Roman Forum

The Lacus Curtius ("Lake Curtius") was a mysterious pit or pool in the ground in the Forum Romanum. The area where the Forum would later be built was originally likely a lake, as the area it was in is known to have been surrounded by brooks and marshes. One part of the area was never drained, but gradually became smaller until only a basin, known as the Lacus Curtius, was left. Its nature and significance in Rome's early history is uncertain, and several conflicting stories exist about its history. The name of the place is likely connected with the Curtia gens, a very old Roman Family with Sabine origins.

The Basilica Julia (Italian: Basilica Giulia) was a structure that once stood in the Roman Forum. It was a large, ornate, public building used for meetings and other official business during the Roman Empire. Its ruins have been excavated. What is left from its classical period are mostly foundations, floors, a small back corner wall with a few arches that are part of both the original building and later Imperial reconstructions and a single column from its first building phase. The Basilica Julia was built on the site of the earlier Basilica Sempronia (170 BC) along the south side of the Forum, opposite the Basilica Aemilia. It was initially dedicated in 46 BC by Julius Caesar, with building costs paid from the spoils of the Gallic War, and was completed by Augustus, who named the building after his adoptive father. The ruins which have been excavated date to a reconstruction of the Basilica by the Emperor Diocletian, after a fire in 283 AD destroyed the earlier structure.

The Comitium (Italian: Comizio) was the original open-air public meeting space of Ancient Rome, and had major religious and prophetic significance. The name comes from the Latin word for "assembly". The Comitium location at the northwest corner of the Roman Forum was later lost in the city's growth and development, but was rediscovered and excavated by archaeologists at the turn of the twentieth century. Some of Rome's earliest monuments; including the speaking platform known as the Rostra, the Columna Maenia, the Graecostasis and the Tabula Valeria were part of or associated with the Comitium. The Comitium was the location for much of the political and judicial activity of Rome. It was the meeting place of the Curiate Assembly, the earliest Popular assembly of organised voting divisions of the Republic. Later, during the Roman Republic, the Tribal Assembly and Plebeian Assembly met there. The Comitium was in front of the meeting house of the Roman Senate – the still-existing Curia Julia and its predecessor, the Curia Hostilia. The Curia Julia is associated with the Comitium by both Livy and Cicero.Most Roman cities had a similar comitium for public meetings (L. contiones) or assemblies for election], councils and tribunals. As part of the forum, where temples, commerce, judicial, and city buildings were located, the comitium was the center of political activity. Romans tended to organize their needs into specific locations within the city. As the city grew, the larger Comitia Centuriata met on the Campus Martius, outside the city walls. The comitium remained of importance for formal elections of some magistrates; however, as their importance decayed after the end of the republic, so did the importance of the comitium.

The Lacus Iuturnae — or Lacus Juturnae or Spring of Juturna — is the name of a formal pool built by the Romans near a spring or well in the Roman Forum. The pool was part of a shrine dedicated to the water nymph Juturna, and the name Lacus Iuturnae is also used for the spring and the shrine, both next to the pool.The site was initially excavated by Giacomo Boni in the early twentieth century. Excavations from the 1980s onwards were supervised by Eva Margareta Steinby.

The Column of Phocas (Italian: Colonna di Foca) is a Roman monumental column in the Roman Forum of Rome, Italy, built when Rome was part of the Eastern Roman Empire after reconquest from the Kingdom of the Ostrogoths. Erected in front of the Rostra and dedicated or rededicated in honour of the Eastern Roman Emperor Phocas on August 1, 608 AD, it was the last addition made to the Forum Romanum. The fluted Corinthian column stands 13.6 m (44 ft) tall on its cubical white marble socle. On stylistic grounds, the column seems to have been made in the 2nd century for an unknown structure, and then recycled for the present monument. Likewise, the socle was recycled from its original use supporting a statue dedicated to Diocletian; the former inscription was chiselled away to provide a space for the later text. The base of the column was uncovered in 1813, and the inscription on it reads, in Latin: Optimo clementiss[imo piissi]moque / principi domino n[ostro] / F[ocae imperat]ori / perpetuo a d[e]o coronato, [t]riumphatori / semper Augusto / Smaragdus ex praepos[ito] sacri palatii / ac patricius et exarchus Italiae / devotus eius clementiae / pro innumerabilibus pietatis eius beneficiis et pro quiete / procurata Ital[iae] ac conservata libertate / hanc sta(tuam maiesta)tis eius / auri splend(ore fulge)ntem huic / sublimi colu(m)na(e ad) perennem / ipsius gloriam imposuit ac dedicavit / die prima mensis Augusti, indict[ione] und[icesima] / p[ost] c[onsulatum] pietatis eius anno quinto The English translation is as follows: To the best, most clement and pious ruler, our lord Phocas the perpetual emperor, crowned by God, the forever august triumphator, did Smaragdus, former praepositus sacri palatii and patricius and Exarch of Italy, devoted to His Clemency for the innumerable benefactions of His Piousness and for the peace acquired for Italy and its freedom preserved, this statue of His Majesty, blinking from the splendor of gold here on this tallest column for his eternal glory erect and dedicate, on the first day of the month of August, in the eleventh indiction in the fifth year after the consulate of His Piousness. The precise occasion for this signal honour is unknown, though Phocas had formally donated the Pantheon to Pope Boniface IV, who rededicated it to all the martyrs and Mary (Sancta Maria ad Martyres). Atop the column's capital was erected by Smaragdus, the Exarch of Ravenna, a "dazzling" gilded statue of Phocas (which probably only briefly stood there). Rather than a demonstration to mark papal gratitude as it is sometimes casually declared to be, the gilded statue on its column was more likely an emblem of the imperial sovereignty over Rome, which was rapidly fading under pressure from the Lombards, and a personal mark of gratitude from Smaragdus, who had been recalled by Phocas from a long exile and was indebted to the Emperor for retrieving his position of power at Ravenna. In October 610, Phocas was overthrown and killed; his statues everywhere were overthrown. The monument remains today in its original location (in situ). Its isolated, free-standing position among the ruins has always made it a landmark in the Forum, and it often appears in vedute and engravings. The rise in ground level due to silt and debris had completely buried the socle by the time Giuseppe Vasi and Giambattista Piranesi made engravings and etchings of the column in the mid-18th century. The square foundation of brick (illustration, right) was not originally visible, the present level of the Forum not having been excavated down to its earlier Augustan paving until the 19th century.

The Lapis Niger (Latin, "Black Stone") is an ancient shrine in the Roman Forum. Together with the associated Vulcanal (a sanctuary to Vulcan) it constitutes the only surviving remnants of the old Comitium, an early assembly area that preceded the Forum and is thought to derive from an archaic cult site of the 7th or 8th century BC. The black marble paving (1st century BC) and modern concrete enclosure (early 20th century) of the Lapis Niger overlie an ancient altar and a stone block with one of the earliest known Old Latin inscriptions (c. 570–550 BC). The superstructure monument and shrine may have been built by Julius Caesar during his reorganization of the Forum and Comitium space. Alternatively, this may have been done a generation earlier by Sulla during one of his construction projects around the Curia Hostilia. The site was rediscovered and excavated from 1899 to 1905 by Italian archaeologist Giacomo Boni. Mentioned in many ancient descriptions of the Forum dating back to the Roman Republic and the early days of the Roman Empire, the significance of the Lapis Niger shrine was obscure and mysterious to later Romans, but it was always discussed as a place of great sacredness and significance. It is constructed on top of a sacred spot consisting of much older artifacts found about 5 ft (1.5 m) below the present ground level. The name "black stone" may have originally referred to the black stone block (one of the earliest known Latin inscriptions) or it may refer to the later black marble paving at the surface. Located in the Comitium in front of the Curia Julia, this structure survived for centuries due to a combination of reverential treatment and overbuilding during the era of the early Roman Empire.

The Graecostasis was a platform in the Comitium near the Roman Forum, located to the west of the Rostra. The name refers to the Greek ambassadors for whom the platform was originally built after the Roman Republic conquered Greece. Placed at the southwest end of the Comitium, the platform was the designated spot for all representatives of foreign nations and dignitaries from the republic and empire's domain. Visiting outsiders were not permitted within the Senate House or Curia and instead may have stood on this platform while waiting to meet with senators or to hear orations from the Rostra to its east side. Although one scholar has disputed this interpretation and argues that it may have served as a viewing platform for entertainment.

The Puteal Scribonianum (Scribonian Puteal) or Puteal Libonis (Puteal of Libo) was a structure in the Forum Romanum in Ancient Rome. A puteal was a classical wellhead, round or sometimes square, placed atop a well opening to keep people from falling in. The Scribonian Puteal was dedicated or restored by a member of the Libo family, perhaps the praetor of 204 BC, or the tribune of the people in 149 BC. The praetor's tribunal was convened nearby, having been removed from the comitium in the 2nd century BC. It thus became a place where litigants, money-lenders and business people congregated. According to ancient sources, the Scribonian Puteal was a bidental—a spot that had been struck by lightning. It took its name from its resemblance to the stone curb or low enclosure around a well (puteus) that was between the Temple of Castor and Pollux and the Temple of Vesta, near the Porticus Julia and the Arcus Fabiorum (arch of the Fabii). No remains of this puteal, however, have been discovered. It was once thought that an irregular circle of travertine blocks found near the Temple of Castor formed part of the puteal, but this idea was abandoned in the early 20th century. A coin issued in 62 BC by Lucius Scribonius Libo (praetor 80 BC) depicts this puteal, which he had renovated. It resembles a cippus (sepulchral monument) or an altar, with laurel wreaths, two lyres and a pair of pincers or tongs below the wreaths. The tongs may be those of Vulcan, emblematic of him as a forger of lightning.

Sant'Adriano al Foro was a church in Rome, formerly in the Curia Julia in the Forum Romanum and a cardinal-deaconry (a titular church for a Cardinal-deacon).

The Arch of Septimius Severus (Italian: Arco di Settimio Severo) at the northeastern end of the Roman Forum is a white marble triumphal arch dedicated in 203 A.D. to commemorate the Parthian victories of Emperor Septimius Severus and his two sons, Caracalla and Geta, in the two campaigns against the Parthians of 194-195 A.D. and 197–199 A.D. After the death of Septimius Severus, his sons Caracalla and Geta were initially joint emperors. Caracalla had Geta assassinated in 212 A.D.; Geta's memorials were destroyed and all images or mentions of him were removed from public buildings and monuments. Accordingly, Geta's image and inscriptions referring to him were removed from the arch.

The Temple of Castor and Pollux (Italian: Tempio dei Dioscuri) is an ancient temple in the Roman Forum, Rome, central Italy. It was originally built in gratitude for victory at the Battle of Lake Regillus (495 BC). Castor and Pollux (Greek Polydeuces) were the Dioscuri, the "twins" of Gemini, the twin sons of Zeus (Jupiter) and Leda. Their cult came to Rome from Greece via Magna Graecia and the Greek culture of Southern Italy.The Roman temple is one of a number of known Dioscuri temples remaining from antiquity.

The Curia Julia (Latin: Curia Iulia, Italian: Curia Iulia) is the third named curia, or senate house, in the ancient city of Rome. It was built in 44 BC, when Julius Caesar replaced Faustus Cornelius Sulla's reconstructed Curia Cornelia, which itself had replaced the Curia Hostilia. Caesar did so to redesign both spaces within the Comitium and the Roman Forum. The alterations within the Comitium reduced the prominence of the Senate and cleared the original space. The work, however, was interrupted by Caesar's assassination at the Curia of Pompey of the Theatre of Pompey, where the Senate had been meeting temporarily while the work was completed. The project was eventually finished by Caesar's successor, Augustus Caesar, in 29 BC.The Curia Julia is one of a handful of Roman structures that survive mostly intact. This is due to its conversion into the basilica of Sant'Adriano al Foro in the 7th century and several later restorations. However, the roof, the upper elevations of the side walls and the rear façade are modern and date from the remodeling of the deconsecrated church, in the 1930s.