The Roman City

The Roman Empire was in essence an urban empire. Towns were the political, administrative, economic and cultural centres.

All the newly-created towns were built according to a similar city plan: it had square or rectangular shape, was surrounded by walls and was organised around two central roads: the cardum (from north to south) and the decumanus (from east to west). They had a central square, the forum, with the main buildings and the market, and the rest of the town was organised into streets which formed a grid. 

The forum had arcades and was decorated with statues of the main emperors and distinguished people from the city. These were the main buildings around the forum:

- capitol, the main temple
- curia, meeting place for the city council
- basilica, place for trade and justice

Near the forum, there were shops, markets and workshops.

Roman cities had all kinds of facilities, such as theatres, amphitheatres,  fountains and sewage systems (cloacae). Click here to find out more about the sanitation system.