HORTI SALLUSTIANI
the gardens of the historian Sallust in
Region VI.
It is possible that the nucleus of these gardens was the horti that Caesar
had owned ad portam Collinam (Ps. Cic. resp. in Sail. 19). Sallust spent
on them much of the wealth that he had amassed in Numidia, and they
probably remained in the family until the time of Tiberius (supra, p.
216, n. i ;
CIL vi. 9005), when they became imperial property (Tac.
Ann.
xiii. 47;
CIL vi. 5863, 8670-8672;
xv. 7249-7250;
Dig. xxx. 39. 8),
but they seem to have been open to some, if not to the general public
(Ps. Sen. ad Paul. I). They were a favourite resort of Vespasian (Cass.
Dio lxv. 10. 4) and Aurelian (Hist. Aug. Aurel. 49). Nerva died here
(Chron. 146), and they were still a resort in the fourth century (Incert.
auct. Panegyr. in Const. 14 (ed. Teubn. 300, 26)). In 410 they were
sacked by the Goths under Alaric (Procop. B.
Vand. i. 2).
In these gardens was a conditorium, or sepulchral vault (Plin.
NH
vii. 75), and aporticus Miliarensis (Hist. Aug. Aurel. 49), built by Aurelian,
in which he exercised himself and his horses. Miliarensis should mean a
thousand paces long, and a porticus of that length must have run about
the gardens in various directions. v. Domaszewski (
SHA 1916, 7. A, 13)
regards this as a mere invention from the similar portico in the domus
Aurea. There was also a temple to
VENUS HORTORUM SALLUSTIANORUM
(
CIL vi. 122, 32451, 32468;
BC 1885, 162), of which nothing more is
known. In the Acta martyrum (cf.
Jord. ii. 124-5, 185, 410 for literature) there are references to thermae, palatium, forum, tribunal and
pyramis Sallustii, names which were probably attached more or less
correctly to some of the buildings in these gardens. Of them the pyramis,
identical with that of Eins. (2. 7;
Jord. ii. 344; DAP. 2. ix. 396; cf.
however, Mon.
L. i. 460;
BC 1914, 373), is the obeliscus that was erected
in the post-Augustan age (Amm.
Marcell. xvii. 4. 16). (For history and
description of this obelisk, see
OBELISCUS HORTORUM SALLUSTIANORUM.)
The eastern boundary of these horti was probably the via Salaria
vetus, and the northern the line afterwards followed by the Aurelian
wall from the porta Salaria westward (Tac.
Hist. iii. 82;
CIL vi. 35243;
Jord. ii. 123;
Mitt. 1891, 268;
BC 1888, 9; HJ 433). On the south the
boundary must have run along the ridge of the Quirinal, close to the
FORTUNAE TRES (q.v.; cf. Anth. Pal. app. iv. 40), between the Servian
wall and the vicus portae Collinae (Via Venti Settembre). How far the
gardens stretched to the west is uncertain, but probably not beyond
the Piazza Barberini. This district was called Sallustricum in the Middle
Ages (Andreas Fulvius, Antiquitates, f. 24).
Within this area many works of art and remains of various structures
have been found-a hippodromus
1 in the valley between the Pincian and
Quirinal with walls and terraces extending up the slope of the latter
hill, a nymphaeum in the north-east part, and three piscinae (M6e. 1891,
167-170; LS passim; Schreiber, Villa Ludovisi, passim;
BC 1888, 3-11;
1902, 69;
1906, 159-185;
Mitt. 1889, 270-274;
1892, 313; HJ
434-5 and literature cited; Gilbert, iii. 376 and literature cited; Homo,
Aurelien 241; LR 415-421; PT 78-018, 158-159). The only ruins now
visible are those of a nymphaeum at the end of the via Sallustiana,
with an adjacent four-story building (Middleton, ii. 243-5, Rivoira,
RA 96-99, who attributes it to the reign of Vespasian).
