THERMAE SURANAE
baths on the Aventine in
Region XIII (Not. Cur.
Reg. XIII and Append.), which were built by Licinius Sura, the fellow-countryman and friend of Trajan (Cass.
Dio lxviii. 15:
ὅστις ἐς τοῦτο καὶ πλούτου καὶ αὐχήματος ἀφίκετο ὥστε καὶ γυμνάσιον ῾Ρωμαίοις οἰκοδομῆσαι,
if
γυμνάσιον here means thermae;
1 cf.
THERMAE COMMODIANAE), or by
Trajan himself and dedicated in the name of his friend (Vict. Caes. 13;
Epit. 13). This establishment is represented on fragments of the Marble
Plan (FUR 41, 258, 329, 387; Atti del Congresso storico i. 49), and its
site is thereby identified with that of the modern restaurant of the
Castello dei Cesari, just north of S. Prisca, where some remains have
been found and a fragmentary inscription (
CIL vi. 1703) recording the
restoration of a cella tepidaria by Caecina Decius Acinatius Albinus,
praefectus urbi in 414 A.D. (cf., however, Merlin 433, who makes this
inscription refer to the thermae Decianae). A previous restoration by
the third Gordian is proved by the discovery in 1920 in S. Sabina of part
of a marble block, probably the architrave over a door, with a fragmentary
inscription-
Imp. Caes. Marcus Antonius [Gordianus Augustus] Balneum
Surae o[rnandum curavit]-in which this restoration of the text seems
justified, especially when compared with a passage from Hist. Aug.
Gord. 32. 5:
Opera Gordiani Romae nulla extant praeter quaedam
nymphia et balneas. sed balneae privatis hominibus fuerunt et ab eo in
usum privatum exornatae sunt (
NS 1920, 141-142). This Sura had a
house on the Aventine, presumably close to the thermae (
Mart. vi. 64.
12-13), or perhaps converted into them by Trajan (but see
RE xiii. 481-2).
The latter are not mentioned after the fourth century (HJ 156-157;
Merlin 314-316 and older literature cited; cf.
BC 1914, 348, for the
Renaissance conjecture Varianae for Severianae).
