The material of the column is Greek marble, the capital is Corinthian, and the shaft is fluted. The height is forty-six feet, but as it stands upon a pyramid of eleven steps, its elevation is increased about eleven feet.
The seventh Basilica stands about two miles from the walls; the church itself is a fine building, restored in 1611; but the portico, of antique marble columns, is of the time of Constantine. Under the church are the openings to very extensive catacombs, originally formed no doubt by the ancient Romans, to procure pozzolana for their buildings; and enlarged by the early Christians, who used them as places of refuge during their persecutions, and as cemeteries, one hundred and seventy thousand of them having, it is said, been interred there. The passages are from two to three feet in width, and extend several miles in different directions.
A hall of immense size[169] was discovered about the beginning of the last century, concealed under the ruins of its own massive roof. The pillars of verde antico that supported its vaults, the statues that ornamented its niches, and the rich marbles that formed its pavements, were found buried in rubbish, and were immediately carried away by the Farnesian family, the proprietors of the soil, to adorn their palaces and furnish their galleries. This hall is now cleared of its encumbrances, and presents to the eye a vast length of naked wall, and an area covered with weeds. “As we stood contemplating its extent and proportion,” continues Mr. Eustace, “a fox started from an aperture, once a window, at one end, and crossing the open space, scrambled up the ruins at the other, and disappeared in the rubbish. This scene of desolation reminded me of Ossian’s beautiful description:—‘The thistle shook there its lonely head; the moss whistled to the gale; the fox looked out from the windows; the rank grass waved round his head.’”
There are twelve obelisks at Rome still standing erect, the oldest of which is that brought by Augustus, which is eighty feet in height, decorating the fine square called Piazza del Popolo.
Roman conquerors had successively enriched the capital of the world with the monuments of subdued nations, and with the spirit of art from Sicily, Greece, and Egypt. Among these, the emperor Augustus ordered two Egyptian obelisks to be carried to Rome. To this end, an immense vessel of a peculiar structure was built, and when, after a tedious and difficult voyage, it reached the Tiber with its freight, one of the columns was placed in the Grand Circus, and the other in the Campus Martius. Caligula adorned Rome with a third Egyptian obelisk, obtained in the like manner.
A fourth was added afterwards. The emperor Constantine, equally ambitious of these costly foreign ornaments, resolved to decorate his newly-founded capital of Constantinople with the largest of all the obelisks that stood on the ruins of Thebes. He succeeded in having it conveyed as far as Alexandria, but, dying at the time, its destination was changed, and an enormous raft, managed by three hundred rowers, transported the granite obelisk from Alexandria to Rome.
The Circi were places set apart for the celebration of several sorts of games. They were generally oblong, or almost in the shape of a bow, having a wall quite round, with ranges of seats for the convenience of the spectators. At the entrance of the circus stood the Carceres, or lists, whence they started, and just by them one of the Metæ, or marks, the other standing at the further end to conclude the race. “There were several of these Circi at Rome, as those of Flaminius, Nero, Caracalla, and Severus; but the most remarkable, as the very name imports, was Circus Maximus, first built by Tarquinius Priscus. The length of it was four furlongs, the breadth the like number of acres, with a trench of ten feet deep, and as many broad, to receive the water; and seats enough for one hundred and fifty thousand men. It was beautified and adorned by succeeding princes, particularly by Julius Cæsar, Augustus, Caligula, Domitian, Trajan, and Heliogabalus; and enlarged to such a prodigious extent as to be able to contain, in their proper seats, two hundred and sixty thousand spectators. In the time of Constantine it would hold three hundred and eighty-five thousand persons to view the combats, chariot races, &c.[170]” The Circus Maximus stands on the spot where the games were celebrated when the Romans seized the Sabine women; and it was here also that the interesting scene took place between Androcles and the lion.
The number of beasts exhibited in the circus is wonderful; and were it not well attested, would be incredible. In the days of imperial splendour, nearly every rare animal that Western Asia or Northern Africa could produce, was commonly exhibited to the Roman people. In the year 252 B. C. one hundred and forty-two elephants, brought from Sicily, were exhibited in the circus. Cæsar, in his third dictatorship, showed a vast number of wild beasts, among which were four hundred lions, and a camelopard. The emperor Gordian devised a novel kind of spectacle; he converted the Circus into a temporary kind of wood, and turned into it two hundred stags, thirty wild horses, one hundred wild sheep, ten elks, one hundred Cyprian bulls, three hundred ostriches, thirty wild asses, one hundred and fifty wild boars, two hundred ibices, and two hundred deer. He then allowed the people to enter the wood, and to take what they pleased. Forty years afterwards the emperor Probus[171] imitated his example. “Large trees were pulled up by the roots,” says an ancient writer, “and fastened to beams, which were laid down crossing each other. Soil was then thrown upon them, and the whole Circus planted like a wood. One thousand ostriches, one thousand stags, one thousand ibices, wild sheep, and other grazing animals, as many as could be fed or found, were turned in, and the people admitted as before.”
Of the trouble which was taken in the republican times to procure rare animals for exhibition in Rome, we have a curious illustration in the letters of Cicero. The orator went out in the year 52 B. C., as governor of a province of Asia Minor; and while there, he was thus addressed by his friend Cœlius:—“I have spoken to you, in almost all my letters, about the panthers. It will be disgraceful to you, that Patiscus has sent ten panthers to Curio, while you have scarcely sent a greater number to me. Curio has made me a present of these, and ten others from Africa. If you will only keep it in mind, and employ the people of Cybira, and also send letters into Pamphylia (for I understand that the greatest number are taken there), you will gain your object.” To this the proconsul replies:—“I have given particular orders about the panthers to those who are in the habit of hunting them; but they are surprisingly scarce; and it is said, that those which are there, make a great complaint that there are no snares laid against any one in my province but themselves. It is accordingly supposed, that they are determined to quit my province. I go into Caria. However, I shall use all diligence.”