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LATERANI, DOMUS

* under the church of S. John Lateran, to which it gave its name.1 The house was presented to T. Sextius Lateranus, consul in 197 A.D., by his friend, the Emperor Septimius Severus (Vict. Epit. 20; CIL xv. 7536). It is probable, if not certain, that this was the egregiae Lateranorum aedes (Juv. x. 17) that belonged to Plautius Lateranus, who was executed by Nero for complicity in the conspiracy of Piso (see L. LUSIUS PETELLINUS, DOMUS), and that it was simply restored to the Laterani by Severus. The greater part of the remains that have been found belong to this period, including two rooms with mosaic pavement found under the pavement of the baptistery in 1924.

Although ordinarily called domus Laterana (Hist. Aug. M. Ant. I), it must have fallen again into imperial hands, for Constantine presented it to Pope Miltiades in 313 A.D., after which time it continued to be the official residence of the popes until it was destroyed by the gradual enlargement of the Lateran basilica (LR 341-345 ; Ann. d. Inst. 1877, 332-384; HJ 243; LS iii. 80; Homo, Aur6lien, 252-3; Lauer, Le Latran, 1-20; DAP 2. xv. 282-284; Wilpert, Mosaiken und Malereien i. 127-148 (for the painting of Roma from this house); YW 1924-5, 86).

1 HCh 272; cf. also S. Pancratius in Laterano, frequently mentioned in the eighth and ninth centuries (HCh 409).

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313 AD (1)
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