The Same Author Says, There Is
A Descent Of Eleven Steps To Go Into It; That It Is A Hundred And
Forty-Four Feet In Heighth, And As Many In Breadth; That It Was
Covered With Copper, Which, With The Brass Nails Of The Portico,
Pope Urban VIII.
Took away, and converted into the four wreathed
pillars that support the canopy of the high altar in the church
of St. Peter, &c. The truth is, before the time of pope Alexander
VII.
The earth was so raised as to cover part of the temple, and
there was a descent of some steps into the porch: but that
pontiff ordered the ground to be pared away to the very pedestal
or base of the portico, which is now even with the street, so
that there is no descent whatsoever. The height is two hundred
palmi, and the breadth two hundred and eighteen; which, reckoning
fife palmi at nine inches, will bring the height to one hundred
and fifty, and the breadth to one hundred and sixty-three feet
six inches. It was not any covering of copper which pope Urban
VIII. removed, but large brass beams, which supported the roof of
the portico. They weighed 186,392 pounds; and afforded metal
enough not only for the pillars in St. Peter's church, but also
for several pieces of artillery that are now in the castle of St.
Angelo. What is more extraordinary, the gilding of those columns
is said to have cost forty thousand golden crowns: sure money was
never worse laid out. Urban VIII. likewise added two bellfrey
towers to the rotunda; and I wonder he did not cover the central
hole with glass, as it must be very inconvenient and disagreeable
to those who go to church below, to be exposed to the rain in wet
weather, which must also render it very damp and unwholesome. I
visited it several times, and each time it looked more and more
gloomy and sepulchral.
The magnificence of the Romans was not so conspicuous in their
temples, as in their theatres, amphitheatres, circusses,
naumachia, aqueducts, triumphal arches, porticoes, basilicae, but
especially their thermae, or bathing-places. A great number of
their temples were small and inconsiderable; not one of them was
comparable either for size or magnificence, to the modern church
of St. Peter of the Vatican. The famous temple of Jupiter
Capitolinus was neither half so long, nor half so broad: it was
but two hundred feet in length, and one hundred and eighty-five
in breadth; whereas the length of St. Peter's extends to six
hundred and thirty-eight feet, and the breadth to above five
hundred. It is very near twice as large as the temple of Jupiter
Olympius in Greece, which was counted one of the seven wonders of
the world. But I shall take another opportunity to explain myself
further on the antiquities of this city; a subject, upon which I
am disposed to be (perhaps impertinently) circumstantial. When I
begin to run riot, you should cheek me with the freedom of a
friend. The most distant hint will be sufficient to, - Dear Sir,
Yours assuredly.
LETTER XXXII
NICE, March 10, 1765.
DEAR SIR, - The Colossaeum or amphitheatre built by Flavius
Vespasian, is the most stupendous work of the kind which
antiquity can produce. Near one half of the external circuit
still remains, consisting of four tire of arcades, adorned with
columns of four orders, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite.
The height and extent of it may be guessed from the number of
spectators it contained, amounting to one hundred thousand; and
yet, according to Fontana's mensuration, it could not contain
above thirty-four thousand persons sitting, allowing a foot and
an half for each person: for the circuit of the whole building
did not exceed one thousand five hundred and sixty feet. The
amphitheatre at Verona is one thousand two hundred and ninety
feet in circumference; and that of Nismes, one thousand and
eighty. The Colossaeum was built by Vespasian, who employed
thirty thousand Jewish slaves in the work; but finished and
dedicated by his son Titus, who, on the first day of its being
opened, produced fifty thousand wild beasts, which were all
killed in the arena. The Romans were undoubtedly a barbarous
people, who delighted in horrible spectacles. They viewed with
pleasure the dead bodies of criminals dragged through the
streets, or thrown down the Scalae Gemoniae and Tarpeian rock,
for their contemplation. Their rostra were generally adorned with
the heads of some remarkable citizens, like Temple-Bar, at
London. They even bore the sight of Tully's head fixed upon that
very rostrum where he had so often ravished their ears with all
the charms of eloquence, in pleading the cause of innocence and
public virtue. They took delight in seeing their fellow-creatures
torn in pieces by wild beasts, in the amphitheatre.
They shouted with applause when they saw a poor dwarf or slave
killed by his adversary; but their transports were altogether
extravagant, when the devoted captives were obliged to fight in
troops, till one side was entirely butchered by the other. Nero
produced four hundred senators, and six hundred of the equestrian
order, as gladiators in the public arena: even the women fought
with wild beasts, as well as with each other, and drenched the
amphitheatres with their blood. Tacitus says, "Sed faeminarum
illustrium, senatorumque filiorum plures per arenam faedati
sunt," "But many sons of Senators, and even Matrons of the first
Rank, exposed themselves in this vile exercise." The execrable
custom of sacrificing captives or slaves at the tombs of their
masters and great men, which is still preserved among the negroes
of Africa, obtained also among the antients, Greeks as well as
Romans. I could never, without horror and indignation, read that
passage in the twenty-third book of the Iliad, which describes
twelve valiant Trojan captives sacrificed by the inhuman Achilles
at the tomb of his friend Patroclus.
Dodeka men Troon megathumon uias eathlous
Tous ama pantas pur eathiei.
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