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Rome- The Eternal City
Foundations of Rome
• 753 B.C. traditional founding date of Rome
• Romulus & Remus- twin brothers- sons of
Mars and Rhea Silvia
• Romulus killed Remus in quest for Rome
• Romulus first king of Rome
• Rome founding on the Tiber River
Palatine Hill
• Palatine Hill
– First settlement in Rome
– named for Pales goddess of sheperds
– Became residential district for statesman and wealthy
and temple district
– Augustus built his palace on Palatine
Roman Forum
• Forum
– Below Palatine Hill
– Market place, business district, civic center
– Law courts, senate (Curia), public buildings
– Rostra- speaker’s platform
– Many temples, Vesta, Julius Caeasar, Castor & Pollux
Via Sacra
Via Sacra, leading from the Arch of Constantine and
the Colosseum into the forum
SUBURA
We live in a city largely
held up by thin props,
for that is how the real
estate agent supports the
tottering house. And
when he plasters over
the gaping cracks on the
long-neglected wall, he
tells the occupants not
to worry and to sleep
soundly, though the
place is about to crash
down.
Juvenal
The Subura or Suburra in Modern times
Wall along today's Via Tor d'Conti
Santa Maria dei Monti
Mercato Rionale closed on Sundays
Capitoline Hill
• Capitoline Hill
– Temple of Jupiter –Capitolium
– Temple of Juno Moneta (mint)
– today – seat of government
– Statue of Marcus Aurelius – last good emperor
Campus Martius
• Campus Martius
– Northwest of Forum
– Temples, theaters, baths,public buildings
– Residential area during Medieval times
– Pantheon – temple to all Olympian gods and is only
surviving building today in Campus Martius
Trevi Fountain,
Via dei coronari, old roman street
The Column of Marcus Aurelius in the square,
Colosseum
• Colosseum
– Flavian amphitheater for Flavian emperors
– Built between 72-80 A.D.
– Gladitorial contests held
– Seat up to 50,000
– Today parts are being reconstructed for performances
Circus Maximus
• Circus Maximus
– Valley between Aventine and Palatine hills
– Racecourse for chariots
– Chariot racers were broken into teams – like political
parties
Cloaca Maxima
Greatest Sewer
•World’s earliest sewage systems
•Drain marshes & remove waste
• constructed 600 B.C –
Tarquinius Priscus
•Originally open drain
•Aqueducts supplied water to
flush out drain
The underground structure was much praised.
Here are the words of Pliny the Elder:
Hills were tunneled into the course of the construction of the
sewers, and Rome was a "city on stilts" beneath which men
sailed when Marcus Agrippa was aedile. Seven rivers join
together and rush headlong through Rome, and, like torrents,
they necessarily sweep away everything in their path. With
raging force, owing to the additional amount of rainwater,
they shake the bottom and sides of the sewers.
Sometimes water from the Tiber flows backwards and makes
its way up the sewers. Then the powerful flood-waters clash
head-on in the confined space, but the unyielding structure
holds firm. Huge blocks of stone are dragged across the
surface above the tunnels; buildings collapse of their own
accord or come crashing down because of fire; earth tremors
shake the ground - but still, for seven hundred years from the
time of Tarquinius Priscus, the sewers have survived almost
completely intact.
[Pliny the Elder, National History, 36.104-106;
tr. J.F. Healy]
Door leading to the Cloaca
Maxima, near the Basilica Julia at
the Forum Romanum