2 THE ATRIUM VEST. 
period. Moreover, the larger number of stamped bricks were either not 
found in structural parts of the building or are for various reasons open to 
doubt in regard to their dates.'. Lanciani,’ agreeing with Jordan as to the 
architectural unity of the building, assigned the whole to the period of 
Septimius Severus. His conclusions were based upon the general style of 
architecture in the parts best preserved, and upon the presence, in certain 
walls, of brickwork undoubtedly belonging to the time of Severus. In 1888 
Auer, a practical architect, after an independent study of the building, 
published a brief but suggestive discussion of its history,? with a new plan 
of the group of rooms on the east.‘ His conclusions’ differed radically from 
those of the earlier writers. The Atrium, or rather the part of it then exca- 
vated, was not, he held, the work of a single builder or period, as Jordan and 
Lanciani had maintained, but was composed of three distinct units, which 
were to be assigned to as many periods. The group of rooms on the east,’ 
the center of which is the large room called by Jordan® the tablinum, which 
was rightly regarded by Auer as a single structure, was the earliest part 
of the building and belonged to the period immediately following the fire of 
Nero.® The group of rooms on the south along the Nova Via, less symmet- 
rical in plan than the group on the east, was wholly the work of Hadrian.” 
The rooms on the north, which were more difficult to identify, since they 
were only partly excavated, were of a much later period, possibly later than 
the time of Diocletian." The rooms on the west were not yet excavated 
at the time of the publication of Auer’s work. 
Purpose of the Present Work: The conclusions of Auer as here given 
were generally accepted as final, when the results of the excavations which 
were carried on in 1901-03” led me to a careful study of the plans of the 
Atrium, not only those mentioned above but those which have been pub- 
lished more recently,” and of the views advanced concerning its architectural 
history. After a futile attempt to adapt the plans in detail to the walls as 
1 Jordan in his discussion refers to seventy stamps. 
Over forty of these are valueless as direct 
evidence, by reason of uncertainty concern- 
ing their original place in the walls or their 
date. The evidence of none of those which 
are free from doubt is contradictory to the 
conclusions reached in this discussion. Cf. 
Auer, Der Tempel der Vesta, 20. 
? Bull. dell’ Inst., 1884, 148ff. 
3 Auer, Der Tempel der Vesta, 1-10, 20-22. 
* Auer, /. c., plate mu. Plate 1 is a reproduction of 
that published by Lanciani in the Notizie. 
5 Auer, /. c., 3, 6-10, 20-21. 
° A fourth period may be, perhaps, represented by 
the upper story (Auer, /. c., 8). Richter 
(Topographie der Stadt Rom, 90) seems so 
to interpret the divisions made by Auer. 
7 Auer, J. c., plate . Cf. plan C of the present 
work. 
8 Jordan, Der Tempel der Vesta, 36 et al. 
9 Auer, /. c., 20. Note Richter’s error (/. c.) in 
quoting this date. 
Auer, /.¢., 21. 
UL.c. Middleton (Rem. of Anc. Rome, 1, 309) 
accepted in general the view of Jordan. 
Richter (/. c.) follows that of Auer. Huelsen 
(Huelsen-Carter, The Roman Forum, 206 
and fig. 125. See also Huelsen, Roem. 
Mitth., 1889, pp. 245-247), adopting the 
views of Auer in the main, adds to the south 
rooms those more recently excavated on the 
west, and assigns the rooms on the north to 
the period of Septimius Severus. The 
official report of the later excavations is not 
yet published. 
12See plate 1. 
13Huelsen, Roem. Mitth., xvu, plate 1. Vaglieri, 
Gli Scavi Recenti nel Foro Romano, 1903; 
15 and 71. Thedenat, Le Forum Romain, 
1904, 317. 
