This Ancient Road Is At Least Thirty Feet Below The Surface
Of The Present Road And The Ground About It.
This shows how the ground must
have been filled up by the destruction of buildings at the different
sackings of Rome and the consequent accumulation of rubbish.
The French
when they were here began these excavations and the Duchess of Devonshire
continues them.[86] It is useful in every way; it employs a number of poor
people and may be the means of discovering some valuable remains of
antiquity and objects of art. At any rate it is highly gratifying to have
discovered the identical road to the Capitol on which so many Consuls,
Dictators and Emperors moved in triumph, and so many captive Kings wept in
chains.
We then ascended the steps that lead to the modern Capitol and mounted on
the Campanile of the same, from whence there is a superb panoramic view
of Rome. On descending from the Campanile, we visited the Tarpeian rock,
which is now of inconsiderable height, the ground about it and heaps of
rubbish having filled up the abyss below. We then entered the court yard of
the Capitol. The Capitol and building annexed to it form three sides of a
rectangle, the centre or corps de logis lying North and South, and the
wings East and West, the whole inclosing a court yard open on the South
side of the rectangle, from whence you descend into the street on the plain
below, by a most magnificent escalier or flight of steps. Of the Capitol,
the corps de logis or central building to which the Campanile belongs,
is reserved for the occupation and habitation of the Senator Romano, a
civil magistrate, corresponding something to the mayor in France or
Oberbuergermeister in the German towns, and who is chosen from among the
nobility and nominated by the Pope. The wings contain the Museum
Capitolinum of painting and sculpture. There is a great deal to call forth
the admiration of the traveller in the court yard of the Capitol. The most
prominent object is the famous bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius,
which cannot fail to rivet the attention of the least enthusiastic
spectator. I observed at each angle of the facade of the Capitol a colossal
statue of a captive King in a Phrygian dress; but still more striking than
these are the colossal statues of Castor and Pollux leading horses, which
stand a little in front of the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, and
nearer the escalier, the one on the right the other on the left. Two
lions in basalt on each side of the escalier are very striking objects,
and the escalier itself is the most superb thing of the kind perhaps in
the world. This escalier and the Marcus Aurelius, unique also in its
kind, are both the workmanship of Michael Angelo.[87] We descended this
escalier and then fronted it to take a view of the Capitol from the
bottom; but the statue of Marcus Aurelius is so prominent and so grand that
it absorbed all my attention.
After dinner I walked a little in the gardens on the Pincian hill, and then
visited some friends belonging to the French Academy of Painting and
Sculpture, who were so good as to shew me their productions, and also a
copy of the superb folio edition of Denon's work on Egypt which to me, who
had been in that country, was highly gratifying. Oh! what a pity that the
French could not keep that country! What a paradise they would have made of
it! As it is (and to their credit be it said) they did more good for the
country during three years only, than we have done for our possessions in
India for fifty years.
ROME, 15th Septr.
The next morning, after an early breakfast, I repaired to the Pantheon, now
called Santa Maria della Rotonda, and appropriated to the Catholic
worship. It is easily recognizable by its rotundity and by the simple
grandeur of its facade and portico. The bronze has been taken out of the
letters of the inscription. 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. The bronze that formerly ornamented this temple was made use of
to fabricate the baldachin of St Peter's. Of late years it has been the
fashion to erect monuments affixed to the walls of the interior of the
Pantheon to the memory of the great men and heroes of poetry, painting,
sculpture and music who were natives of Italy, or for foreigners,
celebrated for their excellence in those arts, who have died in Rome.
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