Dab solver - Pomerium

Most tools require the use of JavaScript. If you are using Firefox with the NoScript addon, please mark toolserver.org as trusted. See the Help page for details.

Feedback / Report a bug

1 point on this page / 19,509 points earned collectively this month / Disambiguate pages on your watchlist

*[[Pompey's Theatre]], where Julius Caesar was murdered, was outside the pomerium and included a chamber where the Senate could meet allowing the attendance of any senators who were forbidden to cross the pomerium and thus would not have been able to meet in the [[Curia Hostilia]].

*Weapons were banned inside the pomerium for religious and traditional reasons. [[Praetorian Guard|Praetorian guards]] were allowed in only in civilian dress (toga), and were then called collectively cohors togata. But it was possible to sneak in daggers (the proverbial weapon for political violence, see ). Since Julius Caesar's assassination occurred outside this boundary, the senatorial conspirators could not be charged with sacrilege for carrying weapons inside the sacred city.

== See also ==

*[[Roma quadrata]]

== References ==

<references/>

== External links ==

*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/PLATOP*/Pomerium.html Samuel Ball Platner, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome]: Pomerium
*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Pomoerium.html Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities]: Pomoerium
*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/TAPA/44/Pomerium*.html Transactions of the American Philological Association] Alternate etymology: pro-murium

[[Category:Topography of ancient Rome]]
[[Category:Roman law]]
[[Category:Ancient Roman architecture]]

{{Link GA|fr}}

Single scrollbar

The '''pomerium''' or '''pomoerium''' ([[Latin]], from ''post'' + ''moerium'' > ''murum'', "wall"), was the sacred boundary of the city of [[Rome]]. In legal terms, Rome existed only within the ''pomerium''; everything beyond it was simply territory ''([[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#ager|ager]])'' belonging to Rome.

==Location and extensions==
[[Tradition]] maintained that the pomerium was the original line ploughed by [[Romulus]] around the walls of the original city, and that it was inaugurated by [[Servius Tullius]]. The legendary date of its demarcation, 21 April, continued to be celebrated as the anniversary of the city’s foundation.<ref>[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/469348/pomerium Pomerium], Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 24 January 2012.</ref>

The Roman historian [[Livy]] writes, in his [[Ab urbe condita (book)|''Ab urbe condita'']], that although the etymology of the word ''pomerium'' (''post'' – ''moerium'') implies a meaning of "beyond the wall", the pomerium was in fact an area of ground both on the inner and outer sides of the city wall. According to Livy, it was an [[Etruscan civilization|Etruscan]] tradition to consecrate this area by [[augur]]y, which in part had the purpose of preventing buildings from being erected close to the wall (although he writes that in his time, houses were in fact built against the wall). Livy also writes that it was unlawful to inhabit or to farm the area of the pomerium.<ref>[[Livy]], [[Ab urbe condita (book)|''Ab urbe condita'']], I.44</ref>

The pomerium did not follow the line of the [[Servian walls]], and remained unchanged until the [[Roman dictator|Dictator]] [[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]], in a demonstration of his absolute power, expanded it in 80 BC. Several white marker stones (known as ''[[cippi]]'') commissioned by [[Claudius]] have been found ''in situ'' and several have been found away from their original location. These stones mark the boundaries and relative dimensions of the pomerium extension by [[Claudius]]. This extension is recorded in [[Gaius Cornelius Tacitus|Tacitus]]. [[Aulus Gellius]] also reports extensions by [[Caesar Augustus]], [[Nero]], and [[Trajan]], but no other written or archaeological evidence supports this.

The pomerium was not a walled area (unlike the Chinese [[Forbidden City]]), but rather a legally and religiously defined one marked by ''[[cippi]]''. It encompassed neither the entire metropolitan area nor even all the proverbial Seven Hills (the [[Palatine Hill]] was within the ''pomerium'', but the [[Capitoline Hill|Capitoline]] and [[Aventine Hill|Aventine]] Hills were not). The [[Curia Hostilia]] and the well of the [[Comitium]] in the [[Forum Romanum]], two extremely important locations in the government of the [[city-state]] and its empire, were located within the pomerium. The [[Temple of Bellona (Rome)|Temple of Bellona]] was beyond the pomerium.

==Associated restrictions==
*The [[Magistratus|magistrates]] who held [[imperium]] did not have full power inside the pomerium. They could have a citizen beaten, but not sentenced to death. This was symbolised by removing the axes from the [[fasces]] carried by the magistrate's [[lictor]]s.{{Citation needed|date=May 2010}} Only the dictator's lictors could carry fasces containing axes.

*It was forbidden to bury the dead inside the pomerium. During his life, [[Julius Caesar]] received in advance the right to a tomb inside the pomerium, but his ashes were actually placed in his family tomb.<ref name=bnp>{{cite book |url=http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2rtaTFYuM3QC&pg=PA177|last1=Beard |first1=Mary |authorlink1=Mary Beard (classicist) |last2=North |first2=John |last3=Price |first3=Simon |title=Religions of Rome Volume 1: A History |year=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-31682-8 |pages=177-180 }}</ref> However, [[Trajan]]'s ashes were interred after his death in AD 117 at the foot of his [[Trajan's Column|Column]],<ref>''[[Epitome de Caesaribus]]'' [http://www.roman-emperors.org/epitome.htm 13.11]; [[Eutropius (historian)|Eutropius]] [http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/eutropius/trans8.html#5 8.5].</ref> which was within the pomerium.<ref name=bnp/>

*Provincial [[promagistrates]] and generals were forbidden from entering the pomerium, and resigned their [[imperium]] immediately upon crossing it (as it was the superlative form of the ban on armies entering Italy). Ceremonies of triumph, in which an army would march through the city in celebration of a victory, were an exception to this rule, although a general could only enter the city on the very day of his triumph, and would be required to wait outside the pomerium with his troops until that moment.<ref name=bnp/> Under the Republic, soldiers also lost their status when entering, becoming citizens: thus soldiers at their general's triumph wore civilian dress. The ''Comitia Centuriata'', one of the [[Roman assemblies]], consisting of [[centuria]]e (voting units, but originally military formations within the legions), was required to meet on the [[Campus Martius]] outside the pomerium.

*[[Pompey's Theatre]], where Julius Caesar was murdered, was outside the pomerium and included a chamber where the Senate could meet allowing the attendance of any senators who were forbidden to cross the pomerium and thus would not have been able to meet in the [[Curia Hostilia]].

*Weapons were banned inside the pomerium for religious and traditional reasons. [[Praetorian Guard|Praetorian guards]] were allowed in only in civilian dress (toga), and were then called collectively ''cohors togata''. But it was possible to sneak in daggers (the proverbial weapon for political violence, see ''<<link:0>>''). Since Julius Caesar's assassination occurred outside this boundary, the senatorial conspirators could not be charged with sacrilege for carrying weapons inside the sacred city.

==See also==
*[[Roma quadrata]]

==References==
<references/>

==External links==
*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/PLATOP*/Pomerium.html Samuel Ball Platner, ''A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome'']: Pomerium
*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Pomoerium.html Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities]: Pomoerium
*[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/TAPA/44/Pomerium*.html Transactions of the American Philological Association] Alternate etymology: pro-murium

[[Category:Topography of ancient Rome]]
[[Category:Roman law]]
[[Category:Ancient Roman architecture]]

Edit summary:
This is a minor edit Watch this page

Cancel

Dab solver - Pomerium

Tools

Interaction