The Capitoline Hill Piazza Tomb of Venezia Bibulus the Capitoline Hill Via Dei Fori Imperiali

34 Blue Guide Rome 35 ThE CApiToLinE hiLL piazza Tomb of venezia Bibulus The Capitoline Hill Via dei Fori Imperiali The political and religious centre of ancient Rome and the seat of civic government Vittoriano Via since the end of the 11th century of the modern era, this little hill, with views directly over di San forum of caesar the Roman Forum, has the city’s historic collections of beautiful ancient sculpture. Clivus Argentarius Pietro in Santi Luca Carcere e Martina ocated in the heart of the city (map p. 654, C3), the Capitoline Hill (Campidoglio) F is the best place to start a visit to Rome. Today it preserves its ancient feeling of piazza pride, combined with a sense of intimate elegance provided by the little piazza d’aracoeli L Tullianum created by Michelangelo on its summit. Here, around the famous equestrian monu- E ment to Marcus Aurelius, stand the town hall of Rome and the Capitoline Museums, with the city’s superb collections of Classical sculpture—the arrangement still reflects Cordonata piazza del D A roman their history as the oldest public collection in the world. There are delightful peaceful Roman Via campidoglio Temple of forum tenement gardens off the quiet street which encircles the top of the little hill, from which there delle Tre Vespasian Temple of are superb views of the city and of the Roman Forum. B Via Campidoglio Saturn Pile HISTORY OF THE CAPITOLINE HILL The smallest of the seven hills of Rome, the Capitoline Hill is nevertheless the most Capitolinus important. Excavations have proved that it was the first place in Rome to be settled C Clivus at the end of the Bronze Age (1300 bc). During the early 6th century bc the construc- Via del Monte Tarpeio Temple of tion of a huge temple was begun on its southern summit (the Capitolium). It was dedi- Jupiter Via di Via cated to Jupiter, Juno and Minerva in 509 bc and remains of its foundations can still be seen (see p. 44). The northern summit of the hill was occupied by the Arx, or citadel Giove Villa Caffarelli of Rome, and in 343 bc, on the highest point of the hill here, a temple was dedicated to Juno Moneta. The temple was guarded by geese which were sacred to the goddess. In Via del Tarpeian Rock the middle of a dark night in the same century, it was their honking which alerted the Teatro Via del Tempio di Romans to an attempt on the hill by the Gauls, and all was saved, although the rest of the city was sacked. The name Moneta came to be connected with the mint established di Marcello here (and hence our word ‘money’). monte caprino gardens By the 8th century ad the site of this temple had been occupied by the church of Aracoeli, which was used as the meeting-place of the Roman Council. Because of its A Palazzo Senatorio historic position, the fortress close by (now Palazzo Senatorio) was chosen as the seat B Palazzo dei Conservatori of the newly-formed senate of the comune of Rome in the 12th century. From the mid- C Palazzo Caffarelli-Clementino forum 14th century onwards the governing magistrates (the ‘Conservators’) of the city car- boarium D Tabularium E Palazzo nuovo ried out their administrative duties in Palazzo dei Conservatori, though they exercised F Santa Maria in Aracoeli effective power only for some hundred years, sinceNicholas V saw to it that the papacy took control of the city in the middle of the following century, when he had the palace 118 Blue Guide Rome San Pietro in Vincoli 119 Michelangelo’s Moses mortal flesh, and they were to be alternated with figures of Victory (one was partially The tomb of Pope Julius II, the famous unfinished masterpiece of Michelangelo, who realised and is in Palazzo Vecchio in Florence). The programme of the whole structure was so harassed while working on it that he called it the ‘tragedy of a sepulchre’, is at could be seen therefore as an allegory of the ascent of the soul, from its battles against the end of the south aisle. Hindered by quarrels with the pope and by the jealousy of the bonds of the flesh, up through the purification afforded by the teachings of the his successors, Michelangelo finally abandoned work on the tomb and the great pon- Church, to its final emancipation in death. tiff, who had contemplated for himself the most splendid monument in the world, lies After Julius died in 1513, the project lost momentum and was eventually reduced to uncommemorated in St Peter’s. Some 40 statues were to have decorated the tomb, no more than a small façade on a wall, in which assistants contributed major elements. including the two Slaves now in the Louvre and the four unfinished Slaves in the Only the Moses, on the insistence of the trustees of the will, was included from the Accademia Gallery in Florence, but no idea of the original design can be gained from original project. N.McG. the surviving unsatisfactory grouping. Only a few statues remain here, notably the magnificent Moses, in whose majestic glance is seen the prophet who spoke with God. other works of art in the church The satyr-like horns represent beams of light, a traditional attribute of the prophet in In the chapel to the right of the sanctuary (behind glass) is a beautiful painting of medieval iconography, based on a mistranslation of the Hebrew word for the radiance St Margaret by Guercino. The bishop’s throne in the apse is a marble chair brought that emanated from Moses’ head after his interview with the Almighty (it was con- from a Roman bath. The 19th-century baldacchino over the high altar is by Virginio fused with the Hebrew word for horns). The figures ofLeah and Rachel on either side— Vespignani. In the confessio below are the chains of st Peter displayed in a 19th- symbols of the active and contemplative life—are also by Michelangelo. The rest is his century casket in a tabernacle with beautiful bronze doors (1477) attributed to pupils’ work, although the effigy of the pope himself was attributed by some scholars Caradosso—however these are not usually visible since they are kept open. to Michelangelo during restoration work in 1999. The pose is based on the reclining figures on Etruscan tombs. TheProphet and Sibyl are by Raffaello da Montelupo. THE CHAINS OF ST PETER THE TOMB OF POPE JULIUS II The project for the tomb of Pope Julius II stretched over 40 years of Michelangelo’s The two chains with which St Peter was career (between 1505 and 1545) and was in constant transformation during that supposedly fettered in the Carcer (or period. The changes it underwent are documented in six surviving contracts, each Tullianum; see p. 63) are said to have been of which successively reduced the scale of the original scheme. At its inception, the taken to Constantinople. In 439 Juvenal, plan was to create one of the grandest Christian tombs ever built, to be placed above Bishop of Jerusalem, gave them to the Empress the sepulchre of St Peter at the centre of St Peter’s basilica. It was Pope Julius who Eudoxia, wife of Theodosius the Younger. She had conceived and begun the building of the new St Peter’s; after his death it was to placed one of them in the Church of the Holy become an everlasting mausoleum to himself. What we see now is a deflated and ill- Apostles at Constantinople and sent the other proportioned shadow of that project: the artist himself would acknowledge as much. to Rome for her daughter, also Eudoxia, the The exact design of the original plan is not clear: but we know that it was to have wife of Valentinian III, who was Emperor of the been a massive, free-standing structure with three tiers in pyramidal arrangement, Western Empire (425–55). In 442 the younger surrounding an internal chamber. At the summit was to have been either the pope’s Eudoxia gave the chain to St Leo I (pope 440– sarcophagus or a seated effigy of the pope. Below this, on the middle level, were the 61) and built this church (called the Basilica figures of Moses and St Paul (emblems of the two Testaments), paired with a sibyl Eudoxiana or St Peter ad Vincula: ‘St Peter in Bonds’) to house it. Later the second and a prophet: of these, the Moses (1515) alone remains. On the lowest level was chain was sent to Rome. On being brought together, the two chains are said to have an allegorical arrangement playing on the way Classical and antique architecture miraculously united. They have ever since been amongst the most revered relics in any uses human figures as architectural elements: in Michelangelo’s conception, the church in Rome. figures were not just supporting the cornice but were miraculously coming to life and breaking free of their bonds. Sometimes called ‘slaves’ or ‘prisoners’, sometimes referred to as ‘dying’ and at other times as ‘awakening’, these powerful figures of In the tiny crypt (closed) there is a fine late 4th-century Roman sarcophagus with New male nudes are seen by some as representing the provinces subjugated by Julius, the Testament scenes, for long thought to contain the relics of the seven Jewish Maccabee warrior pope, and by others as personifying the Liberal Arts, awakened during his brothers (1st century bc). These martyrs are interesting as the only figures in the enlightened reign.

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