ARCH, TRIUMPHAL, or MEMORIAL. Usually a free-standing arch, spanning a road; though sometimes city gates and monumental doorways are turned into memorial arches. These arches are erected to commemorate triumphs or suc cessful campaigns. or even great peaceful events, or an entire reign, or even a great family. They appear to have originated with the Romans.
Nearly one hundred and fifty such Roman arches remain wholly or in part, of which about sixty are in North Africa. At Rome they were placed along the Triumphal Way followed by the tri umphing general and his army from the Field of Mars to the Capitol. The custom spread from Rome elsewhere. The earliest arches mentioned at Borne are those of Stertinius (me. 196) and Scipio Africanus (n.c. 190). Then the Fabian gem, erected one to itself (c.120 B.c.). But it was under Augustus that the custom took root everywhere, as is shown in the Roman Forum, at Aosta, Suss, Rimini, Fano, etc. From that time until the fall of the Empire in the Fifth Century such arches followed Roman dominion throughout the civilized world, and they are found in France (Saint Remy, Orange, etc.), Spain (Ceparra, Barn), North Africa (Timgad, Tebessa, Thugga, HaIdra). Syria (Palmyra, Gerasa, Baalbek), Asia Minor, etc. The early arches were of stone and without much carving, being mainly arched bases for a group of tri umphal statuary. But under the Empire, though still crowned by the triumphal quadriga and other figures in bronze, the arches themselves became of great artistic importance, and often represent the most successful effort of Roman genius at combining architectural and sculptural design. They were then built of marble. The number of openings varied from one to four, according as special arcades were or were not made for foot-passengers, or two main arches provided for vehicles in place of one. Still an
other favorite form was the Janus arch, or Tetrapylon, a solid cube, with arches at right angles, usually placed at the intersection of avenues, as at Philippopolis, Gerasa, and Rome. Few cities were built under the Empire without one or more of these arches, but only in Italy and South France were they profusely decorated with relief sculptures. The most perfect of all such sculptured arches is that of Trojan, at Benevento (A.D. 1 1 4 ) ; then come those of Titus (A.D. SO), Septimius Severus (A.D. 203), and Constantine (A.D. 312) at Rome, and that of Tiberius at Orange. The sculptures commemo rated events of these emperors' reigns, and the attic contained the dedicatory inscription. One of the slenderest and most elegant is the one erected on the Mole at Ancona, to celebrate the enlargement of this port by Trajan. The Renais sance resurrected the arch after a lapse of a thousand years (Arch of Alfonso at Naples, Fifteenth Century), and it has since the Seven teenth Century steadily increased in popularity in Italy (Arco della Pace, Milan) ; France (Are de l'Etoile, Arc du Carrousel) ; Germany (Brandenburger Thor, Berlin; Siegesthor, Mu nich), and America (Washington Arch, New York; Memorial Arch, Brooklyn). Consult: Baumeister. Denknailer des Hassisehen Alter turns (Munich, 1885-MS) Daremberg and Saglio, Dictionnaire des antiquites grerques et ro 77taines (Paris. l8S1-92) Bellori. Veteres Arens -lugustorum (Rome, 1690) ; and Philippi, Ueber die roinisehen Triumphalreliefe (Leipzig, 1874).