Pyramid of Cestius Totally Explained

Everything about The Pyramid Of Cestius totally explained

The Pyramid of Cestius (in Italian, Piramide di Caio Cestio or Piramide Cestia) is an ancient pyramid in Rome, Italy near the Porta San Paolo and the Protestant Cemetery. It stands in a fork between two ancient roads, the Via Ostiensis and another road that ran west to the Tiber along the appoximate line of the modern Via della Marmorata. Due to its incorporation into the city's fortifications, it's today one of the best-preserved ancient buildings in Rome.

Physical attributes

The pyramid was built about 18 BC-12 BC as a tomb for Gaius Cestius Epulo, a magistrate and member of one of the four great religious corporations at Rome, the Septemviri Epulonum. It is of brick-faced concrete covered with slabs of white marble standing on a travertine foundation, measuring 100 Roman feet (22 m) square at the base and standing 125 Roman feet (27 m) high.
   In the interior is the burial chamber, a simple barrel-vaulted rectangular cavity measuring 5.95 metres long, 4.10 wide and 4.80 high. When it was (re)discovered in 1660, the chamber was found to be decorated with frescoes which were recorded by Pietro Santi Bartoli, but only the scantest traces of these now remain. There was no trace left of any other contents in the tomb, which had been plundered in antiquity. The tomb had been sealed when it was built, with no exterior entrance; it isn't possible for visitors to access the interior. Two marble bases were found next to the pyramid during excavations in the 1660s, complete with fragments of the bronze statues that originally had stood on their tops. The bases carried an inscription recorded by Bartoli in an engraving of 1697:
ť M · VALERIVS · MESSALLA · CORVINVS ·

   P · RVTILIVS · LVPVS · L · IVNIVS · SILANVS · ť L · PONTIVS · MELA · D · MARIVS ·

   NIGER · HEREDES · C · CESTI · ET · ť L · CESTIVS · QVAE · EX · PARTE · AD ·

   EVM · FRATRIS · HEREDITAS · ť M · AGRIPPAE · MVNERE · PER ·

   VENIT · EX · EA · PECVNIA · QVAM · ť PRO · SVIS · PARTIEVS · RECEPER ·

   EX · VENDITIONE · ATTALICOR · ť QVAE · EIS · PER · EDICTVM ·

   AEDILIS · IN · SEPVLCRVM · ť C · CESTI · EX · TESTAMENTO ·

   EIVS · INFERRE · NON · LICVIT · This identifies Cestius' heirs as Marcus Valerius Messala Corvinus, a famous general; Publius Rutilius Lupus, an orator whose father of the same name had been consul in 90 BC; and Lucius Junius Silanus, a member of the distinguished gens Junius. The heirs had set up the statues and bases using money raised from the sale of valuable cloths (attalici). Cestius had stated in his will that the cloths were to be deposited in the tomb, but this practice had been forbidden by a recent edict passed by the aediles.
   During the construction of the Aurelian Walls between 271 and 275, the pyramid was incorporated into the walls to form a triangular bastion. It was one of many structures in the city to be reused to form part of the new walls, probably to reduce the cost and enable the structure to be built more quickly. It still forms part of a well-preserved stretch of the walls, a short distance from the Porta San Paolo.
   The origins of the pyramid were forgotten during the Middle Ages. The inhabitants of Rome came to believe that it was the tomb of Remus (Meta Remi) and that its counterpart near the Vatican was the tomb of Romulus, a belief recorded by Petrarch. Its true provenance was clarified by Pope Alexander VII's excavations in the 1660s, which cleared the vegetation that had overgrown the pyramid, uncovered the inscriptions on its faces, tunnelled into the tomb's burial chamber and found the bases of two bronze statues which had stood alongside the pyramid.

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