THE EQUINE CUCKOO 69
the rule of the new dynasty, namely the end of the brutal civil wars
that followed the suicide of the last of the Julio-Claudians.
What then of the other, older part of the monumental centre of
Rome, so rich in the associations of antiquity? The Roman Forum
proper was much harder to adapt to any consistent ideology, new or
old. It was too small, too cluttered, too holy; and it had too many
memories to be readily pressed into service in the same way, at least
without the kind of whole-scale devastation and rebuilding that was
far from practical. There was quite simply no room or opportunity
here for the Flavians to build on the vast and space-intensive scale
seen to the north and east. The Julio-Claudians had in any case been
there before them, cutting down the number of opportunities to claim
space even more. The Basilica Julia loomed large, and the Temple of
the Deified Julius had encroached yet further upon the small open
square, since, though fairly modest in size, it had nonetheless been
built on what had once been open space in front of the Regia where
Caesar’s body had been burnt. The Arch of Augustus, constructed
between the Temple of Castor and the Temple of the Deified Julius,
also served as a means to claim sway over the south-eastern approach
to the Forum. Nor is it a question solely of completely new buildings
added by the Julians to the existing complex. The Temple of Castor
and the Basilica Julia, for example, were lavishly rebuilt by Augustus
after fires in 14 and 9 B. C. Similarly, on the north side, in front of the
Basilica Aemilia, Augustus constructed a small porticus dedicated in
the names of his adopted sons Gaius and Lucius Caesar. He also paid
for the Basilica Aemilia itself to be rebuilt after its destruction in the
fire of 9 B. C., although, in one of his most emphatic gestures of re-
publican modesty, the restored building was in fact re-dedicated by a
member of the family of the Aemilii Lepidi and so retained its old
name. Furthermore, both Caesar and Augustus built new rostra at the
western end, while an arch in honour of Tiberius also claimed atten-
tion, providing as it did a monumental entrance into the Forum where
the Vicus Iugarius debouched into the south-western end between the
Temple of Saturn and the Basilica Julia. Lastly, the extremely vener-
able Temple of Concord, on the western side, was rebuilt as the Tem-
ple of Concordia Augusta by Augustus himself and then again by
Tiberius, in A.D. 10: it stood, significantly enough, directly in line
with the Temple of the Deified Julius. In short, almost every building
in the Forum Romanum had been newly erected or else totally rebuilt