📍Caelian Hill, 00184 Rome, Italy
121 – 138“I was born in my family's house on the Caelian Hill in Rome in 121, a quiet district of aristocratic villas and gardens, with few public buildings and fine views across the city. My father died when I was very young, and I was raised by my mother, Domitia Lucilla, and my grandfather, Marcus Annius Verus, in whose palace near the Lateran I spent much of my childhood. My grandfather was a senator and friend of the emperor Hadrian. Years later, in the first book of my Meditations, I gave thanks for what each person in that household taught me. From my grandfather, I learned good character and how to govern my temper. From my mother, reverence for the gods, generosity, and a simple way of life, not like the rich. My tutors taught me rhetoric and Greek, but it was Diognetus, when I was about eleven, who introduced me to philosophy. I was so taken with it that I wore the rough Greek cloak of the philosophers and slept on the floor, until my mother persuaded me to use a bed. Hadrian noticed me as a serious boy and arranged for me to be adopted into the imperial family. In 138 I left the Caelian Hill for the palace, and in 161 I became emperor. Through long years of war and plague I tried to rule as a Stoic, and in my tent on the frontier I wrote the private notes that became the Meditations. The Caelian Hill's quiet gardens, my mother's simplicity and my grandfather's calm stayed with me. An equestrian statue of me, now on the Capitoline, was once on display near the Lateran, close to where I grew up.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today