The Column of Trajan.
The height of the column is 124 feet from the pavement to the foot of the statue. It stands upon a pedestal of marble eighteen feet high, ornamented on three sides with highly interesting bas-reliefs representing trophies of Roman and Dacian armour of various kinds, the Roman labarum and the Dacian dragon, coats of mail made of scale or chain armour, helmets, curved and straight swords, axes, clubs, bows, quivers, arrows, lances, trumpets, and several kinds of military tools. On the fourth side two genii bear the tablet on which is the inscription: SENATUS POPULUSQUE ROMANUS IMP. CAESARI DIVI NERVAE F. NERVAE TRAJANO AUG. GERM. DACICO PONTIF. MAXIMO TRIB. POT. XII. IMP. VI. PP. AD DECLARANDUM QUANTAE ALTITUDINIS MONS ET LOCUS TANT[is operi]BUS SIT EGESTUS.
The last words of this inscription are illustrated by a passage of Dion Cassius, who says that Trajan placed a colossal pillar in his Forum to be his own tomb, and also to show the amount of labour expended upon the Forum, the slope of the hill which previously occupied the site having been dug away so as to afford a level space for the Forum. There is no need to interpret this, as some writers have done, to mean that the ground on the spot where the column stands had previously been as high as the top of the column. Such an interpretation seems highly improbable. The view taken by Becker and Brocchi is more tenable, that the words allude to the cutting away of the Quirinal Hill, which was steep and inaccessible before but was sloped away to a point on the side of the hill as high as the top of the column. Brocchi’s geological observations have made it almost certain that the ground has not been cut away to any great depth between the two hills.
The top of the column is only six feet lower than the level of the Villa Aldobrandini on the top of the Quirinal, and two feet higher than the Piazza di Ara Cœli. If, therefore, at any time the ground on the site of Trajan’s Forum was as high as the column, it must have formed a ridge between the Capitoline and Quirinal Hills, higher than the Capitoline and very nearly as high as the Quirinal.
In the base of the column the ashes of Trajan were deposited in a golden urn. Sixtus V. had the chamber in which the urn was placed opened, but found it empty, and it has now been walled up.
Above the pedestal are two flat stones ornamented with garlands of oak leaves, and upon them rests a round base carved in the shape of a laurel wreath. The shaft which stands immediately upon this is composed of nineteen cylindrical blocks of marble, on the outside of which a spiral band of beautifully executed bas-reliefs winds from bottom to top, covering the whole shaft. The capital is a single ring of egg-shaped ornaments with arrowheads between them, and a simple border below. On a pedestal above it stood originally the colossal bronze-gilt statue of Trajan. This statue and pedestal were probably carried off during the robberies committed at Rome by the Byzantine emperors, A.D. 663. Sixtus V. replaced it by a modern cylindrical pedestal and statue of S. Peter. The ancient winding staircase hewn in the solid blocks of marble, and lighted by narrow openings, still leads to the top. From thence it may be seen how difficult it is to suppose that the ground ever rose to such a height between the Capitoline and Quirinal as has been imagined by many historians and topographers.
Bas-reliefs representing scenes in the Dacian wars.
The magnificent wreath of bas-reliefs which winds round the shaft may be best studied by means of the model to be seen in the French Academy on the Pincian Hill, or that in the Kensington Museum. It contains the history of two campaigns against the Dacians, and has been ingeniously and minutely interpreted by several writers. A complete account of this marble history of the Dacian wars, with a discussion of all the historical and antiquarian points connected with it, would occupy several volumes, and we must, therefore, content ourselves with noticing the general character of the work and some few of the more interesting portions.
Trajan’s first campaign in Dacia.
Two campaigns are represented. The first of these took place in the year 101, and during it Trajan’s army passed down the river Save and crossed the Danube in two divisions at Kastolatz and at the confluence of the Tjerna. The two divisions effected a junction at the pass of the Bistra, called the Iron Gate, which they forced, and then attacked and took the royal city Zermizegethusa. Trajan was not satisfied with this success, but pushed on into the heart of the enemy’s country, and gained a great victory at Tapæ, after which Decebalus, the Dacian king, sued for peace.