"MACELLUM" OR "TEMPLE OF SERAPIS"

THE MOST FAMOUS CITY MARKET IN ANCIENT TIMES

"Macellum", today known as Serapeum or wrongly as "Temple of Serapis'', owing to the discovery the statue of Jupiter Serapis'', an Egyptian god. A quadrilateral area with a portico on columns of granite and cipolin, surrounded by 36 shops with alternate openings, outside and inside. Four large columuns with a portico stood in front of a cella. Then, a circular podium with Corinthian columns which bore a trabeation and a cone-shaped dome. In the centre there were a fountain, statues and African marbles. It was a "Macellum" (city market), which appeared in all its beauty and greatness to the Eastern merchant who approached the beautiful and famous land. All kinds of people, goods, cults, rites came here and this confirms the extraordinary role Puteoli played in ancient times.  But the Serapeum is also famous for the phenomenon of the Phlegraean bradyseism: the three columns of cipolin, 11.78 m. high, (the fourth one, which lies on the ground, should be raised in line with the other three) give us the exact measure of the sinking of the edifice. As a matter of fact, the holes left on the shafts of the columns by the lithodomi, marine molluscs that live on the surface of the water, clearly indicate the highest level reached by the sea- water (5.71 m.). Not far away there were the sea, the port, the remains of Caligula's mole and the submerged ones of the Via Herculanea. But the Serapeum stands out with its quiet beauty: an enclosure of old and faded marbles, only three columns are there to challenge tremors and carelessness.
The floor is dry. There are not the footfalls of the ancient merchants and the glittering of the gold objects from the East anymore. There are only some sea-gulls, perhaps liking archaeology. A monument that leaves aghast. Columns like marble skeletons without the breath of the divine images. One of the three large and central columns is caged. A fourth one, on the line of the portico, lies on the ground: sign of some seismic event. And, all around, there are the remains of the shops. In the middle of the "Macellum" there is a brick platform covered with marbles: a small circular temple surrounded by sixteen marble columns. The songs of the Eastern merchants spread out here and, under the protection of the gods, the town lived and fed on fortune and magnificence. A temple of timeless stones, marked by the tremors of a restless land.

Come doveva apparire il cortile interno con porticato e tholos centrale del Serapeo, in una ricostruzione plastica dal Progetto Eubea

The clamour of freedmen, merchants and slaves near the Puteolan ripa (quay) cannot be heard anymore. The shouting and the noisy crowd of the spice and incense traffickers has disappeared. Even that surface of water which protected the marble floor from the outrage of plunderers of any time has disappeared. There are only shreds of pale marble laid as trophies of a buried town, submerged in the waters of the gulf, in the shoal that leads to Caligula's follies. Crown of dry stones which die only in the dust, but leave piety and memory on the remains of the "Colonia Flavia". Then, that fragment of marble veined with saltish taste of the footprints of the merchants of Perge, Syria, Egypt and Asia. Like a pond of insistent and pitiless shadows, in the enclosure of silent and motionless "tabernae" (inns), where the sand advances to the remains of the podium and with nitre and copper from Cyprus gave glory and money to Vestorius' factory. So, the most famous market in ancient times is crowded with negotiatores (wholesale dealers) of the Republican age, owners of the large barns (horrea) of Puteoli; everywhere there is a varied and plyglot multitude of every kind of people. There are neither shouts nor scent of myrrh anymore, but it preserves the immutable signs of ancient violence. It is better to name it "macellum" than "temple", even though it is mistakenly known as "temple", because here prayer has vanished and Jupiter has chosen Tiberius' ways. The "tabernae" are empty, like sunny urns. The "Macellum" lies in the bowels of a land of ash, which leaves the game of the inexorable in a colourless marble chessboard. Like the one of the "negotiatores", slaves, freedmen and of the goods that crowd the "macellum". And the ground slowly moves upward and downward. Abyss of voices. The merchants will sing praises to Isis, will pray and sing so that the gods can protect them and the harvest can be rich; the crowd will greet Augustus, ruler of everything. St. Paul in chains will see the first Christians, while on the "emporium" (the market square) people will sing the emperor's praises.

Macellum:cortile centrale con la tholos

Mario Sirpettino (from "La terra della Sibilla", F. Di Mauro Editore, Napoli 2nd Edition)