2. At the corner where the Strada della Vite crosses the Corso is a tablet recording the improvements made by Alexander VII. in the Corso at that point, whence he removed the ruins of an ancient triumphal arch which impeded the thoroughfare. A view of this is given by Donati, who calls it the Arcus Domitiani. But Nardini and all topographers since his time are agreed that the arch which stood here till 1662, must have been erected at a later time in honour of M. Aurelius. When it was pulled down, for public convenience as the inscription tells us, there were still four columns of verde antico standing, two of which are now used to adorn the principal altar in the Church of S. Agnese in Piazza Navona, and two are in the Corsini Chapel of the Lateran Basilica. The keystone of the arch is preserved in the Collegio della Sapienza; on each side of the arch there were two reliefs, now placed in the Capitoline Palace of the Conservators on the landing places at the top of the stairs. One of these represents M. Aurelius standing on a suggestus to deliver an harangue, and the other the apotheosis of the younger Faustina, his wife, who is being carried up to heaven by a genius, while the emperor is seated below, and at his feet the genius of Halala, a town at the foot of Mount Taurus where Faustina died. These two reliefs were removed into the Palace of the Conservators in order that they might be placed near four other reliefs, which had been found in the sixteenth century in the Church of S. Martina on the Capitol. A fifth, also found in the same church, is now in the Palazzo Torlonia in the Piazza di Venezia. The earlier history of the removal of these last five reliefs is not known, but it seems certain, from their style and subjects, that they belonged to the Arch of M. Aurelius. The four which are now in the Conservators’ Palace represent Marcus Aurelius on horseback with his army, a group of barbarians kneeling before him, the goddess Roma, receiving the emperor who comes on foot to the gates, and presenting him with the globe, the symbol of empire, the triumphal procession of M. Aurelius in a quadriga crowned by Victory, and his thanksgiving sacrifice on the Capitol. The fifth relief, which is now in the Palazzo Torlonia, represents either M. Aurelius, or his brother Lucius Verus in conference with some barbarians who kneel as suppliants before him. Even supposing that the last mentioned five reliefs do not belong to this arch, yet the two first which are known to have stood upon it are quite sufficient to prove that it was the arch of M. Aurelius. The similarity between the representation of the apotheosis of the younger Faustina and that of Antoninus Pius and the elder Faustina is too evident to be overlooked and the whole style of sculpture and architecture points to the Antonine Age.