Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/1226

 1202 TIBUR. it away when he deprived the rest of the muni- cipal cities of it, with the esception of Anasjnia (Cic. pro Dom. 30), but it was probably regained on the abdication of the dictator. The treasure deposited at Tibur in the temple of Hercules was appropriated by Octavian during his war against Lucius Antonius, when so many other temples were plundered at Rome and in its neighbourhood. (A]jp. B. C. V. 24.) From this period we have no notices of Tibur till the time of the Gothic war in the 6th century of our era. During the siege of Eonie by Vitiges, Belisarius placed 500 men in it, ami afterwards garrisoned it with Isaurians. (Pi-o- cop. B. G. ii. 4.) But under bis successor Totila a party of the Tiburtines having introduced the Goths by night into the city, the Isaurians fled, and the Goths murdered many of the inhabitants with cir- cumstances of great cruelty {lb. iii. 10.) Great part of the city must have been destroyed on this occasion, since it appears further on (c. 24) that Totila having retired to Tivoli, after a vain attempt upon Rome, rebuilt the fortress. At present there are but few traces of the boun- daries of the ancient city ; yet there are certain points which, according to Nibby {Dintorni, iii. p. 186, seq.), enable us to determine the course of the walls with some degree of accuracy, and thus to es- timate its circumference, at all events during the time of its subjection to the Romans. These points are determined partly by the nature of the ground, partly by existing remains, and partly by positive tes- timony. The nature of the ledge upon which the town is built shows that the walls must have traversed the edge of it towards the N. and E.; and this as- sumption is confirmed by some remains. The two temples commonly known as those of the Sibyl and of Drusilla in the quarter called Castro Vetere, and the evident pains taken to isolate this part, indicate it to have been the ancient acropolis or ars, and probably the Siceliou of Dionysius. On the V. the boundary is marked by some remains of the walls and of the gate opening on the road to Rome. On investigating this track, we find that it inclined inwards towards the church of the Annunziala, leaving out all that part now occupied by the Villa dJEste and its appurtenances. From that church it proceeded towards the modern gate of Santa Croce and the citadel built by Pope Pius II. on the site of the ancient amphitheatre. Thence to the Anio two points serve to fix the direction of the walls: first, the church of S. Clemente, which was cer- tainly outside of them, since, according to the testimony of Marzi, some sepulchral stones were discovered there; second, the church of S. Vin- cenzo, which was certainly within them, as vestiges of ancient baths may still be seen at that spot. From the f irtress of Pius II. the wail seems to have proceeded in an almost direct line to the Anio be- tween the church of 5. Bavtolomineo and the mo- dern gate of S. Giovanni, It did not extend to the opposite bank, as a small sepulchre of the imperial times has recently been discovered there, at the spot where the tunnel for diverting the Anio was opened ; where also were found remains of an ancient bridge. Thus the plan of the city, with the abatement of some irregularities, formed two trapeziums joined togetiier at their smallest sides. The arx also formed a trapezium completely isolated, and was connected with the town by a bridge on the same site as tlie present one of S. Martina. The cir- cumference of the city, including the arx, was about TIBUR. 8000 Roman feet, or 1 1- miles. The remains of the wall which still exist are of three different epochs. The rarest and most ancient consist of trapezoidal masses. Others, near the Porta Romana or del Colle, are of opus incertum, and belong to the time of Sulla. The gate itself, though composed of qua- drilateral masses, is of the style of the gates of Rome of the age of Justinian. From the nature of the place and the direction of the ancient roads, Tibur must have had five gates; namely, three to- wards the W., one towards the S., and one towards the E., without couiiiing that which communicated with the citadel; but with the exception of the Re- atina, where the aqueduct called Anio Vetus began, their names are unknown, and even with regard to that the reading is doubtful. (Front. Aq. p. 30.) The ancient remains existing at Tivoli, to call them by the names under which they commonly pass, are, the temple and portico of Hercules, the temples of Vesta and Sibylla, the thermae or baths, the two bridges and the little tomb recently disco- vered, the temple of Tussis, the villas of Maecenas, of Varus, &c. Tibur was famed for the worship of Hercules, and hence the epithet of Herculean, so frequently ap- plied to it by the Roman poets (Prop. ii. 32. 5; Sil. It. iv. 224;'Mart. i. 1.3. 1, &c.; cf. Stat. Silv. iii. 1. 183.) The temple of that demigod at Tibur was, with the exception of the vast temple of Fortune at Praeneste, the most remarkable presented by any city in the neigbourhood of Rome. Thus Strabo (l. c.) mentions the Heracleum and the waterfall as the distinguishing features of Tibur, just as he alludes to the temple of Fortune as the principal object at Praeneste. And Juvenal (xiv. 86, seq.) censures the extravagance of Cetronius in building by saying that his villas at Tibur and Praeneste outdid the fanes of Hercules and Fortune at those places. The name of Heracleum used by Sirabo of the former, as well as the term refieios applied to it by Stephanus Byzantinus, show that it embraced a large tract of ground, and as Augustus is said to have frequently admini.-tered justice in its porticoes (Suet. Oct. 72), they must have been of considerable size. It possessed a library, which, however, in the time of the Antonines appears to have fallen into decay. (A. Gell. N. A. xix. 5.) We have already seen that it had a treasury. There was also an oracle, which, like that at Piaeneste, gave responses by means of sortes. (Stat. Silv. i. 3. 79.) Some antiquaries seek this vast temple behind the tri- bune of the present cathedral, where there are some remains of a circular cella composed of materials of a rhomboidal shape, thus marking the tran- sition in the mode of building which took place about the age of Augustus from the opus incertum to the opus reticulatum. But it would be difficult to regard these vestiges as forming part of a temple 150 feet in circumference; nor was it usual to erect the principal Christian church on the foundations of a heathen temple. Nibby therefore {Dintorni, iii. p. 193), after a careful investigation, and a comparison of the remains at Palestrina with those of the so- called villa of ^Maecenas at Tivoli, is inclined to re- gard the latter, which will be described further on, as belonging to the celebrated temple of Hercules. It is probable, however, that there were several tem- ples to that deity at Tibur, just as there were at Rome. The [irincipal one was doubtless that dedi- cated to Hercules Victor Tiburs; but there was also one of Hercules Saxanus, which will be described by