The first of these, the Pillar of Antoninus Pius, was a monolith of red syenite, resting upon a pedestal of the same stone ornamented with reliefs. These remained upon their original site in the garden of the Casa della Missione near the Monte Citorio, until the time of Benedict XIV., when the pedestal was removed and placed in the Piazza di Monte Citorio near the Gnomon Obelisk, but the monolith was found to be so damaged, as not to be worth the expense of re-erection. Pius VI. when he placed the Gnomon Obelisk in the Piazza di Monte Citorio, removed the pedestal and took it to the Vatican Gardens, and it was finally placed in the Giardino della Pigna by Gregory XVI., who caused it to be carefully restored. [Sidenote: Column of M. Aurelius.] The second of the great Antonine monuments, the Column of M. Aurelius, still stands upon its original site in the Piazza Colonna. Formerly it was the centre point of a group of massive temples and colossal halls, which have entirely perished. It is now surrounded by houses of modern construction, and surmounted by a statue of S. Paul, and looks like a grey veteran clothed in the dress of a later generation, in which he feels self-conscious and ill at ease. The only remains of the colonnades, which once enclosed the court in which it stood, are to be found on the east side of the piazza in the palace of the Prince of Piombino. They consist of a triple portico of brickwork, probably faced in ancient times with marble. The Temple of M. Aurelius, which stood, like that of Trajan, in front of the column, was probably upon the western side towards the Piazza di Monte Citorio, and it is from the ruins of this temple, and not of the Amphitheatre of Statilius, as commonly supposed, that the mound of ruins called Monte Citorio may have been formed. But no traces of the substructions or of the walls or columns have been found.[97]