The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Edward Gibbon [2318]
[Footnote 28: Omnia quae erant in aere ad ornatum civitatis deposuit, sed e ecclesiam B. Mariae ad martyres quae de tegulis aereis cooperta discooperuit, (Anast. in Vitalian. p. 141.) The base and sacrilegious Greek had not even the poor pretence of plundering a heathen temple, the Pantheon was already a Catholic church.]
[Footnote 29: For the spoils of Ravenna (musiva atque marmora) see the original grant of Pope Adrian I. to Charlemagne, (Codex Carolin. epist. lxvii. in Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. iii. P. ii. p. 223.)]
[Footnote 30: I shall quote the authentic testimony of the Saxon poet, (A.D. 887 - 899,) de Rebus gestis Caroli magni, l. v. 437 - 440, in the Historians of France, (tom. v. p. 180:)
Ad quae marmoreas praestabat Roma columnas, Quasdam praecipuas pul hra Ravenna dedit. De tam longinqua poterit regiona vetustas Illius ornatum, Francia, ferre tibi.
And I shall add from the Chronicle of Sigebert, (Historians of France, tom. v. p. 378,) extruxit etiam Aquisgrani basilicam plurimae pulchritudinis, ad cujus structuram a Roma et Ravenna columnas et marmora devehi fecit.]
[Footnote 31: I cannot refuse to transcribe a long passage of Petrarch (Opp. p. 536, 537) in Epistola hortatoria ad Nicolaum Laurentium; it is so strong and full to the point: Nec pudor aut pietas continuit quominus impii spoliata Dei templa, occupatas arces, opes publicas, regiones urbis, atque honores magistratuum inter se divisos; (habeant?) quam una in re, turbulenti ac seditiosi homines et totius reliquae vitae consiliis et rationibus discordes, inhumani foederis stupenda societate convenirent, in pontes et moenia atque immeritos lapides desaevirent. Denique post vi vel senio collapsa palatia, quae quondam ingentes tenuerunt viri, post diruptos arcus triumphales, (unde majores horum forsitan corruerunt,) de ipsius vetustatis ac propriae impietatis fragminibus vilem quaestum turpi mercimonio captare non puduit. Itaque nunc, heu dolor! heu scelus indignum!
de vestris marmoreis columnis, de liminibus templorum, (ad quae nuper ex orbe toto concursus devotissimus fiebat,) de imaginibus sepulchrorum sub quibus patrum vestrorum venerabilis civis (cinis?) erat, ut reliquas sileam, desidiosa Neapolis adornatur. Sic paullatim ruinae ipsae deficiunt. Yet King Robert was the friend of Petrarch.]
[Footnote 32: Yet Charlemagne washed and swam at Aix la Chapelle with a hundred of his courtiers, (Eginhart, c. 22, p. 108, 109,) and Muratori describes, as late as the year 814, the public baths which were built at Spoleto in Italy, (Annali, tom. vi. p. 416.)]
[Footnote 33: See the Annals of Italy, A.D. 988. For this and the preceding fact, Muratori himself is indebted to the Benedictine history of Pere Mabillon.]
[Footnote 34: Vita di Sisto Quinto, da Gregorio Leti, tom. iii. p. 50.]
[Footnote *: From the quotations in Bunsen's Dissertation, it may be suspected that this slow but continual process of destruction was the most fatal. - M]
[Footnote 35: Porticus aedis Concordiae, quam cum primum ad urbem accessi vidi fere integram opere marmoreo admodum specioso: Romani postmodum ad calcem aedem totam et porticus partem disjectis columnis sunt demoliti, (p. 12.) The temple of Concord was therefore not destroyed by a sedition in the xiiith century, as I have read in a MS. treatise del' Governo civile di Rome, lent me formerly at Rome, and ascribed (I believe falsely) to the celebrated Gravina. Poggius likewise affirms that the sepulchre of Caecilia Metella was burnt for lime, (p. 19, 20.)]
[Footnote 36: Composed by Aeneas Sylvius, afterwards Pope Pius II., and published by Mabillon, from a Ms. of the queen of Sweden, (Musaeum Italicum, tom. i. p. 97.)
Oblectat me, Roma, tuas spectare ruinas: Ex cujus lapsu gloria prisca patet. Sed tuus hic populus muris defossa vetustis Calcis in obsequium marmora dura coquit. Impia tercentum si sic gens egerit