of religious imposture. The very study of the ancient relics is perverted, and rendered subservient to church fable. Cardinal Baronius, for the sake of finding St. Peter's prison at St. Niccolas in carcere, distorted the position of the Roman Forum: and Nardini himself, in other respects so incredulous, affirms that there is a ertain tradition of the confinement of that apostle in the Mamertine dungeon, and of the fountain springing up for the baptizement of his jailer. What were the merits of the latter pontiffs in the preservation of the ancient fabrics will be seen in another place: the above remarks may have served to show how far their predecessors and the religion of which they were the chiefs are to be taken into account in treating of the ruin and neglect of these venerable monuments. *Christum Dominum Vivens adoravit Seque deinceps Dici vetuit † Nardini, lib. v. cap. xi. See a notice of the Temple of the Roman Piety. VOL. I. R CHAPTER X. CONTINUATION OF CAUSES OF DILAPIDATION. THE agency of the barbarians and of the catholic religion is far from being an adequate cause for so little being left of that city, which was called the epitome of the whole world. It is proposed, therefore, to take a cursory view of the general progress of decay arising from other causes of destruction. A tremendous fire in the year 700 or 703, of the city, had made it necessary to rebuild the greater part of Rome. This was undertaken by Augustus, and the famous eulogium on the grandeur of his restoration ‡ shows what materials were a prey to the fire of Nero, from which only four regions escaped untouched, and Επιτομὴ τῆς οἰκουμένης is an expression of Athenaus, quoted in one of the topographers, Julius Minutulus. † Orosii, Hist., lib. vi. cap. xiv., and lib. vii. cap. ii. Fourteen vici were consumed. + "He found it brick, he left it marble;" or, as Dion says, Thu Ρώμην γηΐνην παραλαβὼν λιθίνην ὑμῖν καταλείπω.-Hist. Rom., lib. Ivi. p. 829, tom. ii., edit. Hamb. 1750. What is said of Themistocles is a much finer eulogium : Ος ἐποιησεν τὴν πόλιν ἡμῶν μεστὴν cúpòv éπixeiλî.—Aristoph., Equit., v. 811: "He made our city full, having found it empty." * which was fatal to the most venerable fanes and trophies of the earlier ages. We may conclude from a passage of Tacitus, that so early as the reign of Vitellius a work belonging to the time of the republic was a rare object.† The fire and civil war which destroyed the Capitol during that reign, that which raged for three days and nights under Titus,‡ the conflagration in the thirteenth year of Trajan which consumed a part of the Forum and of the golden house of Nero,§ must have contributed to the obliteration of the ancient city; and if there was scarcely any relic of republican Rome when Tacitus wrote, it may be suspected that the capital even of the first Cæsars had begun to disappear at an earlier period than is usually imagined. The temples under the Capitol bear witness to the falls and fires which had required the constant attention and repair of the senate, || and became more common after the transfer of the seat of government to Constantinople. Popular tumults *Sueton. in vit. Neronis. Tacit. Annal., lib. xv. cap. xxxviii.-xli. "Lutatii Catuli nomen inter tanta Cæsarum opera usque ad Vitellium mansit.”—Hist., lib. iii. cap. lxxii. Sueton. in vit. Titi. § G. Syncellus in Chronog., p. 347, quoted in Dissertazione, &c., p. 293. D. N. Constantino. Maximo. Pio. Felici . ac. Triumphatori. semper. Augusto. ob. amplificatam. toto.orbe. rem. publicam. tactis. consiliisque. S. P. Q. R. Dedicante. Anicio. Paulino. Juniore. C. V. Cos. ord. Præf. urbi. S. P. Q. R. S. P. Q. R. Ædem. Concordiæ. vetustate. collapsam.in. meliorem. faciem. opere. et. cultu. splendidiore restituerunt. This inscription was found near the ruins under the Capitol, and transferred to the Lateran, whence it has disappeared. The were then more frequent and injurious. In one which occurred in the year 312 the Temple of Fortune was burnt down.* The Palace of Symmachus,† that of the prefect Lampadius, in 367, and it is probable the Baths of Constantine, each suffered by the same violence; and an inscription which records the repair of the latter, informs us also how small were the means of the senate and people for restoring the ancient structures. The destruction must not be confined to one element. The The words now remaining on the frieze of the Temple with the eight columns are Senatus Populusque Romanus The other temple of three columns, called Jupiter Tonans, has the letters ESTITVER. This was the name given to them in 1817; but Jupiter Tonans is dethroned now, and authorities are divided between Vespasian and Titus and Saturn.-See Dr. Smith's Dict., art. Roma, p. 182, &c. * Annali d'Italia, ad an. 312, tom. ii. p. 312. Muratori quotes Zosimus, lib. ii. c. 13, and would make us put this fire to the charge of religion. † Amm, Marcellinus, lib. xxvii. cap. iii. p. 523, edit. Lugd. Bat. 1693. "Hic præfectus [Lampadii] exagitatus est motibus crebris, uno omnium maximo cum collecta plebs infima, domum ejus prope Constantinianum lavacrum injectis facibus incenderat et malleolis," &c.-1bid. Vid. Nardini, lib. iv. cap. vi. "Petronius Perpenna magnus Quadratianus V. C. et Inl. Præf. Urb. Constantinianas thermas longa incuria et abolendæ civilis vel potius feralis cladis vastatione vehementer adflictas ita ut agnitione sui ex omni parte perdita desperationem cunctis reparationis adferrent deputato ab amplissimo ordine parvo sumptu quantum publicæ patiebantur angustiæ ab extremo vindicavit occasu et provisione largissima in pristinam faciem splendoremque restituit." Tiber, which Augustus* cleansed, which Trajan deepened, and Aurelian endeavoured to restrain by a mound,t rose not unfrequently to the walls, and terrified the pious cruelty of the Romans into persecution.‡ The repeated notices of inundation will be seen to form part of the melancholy annals of the declining capital; but the decay of the city was hastened not only by these natural evils and by the violence of hostile conflicts within the walls, § but by the silent dilapidation of ancient structures, both private and public, which appears to, have been a delinquency as early as the beginning of the fourth century, and to have been prohibited afterwards by successive imperial laws. The removal of the emperors to Constantinople encouraged the spoliation, and if it were possible to ascertain the list of all the ornaments of Rome which were transferred to the seat of empire, there might be a better justification for those who attribute the ruin of the old to the rise of the new capital. The departure of many of the principal families for the banks of the Bosporus had emptied a *Sueton. in Vit. Augusti, cap. xxx. † "Tiberinas extruxi ripas. Vadum alvei tumentis effodi."Vopisc. in Vit. Aureliani, p. 215, Ald. edit. 1519. "Tiberis si ascendit ad mœnia; si Nilus non ascendit in arva: si cœlum stetit, si terra movit, si fames, si lues, statim Christianos ad Leones."-Tertull. Apolog., cap. xlii. § A battle was fought on the Cælian hill in the reign of Aurelian. -Decline and Fall, cap. xi. tom. ii. oct., p. 51. "Ut non immerito dixeris, non a barbaris, sed prius a Constantino eversam fuisse Romam."-Isa. Vossii de Magnitudine Romæ Veteris. ap. Græv. Antiq. Roman., tom. iv. p. 1507, p. 1516, cap. vii. |