This Beautiful Specimen Of Ancient Architecture
Is Situated In A Small Piazza Or Square Called Piazza Della Rotonda,
Where A Market Of Poultry, Game, And Vegetables Is Held.
There are only now
three or four steps on the escalier to ascend, in order to enter into the
Portico; but as it is known that according to the descriptions of the
Pantheon in ancient times there was an immense flight of steps to ascend,
it is an additional proof how much the ground on which modern Rome stands
has been filled up, and consequently it is evident that the greater part of
this flight of steps remains still buried in the earth.
If I was so struck with the appearance of this interesting edifice outside,
how much more so should I have been on seeing the inside, were not the
niches, where formerly stood the statues of the Gods, filled with tawdry
dolls representing the Virgin Mary and he and she saints. The columns
and pilasters in the interior of this temple are beautiful, all of jaune
antique and one entire stone each. How much better would it have been to
replace the statues of the Dii Majorum Gentium which occupied the niches,
by statues in marble of the Apostles, instead of the dolls dressed in
tawdry colors, and the frippery gilding of the altars on which they stand,
which disfigure this noble building. The Pantheon was built by Agrippa as
the inscription shews. In the interior are sixteen columns of jaune
antique.
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