Marking the Pomerium

Map

Pomerium Marker, Via dei Banchi Vecchi

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Embedded into a wall in Via dei Banchi Vecchi, a short distance from the Chiesa Nuova, is an ancient inscription dating back to the time of the emperor Claudius (r. 41-54). 

It reads: [T]I CLAUDIVS / [D]RVSI F CAISAR / [A]VG GERMANICVS / [PO]NT MAX TRIB POT / [V]IIII IMP XVI COS IIII / [C]ENSOR P P / [AV]CTIS POPVLI ROMANI / [FI]NIBVS POMERIVM / [A]MPLIAℲIT TERMINAℲITQ (Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, son of Drusus, Pontifex Maximus, vested with the power of Tribune for the ninth time, acclaimed Imperator for the sixteenth, Consul for the fourth, Censor, Father of the Fatherland, on the extension of the territory of the Roman people, increased and delimited the Pomerium).

The inscription was part of a cippus (marker stone), which was erected by Claudius, Rome's fourth emperor, to mark his extension to the pomerium. It is one of several such cippi to have been discovered. 

The pomerium or pomoerium was a religious boundary around the city of Rome. Pomerium is a contraction of post moerium (beyond the wall). 

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