Archaeological memory and urban morphology: the republican model in the imperial E42

The idea that the modern city should rise on a tabula rasa of the ancient city has been promoted since the Plan Voisin (Lecorbusier, 1925), and was essentially conceived on the ideology of the destruction of the ancienne regime, or to better say the destruction of its space, as a base to build a new world. Nowadays we recognize that demolitions of urban fabric inside historical cities are not conceivable, they were accomplished mostly by absolutist regimes or war bombings, upholding in substance the very same effect. Therefore we should reconsider critically the foundation of the E42 in Rome (1941), shown by fascist propaganda as a modern foundation, but planned outside the city centre. Even though meaningful demolitions were accomplished inside the monumental area of the Roman forums in the ‘30, in a very subtle manner, the archaeological topography of the ancient republican Rome became part of the new E42. The foundation was based on analogous orientations, in relationship with the f

The idea that the modern city should rise on a tabula rasa of the ancient city has been promoted since the Plan Voisin (Lecorbusier, 1925), and was essentially conceived on the ideology of the destruction of the ancienne regime, or to better say the destruction of its space, as a base to build a new world. Nowadays we recognize that demolitions of urban fabric inside historical cities are not conceivable, they were accomplished mostly by absolutist regimes or war bombings, upholding in substance the very same effect. Therefore we should reconsider critically the foundation of the E42 in Rome (1941), shown by fascist propaganda as a modern foundation, but planned outside the city centre. Even though meaningful demolitions were accomplished inside the monumental area of the Roman forums in the ‘30, in a very subtle manner, the archaeological topography of the ancient republican Rome became part of the new E42. The foundation was based on analogous orientations, in relationship with the foundation day of ancient Rome. Form and meaning of architectures, recalling the memory urban parts of ancient Rome, were used as archetypes to symbolize the past glory of Rome. This study presents the comparative analysis of the Palace of Receptions and Congresses (Adalberto Libera, 1938) and of the Temple of Venus and Rome (Hadrian, 121 ad), analyzing the city through models, proposing a new interpretation of the E42 as an analogous city. This comparative analysis recognizes in the plan elements of non-immediate perception, tracing a key to understand the meaning of the spaces of the city.