Professional Documents
Culture Documents
d i a n e fav r o
christopher johanson
University of California, Los Angeles
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Figure 1 Late republican or early imperial relief depicting a funerary procession from Amiternum, Italy. Museo Nazionale dAbruzzo, LAquila (photo
by Christopher Johanson)
aspects, including the upper floors of buildings, the placement and scale of art, colors, textures, and ephemera (such as
plantings, scaffolding, and banners). Too often reconstruction
images or models do not make variations in level of accuracy
visible. Such indeterminacy, no matter how well reasoned, is
unpalatable to many scholars, but especially to archaeologists,
who are trained to appreciate accuracy, not speculation.8
The close experiential reading of historic processions
such as the Roman funeral has also been hampered by the
scarcity of specific details of these events. Only a few imperial funerals are described at length by ancient authors; even
fewer by contemporary eyewitnesses. Furthermore, these
accounts by male elite voices generally serve specific agendas and often use the description of a funeral for calculated
effect.9 Few detail the setting of the funeral or mention the
sensorial impact of the sights, sounds, and smells of the
emotionally and politically charged event, perhaps because
they considered such perceptual information too obvious to
merit comment. The same familiarity may explain the relative silence about funeral activities.10 Depictions of ancient
processions in art tend to focus on the participants and offer
only limited representation of the physical context, which
would inform an assessment of the experiential impact. Graham Zanker has perceptively noted that the omission of
architectural environments in ancient art provoked viewers
to complete the picture in their minds, an act of supplementation that engaged ancient observers, but frustrates modern
historians (Figure 1).11
The situation is exacerbated for the Forum Romanum.
The geographical touchstone of the Roman world, this
urban space was well known; throughout the vast empire,
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Figure 2 Adlocutio relief of the Anaglypha (Plutei Traiani), showing events in the imperial Forum Romanum with the buildings on the southwest side as
backdrop; late 2nd century. Currently located in the Curia of the Forum Romanum, Rome (photo by Diane Favro). See JSAH online for high-resolution,
zoomable image with buildings of the Forum identified
Figure 3 Debt Burning relief, from the same monument as the Adlocutio relief, showing action in front of the opposing Rostra just visible in the
lower right corner. Currently located in the Curia building of the Forum Romanum, Rome (photo by Diane Favro). See JSAH online for high resolution,
zoomable image with buildings of the Forum identified
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pushed to the rear (see Figure 2). Gestures clarify the action,
with the standing emperor raising his arm in a familiar signal
of address. Overall, the emphasized body language underscores the importance of visual cues in an open space where a
speakers words quickly wafted away.19
The reliefs also demonstrate the active role of statues
whose location in the visual hierarchy is equal (or superior)
to that of the human participants in forum events.20 In this
case the artist selected, from among all the statues in the
forum, a depiction of Marsyas, which was associated with
libertas, and a group with Italia, her children, and the seated
Trajan, which celebrated the alimentary program. The reliefs
reinforce the closed topographical experience of the imperial
Forum Romanum, which afforded limited views of the surrounding city, focusing inward on the two opposing rostra
that defined the space and action.
Despite their usefulness in explicating the interaction
between public events and the forum, the Plutei Traiani leave
many questions about the experience of the events unanswered. How did accompanying sounds reinforce the activities? Did lighting and temperature affect the participants
comfort? Was color used to attract the eye? Did the smell of
the burning books drive the audience away? Where did spectators stand? Were women and slaves allowed to watch?
What route to the forum was taken by participants?
Unfortunately, the established methodological apparatus for analyzing the symbiotic exchange between kinetic
ceremonies and urban form is not especially useful for ancient specialists. Modern anthropological and urban analyses
are usually based on first-person documentation, interviews,
and cognitive mapping; such approaches are not applicable
to periods when voices are few and primarily of the elite.
Techniques developed to convey kinetic progression, such as
the serial views and cognitive maps popular with urban planners in the 1960s, have rarely been included in the architectural historians toolbox.21
During subsequent decades, the popularity of reception
theory led to increased interest in the gaze. In Roman studies, a number of publications dealt with viewing in situ. Most
considered intervisuality in elite artworks and environments,
usually the Roman house.22 A few employed semiotic ideas
to consider the experiences of urban buildings as linked together to form narratives.23 While some authors explored
kinetic viewing, the majority emphasized what could be seen
from fixed positions, a preference that minimized the impact
of peripheral viewing and the full-bodied, synergistic interplay of all the senses.24 Beyond sight, sensorial analyses of
Roman environments have been few.25
In part, the available representational tools have been
deterministic. Sketches, measured drawings, and physical
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Figure 8 Reconstructed drawing of Roman Forum and Capitoline Hill showing the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on the Capitoline Hill, after
Alberto Carpiceci in Rome 2000 Years Ago (Florence: Bonechi, 1981), 89. See JSAH online to compare the elevation of the temple in this hypothetical reconstruction to that of the same temple in the more accurate digital reconstruction
republic, and the only clear evidence of the occasional alteration of the usual processional route is associated with this
clan.47 To the traditional cortege path, which moved from the
house of the deceased to the rostra in the forum and then to
the burial site, the Cornelii added a visit to the Capitoline Hill
to collect the wax mask (imago) of Scipio Africanus, the famed
conqueror of Hannibal during the second Punic Wars and the
most illustrious member of their family. They introduced this
new itinerary after Scipios death in 183 BCE.48
Roman aristocratic families usually housed such imagines
of ancestors who had attained a curule magistracy in dedicated
cupboards in the atria of their residences. Only on special occasions were these open for viewing, and only at the Roman
funeral were the masks paraded through the streets.49 For reasons not entirely clear, the wax mask of Scipio Africanus was
placed in the cella of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus,
in effect equating the residence of the most powerful god in
the Roman pantheon with the atrium of Scipios house.50
The Cornelii followed other practices that differed from
the norm. For instance, while the rest of Rome cremated their
loved ones, the Cornelii continued to inhume the deceased.51
Perhaps the reason was pragmatic; the house of Scipio Africanus stood immediately next to the Roman forum behind the
Tabernae Veteres, which meant that a funeral procession to
the republican rostra (located directly to the northeast of the
later Rostra Augusti) would have been a short walk of less
than one hundred metersnot long enough to attract an
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appropriately large crowd (see Figure 5, Figure 9).52 The detour to the Capitoline Hill to acquire the important ancestral
mask significantly lengthened the parade. Simultaneously, it
emphasized a sequence of vistas to notable buildings, art, and
urban features that were seen by parade participants and a
reciprocal sequence of views of the funeral parade by the audience gathered in the forum. Although it is problematic to
build an argument about the Roman funeral of the middle
Republic based on a famous exception, a visual analysis of the
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alteration of the Corneliis processional route offers a potential key to understanding the choreography of this mid-second-century event. The case study places the evidence for the
funeral into the reconstructed topographic context of 183
145 BCE (Figure 10).
After the imago of Scipio Africanus was placed in the
Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, funeral processions for
the Cornelii clan began at the house of the deceased family
member, moved through the forum, and then turned away
from the gathering crowd to ascend the Clivus Capitolinus
(Figure 10a).53 Once the cortege moved past the Temple of
Saturn, visual contact with spectators in the low-lying forum
plaza was severed. How the imago was collected from the
temple has not been recorded, but presumably the event occurred atop the Capitoline Hill before the south-facing
Temple of Jupiter, where an actor wearing triumphal regalia
donned the mask (Figure 10b). The action would have been
visible from the aristocratic houses on the northwestern
Palatine for those with an unobstructed view and good eyesight, yet most of the nobility would have already joined the
awaiting audience in the low-lying forum.54 Some curious
spectators may have followed the musicians, mimes, and
dancers as they proceeded up the hill to the Capitoline temple, but the Clivus Capitolinus, and even the much larger
platform on the hill above, offered only limited room to turn
a large procession. Doubtless, most spectators preferred to
secure good viewing spots for the oration in the forum. How
did the Cornelii connect this unique segment of their family
funeral with the more traditional program of the republican
funeral? To what degree were the symbolic connections between the funerary activities at the rostra and those on the
Capitoline magnified by spectacle?
Digital reconstructions facilitate the experiential examination of the connections between the forum and the
Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in this period (Figure
10c).55 Unfortunately, without information on sounds,
smells, and haptic responses, the exploration remains visioncentered, an emphasis that must be constantly kept in mind.
Static and kinetic viewsheds are predicated on the accurate
depiction of an environment and of building massing in particular. In this instance, the height and footprint of the
Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus remain somewhat controversial. The dispute centers on whether the measurements given by Dionysius of Halicarnassus and confirmed
by recent archaeological work can refer to the temples podium, as asserted by Einar Gjerstad in the 1960sa reconstruction that produces intercolumniations substantially
larger than even those of the Pantheonor to a platform on
which a smaller structure rose, as championed more recently
by John Stamper.56
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10a
10b
10c
10d
10e
10f
10g
10h
10i
Figure 10 The Forum in 160 BCE, with views 10ai marked on the map (image by Christopher Johanson; 10ai and courtesy of the Regents of the
University of California, Christopher Johanson, and the Experiential Technologies Center [ETC], UCLA). See JSAH online for a birds-eye view of a
real-time, three-dimensional model of the republican Roman Forum (160 BCE) set in its geographic context. 10a Elevated view from the northeast
corner of the Forum looking toward the Capitoline Hill; 10b Birds-eye view of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus. The northwest corner of the
Roman Forum is visible on the right; 10c View of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus (based on Gjerstad) from the north side of the Forum plaza;
10d Partly occluded view of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus (based on Gjerstad) from the southern side of the Forum plaza; 10e View of the
Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus (based on Gjerstad) from the area in front of the Rostra; 10f Occluded view of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus
Maximus (based on Stamper) from the Lacus Curtius; 10g Panoramic view of the occluded Capitoline Hill (left) and the Comitium (right) from the balcony of the Basilica Sempronia; 10h View from the balcony of the Basilica Aemilia of the Rostra with the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus (based
on Gjerstad) clearly visible in the background; 10i View of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus from the steps of the Curia Hostilia
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11a
11b
11c
11d
11e
11f
11g
11h
Figure 11 Schematic view of the Forum with views labeled (image by Christopher Johanson; 11ah and courtesy of the Regents of the University
of California, Christopher Johanson, and the Experiential Technologies Center [ETC], UCLA). See JSAH online for a birds-eye view of a real-time, threedimensional model of the republican Roman Forum set in its geographic context. 11a View from the area in front of the Rostra, populated by hypothetical bystanders, looking toward the Temple of Saturn and the Clivus Capitolinus, the main road leading down from the Capitoline Hill; 11b View of the
orator, bier and ancestors atop the Rostra; 11c Elevated view from the balcony in front of the Basilica Sempronia; 11d View of the Basilica Porcia (to
the left of the Curia Hostilia). The Basilica is represented in schematic form omitting the colonnaded lower and upper levels; 11e Privileged view of
the Rostra from the northern side of the Comitium; 11f Birds eye view of the Forum illustrating the intimacy of the Comitium in comparison to the
open Forum plaza; 11g View from the Comitium of the imago of Scipio Africanus as it returns from the Capitoline Hill; 11h View from the Comitium
of the imago of Cato entering or leaving the Curia Hostilia. See JSAH online for an analogous view keyed to a real-time, three-dimensional model
set in its geographic context
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The parade route from Jupiters temple to the forum suggested a direct connection between Scipio Africanus, his
descendants, and the great god by highlighting a genetic and
a spectacular topographic descent.72
The visual connection with the Temple of Jupiter was
desirable, but not essential. As the most important shrine in
the Roman world, its appearance was familiar to all spectators. They did not have to see the connection; the wisps of
smoke, the echoes of processional music, and the entrance of
the cortege from the direction of the temple were enough to
forge the associations desired by the Cornelii. It is clear,
however, that in one possible configuration most of the audience could have seen the event on the hill, and that an understanding of the visual impact of the Corneliis procession
helps to clarify the organization of the event below. The
oratorical stage of the mid-Republic prior to 145 BCE was
different than that of the first century, and the earlier configuration both better accommodates the evidence and better
solves practical logistical problems.
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13a
13b
Figure 13 The Roman Forum of 191/92 CE (image by Christopher Johanson; 13ab and courtesy of the Regents of the University of California,
the CVRLab, and the Experimental Technologies Center [ETC], UCLA). See JSAH online for a birds-eye view of a real-time, three-dimensional
model of the imperial Roman Forum (191/92 CE) set in its geographic context. 13a View from the northwestern corner of the Temple of Divus
Iulius looking toward the Rostra Augusti and Temple of Concord; 13b View looking up at the Rostra Augusti with the Temple of Concord and Tabularium behind. In reality the Temple of Vespasian and Titus to the west had not yet been repaired after being damaged in the fire of 191/92 CE
and geographic extent of the Empire. Racehorses and a panoply of funeral gifts alluded to the elaborate games to follow.
The procession climaxed with a portable golden altar bedecked with ivory and precious stones.
Notably, the actual remains of the deceased were not in
the funeral parade. Pertinax, who had died months earlier
and had been cremated, was represented by a wax effigy,
dressed in triumphal regalia and placed on view in a small
building with columns of gold and ivory erected atop a temporary stage in front of the rostra.82 To maintain the fiction
of a traditional funeral with a corpse, and to displace the
memory of Pertinaxs bloody beheading, a slave boy waved a
fan of peacock feathers as if to keep flies away from the decomposing body. The new emperor, now called Lucius Septimius Severus Pertinax, not the deceaseds son, gave the
funeral oration, confirming his role as heir.
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Figure 14 Oration relief from the Arch of Constantine depicting the Rostra Augusti with columns. Behind rise the Basilica Iulia and Arch of Tiberius
and Basilica Iulia on the left, and the Arch of Septimius Severus on the right
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the surmounting bronze sculptures of the emperor and his sons are
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17a
17b
17c
Figure 17 Roman Forum of 211 CE. Alternative 1 (image and courtesy of the Regents of the University of California, the CVRLab, and the Experimental Technologies Center [ETC], UCLA) . See JSAH online for a birds-eye view of a real-time, three-dimensional model of the imperial Roman
Forum (211 CE) set in its geographic context. 17a View from in front of the Basilica Aemilia looking toward the Rostra Augusti and Arch of Septimius
Severus (17 ac: images and courtesy of the Regents of the University of California, the CVRLab, and the Experimental Technologies Center
[ETC], UCLA); 17b View of the Rostra Augusti from the north side of the Arch of Septimius Severus in front of the Temple of Concord; 17c View
from in front of the Temple of Saturn toward the Rostra Augusti and Arch of Septimius Severus
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18a
18b
18c
18d
18e
Figure 18 Roman Forum of 211 CE. Alternative 2. See JSAH online for a birds-eye view of a real-time, three-dimensional model of the imperial
Roman Forum (211 CE) set in its geographic context (18ae: images and courtesy of the Regents of the University of California, the CVRLab, and
the Experimental Technologies Center [ETC], UCLA). 18a View through the Arch of Augustus looking toward the Basilica Iulia and the Temple of
Saturn; 18b View from in front of the Basilica Iulia. Beyond the Temple of Saturn rises that of Vespasian and Titus, with the Severan inscription
(see inset); 18c View from the south corner of the Rostra Augusti looking north toward the Arch of Septimius Severus with parthico inscription;
18d View from the balcony of the Basilica Iulia looking north toward the Arch of Septimius Severus with the statue of Trajan atop his honorific column
visible in the distance; 18e View from in front of the Rostra Augusti looking up toward the Arch of Septimius Severus
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JSAH online for an analogous view keyed to a real-time, three-dimensional model set in its geographic context
Conclusion
Computer visualizations replete with movement, sound,
light, and other features are changing the way we think about
reconstructions. A digital laboratory facilitates experimentation by allowing consideration of alternative reconstructions
of both human actions and the environments in which they
occur. In creating digital reconstructions of events and places,
scholars can yoke together disjointed archaeological sites into
a holistic environment, united by a common coordinate system. The experimental insertion of ritual events in these
environments can restore human activity to the context it
once inhabited. Although the topographical picture and the
granularity of the reconstructed evidence have changed, the
means of reinterpretation is the same. The exploration of a
historical event within its context and the reading of the
interrelationship among reconstructed digital forms that are
tied to more scientifically accurate topography can give rise
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to new questions and conclusions. The visualization of historical phenomena temporally and topographically prompts,
in turn, the reassessment of literary and material evidence.
The digital recreations are not post-research presentations,
but integral research tools.125
The study of digital experiential models of the Forum
Romanum during the mid-Republic period confirms the
clear visual interconnection between the Capitoline Temple
of Jupiter Optimus Maximus and the Comitium. The interactive reconstructions also demonstrate the striking concurrence between textual allusions to the oratorical stage and
the schematic, reconstructed topography. An enriched interpretation of the spectacle is the result. The contextualized,
three-dimensional analysis of viewsheds underscores the
Corneliis exploitation of sight lines between Jupiters temple
above and the ceremonial actions below, informing the much
discussed question of speaker orientation.
For scholars of the high imperial period, immersive
digital models facilitate the testing of hypotheses regarding
buildings, topography, and processions. The consideration of
events in situ illustrates how the Romans choreographed their
processions to exploit the scale, orientation, sequencing, and
symbolic associations of structures and places. The Severan
building program in the forum refocused funeral activities. Its
architecture, inscribed propagandistic texts, and sculptural
program redirected both the processional route and the gaze
of the audience and participants. The result was an imperial
panorama that reified the res gestae of the emperor and confirmed through visual associationism the symbolic connection
between the deceased and revered earlier rulers.
Notes
We would like to thank Hilary Ballon, David Brownlee, the Society of
Architectural Historians, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for the
opportunity to publish born-digital research in the first online issue of the
JSAH. Abbreviations of ancient sources and related texts follow Simon
Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, ed. The Oxford Classical Dictionary
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), xxxixliv.
1. Egon Flaig, Ritualisierte Politik: Zeichen, Gesten und Herrschaft im Alten
Rom. Historische Semantik (Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003), vol.
1, 4968. Polybius specifically cited the wearing of ancestral masks and giving eulogies at funerals as evidence of Roman superiority; Polyb. 6.5254;
see also Sallust Iug. 4.56; the merits of various forms of symbolic capital are
discussed in Sallust Iug. 85, passim.
2. For a broad overview of Roman funerary practices see J. M. C. Toynbee,
Death and Burial in the Roman World (London: Thames & Hudson, 1971),
4364; for funerary spectacles see Keith Hopkins, Death and Renewal
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 20156; for the use of
ancestral imagery see Harriet Flower, Ancestor Masks and Aristocratic Power
in Roman Culture (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), 91158.
3. The most detailed analysis of the experience of the Roman funeral is found
in John Bodel, Death on Display: Looking at Roman Funerals, in The Art
of Ancient Spectacle, ed. Bettina Ann Bergmann and Christine Kondoleon
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(Washington D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1999), 25980; and Javier Arce,
Memoria De Los Antepasados: Puesta En Escena y Desarrollo del Elogio Funebre
Romano (Madrid: Electa, 2000).
4. The major modern works on funerals of the emperors are by Javier Arce,
Funus Imperatorum: los funerales de los emperadores romanos (Madrid: Alianza,
1990); Paul Zanker, Die Apotheose Der Rmischen Kaiser: Ritual Und Stdtische
Bhne (Munich: Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung, 2004); and S. R. F
Price, From Noble Funerals to Divine Cult: the Consecration of Roman
Emperors, in Rituals of Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies,
ed. David Cannadine and S. R. F. Price (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1987), 56105. The distinction between funerals at public expense
(funus publicum) and other privately funded events, as well as the process for
allowing funerals in the Forum Romanum, remains uncertain.
5. The real-time digital models of the Forum Romanum used in these
analyses were created at UCLA over a number of years; http://www.etc.ucla.
edu. This study contains two distinct types of models, each built with
related, but not entirely similar, goals and methodologies. The two types are
clearly distinguished by surface material. The fully textured, highly detailed
models showing imperial Rome in the fourth century CE were developed
in a multi-university project directed by Bernie Frischer and Diane Favro;
the construction of the models was overseen by Dean Abernathy initially at
UCLA and later at the University of Virginia. For a full list of participants
and data, see http://dlib.etc.ucla.edu/projects/Forum. Scholarly scientific
committees vetted each building reconstruction. The original models were
rebuilt by Itay Zaharovits (UCLA ETC), Steven Guban (UCLA ETC), Tom
Beresford (UCLA ETC), and Brendan Beachler (UCLA ETC) under the
direction of Christopher Johanson (UCLA) in order to further refine the
geographical accuracy of the models and to accommodate the demands of
internet-based distribution. The schematic, textureless models depicting
republican Rome were based on the doctoral research of Johanson, who
oversaw development by Tom Beresford (UCLA ETC) and Kathryn Fallat
(UCLA ETC); Philip Stinson (University of Kansas) worked on sections of
an initial investigation of the Curia and Comitium complex.
A graphic representation is a bearer of meaning. In creating the models of the Forum Romanum, two general operating principles were implemented. First was the decision to convey the level of evidence on which it is
based through graphical means. Since data for the forum in the republican
period is limited and often controversial, the buildings are depicted as simple masses without detail. The models represent possible, but not definitive
reconstructions of the form and location of individual monuments. In contrast, the richer archaeological and textual information for the imperial
period allows (if not encourages) a higher level of detail, including material
textures and colors and architectural details and inscriptions, as well as
increased specificity about building heights. The result has a greater sense
of verisimilitude, but is consciously mediated by the second operating principle. The modeling team members decided not to aim for a hyperrealistic
digital representation. Instead, they conceptualized the digital reconstruction models as knowledge representations based on documented archaeological information, period-specific analogs, and valid secondary information
such as Renaissance drawings of lost building components. Features that
cannot be recreated or located with certainty are not included. At times
technological and resource limitations restricted development. Thus there
are few statues, no people, little vegetation, and no graffiti; building surfaces
do not show age or wear. Structures whose form and placement are controversial are not shown. The result occupies a precarious position between the
hyperrealistic renderings familiar from contemporary films, with historic
environments recreated in toto, and rigorously documented archaeological
reconstructions often depicted as a sanitized (if informative) line drawings
without textures or color.
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16. The following interpretation of the building depictions on the Anaglypha reliefs runs contra to Richardsons proposal that their placement was
arbitrary; Lawrence Richardson Jr., A New Topographical Dictionary of Ancient
Rome (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), 29293.
17. Visuality refers to the cultural constitution of vision. While the concept
of the period eye has been explored for post-antique painting and artwork,
it has only recently been considered in relation to Roman architecture,
urban design, and processional events. Paul Zanker wisely cautions scholars
not to over generalize by imaging ancient viewers are imbued with the
knowledge of all antiquity, rather than the specifics of a particular period,
class, and gender; In Search of the Roman Viewer, in The Interpretation of
Architectural Sculpture in Greece and Rome, ed. Dianna Buitron-Oliver (Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1997), 179; Diane Favro, Ancient
Rome through the Veil of Sight, in Sites Unseen: Landscape and Vision, ed.
Dianne Harris and Dede Ruggles (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh
Press, 2007), 11130; Diane Favro, The Festive Experience: Roman Processions in the Urban Context, in Festival Architecture, ed. Sarah Bonnemaison and Christine Macy (New York: Routledge, 2007), 1042.
18. De arch. 4.5.1. Vitruvius also told architects to locate altars on a lower
level than the statues in the temples, so that those who are praying and
sacrificing may look upwards towards the divinity; De arch. 4.9.
19. Gregory S. Aldrete, Gestures and Acclamations in Ancient Rome (Baltimore:
The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999); Richard Brilliant, Gesture and
Rank in Roman Art: The Use of Gestures to Denote Status in Roman Sculpture
and Coinage (New Haven: The Academy, 1963).
20. Roman statues could depict both deceased and living people. The numerous sculpted works in Rome formed a second population, as evident in a funerary relief showing the deceased shaking hands with a sculpture; Kleiner, Roman
Sculpture, 236. In republican-period funeral processions the actors or family
members wearing ancestral masks imitated motionless statues in chariots; by
the time of the Principate actors were more animated, interacting directly with
the audience; Jrg Rpke, Triumphator and Ancestor Rituals: Between Symbolic Anthropology and Magic, Numen 53, no. 3 (2006), 25189.
21. Especially influential in architectural and urban design circles were
Donald Appleyard, Kevin Lynch, and John Myer, The View from the Road
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1964); and Kevin Lynch, The Image of the City
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1960). The diagrams and notational systems
explored in these works, however, did not gain wide popularity. In a few cases
these representational strategies were applied to the analysis of historical
environments, but generally by practitioners, not historians; G. E. Kidder
Smith, Italy Builds: Its Modern Architecture and Native Inheritance (New York:
Reinhold, 1955); Rob Krier, Urban Space, trans. Christine Czechowski and
George Black (New York: Rizzoli, 1979).
22. Heinrich Drerup, Bildraum und Realraum in der rmischen Architektur, Rmische Mitteilungen 66 (1959), 14574; Daniela Corlaita Scagliarini,
Spazio e decorazione nella pittura pompeiana, Palladio 2325 (197476),
344; Lise Bek, Towards Paradise on Earth: Modern Space Conception in
Architecture, a Creation of Renaissance Humanism, Analecta romana Istituti
Danici, suppl. 9 (Rome, 1980); Franz Jung Gebaute Bilder, Antike Kunst
17 (1984) 71122; John R. Clarke, Houses of Roman Italy, 100 B.C.A.D. 250:
Ritual, Space, and Decoration (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991),
177; Bettina Bergmann, The Roman House as Memory Theater: The
House of the Tragic Poet in Pompeii, Art Bulletin 76, no. 2 (June 1994),
22556. For consideration of urban sightlines see Francesca Bocchi, Nuove
metodologie per la storia delle citt: La citt in quattro dimensioni, in
Medieval Metropolises, Proceedings of the Congress of Atlas Working Group,
ed. Francesca Bocchi (Bologna: Grafis, 1999), 1128; S. J. R. Ellis, The
Distribution of Bars at Pompeii: Archaeological, Spatial and Viewshed
Analysis, Journal of Roman Archeology 17, no. 1 (2004), 37184.
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23. Diane Favro, Reading the Augustan City, in Narrative and Event in
Ancient Art, ed. Peter Holliday (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1993), 23057; Michael Koortbojian, In Commemorationem Mortuorum:
Text and Image Along the Streets of Tombs in Art and Text in Roman
Culture, ed. Jas Elsner (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
24. The domestic architecture preserved around the Bay of Naples is the most
common subject of kinetic, as well as stationary, visual analyses, though
research is expanding; Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, Houses and Society in Pompeii
and Herculaneum (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994); G. P. Earl,
Wandering the House of the Birds: Reconstruction and Perception at Roman
Italica, The 6th International Symposium on Virtual Reality, Archaeology
and Cultural Heritage VAST (2005), http://public-repository.epoch-net.org/
publications/VAST2005/shortpapers/short1056.pdf (accessed 30 July, 2007).
Fixed sightline analysis is problematic for ancient processional events where
the audience members, as well as the parade participants, were frequently in
motion; Favro, The Festive Experience, 1042.
25. Research on the senses in historical contexts is expanding in tandem with a
surge of publications about sensorial contemporary architecture; Michael Benedikt, Coming to Our Senses, Harvard Design Magazine 26 (Spring/Summer
2007), 8391. For example, olfactory stimuli are mentioned for the Roman
funeral (specifically the need for perfumes to mask the smell of death), but such
discussions rarely consider the architectural context; Herodian 4.2; Constance
Classen, Aroma: The Cultural History of Smell (London: Routledge, 1994), 1350.
26. In effect, illustrations are used to present findings of research rather than
operating as part of the research; Diane Favro, The Street Triumphant:
The Urban Impact of Roman Triumphal Parades in Streets: Critical Perspectives on Public Space, ed. Zeynep elik, Diane Favro, and Richard Ingersoll
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) 15164.
27. Seamless access to archaeological and modeling data about a digital
reconstruction is essential. Experiments are underway to make the veracity
parameters of reconstructions evident either graphically (e.g., digital watermarks) or with accompanying graphs (e.g. veracity sliders); Kim Veltman,
Developments and Challenges in Digital Culture, Proceedings of the Moscow
EVA Conference (Moscow: Russian Ministry of Culture, 2001), http://www.
sumscorp.com/articles/pdf/2001%20Developments%20in%20Digital%20
Culture.pdf (accessed 30 June 2007); John Pollini, The Problematics of
Making Ambiguity Explicit in Virtual Reconstructions: A Case Study of the
Mausoleum of Augustus, abstract, http://www.chart.ac.uk/ 21st Annual
Conference of CHArt: Computers and the History of Art http://www.chart.
ac.uk/chart2005/abstracts/pollini.htm (accessed 30 June 2007).
28. Such phenomenological experiments acknowledge a greater scholarly
comfort level today with fuzzy logic and indeterminacy.
29. Oliver Grau, Virtual Art: From Illusion to Immersion translated by Gloria
Custance (Cambridge MIT Press, 2003), 2526.
30. For short references to funeral processions of the middle and late Republic period, see Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 5.17.2; 11.39.55; Horace, Serm. 1.6.43;
Plutarch, Lucul. 43. For the speech on the rostra see Polybius 6.53.1; in foro,
Cicero, De Orat. 11.84.341; the ancient sources are collected in Friedrich
Vollmer, Laudationum funebrium Romanorum historia et reliquiarum editio, in Jahrbcher fr classische Philologie, Suppl. (1891), 445528.
31. The crowd may have already gathered in the forum since, by the late
Republic, some funerals were announced in advance; see Cic. de Leg. 2.24.61.
32. Court cases did not adjourn for a funerary parade; Cic. De Or. 2.225. To
compensate, funerals were loud; see Horace Sat. 1.6.4244 where an orator is
said to have such a loud voice that he could drown out three concurrent funerals.
33. The housing situation for Roman senators is examined in J. P. Guilhembet,
Les rsidences urbaines des snateurs romains des Gracques Auguste: La
maison dans la ville, LInformation historique 58, no. 5 (1996), 18597. Useful
case studies are Steven M. Cerutti, The Location of the Houses of Cicero and
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Clodius and the Porticus Catuli on the Palatine Hill in Rome American Journal of Philology 118, no. 3 (1997), 41726; M. Medri, Fonti letterarie e fonti
archeologiche: un confronto possibile su M. Emilio Scauro il Giovane, la sua
domus magnifica e il theatrum opus maximum omnium, Mlanges darchologie
et dhistoire de lcole franaise de Rome 109, no. 1 (1997), 83110; E. Papi,
Domus est quae nulli villarum mearum cedat (Cic. Epist. 5.6.18). Osservazioni
sulle residenze del Palatino alla met del I secolo a.C., in Horti romani: atti del
convegno internazionale, Roma, 46 maggio 1995, ed. Maddalena Cima and Eugenio La Rocca (Rome: LErma di Bretschneider, 1995), 4567. The exact
route of the Sacra Via is controversial. Some scholars argue the name refers to
a processional path rather than to a specific street, a distinction that is supported by the discrepancies between the textual and archaeological evidence,
and by changes in definition over time, most specifically after the fire of Nero;
Filippo Coarelli, LTUR, vol. 4, 22328; Richardson, New Topographical Dictionary, 33840. Debates over the pre-Neronian route are explored by Adam
Ziolkowski in Sacra Via: Twenty Years after, Journal of Juristic Papyrology Supplements 3 (Warsaw: Fundacja im. Rafaa Taubenschlaga, 2004).
34. Possible but not necessarily probable entries existed along the Argiletum
to the north, the Vicus Iugarius and the Vicus Tuscus to the south, the Clivus
Argentarius to the northwestern entrances that connected to the Sacra Via
and the southeastern entrances to the forum along the road paralleling the
northern course of the Sacra Via. Parades could be quite long. By the late
Republic, Sullas funeral was remarkable even for a funus publicum; in addition
to the countless horn and flute players, the professional mourners and the
family, priests and priestess, the senate, all magistrates including their lictors,
many knights, and all of his legions joined the parade; App. B. Civ. 1.14.106.
35. The similarity was noted in antiquity; Sen. Consolatio ad Marciam 3.1
refers to the funeral of Drusus as very much like a triumph; Hendrik
Simon Versnel, Triumphus: an Inquiry into the Origin, Development and Meaning
of the Roman Triumph (Leiden: Brill, 1970). Understanding of the triumphal
route implicitly guides the discussion of the pompa funebris.
36. See above, note 2; Polybius 6.5354 contains the fullest description.
37. See above, note 3. Jrg Rpke, contends that the parade of ancestors is
actually a parade of living statuary; Triumphator and Ancestor Rituals, 272.
38. Nicholas Purcell, LTUR, vol. 2, 32536 describes the state of the evidence and provides bibliography. For a relatively recent three-dimensional
reconstruction of the republican forum, see Karthryn Welch, A New View
of the Origins of the Basilica: The Atrium Regium, Graecostasis, and
Roman Diplomacy, Journal of Roman Archaeology 16, no. 1 (2003), 534.
39. Mark Gillings, The Real, the Virtually Real, and the Hyperreal: The
Role of VR in Archaeology, in Envisoning the Past, ed. Sam Smiles and
Stephanie Moser (Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2004), 22930.
40. Siting validation is obtained through the use of a GIS base layer. 1:500
geo-referenced cadastral maps of the modern archaeological site created by
S.A.R.A. Nistri, Srl. function as the glue that holds the individual archaeological studies together. All maps and plans were geo-referenced in ESRI
ArcMap, exported to Google Earth via Arc2Earth, and then imported into
Google Sketchup.
41. Randall Davis, Howard Shrobe, and Peter Szolowits, What Is a Knowledge Representation? AI Magazine 14, no. 1 (Spring 1993), 1733.
42. Each type of model (from schematic to the more detailed) is limited.
The nature of the evidence for the forum of the mid-Republic invites controversy. The most in-depth examination of the republican forum is Filippo
Coarellis two-volume work Foro Romano (Rome: Quasar, 198385), but
many of its conclusions have been challenged. For example, Coarellis reconstruction of a circular Comitium has been repeatedly questioned, and portions of the reconstruction seem to defy archaeological evidence. No
satisfactory alternative, however, has been proposed. The approach taken in
this study is to work within research boundaries already established by
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52. Livy (44.16.1011) notes that the house, which probably stood on the
Vicus Tuscus, was purchased and demolished by Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus in 170 BCE to build the Basilica Sempronia; Richardson, New Topographical Dictionary, 134; E. Papi, LTUR, vol. 2, 88. Therefore, the purely
pragmatic need to compensate for the extremely short march to the rostra
by extending the parade to the Capitoline Hill would have been obviated
within thirteen years of Scipios death.
53. Did the main procession move up the Capitoline to retrieve the mask? Or
was it a separate processional element? Appian reports that the imago of Scipio
was still being fetched from the temple during his own time; App. Iber. 23. He
implies that the imago was incorporated into the full procession, but compares
it to other imagines that are brought from the Forum. Rather than consider
from the Forum an egregious error, recall that Appian was writing during
the first third of the second century CE. While the form of the funeral and
the representation of the imagines had changed drastically since the Republic,
the tradition of manipulating the conveyance of the imagines continued.
54. They may have been sitting in bleachers that were built in anticipation of
the upcoming games; E. J. Jory, Gladiators in the Theatre, The Classical Quarterly, new series 36, no. 2. (1986), 53739. See below for the imperial model,
which included bleachers that served a different purpose; Herodian 4.2.5.
55. It must be underscored that such abstracted models are experiments. As
a result they should be treated as hypotheses for investigations much like the
trials undertaken within a scientific laboratory. These models represent an
aggregation and 3-D visualization of the published work of others. They
address the question, If the forum had looked like this, how might we reread the rest of the evidence?
56. Dion. Hal. Rom. Ant. 4.61.3; Einar Gjerstad, Early Rome III: Fortifications, Domestic Architecture, Sanctuaries, Stratigraphic Excavations (Lund: C.
W. K. Gleerup, 1960); John W. Stamper, The Architecture of Roman Temples:
The Republic to the Middle Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2005). For a full discussion of the reconstruction problem see, Mantha Zarmakoupi, review of Stamper, Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 4:22, 2006, and the
review of Stamper by John Senseney, American Journal of Archaeology 111,
no. 2 (April 2007), 384. Cairoli Giuliani notes that in the Gjerstad reconstruction the dimensions of the Temple of Jupiter would have exceeded
those of the Parthenon in its 12-meter central intercolumniation; Ledilizia
nellantichita (Rome: La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1990), 1617.
57. The Capitoline temple was frequently mentioned in speeches given in
the forum, underscoring the crucial intervisuality between these urban
nodes. Livy notes that Manlius Capitolinus was not convicted for sedition
because the site of his trial in the Campus Martius afforded magnificent
views of Jupiters temple; Livy 6.20.5; for a full discussion see Vasaly, Representations, 15. While elite speakers in the Comitium could have seen the
Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, the audience could not. They relied
on their knowledge of its location rather than an actual prospect.
58. The Roman funeral procession included bands of musicians and, often,
persons singing dirges in praise of the dead; John G. Landels, Music in
Ancient Greece and Rome (London: Routledge, 1999), 17980. The recreation
of both the basic sounds and the music of ancient instruments is extremely
problematic; as a result, only generalized interpretations of sound can be
inferred from the architectural context. New attempts to simulate Roman
performances are underway by experimental archaeologists; see for example
http://www.soundcenter.it/synauliaeng.htm and http://www.musicaromana.de/ (accessed 30 June 2007).
59. Pliny mentions the statues on the rostra; NH 34.2325. For a hypothetical plan of statue placement in the Comitium and on the rostra, see Markus
Sehlmeyer, Stadtrmische Ehrenstatuen der republikanischen Zeit: Historizitt
und Kontext von Symbolen nobilitren Standesbewusstseins (Stuttgart: Franz
Steiner, 1999), map 2.
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60. Though Roman spectators in elevated locations (such as the poor in the
highest seats in theaters) may have had totalizing views of events, their sight
was compromised by distance and lack of precision, especially without ocular aids. Regarding ancient spectator seating and associated legislation see
Elizabeth Rawson, Discrimina Ordinum: The Lex Julia Theatralis, Papers
of the British School at Rome 55 (1987), 83114; F. Pina Polo, Contra Arma
Verbis: Der Redner vor dem Volk in der spten rmischen Republik (Stuttgart:
Franz Steiner, 1996), 2325; cf. Robert Morstein-Marx, Mass Oratory and
Political Power in the Late Roman Republic (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2004), 51, esp. note 57.
61. On the effect of the chronological arrangement, see Maurizio Bettini,
Anthropology and Roman Culture: Kinship, Time, Images of the Soul (Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), 16783; and Bodel, Death on Display, 264.
62. Cic. De leg 2.23.58. Elite Roman women could also receive similar funerary honors; Cic. De orat. 2.11; Suet. Iul. 26, Suet. Calig. 10.
63. Cic. Amic. 25.96; Varro, Rust. 1.2.9.
64. Plut. C. Grach 5.3; for a full discussion of the evidence, see MorsteinMarx, Mass Oratory, 457.
65. Plautus Curc. 4756 refers to a canalis in the forum and archaeological
explorations have confirmed the existence of second-century vaulting; John
N. Hopkins, The Cloaca Maxima and the Monumental Manipulation of
Water in Archaic Rome, Aquae Urbis Romae: The Waters of the City of Rome
4 (March 2007), 9.
66. The senaculum was the area where senators congregated before being
summoned to enter the Senate House; Varro, Ling. 5.156. The Graecostasis
was a raised tribunal for ambassadors from foreign states; Varro, Ling. 5.155.
67. For the general topography of the area, see Paolo Carafa, Il comizio di
Roma dalle origini allet di Augusto (Roma: LErma di Bretschneider, 1998).
68. On the Basilica Porcia, see E. M. Steinby, LTUR, vol. 1, 187; and Liv. 39.44.7.
On porticoed viewing at funerals during the Empire, see Cassius Dio 75.74.4.
69. Though it is possible statues faced different directions, the majority of
examples found in situ were oriented in the same direction; Peter Stewart,
Statues in Roman Society: Representation and Response (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 262.
70. For a discussion of Ciceros famous reference to the Capitol, see Vasaly,
Representations, 8384.
71. The evidence is hardly clear. Valerius Maximus in the paragraph subsequent to his description of Scipios imago recounts that an effigies of Cato was
placed in the Curia, but makes no direct funerary association; Val. Max.
8.15.2.
72. Valerius Maximus notes that Scipio allegedly did not participate in business without first having spent some time in the Temple of Jupiter on the
Capitoline and for this reason was considered by some to be the gods progeny; Val. Max. 1.2.2, Raymond Marks, From Republic to Empire: Scipio Africanus in the Punica of Silius Italicus (New York: Peter Lang, 2005), 169, 187.
73. Price, From Noble Funerals, 5758.
74. For example, Herodian records that at the funeral of Septimius Severus
the Roman magistrates gave up their authority; 4.2.
75. Price emphasizes the role of the deceased emperors apotheosis as a
defining act that separated him from his mortal republican forebears; From
Noble Funerals, 57105.
76. Dio Cass.75.45, Herodian 4.2, SHA Sev. 7.
77. Dozens of statues stood in the forum, including republican remnants
such as the statue of Marsyas. By the late second century CE the new sculptural additions were predominantly of the imperial family; Stewart, Statues
(see note 69), 5, 878, 134.
78. Dio Cass. 43.49.
79. Suet. Iul. 8485; Aug. 100.
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80. The high podium of this building was identified as rostra aedes divi
Iuli; Pierre Gros, LTUR, vol. 3, 117. At his funeral Augustus was eulogized
at the opposing rostra; Roger B. Ulrich, The Roman Orator and the Sacred
Stage: The Roman Templum Rostratum, Collection Latomus 222 (Brussels:
Latomus, 1994), 18687.
81. Cassius Dio includes the description of the funeral after a list of dreams
as part of Septimiuss propaganda to legitimize his rule; 75.45; Timothy
Barnes, The Composition of Cassius Dios Roman History, Phoenix 38,
no. 3 (Autumn 1984), 245; Price, From Noble Funerals, 5961.
82. The funeral given by Septimius compensated for the numerous disrespectful acts against Pertinax after he was murdered; SHA Pert. 11, 14; Dio
Cass., 74.13.12.
83. The traditional dress of mourning was the grayish toga pulla; Juv. X.245.
In addition, Roman men put aside all ornaments and did not cut their hair;
Herodian, 4.2; Terent. Heaut. II.3.47; Suet. Jul. 67, Aug. 23, Cal. 24.
84. Evidence on the time of day for imperial Roman funerals is scant. Presumably the funeral procession did not arrive at the rostra until the sun fell on the
platform at mid-morning. It exited the forum in mid-afternoon to allow
enough daylight to complete the activities at the burial site; Plut. Vit. Sull. 38.
85. Roman funeral music and ritual lamentation has been reconstructed by
composer Walter Maioli. His Neniae, performed by Synaulia Research
Group, is recorded on Synaulia, Music of Ancient Rome, Volume 1: Wind
Instruments (Amiata Records 1996). Regarding the significance of music in
funerals of the Imperial era see John R. Levison, The Roman Character of
Funerals in the Writings of Josephus, Journal for the Study of Judaism 33, no.
3 (Sept. 2002), 27476.
86. Damaged in the fire of 191/192 CE, the condition of the temple of
Vespasian and Titus directly south of Concords temple is uncertain for the
time of Pertinaxs funeral; Dio Cass. 72.24.1.
87. The Rostra Augusti was embellished with statues, including one of
Augustus (Tac. Ann. 4.67), as documented by ancient texts and the oration
relief on the Arch of Constantine (see Figure 14).
88. SHA Pert. 3.4.9.
89. Dio Cass. 75.5.
90. Septimius may have undertaken more extensive reworking of the Forum
Romanum in lieu of creating an imperial forum. The addition of his great arch
visually, if not literally, closed in and defined the space with monumental gateways
at the four main entries. Septimius Severus is also associated with the creation of
the Forma Urbis Romae, a great marble map of the entire city. A comprehensive
study of Severan building in Rome is underway by Susann Lusnia.
91. Though not officially adopted by Marcus Aurelius, Septimius referred
to him as father; Dio Cass. 76.7. The equestrian statue also reflected the
impact of the gigantic Equus Domitiani that stood in the center of the forum
until Domitian suffered damnatio memoriae; Stat. Silv. 1.1.
92. A fire in the late second century ravaged the Palatine slopes and Temple
of Vesta, as well as the Forum Pacis; the extent of destruction in the central
forum is uncertain; Dio Cass. 73.24.
93. Charmaine Gorrie, Julia Domnas Building Patronage, Imperial Family Roles and the Severan Revival of Moral Legislation, Historia: Zeitschrift
fr Alte Geschichte 53, no. 1 (2004), 6568.
94. Restoration work on the Temple of Vespasian is thought to date to
before 203 CE; CIL VI.938. Archaeological evidence affirms the erection of
the columns as part of the Severan reworking of the area around the rostra;
Patrizia Verduchi, Rostra Augusti, LTUR, vol. 4, 216.
95. In the intervening years numerous sculptures had been added to the
forum, including the large reliefs of the Plutei Traiani/Hadriani. Most major
buildings had been restored or renovated. The new Temple of Antoninus
and Faustina to the southeast, erected in the mid-second century CE, stood
just outside the main open part of the forum.
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96. The SPQR dedication refers not only to Septimius foreign conquests,
but also obliquely to the defeat of his political rivals, though he did not want
to overtly celebrate a triumph for a victory over other Romans. One source
records Septimius declined a Parthian triumph claiming ill-health; SHA Sev.
9; 16,6; Simon Swain, Stephen Harrison, Jas Elsner, Severan Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 2026. Nevertheless, the honor of the
triumph was acknowledged in various events as memorialized in a frieze
above the side arches depicting the pompa triumphalis.
97. The bronze Equus Severi commemorated a dream of Septimius that
foretold his succession. In the dream a horse threw off Pertinax and then
lifted Septimius on his back; the event took place at the spot where popular
assemblies met during the Republic just to the east of the site selected for
the arch; Herodian 2.9.6.
98. The original bronze letters are not extant, but the inscription can be read
from the cuttings into the stone; CIL VI.1033, cf. 31230.
99. Richard Brilliant, The Arch of Septimius Severus in the Roman Forum,
Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 29 (1967); LTUR, vol. 1, 1035.
100. Ann. 2.41.
101. Through the location of the arch of Tiberius remains controversial,
many follow Coarelli, who identifies it with the buttressing arch between
the Temple of Saturn and the Basilica Iulia; Coarelli, LTUR, vol. 1, 1078.
In line with Roman pictorial conventions the arch is depicted frontally on
the oration relief from the Arch of Constantine (see Figure 14).
102. Early scholars argued that stairs and a small open space were cut into
the rostras northern side to provide access after the construction of the
Severan arch; Christian Hlsen, The Roman Forum, Its History and Monuments, trans. Jesse Carter, 2nd ed. (Rome: Loescher, 1906), 6264. Such an
adjustment has been called into question by subsequent excavations; Verduchi, LTUR, vol. 4, 216. The remains of the nearby Umbilicus also seem to
date to the Severan period. After the restoration of the central pavement of
the forum, Septimius emphasized his reverence for Romes history by preserving the Augustan-era inscription of L. Naevius Surdinus. On the complex archaeology of the area see Giuliani and Verduchi, Larea centrale,
3850. The Roman exploitation of architectural design to exclude wheeled
traffic is evident at Pompeii where the higher level of the forum prevented
vehicles from entering.
103. SHA Sev. 7; Herodian 4.2; Toynbee, Death and Burial, 5961.
104. Many modern sources identify this as the route followed by the Sacra
Via after the devastating fire of Nero; Coarelli, LTUR, vol. 2, 227.
105. A third alternative would have the processional vehicles drive around the
Arch of Septimius on the east. The exact configuration of the paving in the
area during the Severan age complicates assessment of this route; furthermore,
the circumvention of the emperors arch seems unlikely for symbolic reasons.
106. The break in the front balustrade of the upper rostra shown on the
oration relief on the Arch of Constantine may indicate the position of a
temporary stair; Hlsen, The Roman Forum, 70.
107. The procession could also have entered the forum north of Caesars
temple and then moved across the front to rejoin the southern street that
paralleled the Basilica Iulia, but this route would have omitted passage
through the Parthian arch of Augustus.
108. The parking of processional vehicles (such as those carrying the gifts
to the deceased) remains problematic in every scenario. In this case the space
behind the rostra was especially tight, compelling the parade participants
and vehicles to line up along one of the streets to the east.
109. Facing southwest, the faade of the arch was lit by the sun for most of
the day, increasing its visual attraction. The triumphal procession has generally been given as the raison dtre for the siting of the arch. The argument
is far from secure. The exact entry point of the triumph into the forum is
contested. Furthermore, the choreography of the triumph is currently called
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