Roman Forum

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Roman Forum, Forum Romanum
Image:Image:Forum Romanum panorama.jpg
Roman Forum
Location Regione VIII Forum Romanum
Built in Unknown Kingdom Era
Built by/for Unknown builder
Type of structure Imperial forums


Roman Forum

Coordinates: 41.892534° N 12.485715° E

This page refers to the main forum in the center of Rome. See Imperial forums or Other forums in Rome (below) for other forums in Rome and other Roman provincial cities.
See Forum (Roman) for the type of building.

The Roman Forum, Forum Romanum, (although the Romans called it more often the Forum Magnum or just the Forum) was the central area around which ancient Rome developed, in which commerce and the administration of justice took place. The communal hearth was also located here. It was built on the site of a past cemetery.

Sequences of remains of paving show that sediment eroded from the surrounding hills was already raising the level of the forum in early Republican times. Originally it had been marshy ground, which was drained by the Tarquins with the Cloaca Maxima. Its final travertine paving, still visible, dates from the reign of Augustus.

Contents

[edit] Structures within the Forum

The ruins within the forum clearly show how urban spaces were utilized during the Roman Age. The Roman Forum includes a modern statue of Julius Caesar and the following major monuments, buildings, and ancient ruins:

Map of central Rome during the Roman Empire, with Forum Holitorium and Forum Boarium shown at bottom middle
Map of central Rome during the Roman Empire, with Forum Holitorium and Forum Boarium shown at bottom middle

[edit] Temples

Temple of Saturn

Temple of Castor and Pollux

Temple of Vesta

Temple of Venus and Roma

Temple of Antoninus and Faustina

Temple of Concord

Campo Vaccino, by Claude Lorrain

The Roman Forum

[edit] Other structures

  • Regia, originally the residence of the kings of Rome or at least their main headquarters, and later the office of the Pontifex Maximus, the high priest of Roman religion.
  • Rostra, from where politicians made their speeches to the Roman citizens
  • Curia Hostilia (later rebuilt as the Curia Julia), the site of the Roman Senate
  • Tabularium
  • Gemonian stairs
  • Clivus Capitolinus was the street that started at the Arch of Tiberius, wound around the Temple of Saturn, and ended at Capitoline Hill.
  • Umbilicus Urbi, the designated centre of the city from which and to which all distances in Rome and the Roman Empire were measured
  • Milliarium Aureum
  • Lapis Niger, a shrine also known as the Black Stone
  • Atrium Vestae, the house of the Vestal Virgins
  • A processional street, the Via Sacra, linked the Atrium Vetae with the Colosseum. By the end of the Empire, it had lost its everyday use but remained a sacred place.
  • Column of Phocas, the last monument built within the Forum
  • Tullianum, the prison used to hold various foreign leaders and generals.

[edit] Excavation and preservation

Campo Vaccino by Herman van Swanevelt.
Campo Vaccino by Herman van Swanevelt.

An anonymous 8th century traveler from Einsiedeln (now in Switzerland) reported that the Forum was already falling apart in his time. During the Middle Ages, though the memory of the Forum Romanum persisted, its monuments were for the most part buried under debris, and its location was designated the "Campo Vaccino" or "cattle field," located between the Capitoline Hill and the Colosseum. The return of Pope Urban V from Avignon in 1367 led to an increased interest in ancient monuments, partly for their moral lesson and partly as a quarry for new buildings being undertaken in Rome after a long lapse. Artists from the late 15th century drew the ruins in the Forum, antiquaries copied inscriptions in the 16th century, and a tentative excavation was begun in the late 18th century.

A cardinal took measures to drain it again and built the Alessandrine neighborhood over it. But the excavation by Carlo Fea, who began clearing the debris from the Arch of Septimius Severus in 1803, and archaeologists under the Napoleonic regime marked the beginning of clearing the Forum, which was only fully excavated in the early 20th century.

Remains from several centuries are shown together, due to the Roman practice of building over earlier ruins.

[edit] Other forums in Rome

The column erected in honour of the Byzantine emperor Phocas, 608: the last addition to the Roman Forum
The column erected in honour of the Byzantine emperor Phocas, 608: the last addition to the Roman Forum
See also: Category:Forums of Rome

Other fora existed in other areas of the city; remains of most of them, sometimes substantial, still exist. The most important of these are a number of large imperial fora forming a complex with the Forum Romanum: the Forum Iulium, Forum Augustum, the Forum Transitorium (also: Forum Nervae), and Trajan's Forum. The planners of the Mussolini era removed most of the Medieval and Baroque strata and built the Via dei Fori Imperiali road between the Imperial Fora and the Forum. There is also:

Other markets were known but remain unidentifiable due to a lack of precise information on the function of the sites. Among these, the Forum cuppedinis, was known as a general market for many goods.

[edit] Comprehensive sites

[edit] Primarily visual

[edit] Primarily text

  • Forum Romanum (at LacusCurtius; article in Platner's Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome)
Ancient Rome Portal
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