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The history of the monuments and works of art of the classical period, which were in existence in Rome during the Renaissance, is of importance to us for many reasons. We may learn what were the materials which were at the disposal of the great masters in architecture, painting, and sculpture, and see in their drawings and sketches, as well as in the works which they actually executed, what use they made of the models which they had before their eyes, and what interested them in a greater or less degree. We may trace the growth of that antiquarianism out of which the science of archaeology was in process of time to develop. We may also obtain valuable information concerning much that has been destroyed or lost, or has, at least, come down to us in a very different state to that in which it was in their day.

It is one of the paradoxes of the study of Roman architecture that what, in terms of the written record, is probably the most thoroughly and reliably documented phase of its whole development, the Augustan age, is from the point of view of the architectural historian still one of the most obscure and controversial. That it was a vital turning point in the history of Roman architecture one cannot doubt; and yet the number of monuments in the capital that can be accepted without hesitation and without reservation as representative of the age is very limited. No doubt the full and critical publication of the excavations of the last few decades will increase the number and provide a firm basis for further studies. But in the meantime we are still dependent—all too dependent—upon those few buildings which are securely and unequivocally Augustan, and which may be used therefore as a safe standard of comparison for some at any rate of the architectural practices current in Augustan Rome.