Identification: Templum divi Claudi The inscription identifies the fragment in this Renaissance engraving as a section of the Temple to the Deified Claudius. Surviving fragments of this monument are 4b, 5a, 5b, 5dg, 5e, 5f, and 5h. This temple was vowed shortly after Claudius' death in 54 CE but remained unfinished during the reign of Nero, who preferred to use the E side of the massive platform built for this purpose on the Caelian Hill as a monumental nymphaeum, part of his sprawling Domus Aurea. Sections of this platform are visible today along the Via Claudia. Nothing remains of the temple, which was not finished until the reign of Vespasian (Suet., Vespasian 9). This drawing shows the temple as prostyle and pentastyle (although it surely had six columns in front, suggests C. Buzzetti in LTUR I, p. 277), oriented to the W, and with 4 steps in front providing access to its podium. The recessed double lines above the temple in this fragment are some of the many long, narrow strips that formed clamp-shaped frames around the temple in center (see reconstruction in PM 1960, pl. 16). These have been interpreted as hedges consisting of low bushes and flowering shrubs, similar to those excavated in the extensive gardens of the villa at Fishbourne in England (Lloyd 1982, pp. 94-95). Spaces in front of and behind the temple were left clear, and paths along the central N-S axis provided direct access through the hedges from the edges of the platform to the temple. This fragment shows a section of the N-S path above the temple. Porticoes have been excavated around the outer wall, and Martial calls the building a porticus (Epig. 2.9-10), yet there is no trace of covered colonnades on the Marble Plan (LTUR I, p. 277).

Significance This engraving is crucial to the identification of the building in frs. 5a-h as the Temple to the Divine Claudius, and it provides our only knowledge of the architecture of the temple itself. The depiction of the hedges as in this fragment constitutes a break from the general rule that only architectural features are included on the FUR. This might indicate that the hedges were framed by built edges. Enough of the platform remains today to bear witness to the fact that the orientation of the temple complex on the FUR in relation to the Flavian amphitheater is shifted ca. 21% from its real position (AG 1980, p. 44). This was probably caused by the difficulty of mosaicking together the individual surveys of different sections of the city.

Text by Tina Najbjerg and Jennifer Trimble