The Area of Imperial Fora Between Modern and Ancient Urban Landscape1
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The area of Imperial Fora between Modern and Ancient urban landscape1 Fabio Giorgio Cavallero A story through images: compare to perceive It would be difficult to suppose the total destruction of a 100.000 sq. m. block, like the one that includes the area of Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II, for the construction of new public buildings nowadays. On the contrary, it wasn’t par- ticularly hard for Augustus and his successors the edification of monumental huge complexes in the heart of the ancient town, that caused the cancellation of the preexisting topographic arrangement. We can only imagine the impact that the Fora had on the previous urban texture, as we can simply suppose the change in the perception of the spaces after their construction. Of course, nobody has lived long enough to see how the shape of the town has changed during the near- ly two centuries from the edification of the Forum of Caesar (46 B.C.) and the Trajan one (112-113 A.D.), and the following Temple (125-138 A.D.) dedicated to him by Hadrian. But, trying to figure it out, we can understand how from a set full of footpaths, little streets, perhaps almost alleys among public buildings (“full urban”, in urban architectonic terms), it changed into big monumental squares (“urban void”). A heterogeneous landscape made of insulae, domus, workshops, streets, little squares and markets was indeed replaced by the mag- nificence and regularity of the Fora wanted by Caesar. 2 According to Paul Zanker “the overall image of a town in a particular historic situation represents an effective system of visual communication, that because of its continuous pres- ence can influence, also at an unconscious level, the inhabitants”.3 If it is true then, the heart of the town, at the end of this urban process, in addition to have been changed into a new showcase of the power, has become the place of the 1 This paper is part of a study on the Imperial Fora, whose first result was the reconstruction of the com- plexes present in the Atlante di Roma Antica (Carandini and Carafa, 2012). Now, all the authors are publishing the articles on each monument, where they explain all the choices that led to the different reconstructive hypothesis. 2 Their addition in the urban landscape meant also the upsetting of the “diversified series of boundaries that, during the different periods, marked and ruled” this area of the town (Palombi, 2008: 300). 3 Zanker, 1989: 23. The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero imperial memory.4 What Plato attributed to the Greek temple was similarly ap- plicable to the Fora complex.5 Indeed, they were the “canonized codification of the cultural (Roman) grammar”, that was able to influence both the “act” and the “behavior” of the Urbe inhabitants.6 In few words, the central area had be- come a subtle and effective way for selecting what should have been remem- bered. The royal power legitimized itself with a mythic and historic past, trans- forming the urban landscape into a tangible sign through great complexes that included, at the same time, both the cultural and the communicative memory.7 In short, the emperors had created an alliance between power and memory, taking possession not only of the mythic and historic past, but also of the future. In fact, if “the power is retrospectively legitimated and prospectively immortalized” then, in little more than two hundred years, they had settled the central area of the town “in view of the eternity”.8 Therefore, the imperial power generated, legitimized, celebrated and perpetuated itself with huge monuments of “propaganda”, set where the events of the city life, such as the processes in the court of the Forum of Augustus9 or the slaves liberations in Trajan one,10 used to take place. For nearly two hundred years, as it often happens, power and architecture, power and urbanity inter- twined with one another. Eighteen centuries later they retied again, when an op- eration which was similar in materials, but ideologically distant, took place in only nine years destroying the flesh of the urban texture that had started its for- mation in the end of the 16th century. It has already been recognized that: “in the history of the town, the impact that the insertion of the forensic squares had on the Ancient Rome urban landscape, can be compared with the demolition and the excavation of Medieval and Modern blocks that was promoted by the Fascist regime for the monumental setting of Via dell’Impero and the archaeological area of the same forum”.11 Furthermore, also in this case, a long process had fin- ished with the construction of an urban landscape that, at the moment of the po- litical regime change, was sacrificed on behalf of its own exaltation in front of the history.12 So, if we compare to perceive, then it will be useful to take a “guided tour” in the area that underwent the deconstruction operations wanted 4 On the meaning of the memorial sites see Connerton, 2010. For an analysis of the meaning in ancient time see La Rocca, 2007; 2004, all with previous bibliography. 5 Assman, 1997: 247. 6 It is the same mechanism recognized by Assman (1997: 247) for the Egyptian temple. 7 On the concept of cultural and communicative memory see Assman, 1997. 8 Cic. de Orat. II.40, 196. 9 Svet. Aug. 29.1-2. 10 Hist. Aug. Comm. 2.1; Sid. Apol. Carm. 2.544-545. 11 Palombi, 2005a: 21. 12 See infra Carafa. - 146 - The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero by Mussolini. That will make it possible the contemplation of the big heteroge- neity that was demolished by the “pickaxe of the Regime”, helping in a better comprehension of such a radical change like the one that brought to the “redis- covery” of the imperial squares. It is important in order to better perceive how their construction radically influenced the central area of the ancient town, where gradually toponyms and buildings, whose functions sometimes were transferred in each Forum, disappeared. So, the history of the central area will be reconstructed from the Pre-urban period up to the Late Republican one, when Iulius Caesar, with the construction of his Forum, started the demolition work of the old district that sprang up from the Middle- Republican period.13 Finally, we will try to define how people previously living in the de- stroyed districts, who had got to be re-located, reacted against the disappearance of places and buildings so deeply connected to their personal experience and every-day life until the appearance of the new landscape (Regret Process). 1. The Alessandrino district: a guided tour Arriving in Rome from Porta del Popolo they passed through the Corso up to Piazza Venezia. From here, taking Via di Macel de’ Corvi, where there was the little San Lorenzo ai Monti church, they would enter the district getting to the Trajan’s Column square (Fig. 1). Passed the square there was the begin- ning of Via Alessandrina, the major road of the whole area. Here the tramlines were paved streets (Fig. 2) overlooked by three or four floor buildings hosting bars, dry cleaners, clobbers, dental offices, banks (Fig. 3) and the grand Medie- val complex of S. Urbano ai Pantani, firstly repaired in the 17th century and then demolished in 1933. Going on they crossed Via dei Carbonari, that would con- tinue on the Salita del Grillo, and Via Bonella. At this corner the first shop that they could see along Via di Tor dei Conti was a drugstore (Fig. 4), accessible crossing the arch of the Pantani (Fig. 5), one of the ancient gates of the Forum of Augustus. Then, after a grocer’s shop (Fig. 6), they could see the Church of the Annunziata, whose baroque portal opened in the ancient delimitation wall be- tween the Forum of Augustus and the Subura (Fig. 7) at the back. Going down towards the Torre dei Conti they would reach Via della Croce Bianca. The street used to pass behind the Southern exedra of the Forum of Augustus overlooked by humble multi storey houses with balconies and added storey in wood (Fig. 8). 13 For the report on the phases after the installation of the first Fora, from the Medieval and the Renais- sance period to the years of the Fascism, see Cavallero in preparation. For a reconstruction of Imperial Fora’s architectures, see Cavallero, 2012: 207-214 with previous bibliography. - 147 - The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero Fig. 1. Trajan’s Column square. Fig. 2. Via alessandrina. Tram on paved street. Fig. 3. Via Alessandrina. From right: bank, block, shop. - 148 - The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero Fig. 4. Via Tor dei Conti, at the corner a Drugstore. Fig. 5. Arch of the Pantani. - 149 - The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero Fig. 6. The grocer’s shop behind the Forum of Au- gustus. Fig. 7. The baroque portal of the Church of the An- nunziata. Fig. 8. Multi storey houses behind the southern exe- dra of the Forum of Augustus. - 150 - The area of Imperial Fora F.G. Cavallero Fig. 9. So called “Colonnacce”. At the end the tavern called “Tempio di Nerva”. Fig. 10. Multi storey houses in Via Cremona. Then, retracing the old route of the Argiletum the street used to cross Via Alessandrina, where high buildings would overlook and connect with the Forum of Nerva. The so-called “colonnacce” still held up the old frieze with the myth of Arachne, concluding the story near to the tavern called “Tempio di Nerva” (Fig.