Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- PART I The Templum Pacis in Context
- CHAPTER 1 Vespasian's Project
- CHAPTER 2 Augustan Influences
- CHAPTER 3 The Surviving Halls
- CHAPTER 4 Grammarians, Philosophers, and Doctors in the Templum Pacis
- CHAPTER 5 “In a Style Surpassing All Human Conception” (Josephus, JW 7.5.7, 158): The Art Collection
- PART II Technical Analysis
- PART III The Great Hall in the Fourth Century
- PART IV AVLA DEI: The Basilica of Pope Felix IV (AD 526–530)
- PART V The Templum Pacis in the Middle Ages
- PART VI Between Renaissance and Baroque
- PART VII Modern Excavations and Restorations
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index (Names)
- Index (Places)
CHAPTER 5 - “In a Style Surpassing All Human Conception” (Josephus, JW 7.5.7, 158): The Art Collection
from PART I - The Templum Pacis in Context
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 January 2018
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- PART I The Templum Pacis in Context
- CHAPTER 1 Vespasian's Project
- CHAPTER 2 Augustan Influences
- CHAPTER 3 The Surviving Halls
- CHAPTER 4 Grammarians, Philosophers, and Doctors in the Templum Pacis
- CHAPTER 5 “In a Style Surpassing All Human Conception” (Josephus, JW 7.5.7, 158): The Art Collection
- PART II Technical Analysis
- PART III The Great Hall in the Fourth Century
- PART IV AVLA DEI: The Basilica of Pope Felix IV (AD 526–530)
- PART V The Templum Pacis in the Middle Ages
- PART VI Between Renaissance and Baroque
- PART VII Modern Excavations and Restorations
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index (Names)
- Index (Places)
Summary
DECORATING THE TEMPLUM PACIS
Pliny the Elder completed his Naturalis Historia in AD 77, and his information on the Templum Pacis refers to the period in which the Vespasianic complex had just been inaugurated (AD 75). He called it opera Pacis (Nat. Hist. 36.27.58). Included among the Roman wonders attesting that “the world had been conquered” (Nat. Hist. 36.101), Pliny spoke of it, of the Basilica Aemilia, and of the Forum of Augustus, as the three most beautiful monuments in the world (Nat. Hist. 36.24.102):
Even if we are not to include among our great achievements the Circus Maximus built by Julius Caesar … should we not mention among our truly noble buildings the Basilica of Paulus, so remarkable for its columns from Phrygia, or the Forum of Augustus of Revered Memory or the Temple of Peace built by his Imperial Majesty the Emperor Vespasian, buildings the most beautiful the world has ever seen? [et templum Pacis Vespasiani Imp. Aug., pulcherrima operum, quae umquam vidit orbis] Should we not mention also the roof of Agrippa's Ballot Office, although at Rome long before this the architect Valerius of Ostia had roofed a whole theatre for Libo's games?
The caryatids and shields that appeared in the attic story of the Forum of Augustus made plain the submission of foreign people to Rome and the emperor. The façade of the Basilica Paulli, restored after AD 14, had an attic story with imagines clipeatae flanked by monumental statues of Parthian dignitaries in colored marbles. Therefore, I argue that the Templum Pacis shared this characteristic with the Forum and the Basilica: the sculptural decoration of the attic story, which had a strong ideological meaning along with an impact on the spatial experience of Vespasian's monument. It appears that Pliny paid attention to sculpture and painting as well as to the building that contained them. He was certainly a man with traditional tastes, but the Templum Pacis, although not particularly original, was regarded also by later visitors – Constantius II in the fourth century and Procopius in the sixth century – among the outstanding monuments of Rome.
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- The Temple of Peace in Rome , pp. 216 - 258Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2017