← Back to the mapPiranesi's engraving of the Arch of Trajan at Benevento
Giovanni Battista Piranesi, 1778 · Wikimedia Commons

Benevento

Italia · Roman province·Italy·Founded 268 BCE (Latin colony)

Roman Beneventum, terminus of the Via Appia and starting point of the Via Traiana. Trajan's Arch here was dedicated in 114 CE — three years old at our snapshot.

A living city of around 55,000 in Campania; the near-intact Arch of Trajan still stands astride a street in the modern town.

Excavation history

1890
Almerico Meomartini (architect) — Funded and carried out the first excavation of Benevento's Roman theatre at his own expense, effectively rediscovering it.
1957
Post-war Italian restoration authorities — After the war the theatre site was used to store statues and stone elements salvaged from bomb-damaged buildings, then was restored and reopened to the public on 26 June 1957.

Notable finds

Diorite Statue of Domitian as Pharaoh
Domitian built Beneventum's Iseum around 88-89 CE and had himself carved here in full pharaonic style — kilt, crown and all — the same gesture Roman emperors from Augustus onward used to claim Egyptian religious authority alongside their own.
Museo del Sannio, Benevento
Sphinxes of the Beneventum Iseum
At least ten stone sphinxes from Domitian's temple to Isis came out of the same excavations as the pharaoh statue, guardian figures for a sanctuary a local notable named Rutilius Lupus dedicated to "Isis the Great, Lady of Benevento."
Museo del Sannio, Benevento
Marble Prow of Isis Pelagia
This carved ship's prow once formed part of a statue of Isis Pelagia, protector of sailors — a fitting emblem for a goddess whose Beneventum cult, imported wholesale from Egypt, sat astride the junction of the Via Appia and the new Via Traiana.
Museo del Sannio, Benevento
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