BELLONA, AEDES
(templum, Liv. x. 19; Fest. 33; Ov. Fast. vi. 205): the temple of Bellona, a goddess who probably represented that characteristic of Mars which was displayed in the fierceness of battle frenzy (WR 137-138; AR 1909, 70, 71). It was vowed by Appius Claudius Caecus in 296 B.C. (Liv. x. 19. 17; Plin. NH xxxv. 12; Ov. Fast. vi. 201-204; CIL i 2. p. 192 (Elog. x.)=xi. 1827), and dedicated a few years later on June 3rd (Ov. Fast. vi. 201). No traces, architectural or epigraphic, of the temple have been found, and its site is not known with certainty; but it was in the campus Martius, in circo Flaminio (Fast. Ven. ad III non. Iun.; CIL i 2. p. 319; Mirabil. 23; BC 1914, 383-385), probably about half-way between the north-east corner of the circus Flaminius and the Petronia amnis. From it the senators heard the cries of the prisoners whom Sulla massacred in the Villa publica (Plut. Sulla 30; Sen. de clem. i. 12. 2; Cass. Dio, fr. 109. 5), and from the open area in front of it one looked at the eastern end of the circus Flaminius (Ov. Fast. vi. 205, 209). It was probably on the east side of the via Triumphalis and faced the east. For a suggestive but hardly convincing theory that this temple was at the west end of the circus Flaminius, in the Piazza Paganica, see BC 1918, 120-126). See Addenda to HERCULES CUSTOS, AEDES.The senate met in this temple on various occasions (SC de Bacch. CIL i. 581 =x. 104; Cic. in Verr. v. 41; Plut. Sulla 7; Cass. Dio 1. 4), and most frequently, as the temple lay outside the pomerium, to receive victorious generals on their return to Rome, and to vote upon their claims for a triumph (Liv. xxvi. 2 ; xxviii. 9, 38; xxxi. 47; xxxiii. 22; xxxvi. 39; xxxviii. 44; xxxix. 29; xli. 6; xlii. 9, 21,28; Sall. frg. v.26; cf. BC 1908, 138). Foreign ambassadors were also received here (Liv. xxx. 21, 40; xxxiii. 24; xlii. 36). The temple is mentioned in the second and early third century (Plut. Cic. 13; Cass. Dio lxxi. 33; Hist. Aug. Sev. 22; Placidus, p. 14 Deuerl.=CGLv. 8. 22, 50. 8). Near It was a SENACULUM (q.v.) or place of assembly for the senators (Fest. 347), and in front of it stood the COLUMNA BELLICA (q.v.). Besides the literature already cited, see RE iii. 254-255; viii. 572-573; Rosch. i. 775; HJ 552- 554; JRS 1921, 32.