IULIUS, DIVUS, AEDES
(delubrum, Pl.;
ἡρῷον, Cass. Dio;
νεώς, App.):
the temple of the deified Julius Caesar, authorised by the triumvirs in
42 B.C. (Cass.
Dio xlvii. 18), but apparently built by Augustus alone
(Mon.
Anc. iv. 2:
aedem divi Iuli ... feci), and dedicated 18th August,
29 B.C. (Cass.
Dio li. 22; Hemerol. Amit. Antiat. ad xv Kal. Sept.).
The body of Caesar was burnt at the east end of the forum, in front of
the Regia (Liv. ep. 116; Plut. Caes. 68), and here an altar was at once
erected (
βωμός, App.
BC i. 4;
ii. 148;
iii. 2), and a column of Numidian
marble twenty feet high inscribed Parenti Patriae (Suet. Caes. 85).
Column and altar were soon removed by Dolabella
1 (Cic. ad
Att. xiv. 15;
Phil. i. 5), and it was on this site that the temple was afterwards built
(App. locc. citt.; Cass.
Dio xlvii. 18). From the evidence of coins,
2 the
temple was restored by Hadrian
(Cohen, Hadrien 416-419, 1388), but
the existing architectural fragments belong entirely to the original
structure (
Toeb. i. 5). It had the right of asylum (Cass.
Dio xlvii. 19),
and the Arval Brethren met there in 69 A.D. (Act. Arv. a. 69, Febr. 26,
CIL vi. 2051, 55).
A considerable part of the foundations, already uncovered (
LS ii. 197),
and the evidence of the coins of Hadrian, enabled Richter in 1889 to
reconstruct the temple in its main lines (Jahr. d.
Inst. 1889, 137-162;
Ant.
Denkmiler i. 27, 28), and additional information was given by the
excavations of 1898-1899 (
CR 1899, 185, 466;
Mitt. 1902, 61-62;
1905,
75-76;
BC 1903, 81-83; Atti 563-566). The temple consisted of two parts,
a rectangular platform 3.5 metres high, 26 wide, and about 30 long; and
on this the stylobate proper which rose 2.36 metres above the platform,
making the cella floor very high (Ov. ex
Ponto ii. 84: divus ab excelsa
Iulius aede videt;
Met. xv. 842), and was about 17 metres in width.
In the middle of the front of the platform is a semi-circular niche 8.3
metres in diameter, of which some of the peperino wall has been left in
place, and in this niche is a portion of the concrete core of a round altar
standing on the travertine slabs which formed the pavement of the forum
when the temple was built. The first altar therefore, which Dolabella
destroyed, must have been restored, and preserved in the niche of this
platform when the temple itself was built. This platform projected
beyond the stylobate on both sides for a distance of 7 metres, and the
projection was called rostra aedis divi Iuli (Frontin. de aq. 129; Cass.
Dio Ivi. 34:
ἔμβολα τὰ ᾿Ιουλίεια) because the wall on both sides of the
niche was decorated with the beaks of the ships captured at Actium
(Cass.
Dio li. 19) in a style similar to that of the old rostra. From this
rostra the emperors seem to have spoken frequently (Cass. Dio locc. citt.;
liv. 35; Suet. Aug. 100). There is some evidence in support of the view,
probable in itself, that Caesar had himself erected a second rostra at the
east end of the forum, which was represented by the rostra aedis divi
Iuli after the building of the temple (Liv. Ep. I 16; Richter, Gesch. d.
Rednerbiihne 52-53;
Gilb. iii. 167-168, 171-172).
The temple was Ionic, hexastyle, probably with antae, and pycnostyle,
that is, with intercolumnar spaces equal to one and a half diameters
(
Vitr. iii. 3. 2; Stat. Silv. i. I. 22-24). The columns were 1.18 metres in
diameter at the base, and their height was nine times the diameter.
The cella occupied the whole width of the temple, about 17 metres.
The space between the two middle columns of the pronaos was wider
than that between the others, and within the cella, opposite its entrance
and this wide intercolumniation, stood a colossal statue
3of Caesar with a
comet or star on its head, perhaps that referred to by Pliny (
NH ii. 93-94;
cf. Suet. Caes. 88, Ov.
Met. xv. 841-842 and Cass.
Dio xlv. 7. I). In
this temple Augustus placed treasures from the spoil that he had taken
(Mon.
Anc. iv. 24), and paintings of the Dioscuri, Victoria (Plin.
NH
xxxv. 27), and of Venus Anadyomene by Apelles (ib. 91). As this had
been injured by dampness, Nero replaced it by one by Dorotheus.
Remains of the concrete podium and of the architectural decoration
still exist; but the concrete core has been almost entirely stripped
of the stone walls by which it was originally enclosed (
Jord. i. 2. 406-409;
Thed. 153-156, 269-273; HC 155-159, Toeb. cit.; Fiechter in Zeitschr.
f. Gesch. d. Archit. viii.
(1924), 62-72;
Mitt. 1906, 276; DR 191-201;
RE
Suppl. iv. 508-510; ASA 72; HFP 14, 15).
