Augustus's mausoleum fell to ruins and thieves during the Dark Ages. Somebody stole the emperor's ashes—no telling who. By the twelfth century, though, the monument had been renovated into a fortress for the powerful Colonna family, to protect them from assaults by various warring princes. Then the Augusteum was transformed somehow into a vineyard, then a Renaissance garden, then a bullring (we're in the eighteenth century now), then a fireworks depository, then a concert hall. In the 1930s, Mussolini seized the property and restored it down to its classical foundations, so that it could someday be the final resting place for his remains. (Again, it must have been impossible back then to imagine that Rome could ever be anything but a Mussolini-worshipping empire.) Of course, Mussolini's fascist dream did not last, nor did he get the imperial burial he'd anticipated.

奥古斯都的陵墓在黑暗时代惨遭毁坏盗窃。有人偷走皇帝的骨灰——盗者何人，并未可知。12世纪时，这座遗迹经过翻修，成为科洛纳（Colonna）望族的堡垒，抵御各交战诸侯的袭击。而后奥古斯都庙不知何故，变成了葡萄园，接着成为文艺复兴庭园，接着是斗牛场（此时是19世纪），而后成了烟火仓库，之后是演奏厅。20世纪30年代被墨索里尼占为己有，将之整个连同古代地基都修复起来，以便成为他的最后安息地（当时肯定同样难以想象，罗马除了崇拜墨索里尼的帝国之外会有其他面目。）当然，墨索里尼的法西斯美梦未能持久，也未能得到他期待的帝王安葬规模。

Today the Augusteum is one of the quietest and loneliest places in Rome, buried deep in the ground. The city has grown up around it over the centuries. (One inch a year is the general rule of thumb for the accumulation of time's debris.) Traffic above the monument spins in a hectic circle, and nobody ever goes down there—from what I can tell—except to use the place as a public bathroom. But the building still exists, holding its Roman ground with dignity, waiting for its next incarnation.

今日的奥古斯都庙是罗马最寂静的地方之一， 深埋在土中。数世纪以来，罗马城在它周围成长。（时间瓦砾的累积，大致一年三厘米。）遗迹上方车水马龙，不见任何人走下来——就我所见——除了作为公共厕所之用。但建筑物依然存在，坚守其罗马的立场，等候下一个轮回。

I find the endurance of the Augusteum so reassuring, that this structure has had such an erratic career, yet always adjusted to the particular wildness of the times. To me, the Augusteum is like a person who's led a totally crazy life—who maybe started out as a housewife, then unexpectedly became a widow, then took up fan-dancing to make money, ended up somehow as the first female dentist in outer space, and then tried her hand at national politics—yet who has managed to hold an intact sense of herself throughout every upheaval.

奥古斯都庙的耐力与任性使我觉得安心，此建筑一生多舛，却始终适应着时代的狂风暴雨。对我而言，奥古斯都庙好比一个毕生生活动荡的人——或许一开始是家庭主妇，而后意外成了寡妇，而后靠跳扇子舞赚钱谋生，最后不知怎么当上外太空第一位女牙医，最后尝试涉足国内政治——然而却能 在经历每次的变动后毫发无伤。

I look at the Augusteum, and I think that perhaps my life has not actually been so chaotic, after all. It is merely this world that is chaotic, bringing changes to us all that nobody could have anticipated. The Augusteum warns me not to get attached to any obsolete ideas about who I am, what I represent, whom I belong to, or what function I may once have intended to serve. Yesterday I might have been a glorious monument to somebody, true enough—but tomorrow I could be a fireworks depository. Even in the Eternal City, says the silent Augusteum, one must always be prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation.Eat, Pray, Love

我看着奥古斯都庙，我想，或许我的生活毕竟不是真的那么混乱不堪。混乱的是这个世界，给我们带来无人能够预期的变化。奥古斯都庙告诫我， 切勿死守我是什么人、我代表什么、我属于谁，或我曾想让自己有什么表现的固执想法。昨天我对某人来说或许是壮丽的古迹，这也是真的——但明天我可能成为烟火仓库。即使在这座“永恒之城”中，沉默的奥古斯都庙告诉我，一个人始终必须为动荡骚乱的变化作好准备。