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‘The eight Ionic columns still standing, part of the Temple of Saturn, the ancient god of the Capitol. Before this temple Pompey sate surrounded by soldiers, listening to the orations which Cicero was delivering from the rostrum, when he received the personal address, “Te enim jam appello, et ea voce ut me exaudire possis.” Here the tribune Metellus flung himself before the door and vainly attempted to defend the treasure of the Aerarium in this temple against Julius Caesar. The present remains are those of an indifferent and late renovation of an earlier temple, being composed of columns which differ in diameter, and a frieze put together from fragments which do not belong to one another. The original temple was built by Tarquin, and was supposed to mark the site of the ancient Sabine altar of the god and the limit of the wood of refuge mentioned by Virgil.’
Augustus Hare, Walks in Rome, London: Strahan & Co, 1871, vol 1, page 147
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