Lectis Magna

In 203, Septimius granted Leptis Magna, and also the rebuilt Carthage, "the ius Italicum, or immunity from provincial taxation" and initiated his splendid building system (Wells 262).

Leptis Magna stood at the end of the trading routes that crossed the Sahara and controlled a vast trade in gold, carbuncles, ivory, slaves, and also the wild animals utilized in amphitheaters throughout the empire. Agricultural exports have been the second pillar on the city's great wealth. North Africa was "the main granary of Rome," and Leptis controlled the "ocean of olive tress" that covered the rolling plains and were worked mainly by slave labor (Wells 148).

Leptis Magna also achieved a specific position in architectural history by getting a meeting factor between the influence on the Hellenic culture of the eastern empire as well as the much more purely Latin culture from the west. Its historic remains are all Roman. Although the city was established as a Carthaginian trading post prior to the fifth century BC and though the precise site is known, "the earliest extant remains are in the Augustan age" (Ward-Perkins 371). With some interesting exceptions, the earlier remains aren't considered "demonstrating any great artistic originality" and have been "largely derivative" of Italian models (Ward-Perkins 371).

The exact same type of elaborate decoration found on the arcades is continued, but much differentiated, on a portico and the exedra that fronted the basilica over a forum side. Lotus and acanthus capitals once more top the portico columns, as well as the entablature was similarly decorated. The entrance for the basilica had "an elegantly carve marble architrave and cornice" which was repeated, over a modest scale and with slight variations, more than the entrances on the shops along the portico (Lyttleton 289).

The building from the Severan forum and basilica complex also posed problems with existing streets. So that you can use the entire available space and yet retain the forthright plan of the frequent Roman civic center, the architect at Leptis Magna produced the forum as being a traditional extended rectangle, as well as the temple stood at 1 end, with the basilica situated transversely at the opposite end. But the basilica was really manufactured at an oblique angle, and so the architect inserted a wedge-shaped row of shops to the space among the basilica's forum side and also the straight line of the forum space. He nonetheless retained the principal entrance to the basilica over a axis from the temple by producing an exedra (open curving space) kind of entrance that fit naturally into the row of shops. A similar merchandise in the wedge of shops evened off one from the sides in the complex, thus retaining the spatial integrity in the forum complex within its irregularly shaped plot of land.

Then, quite suddenly, the first incursion of eastern influences arrived when, under Hadrian, "marble came into use over a big scale" (Sear 197). The impact was quite very good due to the fact not merely did the marble arrive from Greece and Asia Minor, it was also accompanied by craftsmen "trained from the workshops of the Aegean world and of Rome" (Ward-Perkins 376).

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