Edwards. Sculp.
Temple of Rediculus.
London. Published by J & A. Arch. Cornhill March 1st. 1828
Returning to the Appian way, and ascending the ridge, along which it is carried for several miles, we arrive at the Sepulchre of Cecilia Metella, the wife of Crassus; probably of the rich Crassus, for after every allowance for individual wealth, and Roman luxury and ostentation, we are still, in spite of the inscription, at a loss to believe that such a mole should have been erected to contain the bones of one woman. The vast square basement is of rubble, formed of fragments of peperino, with large blocks of travertine built into the mass, to unite with and support the facing of travertine, which once covered the whole, but of which only these heading-blocks remain. In this part there are said to be three small chambers, (to which however I could discover no entrance) and in one of these was found the sarcophagus now in the court of the Palazzo Farnese. The circular part of the edifice rose abruptly, as far as we can judge from the remains, from this square mass, without any preparation to reconcile the change of form: this upper circular part forms a tower about 60 feet in diameter, and of which the walls are 20 feet thick at the bottom, and more higher up, since the opening diminishes upwards in a conical form. Uggeri assigns 87 French feet to the whole diameter, and only 20 feet to the circular chamber; perhaps he is right: I did not measure it. Like all other ruins of any consequence, this was converted into a fortress, or rather made part of a large castle, during the wars of the Roman barons, and was the eyry of the Gaetani family. These sons of rapine and spoil seem to have troubled themselves little about the mal aria. After leaving this monument, and the Gothic fortress in which it was afterwards included, the tombs become very frequent. The fortress occupies exactly the brow of a range of hill extending in a direct line from Albano, and evidently formed by a current of lava, and there are considerable quarries just by it, which supply Rome with paving-stones.
The most simple form of the ancient sepulchre was that of a square, or circular tower, of no great height or size, on a square basement. Fragments of white marble remain in sufficient quantity, to shew that a large proportion of the tombs must have been covered with this material, but for the most part, the existing ruins are merely indistinct masses of rubble. Some are of brick, but these are usually of greater extent, and more complicated forms, with domes and arches; and are probably of later date. These sepulchral chambers are disposed in a single line on each side of the Appian way, but a little further on, we find a great number of fragments scattered over a considerable extent, and called Roma Vecchia.
There are about Rome several buildings more or less closely resembling what I have above described under the name of the temple of Rediculus. Many of these have evident traces of a portico of four columns: one of them has two orders in height, and there are other trifling differences; but in the whole, there is a striking similarity both of design and execution. The facing is uniformly of very neat brickwork, and they are probably all nearly of the same period. There are three such at this Roma Vecchia (for there is more than one Roma Vecchia); four more near the modern road to Naples, one of which has been christened the temple of Fortuna Muliebris, and two or three, out of the Porta San Lorenzo.
Beyond Roma Vecchia we meet again with tombs, and with a farmhouse, most of the walls of which seem to be ancient. Near this there has been a magnificent pyramidal sepulchre, surrounded in its original state by arches, and probably by a colonnade. I extended my walk to an immense round mass, which has formed the basement of some spacious mausoleum; it was unfortunately locked up, nor could I find anybody in the little cottage with which it is at present crowned to give me entrance. Then leaving the Appian way, though marked still further by its line of tombs, and crossing the modern road to Albano and Naples, I found myself again among the ranges of those aqueducts, of which I have already given you some description. The Marana, or Acqua Crabra, here runs among them, conducted on the top of a small mound, and crossing in some places both lines of aqueducts. In Italy, the Roman roads do not by any means adhere to the direct straight line which characterizes them in England. Our country was a forest when these works were undertaken: Italy was highly cultivated, and divided into private estates, and this perhaps has in many cases given rise to the windings, both of the roads and aqueducts: indeed it is difficult to account for the abrupt turns of the latter on any other principle. By the sides of these aqueducts there are other ruins occupying a considerable extent, but no one of them announces any building of much importance. There are vaults, domes, and arches, and one of those great niches so common in the Roman ruins; where the whole end of a building, or much the greater part of it, was made semicircular, and covered with half a dome. In the baths, similar large niches frequently stand quite insulated, but where they occur in the position above described, they seem at one time to have been considered as a decided proof that the edifice to which they belonged, was a temple, and hardly anything was acknowledged to be a temple, where enough remained to shew that no such niche had existed. It is unfortunate that we have only scattered fragments of the temples of Rome, but it seems probable that this arrangement did form in them a very usual termination. Nothing of the sort is found in any Greek temple; but though the Romans borrowed largely from the religious practices and observances of the Greeks, they must have drawn something from other sources. Their square cells (not oblong, as in the Greek buildings), their niches, their vaults, their round temples, and the windows they made in them, were perhaps derived from the Etruscans, together with many of the superstitious rites, and the haruspices, which history teaches us to have been derived from that people.
As I have already mentioned the Basilica, I shall find very little to describe out of the Porta di San Paolo. There is a place called Tre Fontane, where there are three churches, and in one of them, three springs of warm water, or rather I believe, one spring with three openings. The tradition of the place is, that St. Paul was here beheaded; that where his head fell, a warm spring burst out; that it bounded; and where it fell a second time, another spring arose, but not so warm as the first; it bounded again; and produced a third spring, which was nearly cold. There is however so little difference, that I persuaded an English gentleman who was with me that the one said to be the warmest was the coldest. How I hate these ridiculous additions to a story not in itself improbable! The great church is long and low, with some pointed vaulting. That containing the spring is handsome internally, but the best is an octagonal church by Vignola, which rises in a very fine pyramidal form.
I have already given you something of the western bank of the Tiber in my first walk, where I returned by Monte Mario and the Valle d’Inferno. The only thing remaining on this side is the Villa Pamfili, which is one of the largest about Rome; that is, not the house, but the grounds and gardens. On the road are the remains of an ancient aqueduct, which are frequently brought in to support the modern Acqua Paolina. What in English we should call the villa, but which is here known by the name of casino, can hardly be called handsome, and yet it pleases, and the terraces and the flat garden below, cut partly into the hill, the fragments of architecture, the fountains, the groves of towering stone pines, and the views in both directions, make it a place to which you willingly return again and again. The situation of the house is not well chosen. The pride of the artist was to counteract nature, not to follow her, and gently bring her into his service; but the situation of the grounds is very fine. Though high, it has a terrible reputation for mal aria. To the botanist it has another interest, as being the station of several rare plants.
It is among the attractions of Rome, that the Studii or workshops of the artists, and especially of the sculptors, are so easily accessible. That of Canova is announced by the fragments of sculpture which are about it, and built up in the walls externally. The great excellence of this admirable artist lies in female figures, and in those of very young men, with a character rather of grace, than of strength. Hence his Cupid and Psyche; Venus and Adonis; the Graces; his Venus; Hebe; Magdalene; and others of this sort, attract universal admiration. Canova is not a mere sculptor, he also paints well, and is in all respects a most liberal man; witness the busts of the great men of Italy put up by him at the Pantheon. Liberal not only in giving what must cost him a considerable sum, but still more so, in permitting the young men who perform these busts under his inspection and direction, to affix their names as artists. He is about to build a church in his native town. The body of the building is to be like that of the Pantheon, while the portico will be imitated from the Parthenon. I asked his architect how much it would cost, he replied that he could not pretend to say, as in the country where it was to be erected, the stone is probably cheap, and a considerable portion of the labour, particularly in the carriage of materials, would be done gratis by the peasantry, who would consider it meritorious to forward so good a work; but that such a building could hardly be erected in Rome for less than 240,000 scudi.