THE ROMAN FORUM

The spot known as the Roman Forum was in the beginning only a marshy valley between the Capitoline and Palatine Hills. After the union of the Romans and Sabines and during the days of the early kings, the district was drained and used as a market place, a spot adjoining it being set aside as a place of meeting and called the Comitium. Here a senate house was erected and a speaker's platform known as the Rostra. As time went on various buildings were constructed in and around it, temples, public halls, tribunals for the praetors, shrines, etc. and the spot came to serve as the center of the city's life. The markets and the shops were gradually removed and the place given up more and more to political ends. Throughout the centuries it has been the scene of innumerable ceremonies, bitter political quarrels, bloody encounters-in short, the setting for the great drama of Roman history. The passages quoted below can only indicate in an inadequate way the wealt.. material which is at hand for the student who wishes to reconstruct for himself from classical literature the life of Rome as played upon the stage of the Roman Forum.