Trajans Column

Columna Traiani

The Latin name is Columna Traiani .

The Trajans Column is located in the Trajans Forum, which is part of the Imperial Forums at the
Via dei Fori Imperiali, right next to the Piazza Venezia.

"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."

Cassius Dio, Roman History (LXVIII.16.3)

Cassius Dio is talking about how the Emperor Trajan, after his death, the people made a
monument in his honor, because of his work he did in his military campaigns against the Dacians
and the Forum.

The reliefs decorating the column document the stages of each of the emperors military
campaigns in Dacia chronologically.

The ashes of Trajan's cremated body were buried beneath his column in the Forum of Trajan, and
a statue of him was placed on the top, arrayed like a triumphing general when he comes into the
city with a senatorial and army escort.

Aurelius Victor, On the Emperors 13.11

Later his ashes and those of his wife, Plotina were spread on the base of the column.

The Trajan Column was built in 113 AD.

A reconstruction of the Trajan forum.

The Trajan Column was issued by the senate and built by the architect Apollodorus of Damascus.

SENATUS POPULUSQUE ROMANUS / IMP(eratori) CAESARI DIVI NERVAE F(ilio) NERVAE / TRAIANO
AUG(usto) GERM(anico) DACICO PONTIF(ici) / MAXIMO TRIB(unicia) POT(estate) XVII IMP(eratori) /
VI CO(n)S(uli) VI P(atri) P(atriae) / AD DECLARANDUM QUANTAE ALTITUDINIS / MONS ET LOCUS
TANTI(s ope)RIBUS SIT EGESTUS

The Senate and the People of Rome [dedicate this column] to the emperor Caesar Nerva Trajan
Augustus Germanicus Dacicus, son of the deified emperor Nerva, Pontifex Maximus, with
tribunician power for the 17th time, hailed as Imperator for the 6th time, consul for the 6th time
[AD 113] and Father of his Country, to show the height and location of the hill removed for such
great structures.

ILS 294 = CIL 6.960