Tomb of Cestius.

Near the Monte Testaccio, and close to the Porta S. Paolo, stands a pyramidal monument, measuring about 97 feet on each side, and 120 feet in height. It is placed upon a square basement of travertine, and the rest of the building is of rubble, with a casing of white marble. It is built into the Aurelian Wall, no pains having been taken to avoid the injury which this might cause to the building. It has, however, suffered but little from this except in appearance. The ancient entrance, which was probably on the north-east side, has been walled up. No trace is now to be seen of it, and the present entrance on the north-west was made in 1663. The interior consists of a small plastered chamber 16 feet long by 13, and 12 feet high, the corners of which are ornamented with paintings of winged genii. No coffin or sarcophagus was found when the tomb was opened, but the inscription on the outside gives the name of C. Cestius, the son of L. Cestius, of the Publilian tribe, as the person who was buried in it. It further appears that this C. Cestius had been Prætor and Tribune of the commons, and one of the seven epulones who superintended the sacrificial banquets to the gods. The date of his burial has been discovered by means of two marble pedestals containing inscriptions which were found near the pyramid. On one of these the foot of a colossal bronze statue is still fixed. They show that C. Cestius’s death took place in the time of M. Agrippa, and, therefore, of the Emperor Augustus, and that the statues were erected from the proceeds of the sale of some costly robes of cloth of gold (attalica), which Cestius had by his will ordered to be buried with him. Such burial being forbidden by law, the robes were sold and the statues erected from the proceeds by order of his heirs. They probably stood at the corners of the pyramid. Two fluted Doric pillars, the fragments of which were found near the spot, have now been placed at these corners. Cestius may possibly have been the same person who is mentioned by Cicero as a Roman knight.

Baths of Caracalla.

To the south-east of the hills of S. Saba and S. Balbina, between the Aurelian walls and the Via Appia, lie the most colossal ruins in Rome, covering a space each side of which measures more than a thousand feet. It is certain, from the arrangement of these buildings, that they were destined for public baths; and as tradition and the catalogue of the twelfth region both assign the name of the Thermæ Antoninianæ to them, and the style of the masonry is that of the Antonine era, we may feel satisfied that they belonged to the baths mentioned by Cassiodorus and Hieronymus as already partially built by Caracalla in the year A.D. 216, and finished by Heliogabalus and Alexander Severus.[116]

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This enormous mass of building consisted of a central oblong block, containing all the halls and chambers appropriated more immediately to the baths, and a surrounding court, the sides of which were formed by gymnasia and other places of amusement, and the area of which was laid out in gardens, with shrubberies, ornamental colonnades, and fountains. A similar arrangement is found in the Thermæ of Titus and Diocletian.

The central block of buildings contained four immense halls and a rotunda, around which numerous smaller rooms were grouped. The first of these large halls (a) was entered from the north-eastern side by two wide doorways. Rows of niches for sculpture broke the broad inner surfaces of its walls, and it communicated with the chambers on each side by open passages filled with columns of splendid marble and granite. The floor formed an immense basin shaped hollow, showing that the purpose for which it was used was that of a cold swimming-bath. The steps by which the bathers descended into it have been found at the two shorter sides, and on both sides are chambers for dressing and undressing.

In the centre of the group of buildings is another hall (b) of nearly the same dimensions as the cold bath, with large recesses at both ends. The floor of this was paved with the richest marbles. The four lateral circular recesses formed hot baths, and were fitted with steps and seats of various kinds for bathers. In the recesses at the ends stood two enormous porphyry basins, one of which is now preserved in the Museum at Naples. This hall was probably the tepidarium and had a very lofty roof supported by eight granite pillars of colossal size, and by a network of brazen or copper rods. One of the pillars was given to Duke Cosmo I. by Pius IV., and stands in the Piazza di Trinità in Florence. The smaller chambers (c) (d) (e), at the western and southern angles of the tepidarium, contained the apparatus for heating water.

These chambers, the purpose of which is unknown, separate the tepidarium from the rotunda (f). The position of this latter and its shape would seem to indicate that it was a laconicum or hot-air room, but the state of the ruins is at present such as to preclude any positive assertion as to its purpose.