Old Rome: A Handbook to the Ruins of the City and the Campagna

by Robert Burn

That this beautiful ruin, which is one of the most picturesque in Rome, belonged to the wall of Nerva’s Forum is rendered certain by the old views of the sixteenth century, which represent it as part of the inner side of the wall enclosing a splendid temple which stood to the north-west of it. Seven of the columns of this temple were still standing in the fifteenth century, belonging to the left-hand side of the portico, and a considerable part also of the walls of the cella with the pilasters of the portico. The cella of the temple adjoined the semicircular part of Augustus’s Forum on one side, and, as will be seen by the plan, the wall of the enclosure met it on the other, so that only the portico of the temple projected into the open space of the Forum.

On the front were the words, probably the last line of a longer inscription, IMP. NERVA CÆSAR AUG. PONT. MAXIM. TRIB. POT. II. IMP. II. PROCOS, showing that the temple was dedicated by Nerva.

There can be but little doubt that this was the temple of Minerva begun together with the Forum by Domitian, and finished by Nerva. It is true that there is no actual mention in any of the ancient writers of a temple of Minerva here, but the assertion of Dion Cassius that Domitian had a particular reverence for Minerva and Janus, and the character of the designs and statues of Minerva found upon the ruined part of the enclosure already described, leave little doubt on the subject. The name of Palladium given to the Forum by Martial also agrees with this supposition.

The fate of the Temple of Minerva is better known than that of most of the ancient temples in Rome.

In the time of Pope Pius V. (1566-1572) the building of a new quarter of the city was begun in this district. The streets Via Alessandrina and Via Bonella were laid out, and as the new quarter grew, the ruins of the old temple became an impediment to their progress, which Paul V. in the beginning of the seventeenth century ordered to be removed, and to be applied to the construction of the Chapel of S. Paul in the church of S. Maria Maggiore and that of the Fontana Paolo upon the Janiculum. The great gateway which stood at the end of the Via della Croce Bianca was suffered to remain for a century longer, but is now quite gone.

Tomb of Bibulus.

We now return to the Piazza Trajana. Between it and the Piazza del Campidoglio, in a street called the Via di Marforio, are two of the more ancient ruins in Rome consisting of tombs now built into the walls of houses. These tombs are monuments of imperial Rome, and were probably outside the ancient Servian Wall not far from the Porta Ratumena.

The more prominent of the two, the Tomb of Bibulus, stands close by the junction of the modern streets of Macel de’ Corvi and Marforio. The front of it only can be seen, as the rest is built into the wall of a house. The inscription is as follows,

C . POPLICIO . L . F . BIBULO AED . PL . HONORIS.
VIRTUTISQUE . CAUSSA . SENATUS.
CONSULTO . POPULI . QUE . JUSSU . LOCUS.
MONUMENTO . QUO . IPSE . POSTEREIQUE.
EIUS . INFERRENTUR . PUBLICE . DATUS . EST.

The inscription was also placed on the side of the tomb, where the beginning of it may still be seen. It must not be inferred that the privilege of being buried within the walls was granted to Bibulus contrary to the regulations of the twelve tables, which forbade any corpse to be buried or burnt within the city walls. Had this been the case the exemption would have been expressly mentioned in the inscription, and besides this the course of the Servian Wall, which crossed the depression between the Quirinal and Capitoline, would naturally run so as to exclude the tomb. The inscription only records the gift of the burial place to Bibulus by the Senate, and is intended to prevent the burial of any other person there, except the family of Bibulus.