Old Rome Part 11

CHAPTER VI.

PANTHEON, COLUMN OF MARCUS AURELIUS, MAUSOLEUM OF AUGUSTUS, MAUSOLEUM OF HADRIAN, AND NEIGHBOURHOOD.

[Sidenote: The Septa.]

Near the Piazza Venezia and S. Marco, to the east of the site of the ancient Circus Flaminius, stood the Septa, an ancient building erected for the purpose of holding the Roman comitia or elections. Some ruins of a very peculiar kind are situated under the Palazzo Doria and the church of S. Maria in Via Lata. They consist of ancient piers of travertine stone, about thirty-nine inches square, standing in rows at distances of five or six yards, and evidently belonging to the remains of a portico. There are three rows of these, each containing eight piers under the Palazzo Doria, and five rows under the church of S. Maria in Via Lata, containing each five piers. It is plain that these were originally faced with marble, as the exterior surface of the travertine is rough hewn. The situation of these pillars agrees well with the locality in which the Septa are placed by cla.s.sical writers, and a further proof that they certainly formed a part of that building is given by the Capitoline map, upon which we find a large tract occupied by a building resting upon piers arranged in regular rows exactly corresponding to the piers under the church of S. Maria and the Palazzo Doria. Upon these fragments the letters SaePT and LIA are legible, which appear to belong to the words SaePTA JULIA.

The shape of the building is very peculiar. It must have reached along the side of the Via Lata from the Piazza di S. Marco to the church of S. Maria in Via Lata, and consisted of a long cloister supported by parallel rows of eight marble piers. This cannot have been the arrangement of the place in the Republican or early Imperial times, for a design less adapted for the orderly meeting of a large body of people can hardly be conceived. It is much more probable that in the present ruins we have the remains of Hadrian's Septa, built when the original purpose of the building, the reception and division of the centuries when they voted, had become an affair of the past.

The design of these s.p.a.cious covered cloisters seems to have been to afford a sheltered place for various cla.s.ses of the Roman populace. Even in Domitian's time the Septa had become the common resort of slave vendors, dealers in fancy goods, flaneurs and loungers, and the new arcades were intended possibly for the express accommodation of such persons. The wide court in which the great a.s.semblies of the centuries had previously been held was partly filled up by these new buildings, and partly occupied by private houses, as the Capitoline plan shows. When that plan was prepared, in the time of Septimius Severus, the old Septa had entirely lost their form and original use, and the name only remained attached to the s.p.a.cious colonnades of Hadrian.

In the early times of the Republic the Septa were simply an enclosed place on the Campus Martins part.i.tioned off into a number of different plots by means of ropes or slight railings, in each of which one division of voters or century a.s.sembled, and whence the presidents pa.s.sed one by one over the pontes to deliver the vote of their respective century. Hence arose the nickname of ovilia, which was given to the septa on account of their similarity to a sheepfold. Julius Caesar first entertained the idea of setting up marble enclosures for the comitia centuriata, and surrounding them with a magnificent portico. The whole formed a s.p.a.cious cloistered court, decorated with works of art, and closely connected with the Villa Publica. Caesar's design was completed after his death by Agrippa in B.C.

27, and he gave the building the name Septa Julia. A rostrum was erected in it, and such was the extent of the s.p.a.ce enclosed that gladiatorial shows, and sometimes naumachiae were held there. This was afterwards altered by Hadrian as above described.

[Sidenote: Temples of Isis and Serapis.]

Westwards from the septa and nearly upon the site now occupied by the church of S. Stefano del Cacco, the little Via di pie di Marmo and a part of the church of S. Maria sopra Minerva, stood the temples of Isis, Serapis, and Minerva Chalcidica.[91] The names of the three temples are given in the catalogue of the Curiosum in the ninth region, and the sites of the two first, the Iseum and Serapeum, have been sufficiently traced by the numerous Egyptian antiquities which have been found near the church of S. Maria sopra Minerva. Of these the most remarkable are the two obelisks, one of which now stands in the Piazza della Rotunda in front of the Pantheon, and the others on the Piazza della Minerva. The latter of these was found between the church of S. Ign.a.z.io and that of S. Maria in the time of Alexander VII. in 1665, and the former had stood, previously to its erection on the present pedestal, in a little piazza near this place, whence it was removed by Clement XI. The antiquarian Fea, in his Miscellanea, gives an account of various other Egyptian relics found on the south-east side of the church of S. Maria sopra Minerva, which undoubtedly belonged to the Iseum and Serapeum.[92]

Among these was a statue of Isis now in the hall of the dying gladiator in the Capitol, the two Egyptian lions now at the foot of the steps of the Capitol; the famous group of the Nile now in the Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican, and two fragments of an altar with Egyptian reliefs, and the inscription ISIDI SACRUM. Further traces of the same Egyptian wors.h.i.+p were found by Canina in the year 1852, of which he has given an account in the Annali dell' Inst.i.tuto of that year. The emperors Commodus and Caracalla were particularly given to the wors.h.i.+p of Egyptian deities, and the emperor Alexander Severus is said to have bestowed additional decorations upon those temples. The third temple, that of Minerva Chalcidica, which was restored by Domitian, together with the Iseum and Serapeum after the fire in A.D. 80, stood nearer to the Pantheon, and probably occupied the site of the present church called S. Maria sopra Minerva. The statue of Minerva, formerly in the Giustiniani Palace and now placed in the Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican, was found here. Some few remains of pilasters which are built into the foundations of the houses between the Via della Minerva and the Via di pie di Marmo may have belonged to this temple.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Pantheon.]

[Sidenote: Pantheon.]

At the same time with his Thermae, which occupied this district, Agrippa built the famous dome, called by Pliny and Dion, and in the inscription of Severus on the architrave of the building itself, the Pantheon, and still retaining that name, though now consecrated as a Christian Church under the name of S. Maria ad Martyres or della Rotunda. This consecration, together with the colossal thickness of the walls, have secured the building against the waste of time, and the still more destructive attacks of the barons of the Middle Ages, who destroyed most of the other great edifices of imperial Rome by either making them their strongholds or pulling them down for building materials. The p.r.o.naos rests upon sixteen granite columns, with marble Corinthian bases and capitals. It was formerly approached by six steps, but two only are now above the level of the surrounding ground. The architrave and frieze are plain, and on the latter stands the inscription, which formerly, as may be seen by the holes for nails, was formed by metallic letters:

M . AGRIPPA . L . F . COS . TERTIUM . FECIT.

Agrippa was consul for the third time in B.C. 27, so that the building is now 1906 years old. Another inscription in smaller characters stands under this upon the two upper ledges of the architrave, commemorating the restoration of the building by Severus and Caracalla. The pediment, as may be seen by the holes of the metal fastenings, formerly contained a bronze relief representing Jupiter hurling thunderbolts upon the giants. The roof of the p.r.o.naos was originally arched, but the vaulting has been replaced by strong beams, and on the outside the gilded bronze has been replaced by lead. In the interior of the p.r.o.naos, on each side of the entrance are two huge niches which formerly contained the statues of Augustus and Agrippa, but are now empty.

The p.r.o.naos is connected with the rotunda by two ma.s.sive projections of masonry ornamented at the sides with marble pilasters and exquisitely worked reliefs in pentelic marble representing candelabra and sacrificial implements entwined with wreaths. These connecting walls originally rose to an equal height with the walls of the rotunda, but are now hidden by the bell towers, erected by Bernini in the time of Urban VIII. about A.D.

1625.

The doorway is of magnificently carved marble slabs, and the folding doors, moving on ma.s.sive hinges fixed in two projecting pilasters, are of exquisitely worked bronze.

The rotunda rests on a rectangular base, similar to those which support the cylindrical part of the mausoleum of Hadrian and the tomb of Cecilia Metella. In the parts where the thickness of the wall is not lessened by niches in the interior, it has the amazing breadth of nineteen feet of solid brickwork. In addition to this it is strengthened with numerous arches built into the wall. Three cornices run round the exterior of the rotunda and divide it into three rings, the lowest of which was faced with marble, and the two upper with stucco. The dome springs from the second cornice, and consists first of a ring of masonry seven feet high, and then of six concentric rings, presenting on the exterior the appearance of six steps. The top is flat, and is pierced in the centre with a large round opening twenty-seven feet in diameter. Round the opening is a ring of ornamental gilded bronze, which is the only part of the old bronze gilt roof now remaining. The masonry of the dome is of wedge-shaped pumice stones, chosen for this purpose on account of their lightness. The same kind of stone is used in several other buildings in Rome where lightness combined with moderate strength is required. The exterior of the dome is flat and heavy, and impressive only from its stern and ma.s.sive solidity.

The proportions of the interior are altogether different, and have been universally admired for their elegance, and the exquisitely simple taste with which they are decorated. The lower part contains eight deep niches, alternately semicircular and square, in one of which the entrance doors are placed, while the others were filled with statues of deities, now replaced by Romish altars. They are decorated with pilasters, and two Corinthian columns stand in front of each, supporting the entablature which runs round the whole interior. Between the eight princ.i.p.al niches are eight smaller ones, now used as altars, faced with aediculae consisting of two small columns with entablature and pediment. The two ring cornices in the interior answer in position to the lower exterior cornices. Above the upper cornice which runs quite round the building there were originally twelve niches surrounded with elegant marbles and stucco work.

These were altered in 1747, and their effect injured by the introduction of heavy pediments, and by the removal of the marbles and stucco work. The interior of the roof is relieved by well-designed rectangular coffer work, decreasing in size towards the apex of the dome so as to give the impression of height and s.p.a.ce. The floor is laid with slabs of Phrygian and Numidian marble, porphyry, and grey granite, in alternate squares and circles, set in reticulated work. In the centre it has a depression pierced with small holes to carry off the rain water from the aperture above. This drain probably communicated with the great cloaca built by Agrippa to drain the Campus Martius. The proportions of the interior of the dome are admirably adjusted, so that no part of the building has an undue prominence, contrasting favourably in this respect with S. Peter's, where the immense size of the piers on which the dome is supported dwarf the upper part too much. The Pantheon will always be reckoned among the masterpieces of architecture for solid durability combined with beauty of interior effect.

The Romans prided themselves greatly upon it as one of the wonders of their great capital, and no other dome of antiquity could rival its colossal dimensions.[93] The height from the pavement to the crown of the dome is 143 feet, half of which is occupied by the cylindrical wall and half by the dome; this height is insignificant when compared with S.

Peter's, the dome of which is 405 feet from the pavement to the base of the lantern, and the exterior appearance of S. Peter's is far finer, but the diameter of the Pantheon is the greater, and the proportions of the interior more harmonious.

The inscription a.s.signs its completion to the year B.C. 27, the third consuls.h.i.+p of Agrippa. For a long time the mistaken notion prevailed that the building was dedicated to Juppiter Ultor, a misapprehension arising from a corrupt reading in a pa.s.sage of Pliny, where the words Jovis Ultoris had been inserted instead of diribitori. The original name, Pantheon, taken in connection with the numerous niches for statues of the G.o.ds in the interior, seems to contradict the idea that it was dedicated to any peculiar deity or cla.s.s of deities. The seven princ.i.p.al niches may have been intended for the seven superior deities, and the eight aediculae for the next in dignity, while the twelve niches in the upper ring were occupied by the inferior inhabitants of Olympus. Dion hints at this explanation when he suggests that the name was taken from the resemblance of the dome to the vault of heaven.[94]

Originally, to all appearance, the Pantheon was not intended for a temple, but for a part of Agrippa's Thermae. Its shape corresponds very closely with the description given by Vitruvius of the Laconic.u.m or Sudatio attached to all Roman Thermae. He recommends a dome-shaped building, with a round opening like that of the Pantheon at the crown, which can be opened or closed at pleasure, so as to lower or raise the temperature, by the removal or application of a lid (clypeum) moved by chains.

And on an examination of the p.r.o.naos it will be found that the stones in its upper part, which abut on the central building, are not bonded into it, but are only placed against it, showing that the p.r.o.naos was an after-thought, and was not erected till the rotunda had been finished.

Agrippa must have changed the design of the building after the completion of the dome, and, perhaps because he found it too vast for the purposes of a sudatio, or because he thought it too splendid a building to be employed for such a purpose, have determined to dedicate it to the G.o.ds of heathendom. The bronze gilt statuary, the work of Diogenes of Athens, with which the temple was decorated, was much admired by the Roman connoisseurs, and in particular the group upon the pediment and the Caryatides. The statue of Venus was adorned with the two divided halves of the famous pearl of Cleopatra, fellow to the one which Cleopatra is said to have dissolved in vinegar in order to win her wager that she could spend ten million sesterces in one dinner.

In the fire of A.D. 80 the Pantheon suffered with the rest of the buildings in this part of the Campus Martius, but from the solidity of its construction the injury done was not great, and was repaired soon afterwards by Domitian. It was damaged by lightning in the reign of Trajan, but restored by Hadrian, who used it frequently as a court of justice.

A hundred years after this, the restoration by Septimius Severus, recorded in the extant inscription, took place A.D. 195. Honorius closed this temple, with the other temples of Rome, in A.D. 399, but it was not consecrated as a Christian church until two hundred years afterwards, when Boniface IV. dedicated it to All Saints in allusion to the pagan name of Pantheon, giving the name of S. Maria ad Martyres. Two acts of plunder perpetrated upon the building deserve mention. In the middle of the seventh century, A.D. 650, Constans II. took off the gilded bronze tiles of the roof, and was carrying them to Constantinople, with the plunder of the Forum of Trajan, when he was intercepted at Syracuse by the Saracens and killed. His act of plunder was imitated by Urban VIII., who in 1632 took away the bronze girders which supported the roof of the p.r.o.naos and had them melted down and used partly for the pillars of the baldachino in S. Peter's, and partly for the cannon of the castle of S. Angelo.

[Sidenote: Aqua Virgo.]

Not far from the Pantheon the arches of the Aqua Virgo projected from the side of the Pincian Hill and crossed the Via Lata. Some remains of these arches are still to be seen in the Via del Nazareno (No. 12) at the back of the Fountain of Trevi. They bear an inscription which was copied in the ninth century by the anonymous chronicler of Einsiedlen, recording the restoration of the arches by Claudius after they had been partially destroyed by Caligula, who intended to build an amphitheatre in this neighbourhood. The arches are now entirely covered with rubbish, and the conduit of the aqueduct itself, which formerly was raised upon them, is consequently now upon the level of the ground. The inscription stands on the side of the conduit, and was formerly at the spot where some princ.i.p.al street pa.s.sed under the aqueduct. Above it is a simple cornice, and below, an architrave, with the upper part of some Doric pilasters, appears above the surface of the water, which is here tapped to afford a was.h.i.+ng trough to the laundresses of the neighbourhood. The masonry is of solid travertine blocks, carefully cut and fitted.

[Sidenote: Dogana in the Piazza di Pietra.]

Some topographers have identified the ruin in the Piazza di Pietra, now the Dogana, with the Posidonium, a portico built by Agrippa in memory of his naval exploits; but unless the ruin in the Piazza di Pietra be a later restoration after the fire of A.D. 80, which is possible enough, the style is not such as to allow us to a.s.sign it to the Augustan age. It has eleven fluted Corinthian marble columns supporting a tolerably well-preserved entablature, and plainly belonging to the longer side of a basilica or temple. The architrave, frieze, and cornice, have a heavy and unimpressive appearance, though some of the details of the work are rich and carefully executed. In the courtyard of the building a portion of the wall of the cella, and the spring of the arches of the vaulted roof, can be seen now incorporated into the modern building.

Various conjectures have been made as to the name and history of this building. Some of the older topographers thought that it was the Temple of M. Aurelius, which seems, however, to have been nearer to the column of that emperor than the ruin in question is;[95] nor does the position of this ruin allow us to suppose that it formed any part of a series of buildings placed symmetrically round the column. Palladio gives an elaborate ground-plan, with all the details, and calls it the Temple of Mars; but there does not appear to be any evidence in favour of this appellation; nor is it known how much of Palladio's design is taken from what remained of the ruin in his time, and how much is merely conjectural restoration. The conjecture of Urlichs that the Temple of Marciana, Trajan's sister, stood here, rests on no evidence but that of the Not.i.tia, and is rendered very improbable by the great size of the building, and by the fact that the expression in the Not.i.tia is Basilica Marciani, and not Templum Marcianae. Another hypothesis, which Professor Reber mentions, has more to recommend it. Antoninus Pius is said to have erected a temple in honour of his adopted father, Hadrian. This temple could not have stood in the Forum of Trajan, where there was no room left for such a building, and would most probably be placed near the rest of the Antonine buildings, not far from the Column of M. Aurelius. In the Mirabilia, the Temple of Hadrian is placed near the Church of S. Maria in Aquiro, which corresponded to the modern Chiesa degli Orfanelli; and part of a temple precinct built of travertine has been discovered in the Palazzo Cini, and is, perhaps, a relic of this temple. A medal of the year A.D. 151 contains a representation of the Temple of Hadrian, and corresponds tolerably well with the extant ruins; and in the neighbourhood of the Piazza di Pietra, several statues and fragments of inscriptions bearing the name of Antoninus Pius have been found at different times. When it is added that the style of building and execution of the ornamental work belong to the Antonine era, it will be seen that, although there is nothing more than probable evidence in favour of the above supposition, yet it has more in its favour than any of the other conjectures mentioned.

The present building was erected by Innocent XII. at the end of the seventeenth century in order to prevent the fall of the columns, which had become dangerously disjointed. The entablature has been restored in many parts, and a kind of attica erected over it, which gives the ruin the appearance of being in better preservation than it really is.

[Sidenote: Gnomon Obelisk.]

North of the Piazza Capranica, in the open s.p.a.ce called the Piazza di Monte Citorio, is a large obelisk of red syenite. This is the Gnomon Obelisk, of which Pliny gives an interesting account in his 'Natural History.' It was brought by Augustus from Egypt, with that which is now in the Piazza del Popolo, and was erected on the Campus Martins under the directions of the mathematician Facundus Novus to serve as a sun-dial, by which not only the hour of the day, but also the day of the month, might be shown. For this purpose the pavement of the piazza in which it stood was marked out with a complicated system of lines in bronze; and, to prevent any disturbances caused by the settlement of the foundations, they were laid as deep below the ground as the height of the obelisk itself.

Pliny remarks that when he wrote, the gnomon had ceased for thirty years to mark the time rightly, and he ascribes this inaccuracy to some displacement of the obelisk due to natural causes, such as earthquakes or inundations.[96] It is more probable that the inaccuracy of the Julian calendar gradually produced the change. Ammia.n.u.s Marcellinus, the Not.i.tia, and the anonymous writer of the Einsiedlen MS., all mention this obelisk as still standing on the place where Augustus placed it. It was then--after the ninth century--lost for a time, but discovered again in 1403 with a part of the figures of the dial. Marliani, in the first half of the sixteenth century, mentions a part of the obelisk as lying neglected in a cellar near S. Lorenzo in Lucina, and it was not erected upon the present site until 1792.

To the east and north of the Monte Citorio lay the great buildings of the Antonine era, of which we still have some remains in the base of the Pillar of Antoninus Pius, now in the Giardino della Pigna of the Vatican, the magnificent Pillar of M. Aurelius in the Piazza Colonna, and the remains of the arch of the latter emperor, now in the Palace of the Conservators of the Capitol.

[Sidenote: Pillar of Antoninus Pius.]

The first of these, the Pillar of Antoninus Pius, was a monolith of red syenite, resting upon a pedestal of the same stone ornamented with reliefs. These remained upon their original site in the garden of the Casa della Missione near the Monte Citorio, until the time of Benedict XIV., when the pedestal was removed and placed in the Piazza di Monte Citorio near the Gnomon Obelisk, but the monolith was found to be so damaged, as not to be worth the expense of re-erection. Pius VI. when he placed the Gnomon Obelisk in the Piazza di Monte Citorio, removed the pedestal and took it to the Vatican Gardens, and it was finally placed in the Giardino della Pigna by Gregory XVI., who caused it to be carefully restored.

[Sidenote: Column of M. Aurelius.]

The second of the great Antonine monuments, the Column of M. Aurelius, still stands upon its original site in the Piazza Colonna. Formerly it was the centre point of a group of ma.s.sive temples and colossal halls, which have entirely perished. It is now surrounded by houses of modern construction, and surmounted by a statue of S. Paul, and looks like a grey veteran clothed in the dress of a later generation, in which he feels self-conscious and ill at ease. The only remains of the colonnades, which once enclosed the court in which it stood, are to be found on the east side of the piazza in the palace of the Prince of Piombino. They consist of a triple portico of brickwork, probably faced in ancient times with marble. The Temple of M. Aurelius, which stood, like that of Trajan, in front of the column, was probably upon the western side towards the Piazza di Monte Citorio, and it is from the ruins of this temple, and not of the Amphitheatre of Statilius, as commonly supposed, that the mound of ruins called Monte Citorio may have been formed. But no traces of the substructions or of the walls or columns have been found.[97]

The column itself, which is a close imitation of that of Trajan, stands upon a pedestal which was so altered by Fontana from its original shape as to present a totally different appearance. The ancient pedestal was much less ma.s.sive and better proportioned to the upper part of the monument.

Its base stood at a level thirteen feet lower than the present pavement of the square, and it consisted of a bas.e.m.e.nt of solid stonework about sixteen feet in height resting on three steps, nearly the whole of which is now under the level of the surrounding ground. On the east side was the door by which the spiral staircase in the interior was reached. Upon the bas.e.m.e.nt stood a large square flat stone, ornamented with genii and triumphal and military ensigns, and above this the pedestal upon which, before the restorations by Fontana, only the words CONSECRATIO and D.

ANTONINI. AUG. PII. were legible. The original shape and inscription of this lower part are only known to us from old prints and antiquarian notes in Gamucci, Du Perac, and Piranesi's works. It became necessary for the safety of the pillar, in 1589 to restore the base, and the whole was cased in marble and repaired by Fontana, under the orders of Sixtus V., who at the same time placed the statue of S. Paul upon the top. From a want of accurate historical information, however, the old inscription was supposed to refer to the elder of the Antonines, Antoninus Pius, and the new inscription accordingly speaks of the monument as dedicated to him. The error was discovered by a narrower inspection of the reliefs upon the shaft, which clearly relate to the exploits of M. Aurelius.

The plinth is quite simple, and the base of the shaft is formed, like the Column of Trajan, in the shape of a laurel crown. The whole of the shaft is occupied by a spiral series of reliefs, and only a small ring of fluted mouldings separates them from the capital, which is of the Romano-Doric order. The whole pillar measures 122 feet in height, being two feet lower than that of Trajan. The shafts of the two are exactly of the same height (100 Roman feet), and are formed in the same way of solid cylinders of marble, in the centre of which the spiral staircase which leads to the top is hewn.

The great winding wreath of bas-reliefs which twines round the column contains scenes from the history of the German wars in the years from A.D.

167-179, in which a number of the tribes north of the Danube, the Marcomanni, Quadi, Suevi, Hermonduri, Jazyges, Vandali, Sarmati, Alani, and Roxolani, with many others, took part. The representations begin with an army on the march crossing a river (the Danube); then follow, as on the Pillar of Trajan, scenes in which the general harangues his troops, the enemy's encampments are seen, and a great victory is won, accompanied with the usual thank-offerings.

But the most remarkable part of the whole relief is a scene which plainly corresponds to the account given by Dion Ca.s.sius of the sudden, and, as it seemed, supernatural relief afforded by a thunderstorm to the Roman army when hard pressed by the Quadi, who had surrounded them and succeeded in preventing all their efforts to escape. "The Roman army," says Dion, "were in the greatest distress from fatigue, many of them were wounded, and they were hemmed in by the enemy, without water, under a burning sun. They could neither fight nor retreat, and would have been compelled to stand in their ranks and die under the scorching heat, had not some thick clouds suddenly gathered, and a heavy rain fallen, which refreshed them, and afforded them drink. This did not happen without the intervention of the G.o.ds (??? ??ee?), for it was said that one Arnuphis, an Egyptian magician, was with Marcus Aurelius, and that he, by invoking the aid of Hermes, the G.o.d of the air, and some other deities by means of incantations, drew down the rain." Xiphilinus, however, from whose abridgement of Dion we have the above account, declares that "Dion has purposely falsified the circ.u.mstances, for he must have known that the 'legio fulminata' obtained its name from this incident, the true history of which was as follows.

There was a legion in the army of Marcus Aurelius, consisting entirely of Christians. The emperor being told that their prayers in such an emergency never remained unanswered, requested them to pray for help to their G.o.d.

When they had prayed, G.o.d immediately smote the enemy with lightning, but refreshed the Roman army by a copious rain, upon which Marcus published a decree, in which he complimented the Christian legion and bestowed the name fulminate upon it." History however, does not bear out this wonderful tale of Xiphilinus, for the name fulminate is known, from inscriptions, to have been given to the twelfth legion as early as the reign of Augustus.[98]

Upon the pillar the scene is represented by the figure of Jupiter Pluvius dripping with rain, which the soldiers are eagerly catching in their s.h.i.+elds.

The drought is followed by an inundation, in which many of the Germans are drowned. A grand battle takes place, followed by the burning of the enemy's huts and the seizure of numerous captives.