Titus, Arch Of:

By: Morris Jastrow, Jr. , Immanuel Benzinger

A triumphal arch erected at Rome in honor of the emperor Titus and in celebration of his victory over the Jews. It rises on the prominent part of the Via Sacra, about 20 yards above the Tiber. One of its faces fronts the Colosseum; the other, the Forum. Under the pontificate of Pius VII. the arch was restored in its lateral portions, which had become injured by time. The structure consists of a single arcade adorned with sculptured crowns and tympans. On the right and on the left are two united columns of a composite order with rich entablature, and an elevated attic. Three bas-reliefs adorn the passage of the arcade. One, on the Colosseum side, shows Titus, crowned by Victory, standing upright in a car drawn by four horses and conducted by a female personifying the city of Rome. The second represents Roman soldiers without weapons, crowned with laurels, and carrying the spoils of the Temple of Jerusalem. These spoils are; two tablets fastened on staffs, the seven-branched candlestick, and the golden table upon which are leaning the sacred trumpets. The third bas-relief, under the vault, exhibits Titus sitting on an eagle, as he appears on the medals struck to consecrate his apotheosis.

A tradition, which still prevails in Rome, says that formerly no Jew ever passed under this arch, and that, in order to go from the Colosseum to the Capitol, the inhabitants of the ghetto opened a way between the arch and the Palatine.

Arch of Titus at Rome. (From a photograph.)