Cestius pyramid

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The Cestius pyramid 2019
The Cestius pyramid 2012 before restoration
The Cestius pyramid in the 18th century
Location in ancient Rome
The Cestius pyramid (southeast side) after the renovation
The Cestius pyramid (northwest side) with a view of the entrance and the two flanking columns

The Cestius pyramid , more precisely "Pyramid des Caius Cestius" (Italian: Piramide Cestia or Piramide di Caio Cestio ), in Rome is the pyramid-shaped tomb of the Roman praetor and tribune Gaius Cestius Epulo († before 12 BC).

location

Burials within the city were forbidden until the 5th century. Tombs were therefore usually erected on the arteries. The Cestius pyramid stands in an exposed position on Via Ostiensis , one of the busiest streets in Rome that led to the port city of Ostia .

From 271 the pyramid was included in the city wall of Emperor Aurelian (the Aurelian wall ). The Porta Ostiensis , today Porta San Paolo , opened next to it .

Client

Cestius was praetor of the year 43 BC. And member of the Septemviri epulonum , one of the four colleges of priests . Little is known about his life, but his name and his tomb went down in the history of architecture and art .

Building

After the conquest of Egypt by Emperor Augustus , Egyptian culture and customs became fashionable in Rome. This also included burials in pyramids, so that several Romans had small pyramids built as tombs. Today only the pyramid of Cestius remains of this brief episode of Roman culture. The building was built between 18 and 12 BC. It was built as a brick structure and covered with travertine and marble slabs.

The pyramid is 36.4 m high (a quarter of the height of the Great Pyramid ) and has a side length of 29.5 m. Inside there is a 4.10 by 5.95 m large and 4.80 m high burial chamber (only accessible during guided tours) with remains of frescoes . These frescoes are executed in the 3rd style . They are the earliest datable Roman wall paintings in this style and therefore form an important chronological fixed point for the emergence of this wall painting style.

The tomb bears the following inscriptions:
On the west and east sides at the top:

C (aius) CESTIUS L (ucii) F (ilius) POB (lilia) EPULO PR (aetor) TR (ibunus) PL (ebis)
VII VIR EPULONUM
Caius Cestius, son of Lucius, from the ( tribe ) Poblilia, Epulo, praetor , Tribune of the people, member of the Septemviri epulonum

On the east side there is also a smaller inscription:

OPUS APSOLUTUM EX TESTAMENTO DIEBUS CCCXXX
ARBITRATU
PONTI P (ublii) F (ilii) CLA (udia) MELAE HEREDIS ET POTHI L (iberti)
The work (was) completed on the basis of the will in 330 days
under the direction
of Pontius Mela, son of Publius, from the (tribe) Claudia, the heir, with the freed Pothus.

On the west and east side below:

INSTAURATUM AN (no) DOM (ini) MDCLXIII
Renewed in the year of the Lord 1663 .

There were four pillars in front of the pyramid, two of which were put back up. They probably carried bronze statues of Cestius.

More pyramids

In the Middle Ages, the Cestius pyramid was called Meta Remi , tomb of Remus , analogous to Meta Romuli , tomb of Romulus , another pyramid near the Castel Sant'Angelo . This tomb was built in 1499 by Pope Alexander VI. demolished to widen the access road to the Vatican for the Holy Year 1500 . The marble of this pyramid was used in St. Peter's Basilica .

Two more pyramids stood in the area of ​​today's Piazza del Popolo .

Bartolomeo Pinelli : Nocturnal burial at the Cestius pyramid (around 1830)
View over the Protestant cemetery

After ancient times

In 1656 Pope Alexander VII had the pyramid restored and exposed again, because over the centuries the ground level had risen by a few meters. The two pillars and the bases of the two lost pillars were also found.

Non-Catholic dead were buried on the western side of the pyramid by 1732 at the latest. The burial ground officially became the Cimitero acattolico , the so-called Protestant cemetery , in 1821 . Numerous graves of prominent contemporaries from all over the world can be found here, such as those of Percy Bysshe Shelley , John Keats or Malwida von Meysenbug .

In the 19th century the wall between the pyramid and the Porta San Paolo was torn down.

From November 2012 to April 2015, the pyramid was completely restored. The costs of 2 million euros were raised by the Japanese businessman Yūzō Yagi.

Others

In 1770, a replica of the Cestius pyramid, the so-called Studnitz pyramid , was built for the Oberhofmarschall Hans Adam von Studnitz in Gotha .

In 1775 a replica of the Cestius pyramid was built in the Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe in Kassel .

Graf Platen wrote the poem The Pyramid of Cestius .

The building in Rome gave the nearby “Piramide” subway station its name.

See also

literature

  • sv Sepulcrum C. Cestii . In: E. Nash: Bildlexikon zur Topographie des ancient Rome , Volume 2, 1962, pp. 321–323
  • Karl-Ludwig Elvers : Lemma Cestius . In: The New Pauly - Encyclopedia of Antiquity (DNP) - Antiquity , ed. by Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider , Volume 2: Ark – Ci, Verlag JB Metzler Stuttgart / Weimar, 1997, Sp. 1077-1078. ISBN 3-476-01470-3 and 476-01472-X
  • O. Falconieri: De pramide Cestii Epulonis dissertatio . Romae 1697
  • C. Krause, sv Sepulcrum: C. Cestius . In: Lexicon topographicum urbis Romae , Volume 4, 1999, pp. 278-279
  • Friedrich Münzer : sv Cestius. 7) . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classical antiquity . New arrangement, ed. by Georg Wissowa . 6th half volume: Campanus ager - Claudius, Stuttgart, JB Metzlersche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1899, Sp. 2005
  • Richard Neudecker : The pyramid of Cestius . In: Luca Giuliani (ed.): Masterpieces of ancient art . Pp. 94-113. CH Beck Verlag, Munich 2005. 185 p. With 77 bw-illustrations. ISBN 3-406-53095-X
  • RT Ridley: The Praetor and the Pyramid - The Tomb of Gaius Cestius in History, Archeology and Literature . In: Bollettino di Archeologia , Vol. 13-15, 1992, pp. 1-29
  • N. Kramer, Augustus, Cestius and the pyramid . In: Martin Dreher (ed.): Citizenship and state power in antiquity and the present , Konstanz 2000, pp. 181–190
  • P. Santi Bartoli: Gli antichi sepolcri , Roma 1697

Web links

Commons : Pyramid of Cestius  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Frank Kolb , Rome, the history of the city in antiquity , CH Beck, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-39666-6
  2. ↑ Since the outer cladding of the pyramids of Giza was almost completely removed in the Middle Ages, the Cestius pyramid gives today's viewer an impression of the original appearance of this ancient wonder of the world .
  3. ↑ Harald Mielsch: Römische Wandmalerei , Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt 2001, p. 67 ISBN 3-534-01360-3
  4. ↑ Klaus Bartels , Roms speaking stones , chap. 12.6 and 12.7, Zabern, Mainz 2004, 4th edition, ISBN 3-8053-2690-4
  5. ↑ Marisa Uberti: Una visita alla Piramide Cestia a Roma. April 5, 2010, accessed May 27, 2018 .
  6. ↑ Thomas Migge: The cemetery for non-Catholics. In: Deutschlandfunk. September 7, 2016, accessed August 26, 2020 .
  7. ↑ Completato il restauro della piramide di Caio Cestio. In: MiBACT, Ministry of Cultural Goods and Tourism . April 21, 2015, accessed November 8, 2016 .
  8. ↑ Graf Platen : The pyramid of Cestius . Full text at zeno.org

Coordinates: 41 ° 52 ′ 35.2 "  N , 12 ° 28 ′ 51.1"  E