HADRIAN'S LAST GREAT JOURNEY
Part Three
Hadrian's final journey lasted six years, from 128 to 134 AD, and included Greece, the provinces of Asia Minor, and Africa. Thanks to written sources and epigraphs, it is possible to reconstruct the itinerary of that long journey.
The first stop was Carthage, which was temporarily renamed Adrianople during his visit. In July 128 AD, the emperor reached Lambaesis in Numidia (now Algeria), where he visited the fortified camp of the Legio II Augusta.
It seems that the fortress has been established as early as the Punic Wars, but the visible remains date to Hadrian's time, between 123 and 129 AD.We know that Hadrian stopped in the camp for six days to see military exercises and gave a speech to the soldiers praising their work. It is therefore possible that he also inaugurated it.
After a brief return to Rome, at the end of 128 AD he went back to Athens with Empress Sabina and members of the court. After a stop in Eleusis (he had been initiated to the Eleusinian Mysteries), Hadrian reached Ephesus in the spring of 129 AD.
His visit was commemorated years later by a rich citizen of Ephesus, Publius Vedius Antoninus Sabinus with the construction of a temple dedicated to Hadrian, which was rebuilt and features a beautiful decorative frieze.
The itinerary touched several other cities in Asia Minor, where the emperor started the construction of buildings, as we know from various inscriptions. This first leg of the journey ended in Antioch, where Hadrian spent the winter, taking the opportunity to visit Palmyra in the Syrian desert.
In 130 AD his journey continued towards Egypt, where he stopped in Alexandria and visited the Temple of Serapis, which is of great importance for archaeoastronomy. Indeed, it was there that an illumination described as the "Kiss of the Sun" occurred, which we discuss in the book «Pantheon. Architecture and Light» (p. 46).
On October 24, 130 AD, Antinous died, drowned in the Nile under rather mysterious circumstances, and Hadrian founded the city of Antinoopolis to commemorate him, deified him, and named a constellation after him.
Immediately after the tragedy, Hadrian visited the Colossi of Memnon, the sculptures depicting the Pharaoh Amenophis III. They were famous in antiquity because one of them emitted metallic sounds at dawn, due to the expansion of the stone, a phenomenon that was considered a sort of miracle.
Visitors carved their names on the legs of the sculptures, and one of them commemorates the visit of Hadrian and Sabina, along with the poeteaa Julia Balbilla. This phenomenon ceased when the statue was restored during the reign of Septimius Severus, after an earthquake.
Returning to Athens in 131 AD, Hadrian inaugurated the Temple of Olympian Zeus, whose construction had lasted on for centuries.
But in the early summer of 132 AD, the emperor urgently went to Judea to quell the Jewish revolt. Thus began the Third Jewish-Roman War, which lasted until 135 AD, and the revolt was harshly repressed.
But by 134 AD, Hadrian had to return to Italy due to his poor health and retired to the imperial villa in Baiae, where he died on July 10, 138 AD.