Portico d'Ottavia

Augustus rebuilt the portico between 27 and 23 BC in place of the earlier portico of Metellus, and dedicated it in the name of his sister Octavia. After a fire in 191 it was restored and largely rebuilt in 203 by Septimius Severus and Caracalla, and most of what stands is that rebuilding; the dedicatory inscription of 203 is still on the architrave, and the Sovrintendenza Capitolina carries its Latin text with an Italian translation. The quadriportico measured 119 by 132 metres and enclosed the temples of Juno Regina and Jupiter Stator, a Greek and a Latin library, and the Curia Octaviae. The south-eastern corner and the propylaeum survive. Two columns of the propylaeum's eastern front were removed and replaced by the large brick arch that still stands, painted with fresco, in the course of major works on the church at the end of the 1200s. From about 770 the church of San Paolo in summo circo, later Sant'Angelo in Pescheria, was built into the propylaeum. Augustus took part of the Circo Flaminio for the portico; the circus had been laid out by the censor Gaius Flaminius Nepos in 221 BC and nothing of it is visible today.