heads of the slaughtered senators. M. Agrippa CHAP. I. adorned this monument with the figure of a hydra.89 90 rium Another monument, which must have been Millianear the end of the Vicus Jugarius, is the Millia- Aureum. rium Aureum, or Golden Milestone, which was erected by, Augustus, B.C. 29. It appears to have been also called the City Milestone, Milliarium Urbis. Pliny speaks of the Milliarium as situated at the top of the Forum, and uses it to give an idea of the greatness of Rome by calculating from it the distances to the thirty-seven gates, the sum of which distances he reckons as exceeding thirty miles. The gates were considerably within the limits of the inhabited space, and the total length of all the streets from the milestone to the extremity of the houses is calculated by Pliny as somewhat more than seventy miles.1 Plutarch 89 Multos caesos, non ad Thrasimenum lacum sed ad Servilium, vidimus. Cic. Rosc. Am. 32. Videant largum in foro sanguinem, et supra Servilium lacum, id enim proscriptionis Sullanae spoliarium est, senatorum capita. Seneca, de Prov. 3. Servilius lacus appellabatur [ab] eo qui eum faciendum curaverat, in principio vici Iugari, continens basilicae Iuliae, in quo loco fuit effigies hydrae posita a M. Agrippa. Festus, ed. Müll. p. 290. 90 Dio Cass. liv. 8. Macer in Dig. lib. L. tit. xvi. § 154. Eiusdem spatium mensura currente a milliario in capite Romani fori statuto ad singulas portas, quae sunt hodie numero triginta septem, ita ut duodecim semel numerentur praetereanturque ex veteribus septem quae esse desierunt, efficit passuum per directum XXX. M. DCCLV. Ad extrema vero tectorum cum castris praetoriis ad eodem milliario per vicos omnium viarum mensura colligit paullo amplius septuaginta millia passuum. Plin. N. H. iii. 9. CHAP. I. says that all the roads of Italy ended at this point. But the distances upon them appear to have been measured from the gates. Meeting of Otho with the Praetorian conspirators. Site of the Milliarium. The principal historical interest of the Milliarium arises from its having been the rendezvous at which Otho met the handful of praetorians by whom the empire of Galba was overthrown. The accounts given by various historians of this incident involve the mention of so many localities of Rome as to give it a special topographical significance. Otho made his morning visit to the Emperor in the Palatine, and accompanied him in his sacrifice at the temple of Apollo, where the haruspex, on inspection of the entrails, foretold a pressing danger. Otho then received a message that his architect awaited him, and, making an excuse for leaving the emperor, proceeded by what Suetonius calls the back part of the Palatine, through the house of Tiberius, to the Velabrum, and so to the Golden Milestone in the Forum under the temple of Saturn. Here he was met by three-and-twenty soldiers, who alarmed him by openly saluting him emperor. He was then put into a lady's chair, and hurried through the Forum to the Praetorian Camp. The situation of the Golden Milestone, 92 92 Sacrificanti pro aede Apollinis Galbae haruspex tristia exta et instantes insidias ac domesticum hostem praedicit, audiente Othone, nam proximus adstiterat . . . nec multo post libertus Onomastus nuntiat, expectari eum ab architecto et redemtoribus . . . Otho . . at the head of the Forum and under the Temple CHAP. I. of Saturn, would lead us to look for it opposite the end of the Vicus Jugarius, at the southern termination of the curved terrace already described, in a position corresponding to that of the round pedestal at the other end of the same terrace. Some remains of the Milliarium may possibly be discovered in case of the removal of the modern road, which crosses the Forum.93 innixus liberto per Tiberianum domum in Velabrum, inde ad milliarium aureum sub aedem Saturni pergit. Ibi tres et viginti speculatores consalutatum imperatorem ac paucitate salutantium trepidum, et sellae festinanter impositum, strictis mucronibus rapiunt. Tac. Hist. i. 27. Ergo destinata die praemonitis consciis ut se in foro sub aede Saturni ad milliarium aureum opperirentur, mane Galbam salutavit, utque consueverat osculo exceptus, etiam sacrificanti interfuit audivitque praedicta haruspicis. Deinde liberto adesse architectos nuntiante, quod signum convenerat, quasi venalem domum inspecturus abscessit, proripuitque se postica parte Palatii ad constitutum. Alii febrem simulasse aiunt . . . Tunc abditus propere muliebri sella in castra contendit. Sueton. Otho. 6. ̓Απῆλθε, καὶ διὰ τῆς Τιβερίου καλουμένης οἰκίας καταβὰς ἐβάδιζεν εἰς ἀγορὰν, οὗ χρυσοῦς εἱστήκει κίων, εἰς ὃν αἱ τετμημέναι τῆς Ιταλιάς ὁδοὶ tãσai teλevtwσi. Plutarch. Galba, 24. 93 There are some remains of a round monument built into the north wall of the passage under the modern road, near the Temple of Saturn. I do not know whether these are in situ. The name umbilicus Romae (see p. 18) looks like a fanciful synonym for milliarium urbis. But the Umbilicus Romae is placed by the author of the Einsiedlen MS. at the Church of S. Sergio, which lay behind the Arch of Severus and partly upon it. The two are separately named in the Notitia, but in the Curiosum only the Milliarium. See Note 61. CHAPTER II. THE MID FORUM. CHAP. II. THE partition of the excavated space, which is Threefold here adopted for purposes of study, corresponds the Forum, with an ancient division of the Roman Forum. division of The open area, which lay under the modern road crossing the Forum, together with the space between that road and the great temples at the Comitium. foot of the Capitol, constituted the Comitium.98 The other extremity of the Forum, where the Temple of Julius was built, was called Infimum Forum.1 Infimum Medium The expression Mid Forum appears to have been applied to the space lying between the Basilica Julia on the one side and the Basilica Aemilia on the other, and bounded in the direction of the Capitol by the edge of the Comitium, and in the direction of the Regia by the cross-road in front of the Temple of Castor. Cicero speaks of Paullus restoring a basilica in medio foro; and in another place of one of the praetors having his tribunal in foro medio, where the locality appears 5 93 If this part of the Forum had not had the name of Comitium, it might have been called summum forum. Dionysius, who does not use the word Comitium, calls it the best and most conspicuous part of the Forum. Dionys. i. 87; ii. 29; iii. 1. Pliny calls this extremity of the Forum, caput Romani fori. Plin. N. H. iii. 9 (note 91) See more as to the topography of the Comitium in Chapter IV. 4 Plaut. Curculio, iv. i. 14. (Note 97). 5 Cicero ad Atticum, iv. 16, 8. See Chapter VI. |