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easy access to one of the roads most frequented, and communicating with the principal streets and buildings of the city. 2. The triumphal procession must also have entered Rome by one of the broadest roads, and through the midst of the most distinguished buildings. This supposition may be overturned without affecting my inference. If the triumphal road was that followed by Romulus, the vanity of the censors would spare no pains to adorn it in a manner suited to its high destination. 3. As the triumphal gate was open only to the conqueror and his train, another was requisite for admitting the vast crowds of people who flocked to Rome by the triumphal road, which I consider with Martial to have been the same with the Flaminian.* Let us examine, according to these principles, the two most probable sites of the Triumphal and Flaminian gates. In the one, I find the most ancient edifices of the Campus Martius, and the beginning of the suburbs, which, as early as the sixth century of Rome, extended beyond the Carmentale gate; I find also the theatre of Marcellus; several temples, particularly that of Bellona, where the general convened the senate to solicit his triumph; the Octavian portico, and the Flaminian circus in which last Lucullus distributed a donative to his troops. In the other of those sites, I scarcely discover any thing more ancient than the age of Trajan, when that prince dug through part of the Quirinal, extended the valley

*

* Martial Epig. x. 6.

between

between that mountain and the Capitol, and at the same time adorned it with a magnificent forum. It was extremely natural that a new road called the Broad-way should soon afterwards be made between the Flaminian road and the city. Why should I here conceal a conjecture respecting the triumphal gate, which appears to me characterised by several marks of probability? I think that this gate was really no other than the famous Janus Geminus, called often the Temple of Janus, the gates of which, as they were open or shut, were appointed by Numa to denote respectively the condition of war and peace. The following are some of the circumstances which persuade me of the truth of a supposition that may at first sight appear paradoxical. Among the real or pretended obscurities of the accounts of the ancients on the subject of Janus, I shall choose for my guide the learned Varro, who deserved from the Roman contemporaries of Cicero the praise of introducing them to the knowledge of their own city. That antiquary thus describes Janus, in speaking of the gates of Rome, in the time of Romulus: Tertia Janualis dicta ab Jano, et ideo ibi positum Jani signum, et ejus institutum a Numa Pompilio, ut scribit in annalibus L. Piso, ut sit clausa semper, nisi cum bellum sit.-It is known that the wall built by Romulus, though it was extended in all other directions, remained always the same on the side of the Capitol and the Tiber: and the expressions of Varro clearly refer to a gate which existed in his own time, or at least in that

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of Piso. The same sense may be extracted from the most correct writers of antiquity. I too well know the danger of exclusive propositions to affirm, that the phrase "Temple of Janus" is not to be found in any writer of pure Latinity; but I perceive that Livy, Horace, Suetonius, and Pliny always employ the proper expression of Janus Geminus, or Janus Quirini, or Quirinus. Virgil, who describes ancient customs with the fire of a poet, and the accuracy of an antiquary, makes mention of this institution among the ancient Latins; but never introduces the word "temple" in speaking of the gates of war.

Sunt geminæ belli portæ, (sic nomine dicunt,)
Religione sacræ et sævi formidine Martis;
Centum ærei claudunt vectes, æternaque ferri
Robora: nec custos absistit limine Janus.+

In this description, every word indicates an arcade, such as that of the gates of cities, shut on both sides by doors of bronze, and consecrated by a statue of Janus, placed perhaps in a niche in the wall. Although modern writers have endeavoured to convert the Janus Geminus into a celebrated temple, their want of accuracy needs not hinder me from giving to the words their primitive sense, which perfectly accords with the expressions of Varro. The triumphal gate and that of Janus belonged, therefore, to the same wall. I may

Tit. Liv. L. i. Sueton in August. xxii. et in Neron. xiii. Horat. Carm, iv. 15. Plin. Hist. Nat. xxxiv. 7.

+ Virgil. Æneid. L. vii. 608.

thence

thence venture to conclude that their identity is possible. 2. But, to render the thing probable, we must endeavour to fix more accurately the situation of the Janus Geminus.*. According to Livy, Numa Pompilius erected it at the lower extremity of the Argiletum, to serve as the index to war and peace. We know that the Argiletum, though its etymology is uncertain, was situate near the foot of the Tarpeian rock not far from the Tiber ;† and Servius fixes its site still more precisely, by saying it was within the vicinity of the Temple of Marcellus. The triumphal gate and that of Janus must also have stood within the limits of this small portion of the wall, extending from the Tarpeian rock to the river. Within the same limits, therefore, we are obliged to place three gates, the Flumentana or Flaminia near to the river, the Carmentalis at the foot of the rock, and the Triumphal in the middle between the two others. tent of only an hundred fathoms of a wall crowded with towers, is it natural to suppose a fourth gate; or is it not more probable that this supposed fourth gate was merely a different name from one of the others? The placing of Janus in the Argiletum, which is done expressly by Livy and Servius, and which is quite consistent with the terms of Varro, is opposed by no other authority than that of Pro

In an ex

* Tit. Liv. L. i. Serv. ad Æneid. VII. Nardini Roma Antica, L. vii. C. 4. p. 439.

† Donati Roma Vetus, L. ii. C. 26. p. 212.

↑ I measured the distance on Nolli's great map of Rome.

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*

copius, who says, that the Temple of Janus stood opposite to the Capitol, and in the middle of the Forum. But Procopius does not say that this temple was the Janus Geminus; and whatever he might say, I should be inclined rather to reject the authority of a soldier of the sixth century, who spoke of a monument no longer in existence, than to suppose with Nardinit that there were two Januses, employed as tokens of war and peace; one of which was the ancient Porta Janualis, which Numa converted into a temple; and the other a temple which he afterwards built in the Argiletum. These two Januses are totally unknown to ancient authors; and Varro directly says, what Livy plainly insinuates, that Numa instituted a new ceremony without building a new edifice. 3. The gates of war and triumph were therefore so near to each other, that it is difficult to distin guish them; and a peculiarity which they posses

sed in common makes me inclined to consider them

as the same. Both these gates were consecrated by public opinion and the ceremonies of religion. According to the institutions of the Tuscans,‡ walls were sacred, but gates were profane; and when they traced the sacred site of the Pomorium, it was customary at times to interrupt the action of the plough, that spaces might be left free for

Procopius de Bell. Gothic. L. i.

+ Nardini Roma Antica, L, i. C. iii. p. 13. et L. v. C. vii. p. 256-257.

↑ Plutarch in Romul.

these

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