the imperial forums

the imperial forums were built adjacent to the roman forum. The roman forum constituted the heart of the city of rome during the republican era, and included the senate house and law courts as well as merchants' shops. when the republic fell and was replaced by an imperial government, at the beginning of the Christian era, however, the roman forum had become too small, so was enlarged by successive emperors, with new forums, each named after themselves, each including open areas, stalls for shopowners, and temples.

here is an overview of the imperial forums, with the colisseum in the distance. in the foreground is the open space that was the forum built by Julius Caesar. The white columns barely visible belonged to a temple to the goddess Venus, whom Caesar claimed as an ancestor.

caesar augustus, Julius caesar's nephew and adopted son, built the next of the imperial forums. In these photos you can see the remnants of the temple he built for it, dedicated to the god Mars Ultor ("the Avenger") and said to have been promised in exchange for finding and killing his uncle's assassins.

best preserved is the forum of trajan, built in 113 A.D. still visible are the arches of the entrances to shops: a sort of roman shopping mall. the colonnades provided shade from the summer heat and protection from the winter rains. (The tower behind the market is from the middle ages: it was built in the 13th century by Pope Gregory IX).

a famous monument in Trajan's forum: the column of trajan, sculpted with a spiral bas-relief showing the emperor's defeat of the dacians (a people living in what is modern Romania). if it had been carved in a straight line rather than along the column, it would street 656 feet long. the roman statue of trajan was replaced in the middle ages with a statue of st. peter.

the imperial forums are still being excavated. above them were built other buildings, of course, including some in the middle ages. perched above the edge of the forum of augustus, for example, is this medieval mansion, the house of the knights of rhodes, built in the 15th century for these crusader-knights, also known as the knights hospitaller.

another medieval monument overlooking the imperial forums is this tower, built at the beginning of the 13th century by pope innocent iii.