SATURNUS, ARA
a very ancient altar, which the antiquarians dated from
before the Trojan war (Fest. 322:
in imo clivo Capitolino ... ubi ara
dicata ei deo ante bellum Troianum videtur), and even ascribed to
Hercules (Dionys. vi. I. 4;
i. 34. 4:
τὸν βωμὸν ...ὃς ἔτι καὶ νῦν διαμένει παρὰ τῇ ῥιζῃ τοῦ λόφου κατὰ τὴν ἄνοδον τὴν ἀπὸ τῆς ἀγορᾶς φέρουσιϝ εἰς τὸ Καπιτώλιον;
Macrob. i. 8. 2:
habet aram et ante senaculum;
cf.
Solin. i. 12). The site of the altar is described in exactly the same
words as that of the later temple (see below), and as it was standing
when Dionysius wrote, it must have been very close to the temple, and
have been preserved until the great changes of the early empire in this
part of the forum caused its removal. It is not possible to decide on which
side of the temple it was (for the literature see
AEDES SATURNI).
