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San Giorgio in Velabro

9th-century churches in Italy9th-century establishments in ItalyChurches of Rome (rione Ripa)Religious buildings and structures completed in 847Titular churches
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SanGiorgio

San Giorgio in Velabro is a church in Rome, Italy, dedicated to St. George. The church is located next to the Arch of Janus in the rione of Ripa in the ancient Roman Velabrum. According to the founding legend of Rome, the church was built where Roman history began: it is near here that the mythical she-wolf found the mythical babies, Romulus and Remus. The façade of the church encroaches upon and incorporates the ancient Arcus Argentariorum. San Giorgio in Velabro is the station church for the first Thursday in Lent.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article San Giorgio in Velabro (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

San Giorgio in Velabro
Via del Velabro, Rome Municipio Roma I

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N 41.889530555556 ° E 12.483136111111 °
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San Giorgio in Velabro

Via del Velabro
00153 Rome, Municipio Roma I
Lazio, Italy
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Arch of Janus
Arch of Janus

The Arch of Janus is the only quadrifrons triumphal arch preserved in Rome. It was set up at a crossroads at the northeastern limit of the Forum Boarium, close to the Velabrum, over the Cloaca Maxima drain that went from the Forum to the River Tiber. It was built in the early 4th century CE, using spolia, i.e. material from earlier buildings, including bricks, together with pottery shards, and was covered with white marble, also from earlier buildings. The exact significance of the arch is poorly understood: it is thought to have been a boundary marker rather than a triumphal arch. An alternative view is that it was built to provide shelter for the traders at the Forum Boarium cattle market. Some researchers believe it was dedicated to Constantine I or Constantius II and was known as the Arch of the deified Constantine. It is 16 meters high and 12 meters wide. Each pier of the arch has two rows of three niches. It seems logical that statues would have filled these 48 niches but none has been identified. The stone at the apex of the central arch on the north side is thought to depict Minerva, although others believe it may be Palladium. Its current name probably dates from the Renaissance or later, and was not used to describe it in classical antiquity. The name is derived from the structure's four-fronted, four-arched configuration. The ancient Roman god Janus (Ianus Quadrifons), was sometimes depicted with four faces and there are Janus-related structures mentioned in historic descriptions of ancient Rome. In the Middle Ages, the Frangipane family transformed the building into a fortress, and so it survived intact until 1830. Then, the attic and top were torn down because they were erroneously believed to not belong to the original structure. However, there is a staircase within the north-west pier which would have given access to this top floor. Iron pins originally held together the marble blocks but were removed in the Middle Ages, leading to the monument's present pock-marked look. Fragments of the dedicatory inscription are still preserved inside the nearby church of San Giorgio in Velabro. The arch has not been accessible to the public since the explosion of a bomb in front of San Giorgio in Velabro, on the night of 27 July 1993. It is the one monument of the Forum Boarium that remains unrestored. The Arch of Malborghetto, just outside Rome, also includes the remnants of a former Roman quadrifons arch.

Temple of Cybele (Palatine)
Temple of Cybele (Palatine)

The Temple of Cybele or Temple of Magna Mater was Rome's first and most important temple to the Magna Mater ("Great Mother"), who was known to the Greeks as Cybele. It was built to house a particular image or form of the goddess, a meteoric stone brought from Greek Asia Minor to Rome in 204 BC at the behest of an oracle and temporarily housed in the goddess of Victory's Palatine temple. The new temple was dedicated on 11 April 191 BC, and Magna Mater's first Megalesia festival was held on the temple's proscenium.The temple was sited on the high western slope of the Palatine, overlooking the valley of the Circus Maximus and facing the temple of Ceres on the slopes of the Aventine. It was accessible via a long upward flight of steps from the flattened area or proscenium below, where the goddess's festival games and plays were staged. The goddess's altar was visible both from the proscenium and the temple's interior. The original temple burned down in 111 BC, and was restored by one Metellus, possibly Gaius Caecilius Metellus Caprarius. It burned on a further two occasions in the early Imperial era, and was restored each time by Augustus; his second rebuilding was probably the more sumptuous of the two.The temple was 33.18 metres deep, and its frontage 17.10 metres wide, accessed by steps of the same width. It was built in the prostyle hexastyle of the Corinthian order. The whole was supported by a massively walled, stucco-faced podium of irregular, thickly mortared tufa and peperino. A coin of Faustina the Elder is thought to show the same temple, with curved roof and a flight of steps. At the top of the steps is a statue of Cybele enthroned, with a turreted crown and lion attendants. This is consistent with a colossal, fragmentary statue of the goddess, found within the temple precincts. The goddess' meteoric stone may have been kept on a pedestal within the temple cella; or incorporated into the face of a statue and set on a pediment. The temple pediment is shown on the Ara Pietatis relief, which represents Magna Mater in aniconic mode; her empty throne and crown are flanked by two figures of Attis reclining on tympanons; and by two lions who eat from bowls, as if tamed by the goddess' unseen presence.The temple remained in use until the late 4th century. It was destroyed in 394 AD, on the orders of Emperor Theodosius I during the Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire.

Temple of Victory

The Temple of Victory (Latin: templum Victoriae) is a temple on the Palatine Hill in Rome. It was dedicated to the Roman goddess of Victory. It is traditionally ascribed to Evander, but was actually built by Lucius Postumius Megellus out of fines he levied during his aedileship and dedicated by him on 1 August when consul in 294 BC. This temple was used to house Cybele's sacred stone between 204 BC and 191 BC, while her own nearby temple was still being built and Cato the Elder afterwards built a shrine of Victoria Virgo next to the temple of Victory. If still in use by the 4th-century, it would have been closed during the persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire. It was in the Temple of Victory that the spoils of war from Roman victories were eventually deposited. Some of its notable contents came from the spoils of Titus from the Temple of Jerusalem which remained deposited in the Temple of Victory until it was looted by the Vandals in the 5th century and subsequently taken to Africa. The golden roof of the temple was also removed by the barbarians during their pillage of Rome. There is no record of any restoration of this temple and its exact site is still uncertain. See CJ 1920, 297, where Chase states that Boni identified this temple with foundations found near the arch of Titus. It was doubtless on the Clivus Victoriae, and remains of two dedicatory inscriptions. found about 50 metres west of the present church of San Teodoro, may indicate its position.