Ruins & Abandoned buildings

Thuburbo Majus, Tunisia

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Thuburbo Majus – Le Capitole
c.1930
Publiser: E.M.Cliche

Google Street View.

Archnet (images)
Rome in the Footsteps of an XVIIIth Century Traveller
Plan of town (in Italian)
Plan of ruins
“Visual reconstruction” of forum

Thuburbo Majus or Colonia Julia Aurelia Commoda, its Roman name, was originally a Punic town, later founded as a Roman veteran colony by Augustus in 27 BC. Military veterans were sent to Thuburbo, among other sites, by Augustus to allow them to start their post-army lives with land of their own. Its strategic location and access to trade routes made it an important establishment. Ruins of the town are in the middle of the countryside with no towns in close proximity. Most of the town was built around 150–200 and restored in the 4th century after the Crisis of the Third Century. It received a Capitolium in 168. The town was a productive grower of grain, olives, and fruit.[5] Under Hadrian it was made a municipium, helping cause a growth in wealth, and Commodus made it a colony.

A 1916 excavation found a tetrastyle temple. The building was decorated with statues of Apollo, Venus, Silvanus, Bacchus, the Dioscuri, and a satyr. Three perfume vases showed dogs pursuing rabbits. In 1920 an inscription found in Thuburbo Majus written in honor of C. Vettius Sabinianus proved that several other inscriptions bearing that name were referring to the same person. Remains of the house of Bacchus and Ariadne dating back to the early 5th century were excavated in 1925.
Wikipedia.

Its Capitol – the most important temple in Roman cities – is among the best preserved in Tunisia. Its façade was made of six elegant Corinthian columns, with four of them still intact, overlooking a large staircase and the Forum.
Tunisia Tourism

St Botolph’s Priory, Colchester, England, UK

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Colchester Abbey
Publisher: Christian Novels Publishing Co.

Google Street View

As can be seen from its ruins in the picture, there was once a considerable early Norman Church here. St Botolph’s Priory was founded in the late 11th century as the first British house of the Augustinian Canons. The church was built of rubble and also Roman bricks, brought from nearby Roman ruins in Colchester.
British Library: Inside View of St Botolph’s Priory at Colchester in Essex.

Founded about 1100, St Botolph’s was one of the first Augustinian priories in England. An impressive example of early Norman architecture, built in flint and reused Roman brick, the church displays massive circular pillars, round arches and an elaborate west front. It was badly damaged by cannon fire during the Civil War siege of 1648.
English Heritage

St. Botolph’s Priory was a medieval house of Augustinian canons in Colchester, Essex, founded c. 1093. The priory had the distinction of being the first and leading Augustinian convent in England until its dissolution in 1536. . . . The priory was dissolved in accordance with the Act of 1536. On 26 May in that year it was granted with all its possessions, including the manors of Blindknights, Canwikes and Dilbridge to Sir Thomas Audley. Audley had licence on 12 September 1540, to grant the site of the priory to John Golder and Anastasia his wife.

As the priory had been an Augustinian house, and therefore the church had both parochial and conventual functions, the nave was retained as a parish church. The choir, which had been solely for the use of the canons, was not spared however, and was demolished along with the cloisters, chapter house and associated buildings. The church remained this way until the Siege of Colchester in 1648 during the Second English Civil War.[6] A Royalist army had seized the town, which was then surrounded and bombarded by the New Model Army led by Thomas Fairfax, with St Botolph’s being caught in the crossfire of the assault on South Gate, reducing it to its present ruinous state.
Wikipedia.

A History of the County of Essex: Volume 2 (1907) “Houses of Austin canons: Priory of St Botolph, Colchester”

Basilica, Pompeii

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List of all pages for Pompeii


On the back:
The Basilica 

Google Street View.

AD 79: Destruction and Rediscovery

A Roman basilica was a large public building where business and legal matters were discussed. The basilica of Pompeii was built in 130-120 BC and is one of the oldest examples of such a building. It had three naves and it was situated at the south-western corner of the Forum; its entrance was on its eastern narrow side and its layout resembles that of an early church. A raised loggia at the western end of the building was most likely the site of the tribunal. Archaeologists believe it was preceded by wooden stairs. Two small rooms under the loggia might have been used as the temporary prison. Lawyers without customers, teachers without pupils, artists without commissions and other jobless citizens spent their days at the basilica hoping to find a way to make some money. Some of them, perhaps during a particularly idle day, wrote graffiti on the walls complaining they were not invited to dinner by anyone or that Venus did not help them in courting a woman, notwithstanding the offers they had made to the goddess.
Rome in the Footsteps of an XVIIIth Century Traveller

Baalbek, Lebanon

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BAALBEK (Syrie). Le Temple de Venus – La façade
Temple of Venus – the facade

On back:
Require PALMYRA HOTEL, the only first class hotel facing the ruins of Baalbek

Published: M. Harris, Baalbek.

Street View

The temple of Venus was built in the third century. It has a highly original design: built on a horseshoe-shaped platform, it consists of a circular shrine with a square entrance that is almost as big. The outer façade of the shrine is graced by five niches, which means that there is not a single square wall. In the niches are representations of doves and shells, which has been taken as evidence that the shrine was dedicated to Venus.
The square entrance probably was not one of those classical triangle-shaped pediments supported by columns. In fact, the straight horizontal line was broken by an elegant arch. This is certainly not without parallel, but the baroque ensemble suggests that the architect wanted to show off that he was the best and the brightest. He succeeded.
Livius.org

UNESCO Word Heritage listing
Rome in the Footsteps of an XVIIIth Century Traveller
The Baalbek Ruins in Lebanon (photos and write up from a tour of site)


Model of Baalbek (Photo by Franck Devedjian. from Wikipedia Commons

Plan of Temple Complex


BAALBEK (Syrie).BAALBEK (Syrie). La Grande Mosque arabe du VIIe siecle construite avec les colonnes de granit des Temples romains
The Grand Mosque of the 7th century built with the granite columns of Roman temples
On back:
Require PALMYRA HOTEL, the only first class hotel facing the ruins of Baalbek

Published: M. Harris, Baalbek.

Google Maps.

The Great Umayyad Mosque
Built in the first century after the Hegira, during the Umayyad reign, on the remains of a Byzantine church, it is the largest mosque of all Baalbek. It is 60 meters long and 50 meters wide. It contains in the middle 30 columns carried from roman temples neighboring the castle. Some of them are decorated with Corinthian capitals either of granite or of massive stones. The walls of the mosques rise for 8 meters. Its architecture is similar to the Umayyad mosque in Damascus. It includes a courtyard surrounded by porticoes and a square minaret that stands in the courtyard like a war tower. The mosque’s walls hold many inscriptions that are decrees belonging to the Mamluk age. It was left ruined for a long time during the Ottoman and the modern ages. Lately, it has been restored and rehabilitated to perform regular prayers in there.
Destination Lebanon

Interior photo

Umayayd Route, Baalbek: photos at bottom of page two (pdf)

Frigidarium, Baths of Caracalla, Rome

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Stato attuale e restauro della grande sala “Frigidarium.
(Current state and restoration of the great “Frigidarium”)

On the back:
Les Thermes de Caracalla. A L’etat actuel et en restauration. De L’oeuvre recemment publiée. Par Le Chev. J. Ripostelli
La Grande Salle Avec Le Bassin Pour Les Bains. | D’eau Froide Frigidarium

(The Baths of Caracalla. At the current state and in restoration. From the newly published work* by the Chev. J. Ripostelli
The Great Room With The Basin For The Baths | Cold Water Frigidarium)
c.1910

Read moreFrigidarium, Baths of Caracalla, Rome

Public buildings, Pompeii,

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List of all pages for Pompeii


Pompei, Quartiere dei Soldati
Soldier Quarters

Behind the scene of the theatre stands a large rectangular enclosure, one hundred and eighty-three feet long and one hundred and forty-eight wide, surrounded by a Doric colonnade, having twenty-two columns on the longer sides and seventeen on the shorter. The columns are constructed of volcanic tufa, fluted two-thirds of their height, covered with stucco and painted, the lower part red, and the upper alternately red and yellow, except the two centre ones of the east and west sides, the upper parts of which are blue. The surrounding walls were also covered with stucco, painted red below, with yellow above. On the northern side there was a direct communication with both theatres, and the portico of the building must have been of great utility to the spectators, affording additional shelter from the rains when the porticos of the great theatre might have been crowded.

At the time when this building was excavated (1766 and several following years) it was supposed to be a barrack, and obtained the name of the Soldiers’ Quarters. Afterwards, however, from its situation near the Forum Triangulare, it came to be considered as a market-place, and was called the Forum Nundinarium, or weekly market. But the arguments on which this view rests are far from being convincing. That it was a sort of barrack hardly admits of a doubt, both from the nature of the place and the objects found in it ; but it may be a question whether it was intended for the soldiery or for the gladiators exhibited in the amphitheatre. That a town like Pompeii must have had accommodation for its garrison is evident enough, and the building in question seems excellently adapted for such a purpose. The arms found in it, however, were exclusively of the kind used by gladiators ; not a single soldier’s weapon was discovered, while the paintings and graffiti had also reference to gladiatorial combats. Among these graffiti, traced with a hard point on the surface of the ninth column of the east side, was the representation of a fighting gladiator, with these letters, XX Valerius. It has been detached from the wall and carried to the Museum. From these circumstances, Garrucci designated the place as a ludus gladiatorius or school for gladiators, in which view he has been followed by Overbeck.
From Pompeii. Its history, buildings, and antiquities (1871)

Google Maps, approximate area & as best I can tell.
AD 79: destruction and rediscovery


Pompei Portico del Foro Civile
Portico of the Civil Forum.

General area, Google Maps.
General area, Google Street View.
AD 79: destruction and rediscovery


Pompei. Arco di Trionfo e foro.
Arch of Triumph [at entrance to] forum
c.1910
Pubisher: Ettore Ragozino, Naples

Street View