Mount Aventine was, in the early ages of the city, adorned with a number of temples, which, there is good reason to believe, on the introduction of christianity, were converted to the purposes for which they are at present used, for, besides many other authorities, Arcadius and Honoriius directed that the public edifices should not be destroyed. It is, therefore, probably that this church of St. Sabina was the celebrated temple of Diana, or at least built on the site, with the ruins of the afore-named temple; and this is strengthened further by the testimony of Appianus, in his account of the civil wars of Rome, book 1. that C. Gracchus, in his flight from the temple of Diana Aventine, passed the Tiber by the wooden bridge of Sublicias, which bridge was afterwards restored by Antoninus Pius, and, being by him built of marble, obtained the name of Marmorea; and which place to this day, where the church of St. Sabina stands is called Marmorata. If to these reasons is superadded, that the port Trigemena, through which the way led from the city to Mount Aventine, was at the foot of the hill through which Gracchus passed to cross the river, which was in existence some time back, and was the customary thoroughfar to the church of Sabina, whose principal entrance faces the west, it is more evident it was formerly the temple of Diana, or at least the site of that temple. This church of St. Sabina was built in the year 425, in the time of Theodosius, and in the papacy of Celestine the first, by Peter of Savona, a cardinal priest of Rome, according to the following inscription: "Hujus temporibus fecit Petrus Episcopus Illyrica de gentenatus Basilicum, Sancta Sabina in urbe Roma in monte Aventino, juxta monasterum Sancti Bonifacii Martyris in quo et Sanctus Alexius jacet." The church is very magnficent, having a portico supported by two beautiful columns of black marble, and another with columns at the side, the front ornamented with elaborate bas-reliefs; twenty-four columns of white marble divide the aisles from the nave, in which is a noble tribune also of marble; the sacred utensils are of a magnificent corresponding with the splendour of the church, amongst which is a ciborium of several pounds weight, together with another ciborium, chalice, paten, and corporal, all of silver, given, as it is said, by Honorius III. in 1216.

Rev. Joseph Nightingale, The Religions and Religious Ceremonies of All Nations: Accurately, Impartially, and Fully Described (London: Sherwood, Gilbert, and Piper, 1835), 34-36.