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The Clivus Argentairus is a road on the slopes of the Capitoline hill, behind the shops of the Forum of Caesar, that connects you from the Capitoline to the Carcer and the Arch of Septimius Severus. The name is actually medieval but was probably the clivus Lautumiarum.

From Platner & Ashby’s (1929) Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome:

The street that formed the only immediate connection between the forum and the campus Martius before the imperial fora were built. 

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It left the forum between the curia and the carcer, and ran along the slope of the Capitoline hill, corresponding closely with the modern Via di Marforio. Clivus Argentarius is found only in mediaeval documents (Ordo Benedicti, p. 143; Mirab. 24), but the name was probably in use under the empire and derived from the shops of the argentarii (see BASILICA ARGENTARIA). In the time of the republic it seems to have been called LAUTUMIAE (q.v.; Jord. i. 2. 438; ii. 445, 634, 666).

What monuments do you see along the Clivus Argentarius?

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Cite this page as: Darius Arya, The American Institute for Roman Culture, “Clivus Argentarius” Ancient Rome Live. Last modified 07/24/2020. https://ancientromelive.org/clivus-argentarius/

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