The column of Trajan - a symbol of the ancient Rome

Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject Archaeology, grade: Sehr Gut (A), Indiana University (Department for Classical Studies), language: English, abstract: "And he set up in the Forum an enormous column, to serve at once as a monument to himself and as a memorial of his work in the Forum. For that entire section had been hilly and he had cut it down for a distance equal to the height of the column, thus making the Forum level." (Cass.Dio 68.16.3)

With these words Cassius Dio describes more than a century later the building of the Forum Traiani and the erection of the Column of Trajan at that Forum. Since unlike other monuments of Ancient Rome the Column survived to our days as one of the most significant symbols of Rome.

Although it seems today that the column of Trajan is a single monument, it is important to consider that it wasn¿t planned to be a single standing monument in Ancient times. On the contrary the Column must be seen initially as part of a much greater whole, which served important practical purposes in the city of Rome, and that is exactly about what the paper is going to be.