The Roman Forum was a large open space located in the center of Roman cities. It served as a marketplace and gathering place where people would come to do business, socialize, get news, and attend school. Over time, wealthy individuals added temples, statues, arches, and basilicas to the Forum, transforming it into a crowded complex of buildings by the time of Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar later built a new adjacent forum with shops and a temple to accommodate the growing city. The Forum was paved and surrounded by important government buildings, and served as the heart of Roman civic life.

1. Roman Forum in general
by Sara, Jason, and Martin
• Usually the forum had stone
pavement, and around the edges there
were fancy buildings, temples, and
basilicas,and sometimes stores
(shops). In some cities the Forum had
a platform in it that people could
stand on to make speeches. This
platform was called the Rostra.The
first forum was built by
Augustus(Octavian). A roman forum
is a rectangle surrounded by ruins of
several important ancient government
buildings at the center of the city of
Rome .
• At the center of most roman cities was a big
open space called the forum. People met
there to do business to sell things and by
things, to see their friends,to find out about
the news, and even to go to school.

2. People first began meeting in this forum
around 500 BCE at the time of the
founding of the Roman Republic. The
senate met in the brick building on the
photograph (actually this is a later
replacement for an older building that
burnt down). Little by little, rich men
added temples and statues, triumphal
arches, basilicas to the forum until by the
time of Julius Caesar, the forum was
very crowded.

3. Julius Caesar built a new forum off
to the side of the first one. This is the
forum of Julius Caesar. It has a
temple at one end, but you can’t see
it in theis picture. What you can see
is the doors of a lot of little shops of
the businesses that were located in
the forum. It was paved in limestone
blocks and not as grassy as it is now.