Severan Forum of Leptis Magna
About
Septimius Severus, born in Leptis Magna, gave his hometown a second forum nearly twice the size of the old one, faced in imported marble and ringed with carved Medusa heads. Ground for it was not broken until nearly a century after this map's snapshot date. In 117 CE, Leptis Magna's civic life is still entirely confined to its modest Augustan-era Old Forum.
What happened here
Business starts at first light. The magistrates' tribunal opens, cases are called, and the crowd that gathers to listen is half the point of coming. Money-changers work from tables under the porticoes, weighing coin from a dozen mints against the local rate. Notices are painted on the walls and whitewashed over when they go stale: elections, gladiator shows, a lost slave, a house to let. By the sixth hour the heat empties the open square and the arcades fill instead. Statues of the town's benefactors stand between the columns, and the men who paid for them expect to be greeted by name. Public slaves sweep at dusk. The forum is where a Roman town keeps its records, its gossip and its self-regard in the same place.
Sources
Nearby
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →