META SUDANS
* a large fountain just south-west of the Colosseum, thought
to stand at the meeting-point of five of the regions of Augustus,
I,
II,
III,
IV,
X. It is said to have been built by Domitian in 96 A.D. (Chron.
146), a date which corresponds with the style of brickwork (
AJA 1912,
413). In shape it resembled a goal in the circus (meta) and sudans
described the appearance of the jets of water.2 That the name was not
an unusual one is shown by the fact that there was one at Baiae (Sen. Ep.
56. 4). This fountain is represented on a coin of Alexander Severus
(Cohen 468, 469), and it is mentioned in Not. (Reg. IV) and in
Eins. (8. 15). The core still stands, conical in shape,
1 metres high
and 5 in diameter at the bottom. Around the base is a great basin,
21 metres in diameter, probably of the time of Constantine. The whole
structure was originally covered with marble (HJ 23; NA Sept. 1, 1908,
110-116;
NS 1909, 428). Its name may be preserved in that of the
church of S. Maria de Metrio, which was situated in this district, and is
mentioned in the catalogues and in bulls of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries. Hilsen proposes to identify it with the church on the south-
west of the Sacra via, on the way up to the arch of Titus, which LR
(170, 201) calls S. Cesareo;
2 cf. HJ 24; HCh 345-346; Arm. 522.
