Pomerium
The
pomerium (or
pomoerium), from post + moerium>murum [wall]), was the sacred boundary of the city of
Rome. In legal terms, Rome existed only within the
pomerium; everything beyond it was simply land belonging to Rome.
Tradition maintained that it was inaugurated by
Servius Tullius, but it did not follow the line of the
Servian walls, and it is unlikely that he actually did establish the sacred boundary, which remained unchanged until the
Dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla in a demonstation of his absolute power, expanded it in
80 BC. Several white
cippi stones commissioned by
Claudius have been found
in situ and several have been found away from their original location. These stones mark the boundaries and relative dimensions of the pomerium extension by
Claudius. This extension is recorded in
Tacitus.
Aulus Gellius also reports extensions by
Caesar Augustus,
Nero, and
Trajan, but no other written or archaeological evidence supports this.
The pomerium was not a walled area (unlike the Chinese
Forbidden City), but rather a legally and religiously defined one marked by
cippi: It encompassed neither the entire metropolitan area nor even all the proverbial Seven Hills (the
Palatine Hill was within the
pomerium, but the
Capitoline and
Aventine Hills were not). The
Curia Hostilia and the well of the Comitia in the
Forum Romanum, two extremely important locations in the government of the
city-state and its empire, were located within the
pomerium. The temple of
Bellona was beyond the
pomerium.
*The
magistrates who held
imperium did not have full power inside pomerium. They could have a citizen beaten, but not sentenced to death. This was symbolised by removing the axes from the
fasces carried by the magistrate's
lictors.
*Religious and political constraints forbade any anointed sovereign from entering the
pomerium. As a result, visits of state were somewhat awkward;
Cleopatra, for example, never actually entered the city of Rome when she came to visit
Julius Caesar.
* It was forbidden to bury the dead inside the pomerium.
*Furthermore, (provincial)
promagistrates and generals were forbidden from passing beyond it, and resigned their
imperium immediately upon crossing it (as it were the superlative form of the ban on armies entering Italy). As a result, a general waiting to celebrate a triumph with his victorious troops was required to wait outside the
pomerium until his triumph. The
Comitia Centuriata, one of the
Roman assemblies, consisting of
centuriae (voting units, but originally military batallions within the legions), was required to meet on the
Campus Martius outside the
pomerium.
Pompey's Theater, where Julius Caesar was murdered, was also outside the
pomerium and included a Senate chamber where the Senate could meet with the attendance of individual senators who were forbidden to cross the
pomerium and thus would not have been able to meet in the
Curia Hostilia.
Weapons were also banned inside the pomerium for religious and traditional reasons. Praetorian guards were allowed in only in civilian dress (toga), and were then called collectively
cohors togata. But it was possible to sneak in daggers (the proverbial weapon for political violence, see
sicarius). Since Julius Caesar's assassination occurred outside this boundary, the senatorial conspirators could not be charged with 'blasphemy' for carrying weapons inside the 'sacred' city.
*
Samuel Ball Platner, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome: Pomerium
*
Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities: Pomoerium
