The Temple of Vesta

• The first structure was hut-like and related, both physically and conceptually, to the Domus Regia
• It was a communal hearth that contained a sacred fire tended by the Vestal Virgins and never allowed to go out, its constancy symbolizing the perpetuity of the Roman state
• Ovid attributes the positioning and building of this complex to Numa Pompilius, Carandini thinks it was Romulus
• The augur-king watched for signs from the sky, three claps of thunder, three bolts of lightning followed by a shield that fell from heaven

Political and military implications

• As long as the fire stays lit, so long will Rome endure
• The fire is a palladium
• There is no physical representation of Vesta