Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

1 98 ]BASILICA. BASILICA.
something by them. So Martial, in rallying a fop,'(Liv. xxvi. 27.) It was situated in the forum adwho had tried to dispense with the barber's ser- joining the curia, and was denominated basilica
vices, by using different kinds of plasters, &c., Porcia, in commemoration of its founder, M.
asks him (Epig. iii. 74), Quid fJcient ulsi/zes? Porcius Cato. Besides this, there were twenty
What will your nails do? How will you get your others, erected at different periods, within the city
tails pared? So Tibullus says (i. 8. 11), quid of Rome (Pitisc. Lex. Ant. s. v. Basilica), of which
(prodest) unaoes acstficis docta subsecuisse nancu; the following are the most frequently alluded to by
from which it appears that the person addressed the ancient authors: - 1. Basilica Semopronia, conwas in the habit of employing one of the more structed by Titus Sempronius, B. C. 171 (Liv. xliv.
fashionable tonsors. The instruments used are 16); anrd supposed, by Donati and Nardini, to have
referred to by Martial. (Epig. xiv. 36, Instru- been between the vicus Tuscus and the Velabrum.
snenta tonsoria.) [A. A.] 2. Basilica Opimia, which was above the comitium.
BA'RBITOS, or BA'RBITON. [LYRA.] 3. Basilica Pauli Aemzilii, or Basilica Aemnilia,
BASANOS (3do-avos). [TORMENTUM,] called also Reiau Pauli by Statius (I. c.). Cicero
BASCA'NIA (3aoTcavita). [FAsCINeM.] (Ad Alt. iv. 16) mentions two basilicae of this
BASCAUDA, a British basket. This term, name, of which one was built, and the other only
which remains with very little variation in the restored, by Paulus Aemilius. Both these edifices
Welsh " basgawd," and the English "basket," were in the forum, and one was celebrated for its
was conveyed to Rome together with the articles open peristyle of Phrygian columns. A repredenoted by it. We find it used by Juvenal (xii. sentation of this one is given below from a coin of
46) and by Martial (xiv. 99) in connections which the Aemilia gens. (Plin. H. N. xxxvi. 24; Appian,
imply that these articles were held in much esteem B. C. ii. 26; Plut. Caes. 29.) The position of
by the luxurious Romans. [J. Y.] these two basilicae has given rise to much conBASILEIA (,3ao-iela), a festival celebrated troversy, a brief account of which is given in the
at Lebadeia, in Boeotia, in honour of Trophonius, Diet. of Biog. Vol. II. p. 766. 4. Basilica PoeLwho had the surname of BaaLXeVs. This festival peii, called also regia (Suet. Aug. 31), near the
was also called Trophonia —Tpoqpc; a (Pollux, i. theatre of Pompey. 5. Basilica Julia, erected by
37); and was first observed under the latter name Julius Caesar, in the forum, and opposite to the
as a general festival of the Boeotians after the battle basilica Aemilia. (Suet. Calig. 37.) C;. Basilica
of Leuctra. (Diod. xv. 53.) Caii et Lucii, the grandsons of Augustus, by whom
BA'SILEUS ([3aIXems). [REX.] it was founded. (Suet. Aug. 29.) 7. Basilica
BASI'LICA (sc. aedes, aula, porticus -, 3aam- Ulpia, or Trajani, in the forum of Trajan. 8.
Xc{i, also regia, Stat. Silv. i. 1. 30; Suet. Aug. Basilica Constantini, erected by the emperor Con31), a building which served as a court of law and stantine, supposed to be the ruin now remaining
an exchange, or place of meeting for merchants and on the via sacra, near the temple of Rome and
men of business. The two uses are so mixed up Venus, and commonly called the temple of Peace.
together that it is not always easy to say which Of all these magnificent edifices nothing now rewas the principal. Thus the basilica at Fanum, mains beyond the ground-plan, and the bases and
of which Vitruvius himself was the architect, was some portion of the columns and superstructure
entirely devoted to business, and the courts were of the two last. The basilica at Pompeii is in
held in a small building attached to it,-the better preservation; the, external walls, ranges of
temple of Augustus. The term is derived, ac- columns, and tribunal of the judges, being still
cording to Philander (Commzent. in Vit7cuv.), from tolerably perfect on the ground-floor.!,SaA.Ess, a king, in reference to early times, when The forum, or, where there was more than one,
the chief magistrate administered the laws he made; the one which was in the most frequented and
but it is more immediately adopted from the Greeks central part of the city, was always selected for the
of Athens, whose second archon was styled iapxcov site of a basilica; and hence it is that the classic,SaoLXevsf, and the tribunal where he adjudicated writers not unfrequently use the termsfbrum and
a-roa 13aeXE1os (Paus. i. 3. ~ ]; Demosth. c. Aristo- basilica synonymously, as in the passage of Clau-.qeit. p. 776), the substantive aula, orporticus in Latin dian (De IHonor. Cons. vi. 645):-Desuetaque
beimg omitted for convenience. The Greek writers eirgit Regius auratis Jbra fascibus Ulpia lictor,
who speak of the Roman basilicae, call them some- where the forum is not meant, but the basilica
times cre'oal SaX;acrKat, and sometimes merely which was in it, and which was surrounded by the
reroal. lictors who stood in the forum. (Pitisc. Lex. Ant.
The name alone would make it highly probable 1. c.; Nard. Rom. Ant. v. 9.)
that the Romans were indebted to the Greeks for Vitruvius (v. 1) directs that the most sheltered
the idea of the building, which was probably bor- part of the forum should be selected for the site of
rowed from the -rob& 8a'Liem0os at Athens. In a basilica, in order that the public might suffer as
its original form it may be described as an insulated little as possible from exposure to bad weather,
portico, detached from the agora or fbrZsum, for the whilst going to, or returning from, their'place of
more convenient transaction of business, which business; he lsight also have added, for their
formerly took place in the porticoes of the agora greater convenience whilst engaged within, since
itself; in fact, a sort of agora inm miniature.; The many of these edifices, and all of the more ancient
court of the Hellanodicae, in the old agora of Elis, ones, were entirely open to the external air, being
was exactly of the form of a basilica. [AGORA]. surrounded and protected solely by an open periThe first edifice of this description was not style of columns, as the aniexed representation of
ere,*' until B C. 184 (Liv. xxxix. 44); for it is the basilica Aemilia from a medal of Lepidus, with
ly stated by the historian, that there were the inscription, clearly shows.
licae at the time of the fire, which de- When, however, the Romans became wealthy
so many buildings in the forum, under the and refined, and consequenItly more effeminate, a
of Marcellus and Laevinus, B. c. 210. wall was substituted for the external peristyle, and