ID AND LOCATION
| Stanford #
| 631 |
| AG1980 #
| 631 |
| PM1960 #
| 631 |
| Slab #
| unknown |
| Adjoins
| none |
CONDITION
| Located
| false |
| Incised
| true |
| Surviving
| true |
| Subfragments
| 1 |
| Plaster Parts
| 0 |
| Back Surface
| smooth |
| Slab Edges
| 1 |
| Clamp Holes
| 0 |
| Tassello
| no |
TECHNICAL INFO
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| ANALYSIS
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| Description The fragment was part of a slab edge. A curved row of tabernae crosses the bottom of the fragment; the shops face upwards. Center right lies a horizontal section of shops: two rows of tabernae face away from each other and are separated by a corridor which is closed at the left end. The fragment is extremely damaged at top right, but a few dashed lines parallel to the top row of shops may represent an arcade. A deep, diagonal line emerges from the top edge in the top left corner.
Identification Rows of tabernae are ubiquitous on the Plan, and the type depicted here are of the most common type seen on the FUR. Each shop consisted of a single room with a wide opening towards the street that could be screened off at night. The owners may have resided with their families on a wooden platform in the back of the shop. Having a covered arcade in front of a row of shops was a luxury but it is common on the Plan, even in predominantly commercial areas (see for example frs. 33abc, 34a, 34b and 34c). These covered arcades or porticos signify that there was a second storey or a mezzanine level above the shops, which would have provided the shop owners with additional living room (Reynolds 1996, p. 158). The function of the line in the top left corner is uncertain.
Significance This fragment is typical of non-identified fragments of the Plan. No monumental buildings are represented, and the fragment instead provides a view of the lesser known residential and commercial buildings.
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| HISTORY OF FRAGMENT |
| 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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| KEYWORDS
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| tabernae, arcades |
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