Temple of Divus Julius
About
Caesar's body was burned in the Forum by a crowd that would not wait for the funeral to finish, and this temple stands on the spot. Augustus dedicated it on 18 August 29 BCE, the first temple in Rome raised to a Roman who had been made a god. Its front platform is a second speaker's rostra, faced with the beaks of ships taken at Actium, so anyone addressing the Forum from it stands on the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra. A round altar in a recess below marks the pyre. In 117 CE the cult of the deified emperors begins here, with the founder of the line.
What happened here
The building itself is a house for the god, and most people never go inside. Everything public happens on the steps and at the altar in front: an animal led up, examined, killed cleanly, its organs read, the meat divided and eaten. The priest covers his head and a flute player keeps up a noise so no ill-omened word is heard. Worshippers leave what they can afford — a terracotta figure, a coin, a model of the body part they want healed — and the accumulated clutter is periodically cleared and buried on site. On festival days the doors are opened and the cult statue is dressed, garlanded, and sometimes carried out through the streets. The temple also holds money, which is why towns keep their treasury in one.
In ancient writing
- Suetonius, Divus Julius 84–85
Describes the crowd burning Caesar's body in the Forum itself, and the column later raised on the spot where the pyre stood.
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 →