ARGILETUM
the street between the Subura and the forum, which
it entered between the Curia and the basilica Aemilia (
Liv. i. 19. 2;
Serv. ad
Aen. vii. 607).
1 The lower part of the Argiletum, which had
been occupied by private houses (Cic.
Att. i. 14. 7 ;
xii. 32. 2), was converted by Domitian and Nerva into the forum Transitorium. The name
was probably derived from the clay (argilla) that was dug near by,
although other explanations, more or less fanciful, were current in
antiquity (Varro,
LL v. 157; Serv. ad
Aen. viii. 345; cf. Mart.
Cap. iii.
273). It was one of the great arteries of communication in Rome, and
a centre of trade, but not by any means the centre of the book trade;
it also bore a somewhat unsavoury reputation (
Mart. i. 3. I; 117, 8-11;
ii. 17; cf. i. 2. 7, 8;
Jord. i. 2. 347-351 ; HJ 327;
CP 1914, 77-78; DR
513-514. For its course in the period of Sulla see
JRS 1920, 16).
