#TempleofRomulus
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This #SpoliaSunday, we step back into the 1290s to see one of the most magnificent #tomb monuments of #medieval #Rome. It's in the #rotunda on the #viaSacra called the #TempleofRomulus, the vestibule of the late-antique church of SS. Cosma e Damiano, a tomb rich in #spolia. #AncientBluesky 🏺
JACOPO TORRITI. ALTAR TOMB WITH SPOLIA AND FRESCO, C. 1295. ROTUNDA OF THE "TEMPLE OF ROMULUS" Only after a fairly recent restoration did the full magnificence of this tomb emerge, as well as the attribution to the late-C13 painter and mosaicist Jacopo Torriti. The sadly lacunar fresco shows the Virgin and Child enthroned between Saints Cosmas and Damian, one of whom, to the left, is presenting the donor, barely visible. We don't know his name but it might well have been the cardinal deacon of the church under Boniface VIII Caetani, the pope's own nephew Benedetto, who died in December 1296. He was never buried here, however. This tomb is framed in pavonazzetto, with a square niche whose lintel and columns are in that white marble with purplish veins. Below the niche with the fresco is a grid of six square panels of different spectacular marbles, the one at top centre an amazing red Chian marble. In a period when many tombs were being made in a Gothic style with a marble canopy and a gisant or reclining statue of the deceased, the strong Romanness of this monument, with its emphasis on unadorned spolia and no hint of a Gothic arch, looks like a political declaration of allegiance to Boniface against his powerful enemy, king Philip the Fair of France.
April 26, 2026 at 8:45 PM