Help

In order to successfully and purposely navigate through the different pages that our website offers, it may be helpful to take a look at this little guide that we have provided:

How do I navigate through the pages of the “digital Forum Romanum”?

It is our aim to provide the users of this site with an overview of the historical development of the Forum Romanum. That is why we have arranged our digital model of the Forum according to eras, which can be found on the list located on the left side of the screen. Clicking on one of the eras will lead you to a page that summarizes the situation on the Forum at that period in time and lists all the buildings and monuments that shaped the appearance of the Forum Romanum in that time period. From this page you can proceed in two ways. Either you can continue on to a page that provides an extensive overview of the specific epoch, or you can select one of the buildings or monuments from the list. This will redirect you to a page providing small introductory texts on the function, history and reconstruction of the building or monument in question as well as an overview of the individual construction phases. All eras and structures are accompanied by images from our digital model; it is possible to view the images in succession by placing the cursor on one of the images and clicking on the arrows to scroll through all of the related images. The images for the epochs can be used in two ways: either you can scroll through all the images (by pressing the button at the bottom left corner of the initial image) or open up an interactive plan (by pressing the button next to the former).

Currently our website provides information on seven eras in the history of the Forum Romanum. Each era documents the growth and change of the square at a distance of ca. 100 years: (1) the Forum with its late Republican physiognomy around 200 B.C. and (2) around 100 B.C.; the Forum under the reign of several famous Emperors: (3) under Augustus in 14 A.D., (4) under Domitian in 96 A.D., (5) during the Antonine dynasty in 150 A.D., (6) under Septimius Severus in 210 A.D and (7) under Constantine the Great in 310 A.D. The list of epochs that are currently on display already indicates that we have further epochs planned and these will be added to the site in the time to come. Check our updates section for news with regard to this topic.

How can I search for something?

Clicking on the “search” button located on the menu at the right side of the page or under the heading “project” will open up our search engine for the site. Here you can look up certain buildings and monuments that were located on the Forum Romanum during the epochs that we have documented on our site or search for specific words (names, phenomena) that occur in our texts.

You can search for something with the aid of various filters:

1. Arbitrary words (names, objects, phenomena) can be typed into the search mask
2. When investigating the buildings and monuments on the Forum, different search filters enable you to refine your search: The structures can be sorted by alphabetical groups, eras or their functions. These search filters can also be combined in order to investigate e.g. buildings from a specific period AND with a specific function.
3. The “reset” button will deactivate all the search filters that had been active
4. All of the search results will be displayed in an updated list of structures. Here you can click on one and proceed to the page of the specific building with its texts and images.

Forum Romanum? What is that?

All the people who only have a vague idea of what the Forum Romanum is can find further information by clicking on “Forum Romanum” on the menu above. This will open up a page with introductory texts that provide the user with e.g. a historical or topographical orientation. For those who want to inform themselves more extensively can click on “resources”. Here the user will find a bibliography with further literature as well as a list of helpful links to other online platforms.

How can I find a specific building if I do not know when it stood on the Forum?

Clicking on the magnifying glass in the menu on the right hand side (or alternatively: clicking on “search” in the Project section) will open up a list of all the structures on the Forum. Here all the buildings and monuments that stood on the Forum during the available epochs are listed in alphabetical order. This provides a good starting point for you to refine your search through the different search filters: either by searching by alphabetical groups or by function. It is also possible to compile lists of structures that are ordered according to time period or function or a combination thereof. By clicking on the search results in the list you can open up the page of the specific page of the building with its texts and images.

I cannot find a specific building!

The current state of our digital model can be described as follows: It contains the most important buildings and monuments from the Late Republic (in 200 B.C. and 100 B.C. respectively), Imperial Period (in 14 A.D., 96 A.D., 150 A.D., and 210 A.D.) and Late Antiquity (in 310 B.C.). With these phases we have collected nearly the entire stock of buildings and monuments in the history of the Forum Romanum. The buildings from the early phases in the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. or the later eras of the Forum will be made available as soon as we have uploaded them to our website; these buildings will then become visible on the alphabetical list of buildings and monuments. Our updates section will inform you about all such changes.

What are the reconstructions of the individual structures based upon?

An overview of our working process can be found in the text “From the Evidence to the Model”, which presents the different kinds of historical sources that were used when we developed our reconstructions. Concrete information about the scholarly foundation for a specific reconstruction is provided by the text that accompanies it. A scholarly evaluation for each of the reconstructions will be successively published on our wiki, which provides our users with a detailed overview of all the materials that were used in our research and reconstruction.

I want to use an image for a presentation, paper or scholarly article. Is this possible?

You are allowed to use our images freely for private purposes, presentations and other forms of research; however, you must name the copyright (© digitales-forum-romanum). If you want to use an image within a published work, please send us an email. More precise information about these matters is located in Contact.

Do you have further questions?

Please do not hesitate to contact us with your questions. See Contact.