In the Roman Forum among Febris, Francesca Romana,Galen

Roman forum

Rome [ENA] COVID-19 is leading us into uncharted territory. But the coronavirus is going to have a very different impact, not only between countries, but also within countries. In Italy the relevant impact is on tourism, of course. Tourism was a common ground without boundaries, open to anyone who had the possibility to travel and connect to art, history and gastronomic culture. Anyway, this period could represent also an

opportunity to discover traces of history one has forgotten.   In the Roman Forum, some traces still remain of what was once the medical district of Ancient Rome. Roman-era cults and modern-day practices overlapped subject to transformations and reinterpretations over the centuries. The Forum’s architectural and sacred spaces enable the area’s historic association with the ars medica to live on.

Temple di Antonino e Faustina

Once upon a time on the Palatine Hill, there stood an ancient temple dedicated to the goddess Febris. Her cult, frightful yet salvific, was very dear to the Romans: goddess of fever and sickness, Febris was honored as “bringer of death”, but also “purifier and healer” of epidemics and malaria, which infested the countryside surrounding the city. She was worshiped during the ancient festival of Lupercalia celebrated from the 13th to the 15th of the month called Februarius. Her cult’s celebrations culminated on the 14th, a day which the Christians would later consecrate first to St. Febronia and then to St. Valentine, patron saint of the febris amoris. In the area where the aedes Febris may have been located, a different place of worship

stands today, undoubtedly tangible and majestic: the church of Saint Francesca Romana, final resting place of its namesake’s tomb since 9 March 1440. Francesca Bussi de’ Leoni was a Roman noblewoman who devoted her life to the service of the poor. During the plague that struck Rome in the early 1400’s, and which took two of her own young children, Francesca opened her palace to the sick and risked her own life to care for them: for this reason, she is considered a protectress from pestilence. On 9 March, 2020, a day after the gates of the Coliseum Area were officially shut in response to the medical emergency currently affecting all of Italy and beyond, the church bells of Santa Francesca Romana rang out to celebrate the saint’s feast day,

the auspicious coincidence of the dates offering a glimmer of hope.    Among the numerous historical figures who frequented the Roman Forum, Galen of Pergamon is the most significant because he was considered the founder of experimental medicine and one of the most celebrated physicians of the ancient world. Born in 129 AD, erudite in many fields and especially in Aristotelian philosophy, Galen decided to settle in Rome, where he quickly rose to fame—so much so that he was chosen as personal physician to the emperors Marcus Aurelius, Lucius Verus, Commodus and Septimius Severus. In addition to holding packed conferences and performing “live” operations before crowds of onlookers, Galen wrote a myriad of treatises dedicated to specific

areas of medicine, such as anatomy, physiology, prognosis and diagnosis, therapy, pharmacology, diet, etc. He kept his works in a “studio” located in the area of the Horrea Piperataria, or spice warehouses, recently discovered beneath the Basilica of Maxentius. The location, although prestigious and practical in the heart of ancient Rome’s medical district, wasn’t without its disadvantages: in one writing, Galen expressed sorrow for the loss of all of his manuscripts and physician’s tools in the catastrophic fire that tore through the Forum in 192 AD, destroying the Horrea and the nearby Temple of Peace.