Capitol

The Capitol is the most sacred hill of Rome, with the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus. In 65 BC, when Caesar was aedile, gilded statues of Marius and his trophies were set up here by night. In the morning people wept, and Catulus spoke in the Senate against Caesar. Triumphs ended here. The temple burned in AD 69 during the struggle for power after Nero, and Vespasian rebuilt it. In AD 80 the temple of Jupiter burned again, eleven years after the fire of AD 69. Domitian rebuilt it once more and had only his own name carved on it, without the names of the earlier builders (Suetonius, Domitian 5.1). On December 19, AD 69, the temple of Jupiter burned in the fighting between the soldiers of Vitellius and the defenders of Flavius Sabinus; the sources disagree on who set the fire. The Senate resolved to rebuild it. In AD 70 Vespasian himself carried out the first basket of rubble from the ruins of the temple.