few cases it may be so; in most it is certainly otherwise. Either the
building was not there, or what we now behold is part of a
reconstruction or an enlargement. Fire, flood, earthquake and the wear
and tear of time called for many a rebuilding or restoration. In the
very year upon which we have fixed, there swept over all this part of
the city perhaps the most disastrous fire that it ever experienced.
Another only a little less destructive occurred in A.D. 283, and when
we say that the remains of the glory of ancient Rome are still visible
in the excavated Forum, we must recognise that the glory which they
represent is the glory of the place as restored after that year.

This does not mean that the general plan and appearance were markedly
different under Nero, nor that there was any lack of magnificence; it
is only meant by way of caution against a frequent misconception.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

If there was no Arch of Severus in the Forum, there was an Arch of
Augustus, near the Temple of Castor, surmounted by his statue in the
four-horsed chariot of the conqueror, and there was an Arch of
Tiberius near the temple of Saturn. If to the north there was as yet
no bridge or "castle" of Sant' Angelo to celebrate the dead Hadrian,
there was, on the near side of the Tiber, not far from the modern
Piazza del Popolo, a splendid Mausoleum of the deified Augustus and
his family. In the chief Forum the Temples of Vesta, of Julius Caesar,
of Castor, Saturn, and Concord existed under Nero in the same spots
and in much the same style as they did through all the remainder of
Roman history. Above them towered the Capitoline Hill, with its