| Description The fragment was part of a slab edge. Two letters, I*A, are visible.
Identification: Praedia et horrea Galbana In 1977, E. Rodríguez-Almeida demonstrated that this fragment was from the same inscription as fr. 24A, and that the entire label read [PRAED]IA [ET HORREA G]ALB[ANA]. He then positioned the two fragments in the lower left corner of slab IX-8 (fr. 24A) and along the right side of slab IX-7 (fr. 24B)(Rodríguez-Almeida 1977-1978, p. 21, figs. 3, 5). Here, the inscription labeled the S section of a vast imperial estate and warehouse complex, the praedia et horrea Galbana, large parts of which are visible in frs. 24a (missing) and 24c.
Originally belonging to the family of Servius Sulpicius Galba, probably the praetor of 187 BCE, the private estate later became imperial property, most likely during the reign of Galba (LTUR III, p. 40). The proximity of a funerary monument (visible in fr. 24c) to a later family member of the same name, perhaps the consul of 144 BCE (Ferrea 1998) or of 108 BCE (F. Coarelli, LTUR III, p. 42) confirms the identity of the Republican property, which may at an earlier state have been called the praedia Sulpicia and have incorporated the horrea Sulpicia, mentioned by Horace (Carm. 4.12.18)(LTUR II, p. 40). The abundant epigraphical evidence suggests that the residential spaces of the imperial complex gradually yielded to large warehouses for the storage of the public grain supply, and of oil, wine, food, clothing, and marble (LTUR II, p. 41; Richardson 1992, p. 193). The mountain of discarded amphoras that constitutes the nearby Monte Testaccio is a testimony to the large scale operation of these horrea. Inscriptions also suggest that the many warehouse workers, variously referred to as horrearii, operarii Galbenses, or Galbenses, to name a few, were organized into three cohortes and that there were different collegia, or societies to which they could belong (LTUR II, p. 41). The latter implies that the complex included scholae for the meetings of these collegia, and most likely also bathing establishments, both of which are probably included in the neighboring horrea Lolliana, visible in fr. 25.
Significance Rodríguez-Almeida's location of this fragment along the lower right edge of slab IX-7 helped demonstrate the vast extent of this imperial estate/warehouse complex by the Tiber. The combination of this fragment with fr. 24A, which showed that the FUR label recorded the dual name of the complex, also helped explain why there was no label placed across the three buildings in frs. 24a and 24c which were known to have been part of the estate. |
| Like the majority of FUR fragments, this piece was discovered in 1562 in a garden behind the Church of Saints Cosmas and Damian. From here, it was transferred to the Palazzo Farnese and stored there. It was not among the fragments that were reproduced in the Renaissance drawings that are now kept in the Vatican, but Giovanni Pietro Bellori included it in his 1673 publication. In 1742, the fragment was moved to the Capitoline Museums and exhibited with some of the other known fragments in wooden frames along the main staircase. Since then, it has been stored with the other FUR fragments in various places: the storerooms of the Capitoline Museums (1903-1924), the Antiquarium Comunale (1924-1939), the Capitoline Museums again (1939-1955), the Palazzo Braschi (1955-1998), and since 1998 in the Museo della Civiltà Romana in EUR under the auspices of the Sovraintendenza ai Beni Culturali del Comune di Roma. (This fragments history corresponds to Iter E as summarized in PM 1960, p. 56.)
Text by Tina Najbjerg |
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