Velabrum
The Velabrum (Script error: No such module "IPA".) is the low valley in the city of Rome that connects the Forum with the Forum Boarium,[1] and the Capitoline Hill with the western slope of the Palatine Hill.[2] The outer boundaries of the area are not themselves clear. Roman etymologies of the name are confused, with attempts to connect it to the Latin words Script error: No such module "Lang". (conveyance) and Script error: No such module "Lang". (cloth): Varro, Propertius, and Tibullus claimed that it was the location of a ferry;Template:Sfn Plutarch, however, claimed the name derived from the awnings placed over the Circus Maximus during games.Template:Sfn The name may also translate to "place of mud".[3]
It was believed that before the construction of the Cloaca Maxima, which probably follows the course of an ancient stream called Spinon,[4] the area was a swamp,[5] though this claim has been disproven by core samples taken from Velabrum in 1994.[6] Varro claims there are two Script error: No such module "Lang"., one Script error: No such module "Lang". and one Script error: No such module "Lang"., with the smaller emerging from the drainage of a swamp close to the northern side of the Forum: if there was any drainage the distinction between the two was largely forgotten by the last century BC when it was referred to in the plural for both.Template:Sfn Ancient authoritiesTemplate:Which state that in this marshy area, the roots of a fig tree (Ficus Ruminalis) caught and stopped the basket carrying Romulus and Remus as it floated along on the Tiber current.[3] The place therefore has a high symbolic significance.
It was also used as a marketplace and a centre of commerce, connecting the Palatine with the two major fora.Template:Sfn[7][8] Plautus (Captivi 489) mentions it as a place where oil-sellers were found, and a scholiast (ancient commentator) on Horace (Satires 2.3.229) states: "Velabrum is a place in Rome where everything connected with food and delicacies was on sale."[9]
Even after the Cloaca was built, the area was still prone to flooding from the Tiber,[10] until the ground level was raised after the Neronian fire.
Within it were the tomb of Acca Larentia along with a small temple to Felicitas.Template:Sfn It is also the site of the Arch of Janus, the Arcus Argentariorum and the church San Giorgio al Velabro.[11]
References
Bibliography
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- ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Roma: la valle del Velabro, il Tevere e il canale idraulico dei Tarquini prima della Cloaca Massima; Elisabetta Bianchi, Piero Bellotti; IX Convegno Nazionale di Speleologia in Cavità Artificiali; Opera Ipogea, 1-2/2020, p83
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- ↑ W. M. Lindsay (1900), Plauti Captivi, p. 238.
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