Forum of Caesar

The Forum of Caesar is the first of Rome's so-called Imperial Fora, laid out by Gaius Julius Caesar in the 50s BC on his own land just north of the Roman Forum. Dedicated in 46 BC after Caesar's quadruple triumph, the rectangular square with its double colonnades served both political assemblies and as a stage for the Temple of Venus Genetrix, the ancestral mother of the Julian line. Augustus completed it after Caesar's assassination and folded the architecture into the expanding district. The overcomposed remains of the cella and three re-erected Corinthian columns mark the southwestern end of the Via dei Fori Imperiali. The Mussolini-era and more recent municipal excavations have made the structures legible again. In the evening the Foro di Cesare light show by Piero Angela and Paco Lanciano brings the space vividly back to life.