,just as state criminals were hurled from theTarpeian Eock. Tacitus (Hist. iii. 74) mentionsthat the mutilated headless body of FlaviusSabinus was exposed in the Gsemonise stairs afterhis murder by the partisans of Vitellius, andthere also the dead body of Sejanus, the profligateminister of Tiberius, was thrown after his execu-tion. It was in the lowest of these dungeonsthat Jugurtha, the Numidian king, was starved todeath. Plutarch tells us that on being let downinto its gloomy depths he exclaimed, either inmadness or in irony" How cold, Eomans, is thisbath of yours ! " And it was in this prison thatthe accomplices of Catiline in his great conspiracy

C


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34 ROME AND ITS RUINS.were confined after they had been arrested, andhere they were put to death by the order of theSenate.But in the eyes of the Eoman Catholic a still

deeper interest attaches to this prison ; for, accord-ing to tradition, St. Peter was confined in it in thereign of Nero. The story is that the Apostle hereconverted the gaoler and several other fellowprisoners, and that, in order to obtain water tobaptize them, he created a miraculous spring inthe floor of the dungeon. I can bear witness tothe existence of this spring, and to the excellenceof the water, however sceptical I may be aboutits origin. A picture over an altar by the sideof the wall commemorates the baptism; and, asthe candle of the monk who showed us the prisonshone opon it, I thought of the story of the gaolerat Philippi, who sprang forward trembling withthe cry, u Sirs, what must T do to be saved ?

But we are now on the top of the tower, thesky is of unclouded brilliancy, and the only draw-back is that the sun is rather too hot. For thisreason it is better to ascend either early in themorning or shortly before sunset, when there isnot only less heat, but less haze in the distance.We are looking towards the east, or rather, tospeak accurately, south-east.


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 35Immediately below us Is one of the most in-

teresting spots in Eome. It is the Forumanirregular oblong space about a third of a mile inlength, which runs in a south-easterly directionfrom the foot of the Capitol. How many asso

THE FORUM.ciations crowd upon the mind as the eye restson this world-famous scene! We fancy still tohear

" The immortal accents flow,And still the eloquent air breathesburns with Cicero."Here was enacted the terrible tragedy of Virginia,

c2


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36 EOME AND ITS RUINS.who was murdered by her father to save her fromoutrage worse than death at the hands of AppiusClaudius the Decemvir. Here Antony pronouncedthat oration over the dead body of the murderedCaesar, with which Shakespeare has made us allfamiliar ; and this was the scene of the fierceststruggles between the Patricians and Plebeians,during which the latter slowly but surely foughttheir way to an equality of rights and power inthe State. It was once the busiest spot in thegreatest city in the world, surrounded by shops,and the centre of public life at Eome ; and nowit is a deserted space of open ground, with nothingbut a few pillars and fragments of ruins to attestits former glory.*

In modern times it has borne the name of IICampo Vaccino, or the cattle market, because itwas used as a sort of Eoman Smithfield ; and it iscurious that Virgil, in his description of its stateat the time when he represents iEneas and hiscompanions as landing in Italy, says that he thensaw herds of cattle wandering in (what was after-

* There were altogether eleven Forums in Rome, called re-spectively Romaimm, Magnum, Cresaris, Augusti, Nervse,Trajani, Ahenobarbi, Boarium, Pistorum, Gallorum, andPistorum. The first-named was the Forum.


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38 EOME AND ITS KUINS.When I use the term " uncovered " I ought to

explain that the whole of the Forum was until afew years ago covered with earth and rubbish, theaccumulation of debris for centuries, to the depthof about fifteen feet. But a small portionalas !only a small portionhas been now excavated, andthe ancient surface has been laid bare. A solitarypillar stands close to the Bostra, which Byronapostrophises as

" Thou nameless column with a buried base ;for in his time the base was covered with earth,and there was nothing to indicate its history. Butnow the earth has been cleared away, and aninscription was found on its plinth or base whichtells us that it was erected by Smaragdas, theexarch of Italy, a.d. 608, in honour of Phocas, oneof the most execrable of the Boman emperors, whodied a.d. 610.The most interesting discovery made during the

excavations was the laying bare the pavement ofthe ancient Via Sacra, or Sacred Way, which led tothe Capitol, and also part of the Clivus Capitolinus,along which the Boman generals marched whenthey enjoyed the honour of a triumph, and alongwhich also the miserable captives followed in sadprocession, to meet the death to which they were


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HOME AND ITS RUINS. 39by the pitiless law of Roman warfare foredoomed.The course taken by the triumphal cortege seemsto have been this. The victorious general, afterhalting his army in the Campus Martius until hereceived permission from the Senate to enter thewalls, marched from the plain into the city throughthe Porta Carmentalis, at the western extremity ofthe Capitoline Hill, and advanced past the Archof Janus Quadrifrons along the road between thePalatine and the Aventine (now the Via di Cerchi).He then turned to the left into the road thatruns between the Palatine and' the Coelian Hills,which was called the Via Triumplialis (now Via S.Gregory), and emerged into the Via Sacra, nearthe point where the Arch of Constantine now7stands. Then turning to the left he marchedstraight to the Capitol from the south.

The pavement of the Via Sacra consists of largeflat polygonal blocks of stone-like slate, irregularlylaid down, and it looks almost as perfect as if ithad been constructed yesterday instead of beingmore than 2,000 years old. The Via Sacra passesstraight up the Forum, and close to the Arch ofSeptimius Severus it is joined by the Clivus Capi-tolinus, which went under that arch and formerlyled to the Capitol ; but it is now covered except


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40 ROME AND ITS RUINS.for a small space by the modern road that windsup the ascent.

Immediately below us, on the left, at the foot ofthe Capitol, behind the arch of Septimius Severus,are the remains of the Temple of Concordmemor-

AKCH OF SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS.able as having been erected (I speak now of theoriginal temple) by Camillus, in the middle of thefourth century before Christ, to commemorate thetermination of the contest between the Patricians


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EOME AND ITS RUINS. 41and Plebeians by opening one of the consulshipsto the latter, and according to them other politicalprivileges.

The three beautiful columns supporting anentablature at a little distance to the right of theTemple of Concord (looking towards the Forum)are supposed by some antiquaries to belong to theTemple of Vespasian, by others to the Temple ofSaturn. But it is clear that the temple, whateverit might be, of which they formed part, occupiedthe site of some older building, for along the friezeof the entablature are sculptured in large sizethe letters ESTITVER, showing that this was arestoration. It seems to me that Canina is rightin calling it the Temple of Vespasian.

Near this is a more imposing ruin, consisting ofan Ionic portico of eight columns, which, on goodauthority, is supposed to be the remains of theTemple of Saturn, where the iErarium or EomanTreasury was kept.

In front of the Temple of Saturn, but separatedfrom it by the modern road which now leads upto the Capitol from the south, and which, as Ihave said before, is almost fifteen feet higher thanthe old bottom of the Forum, is the site of theBasilica Julia, the existence of which was not


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42 ROME AND ITS RUINS.known until the recent excavations were made.But I had better describe what is meant by abasilica.

The ancient basilicas were courts of justice aswell as places of business, and have an especialinterest for us, as they were the models of the

BASILICA OF CONBTANTINE.

6arly Christian churches, and, in fact, a greatmany of them were converted into churches whenChristianity became the prevalent religion of the


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 43Koman empire. Let me explain the constructionof these basilicas, and you will at once see the re-semblance between them and our modern churches,and how suitable they were for transformation intoChristian temples.The basilica consisted of a loftv hall, with two

rows of pillars running from one end to the other,parallel and near to the side walls, so as to leavebetween the two rows a wide vacant space in thebody of the building. Here you will observe wehave the nave and two side aisles. These pillarssupported an entablature, above which were win-dows which admitted light into the hall, like theclerestory windows of our cathedrals.At one end of the hall, between the two rows

of pillars, was a' semicircular space called thetribune, where the judges sat and the trials wereheld. The public used the body of the hall forwalking about and gossiping, just as is the case inWestminster Hall now. In this tribune, when thebasilica was converted into a church, was placedthe altar, and this was the origin of the modernchancel. Still, however, an important feature iswantingnamely, the cross-like form by whicharchitecture symbolises our faith in the Crucified.Of this there was no trace in the old basilicas, for


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44 ROME AND ITS RUINS.the aisles ran straight on, as I have said, from endto end. But the Christian architects attained theirobject by throwing out on each side, near thetribune, a transept, which was sometimes used asa side chapel, as may be seen in that most perfectspecimen of a basilica transformed into a churchthe Santa Maria Maggiore at Eome. I knowno church that pleased me more than this. It hasa noble simplicity and grandeur, which is quiterefreshing in contrast with the elaborate ornamentand profusion of detail which so often, in myopinion, encumbers rather than adorns the interiorof churches. Here, however, the continuity of thegrand lines of pillars was unfortunately brokenby the Popes Sixtus V. and Benedict XIV., whotook away two on each side and threw an archover the vacant spaces to form the two side chapelseach a miracle of costly beauty, but not suffi-ciently harmonizing with the simplicity of the restof the building.To return, however, to the Basilica Julia. The

site, as I said before, has been excavated, and thebroken bases of the lines of pillars that once sup-ported the roof may be seen ; but beyond these, anda few fragments of stone and marble, not a vestigeof the building remains. I may here mention


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 45that the site of a much larger basilica has latelybeen excavated in the Forum of Trajan, at thenorth end of which stands the well-known Columnof Trajan, which was the model of the Napoleon

TRAJAN S COLUMN.

Column in the Place Vendome in Paris. Thisbasilica was called Ulpia, from the family nameof Trajan, and was of immense size. Onlyabout a third of it has yet been excavated; and


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46 ROME AND ITS RUINS.there seems no chance of uncovering more, asthe rest of the site is occupied by streets andhouses.

Just beyond, that is, at the south-east end of theBasilica Julia, stand three most beautiful pillars,the sole relics of a building the name and desti-nation of which have been a fertile subject ofdispute amongst antiquaries. Some think thatthey belonged to the Temple of Jupiter Stator, orJupiter the Stayer of Flight ; others attributethem to the Temple of Minerva Chalcidice, built byAugustus ; others to the Temple of the Dioscuri,that is, Castor and Pollux ; while others havethought that they were part of a Graecostasis orhall, in which the ambassadors of friendly nationswere received and entertained by the Senate. But,however critics may differ as to the nature of thebuilding of which they formed part, there istherecan bebut one opinion as to their matchlessbeauty. I first saw them by moonlight as Iwandered in the Forum on the night of the daywhen I arrived in Eome, and I never shall forgetthe impression they made upon me. There theystood, those three tall, graceful columns, risingabove the wreck of agesapparently so frail thata slight effort would push them down, and yet


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ROME AND ITS EUINS. 47they had survived the vicissitudes of time, thestorm, and the battle ; and, perhaps more destruc-tive than all, the hand of the spoilerfor it iswell known that the ancient buildings of ImperialEome were used as a sort of quarry in the MiddleAges, out of which palaces and churches were built,or, at all events, furnished with their principal-ornaments.We have now glanced at the principal objectsin so much of the Forum as has yet been exca-vated ; but before we leave it you will naturallyask, Why is not morewhy is not the whole of itdisinterred ? At present a road runs along thesurface of the accumulated earth that hides itfrom our view, and it is one of the thoroughfaresto the Colosseum, and the public walks and thegroves on the Ccelian Hill. But this would be noobstacle, for the road could be carried along theold bottom of the Forum as easily as on the top ofthe accumulated deposit, and the expense wouldbe trifling. A body of English railway navigatorswould clear the whole space in a month, and whocan say what treasures of antiquity might not bebrought to light, which now lie buried a few yardsbeneath our feet? Under any other Europeangovernment, except perhaps that of Turkey, this


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48 ROME AND ITS EUINS.would have been done long ago ; and it does seemto be a disgrace to Eome that the whole of thisspot, the cradle of her ancient glory, has not beenexcavated and thoroughly explored. It is quitepossible that statues might be discovered thatwould rival the Laocoon, which was dug up in avineyard on the Esquiline Hill, or the DyingGladiator, which was found amongst the ruins inthe gardens of Sallust.

In fact, there is no saying what marble "nuggets "might not turn up if the Pope would only allowthe " diggings " to go on there ; for it needs littlesagacity to predict that in such a locality some-thing of value would be discovered.*Look now from the tower, on which I suppose that

we are standing, across the Forum to its south-eastend, and you will see a marble arch, under whichthe road I have mentioned, the Via Sacra, runs.This is the Arch of Titus, erected by the Senateafter the death of that emperor, to commemorate

* Addison says, in his Remarks on Italy, that the Jews wereso confident of finding all kinds of valuable treasures in the bedof the Tiber, that they offered to the Pope to cleanse it, andmake a new channel for the river in the meantime. One of thelatest found works of art in the Tiber is a beautiful figure inbronze, now in Berlin, called Ber betende Knabe ; or, thePraying Boy.


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 49the conquest of Jerusalem. It consists of an archof white marble, not at all unlike at a distance theMarble Arch which stands at the north-east cornerof Hyde Park. The bas-reliefs sculptured upon it

^vVh'^vSS^AR'.'H OF TITUS.

are particularly interesting; for they represent aprocession carrying the spoils of Jerusalem, andamongst them the golden seven-branched candle-stick of the Temple, which is said to have been

D


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50 ROME AND ITS RUINS.lost in the Tiber at the defeat of Maxentius byConstantine. It is the only authentic representa-

SPOILS FROM JERUSALEM.tion of this sacred object known to exist; and itis impossible to gaze on it without feelings of deepemotion, as it calls up before our memory the his-tory of the Temple, and its destruction in the lastterrible siege of Jerusalem. Beyond this arch, inthe same direction, at less than a furlong's dis-tance, rise the mighty ruins of the Colosseum, orFlavian Amphitheatre. It was commenced byVespasian on the site of an artificial lake con-structed by Nero,* and it was afterwards continuedby Titus, and finished by Domitian. It is of an

* Hie ubi conspicui venerabilis AmphitheatriErigitur moles, stagna Neronis erant.

Mart. De Spect. Ep. ii. v. 5.


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 51oval form, and when complete was able to contain87,000 spectators.

I frequently visited these ruins, but on twooccasions the difference and contrast of my visitswere so great, that I should like to describe them.

COLOSSEUM.

The one was by day, and the other by night. Theformer occasion was on a Sunday afternoon ; thesun shone brilliantly, though the unclouded skymade it unpleasantly hot. When I entered theColosseum not a soul was there but myself, andI stood beside a crucifix, or image of the Virgin,d2


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52 ROME AND ITS RUINS.I forget which, which is placed in one of thevaulted passages that forms the principal entranceat this end. At that moment a party of Eomanpeasants, both men and women, dressed in theirvery picturesque costume, came into the Colosseum,and each knelt and prayed, and kissed the imagebefore they passed into the interior. In the centreof the arena stands a large wooden crucifix, andhere also several of the party knelt, and thenpressed their foreheads across the cross.

I could not help thinking of the contrast be-tween this scene and such acts of worship, andthe scenes of horror that had been so often enactedthere. I thought of the cry of " Christianos adhones " with which those walls had re-echoed,when whilst every seat was crowded with an eagermultitude, not of men only, but womenof allthe rank and fashion and beauty of Imperial Eomethe Christian martyrs stood on that very spotawaiting the spring of the wild beasts, whoseroar was heard in the subterraneous dens wherethey were raging for their prey.The other occasion to which I allude was when

I went with a friend to the Colosseum at night,just as the moon was rising above the east wall ofthe ruins. We were challenged as we approached


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ROME AND ITS EUINS. 53by the French sentry who is stationed there, butwere allowed to enter the arena. The silence wasunbroken by any sound, except that of the owls,which hooted in the most orthodox manner, andthe whole scene was in perfect harmony with theidea of the fallen majesty of Eome. The reasonwhy a sentry keeps guard at the Colosseum is onaccount of the assassinations and robberies whichhave been committed in its gloomy recesses. Astory is told of an English traveller who one nightvisited it, and as he was coming out through avaulted passage suddenly missed his watch, andseeing a person near with a watch-chain hangingfrom his pocket, he seized it, thinking that it washis own, and that the stranger was the robber.On getting to his hotel, he discovered to hisamazement that his own watch was on the tablewhere he had left it, and that he himself was therobber in having forcibly taken another man'swatch. Next morning he hurried to the police-office, and there he found a respectable priest, whohad just been piteously complaining that he hadbeen robbed on the preceding night at the Colos-seum, of his watch, by a Garibaldista IngleseBut let us now leave what I may call the fore-

ground of the picture before us, and turn our at-


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54 ROME AND ITS EUINS.tention to the higher ground that surrounds it."We will take the six other hills of Rome, in orderas they meet the eye, for you will remember thatwe are supposed to be standing on the Capitoline,which forms the seventh.

That mound-shaped hill on the extreme right,beneath which the Tiber rolls its muddy stream tothe Mediterranean, is the Aventine. It is so closeto the river that there is barely room for the car-riage road which leads to the Porta S. Paolo, out-side of which, at the distance of about a mile fromthe Aventine, has been recently rebuilt the mag-nificently decorated church of S. Paolo, on the siteof the former venerable church of the same name,which was destroyed by fire in 1823. On thesummit of the Aventine are two churches, withconvents adjoining them. The one nearest us isthe Church of S. Sabina, which belongs to aDominican convent, where the present Pope onceresided, and the trees and shrubs which you seethere are part of the gardens of the monastery, inwhich one of the monks pointed out to us alemon-tree said to have been planted by S. Domi-nico, the founder of the Inquisition, himself. Ofcourse ladies are never admitted within the pre-cincts of the convent, and therefore they must


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HOME AND ITS EUINS. 55take on trust what they are told of the interior.But, in truth, there is nothing to tell. There is acurious old cloister in a sadly dilapidated and dirtycondition, surrounded by the cells of the brethren,and a garden overrun with weeds, and utterlyneglected. As we entered the convent, we sawbasins of what looked like very good soup, doledout to some hungry beggars, who get their dinnerthere every day for the trouble of walking up theascent for it. The church contains a very finepainting of the Virgin and Child by Sasso Ferrato.

The other church on the Aventine is that of S.Alessio, about which I believe there is nothingremarkable. At all events, I am not competent tospeak of it on my own authority, as I did notthink it worth while to go inside.But what was the early history of the Aventine ?Among all the Seven Hills of Kome it is entitledto precedence, for here, according to the old tradi-tion, as it is beautifully told by Virgil, KingLatinus held his court when iEneas and his com-panions landed at the mouth of the Tiber after thecapture of Troy. Let me try and bring before youa picture of that old-world time, as it is drawn bythe poet.

Anxious to conciliate the friendship of Latinus,


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56 HOME AND ITS RUINS.iEneas sends an embassy, consisting of a hundredof his followers, with presents to the king. Theyset out on their journey, and as they approach thecity of the Latins, they see the inhabitants en-gaged outside the walls in warlike games. Thearrival of the strangers attracts attention, and KingLatinus orders them to be brought before him.He is seated on his ancestral throne, in a loftybuilding with a portico of a hundred columns,which is at once a temple and a banqueting-hall,adorned with statues and trophies, and surroundedby trees. The king interrogates the Trojans as tothe cause of their coming to Italy, and when toldof the sufferings and exploits of iEneas, and pre-sented with a sceptre which had once belonged toold Priam, he expresses an ardent desire to makethe acquaintance, and grasp the hand, of the Trojanhero. And not to be outdone in generosity, hesends back the strangers with three hundredhorses, decked in golden trappings, as his gift ; andfor iEneas himself, he sends a chariot drawn bytwo coursers of celestial race.

It was on the Aventine that Eemus stood, whilehis brother Eomulus was stationed on the Palatine,to take the auguries that were to determine whichof the two was to be the founder of the future


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EOME AND ITS RUINS. 57city. Possibly owing to the gloomy tradition ofKemus's murder, or from some other cause, theAventine seems to have borne an unlucky reputa-tion. It was never during the time of the Ee~public included in the precincts of the city, orPomoerium,* as it was called ; and to it on morethan one occasion, the Plebeians retired in sullendiscontent during their long contest with the Pa-tricians for equality of rights. It was here thatCamillus dedicated a temple to Juno, after thecapture of Veii, and here was the Temple ofDiana, common to all the Latin tribes, where CaiusGracchus, just before his death, fled for refuge,and, stung by the ingratitude of the Eomans,prayed that they might never be free.

* The Pomoerium, i.e. the post mcerium (murus) was a sym-bolical line marked by small stone pillars (cippi) which mightbe either within or without the actual walls ; but within itscircumference alone could the city auspices be held. ThePomoerium of Rome was increased on two or three occasions ;but only by those who had enlarged the boundary of herdominion by foreign conquest, and after solemnly consultingthe augurs to see whether the gods were favourable. This fell tothe lot of Sylla, Julius Csesar, and the Emperor Claudius. TheAventine was first included in the Pomoerium in the reign ofthe last-named Emperor ; but it was surrounded by a wall asearly as the time of Ancus Martius, when, according to Livy, itwas assigned as the quarter for the population of some capturedcities (Livy i. 32).


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58 EOME AND ITS RUINS.The only fragments of the old wall "of Servius

Tullius until lately known to exist were those onthe Aventine, near the Church of St. Prisca ; butrecently, in clearing away the ground for theCentral Eailway Station, near the Baths of Dio-

OLD WALLS OF ROME.

cletian, some far finer remains have been dis-covered, consisting of immense blocks of darkstone. With true Vandal contempt, however, forrelics of antiquity, these' blocks have not onlybeen detached and dislocated, but their primitiveforms have been destroyed by the chisel, in order,


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ROME AND ITS RUINS. 59I suppose, to make them available for the romanticpurpose of a railway station !

Between the Aventine Hill and the spot wherewe are nowr standing, there are several objects ofinterest, which it will be worth while to point out.

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on " My DUTY towards My NEIGHBOUR"20SUNDAY SCHOOL PRIZE, The 10TEMPEST, The. By C. Tomlinson, Esq. ..... 3 fiTHUNDER.STORM, The. By Ditto. New Edition . 3 6TOM NEAL and SARAH his WIFE, The EXPERI-ENCES of. New Edition, with 3 page Engravings . 1 6TRAVELS by LAND and SEA ; The Old Arm Chair . 3TRIAL of OBEDIENCE, The 10USEFUL LITTLE GIRL, The. By Charlotte Adams,Author of "The Errand Boy" 16

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rome and its ruins - william forsyth (1865) with maps

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