The Secret Lives of Buildings: From the Ruins of the Parthenon to the Vegas Strip in Thirteen Stories by Edward Hollis
Authors: Edward Hollis
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which all distances in the empire were measured, stood right by the gates where the chariots started their races.
The Hippodrome was also the treasure house of the empire. The
spina
and the starting gates were mounted with two obelisks and a whole menagerie of statuary: sphinxes, a column of brazen snakes twisted around one another, a colossal Hercules in bronze, an elephant wrought in the same material, a Nile horse with a scaly tail, a beautiful Helen of Troy, a she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus, and many more besides. Among them were at least three—and perhaps more—
quadrigae
of bronze horses, with another tethered to a gilded chariot that was kept inside the Milion.
On the day of triumph this gilded chariot would be coupled to a foursome of live horses, and a golden statue would be placed inside it. This statue showed Constantine, the founder of the city, dressed as Apollo, the sun god, and holding in his hand a little angel: the guardian spirit of the city. The divine founder was carried around the Hippodrome in his chariot, while the reigning emperor, dressed in gold and standing perfectly still, watched the ritual from his royal box. His attendant priests clouded him in incense and bells as if he were Jupiter the Greatest and Best himself.
I T HAD ALL happened before, for the
quadrigae
of the Hippodrome—and the bronze Hercules, and Romulus and Remus, and many other creatures of the Hippodrome’s menagerie—had presided over triumphs in the capital of still another republic for four hundred years. That’s what the citizens of Constantinople said, anyway, and the Venetians were only too willing to believe them.
Whenever a general—an imperator—achieved a particularly important victory against the barbarians, the Senate and the peoplewould grant him a triumph, and at the head of his army he would enter the city of Rome. All of these triumphs followed the route of the Via Sacra, the holy way that led into the city from the south: past the Colosseum, along the foot of the Palatine Hill, through the Forum, and up under the Tarpeian Rock to the Capitoline Hill, which was crowned with the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, the Greatest and Best. It was to Jupiter that the shackled barbarians would be brought, so that the proper sacrifices might be made: of their treasures in the temple, their families in the slave market, and their lives in the circus. Jupiter’s temple was hung with the chains of captives, the broken gates of cities, and the truncated deities of defeated republics.
After they had celebrated each triumph, the imperators of Rome would erect an arch over the Via Sacra so that their victories might be remembered. The arches looked like gaudy city gates, framed with Corinthian columns, bedecked with winged victories, and carved with reliefs and inscriptions depicting the exploits of the generals. (Some of those memorials still stand in Rome to this day: the Arch of Constantine records his victory at the battle of the Milvian Bridge, while the Arch of Titus depicts with casual pride the sack of the Temple of Jerusalem.) Because the generals had entered the city in chariots, each of their arches was surmounted by a sculpture of horses drawing just such a vehicle. There must have been hundreds of these
quadrigae
.
Then the imperators of Rome had their images stamped on coins and carved in marble. They had the sculptors twist their bull necks into the postures of Grecian heroes, lift their dull eyes as if in divine contemplation, and cover their shaven heads in curly wigs—tousled, they hoped, by the winds of history.
I T HAD ALL happened before. The Venetians, the Constantinopolitans, and the Romans all used to tell a story about the origin of their
quadrigae
; or, at least, they dimly remembered the last time these horses had run with heroes.
When he was young, and before all his triumphs, Alexander loved horses. Indeed, he came of a royal line that loved them. One day, his father,
The Hippodrome was also the treasure house of the empire. The
spina
and the starting gates were mounted with two obelisks and a whole menagerie of statuary: sphinxes, a column of brazen snakes twisted around one another, a colossal Hercules in bronze, an elephant wrought in the same material, a Nile horse with a scaly tail, a beautiful Helen of Troy, a she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus, and many more besides. Among them were at least three—and perhaps more—
quadrigae
of bronze horses, with another tethered to a gilded chariot that was kept inside the Milion.
On the day of triumph this gilded chariot would be coupled to a foursome of live horses, and a golden statue would be placed inside it. This statue showed Constantine, the founder of the city, dressed as Apollo, the sun god, and holding in his hand a little angel: the guardian spirit of the city. The divine founder was carried around the Hippodrome in his chariot, while the reigning emperor, dressed in gold and standing perfectly still, watched the ritual from his royal box. His attendant priests clouded him in incense and bells as if he were Jupiter the Greatest and Best himself.
I T HAD ALL happened before, for the
quadrigae
of the Hippodrome—and the bronze Hercules, and Romulus and Remus, and many other creatures of the Hippodrome’s menagerie—had presided over triumphs in the capital of still another republic for four hundred years. That’s what the citizens of Constantinople said, anyway, and the Venetians were only too willing to believe them.
Whenever a general—an imperator—achieved a particularly important victory against the barbarians, the Senate and the peoplewould grant him a triumph, and at the head of his army he would enter the city of Rome. All of these triumphs followed the route of the Via Sacra, the holy way that led into the city from the south: past the Colosseum, along the foot of the Palatine Hill, through the Forum, and up under the Tarpeian Rock to the Capitoline Hill, which was crowned with the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, the Greatest and Best. It was to Jupiter that the shackled barbarians would be brought, so that the proper sacrifices might be made: of their treasures in the temple, their families in the slave market, and their lives in the circus. Jupiter’s temple was hung with the chains of captives, the broken gates of cities, and the truncated deities of defeated republics.
After they had celebrated each triumph, the imperators of Rome would erect an arch over the Via Sacra so that their victories might be remembered. The arches looked like gaudy city gates, framed with Corinthian columns, bedecked with winged victories, and carved with reliefs and inscriptions depicting the exploits of the generals. (Some of those memorials still stand in Rome to this day: the Arch of Constantine records his victory at the battle of the Milvian Bridge, while the Arch of Titus depicts with casual pride the sack of the Temple of Jerusalem.) Because the generals had entered the city in chariots, each of their arches was surmounted by a sculpture of horses drawing just such a vehicle. There must have been hundreds of these
quadrigae
.
Then the imperators of Rome had their images stamped on coins and carved in marble. They had the sculptors twist their bull necks into the postures of Grecian heroes, lift their dull eyes as if in divine contemplation, and cover their shaven heads in curly wigs—tousled, they hoped, by the winds of history.
I T HAD ALL happened before. The Venetians, the Constantinopolitans, and the Romans all used to tell a story about the origin of their
quadrigae
; or, at least, they dimly remembered the last time these horses had run with heroes.
When he was young, and before all his triumphs, Alexander loved horses. Indeed, he came of a royal line that loved them. One day, his father,
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