The Septizodium was a monumental decorative façade built by Emperor Septimius Severus around 203 CE at the southeastern corner of the Palatine Hill, near the Circus Maximus. Rather than serving a practical function, the structure was intended as a striking architectural display. It concealed the substructures of the Severan Baths and created an impressive visual introduction for visitors approaching Rome from the south.
According to the Historia Augusta, Severus constructed the Septizodium primarily to impress travelers arriving from Africa, his homeland. Although this claim is likely exaggerated, the monument stood near the end of the Via Appia, one of Rome’s most important roads, where it would have been highly visible to those entering the city. After passing through the crowded and less impressive outskirts of Rome, visitors would have encountered the Septizodium as their first major display of imperial grandeur.
Architecturally, the Septizodium was an elaborate three-story façade measuring approximately 95 meters wide and 30 meters high. Its front was organized around three large semicircular apses and multiple tiers of columns, with statues placed in niches throughout the structure. Built from luxurious materials such as Numidian marble and Egyptian granite, the monument also functioned as a nymphaeum, incorporating flowing fountains and water features.
The Septizodium was rich in symbolic decoration. Statues representing the seven classical planets (the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn) stood in its niches. At its center was a reclining figure, likely representing a river god. This cosmic imagery reflected Septimius Severus’s well-known interest in astrology. Ancient sources report that he had is horoscope painted on the ceilings of the imperial palace.
Severus may have chosen this site not only for its visual impact but also because he initially intended the monument to serve as a grand entrance to the imperial complex on the Palatine Hill. However, while the emperor was away, the city prefect placed a statue of Severus in the central niche, making it impossible to construct a gateway at that location. A later attempt by Emperor Alexander Severus to revive the original plan was abandoned after unfavorable omens were reported by soothsayers.
Over time, the Septizodium lost its original splendor. Much of its marble decoration was stripped away in late antiquity and the Middle Ages, and the structure was later reused as a fortified stronghold. Between 1585 and 1590, Pope Sixtus V ordered the complete demolition of the monument, and its valuable stone was reused in Renaissance building projects. Today, no visible remains survive. A row of cypress trees and modern paving mark its former footprint, while scholars rely on Renaissance drawings and fragments of the Forma Urbis Romae to reconstruct the appearance of this once-imposing monument.
Bibliography:
- Bakker, Jan Theo. (2021). “The Septizodium in Rome.” https://www.ostia-antica.org/switzerland/topics/septizodium.htm
- Gorrie, Charmaine. (2001). The Septizodium of Septimius Severus Revisited: The Monument in Its Historical and Urban Context. Latomus, 60(3), 653–670. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23309381
- Lusnia, Susann. (2004). Urban Planning and Sculptural Display in Severan Rome: Reconstructing the Septizodium and Its Role in Dynastic Politics. American Journal of Archaeology, 108(4), 517–544. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40025729
- Platner, Samuel. (1929). “Septizonium.” In A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome (p.473-475). Retrieved from: https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Roma/Rome/_Texts/PLATOP*/Septizonium.html
Septizonium: a building erected by Septimius Severus at the extreme south-east corner of the Palatine hill (Hist. Aug. Sev. 19). The inscription (CIL VI.1032, 31229) records the dedication in 203 A.D.; and the building is undoubtedly referred to by Amm. Marc. in 355. According to the Vita, therefore, Severus intended this building to serve as a monumental façade at this corner of the hill, visible to all who approached by the via Appia, and also as an entrance to the imperial precinct. The latter purpose could not be carried out because the prefect of the city set up the statue of the emperor in the central niche. Ammianus (loc. cit.) implies that the building was in fact a nymphaeum of imposing size and appearance; and a septizonium at Lambaesis had an ‘aqueductus et nymphaei opus’ attached to it (CIL VIII.2657).
The whole of the latter part of the passage in Hist. Aug. Sev. 24 has recently been taken by v. Domaszewski (SHA 1916, 7.A, 5‑7; 1918, 13.A, 48), like that in id. Get. 7 (cf. Sepulcrum Severi) to be an interpolation; and this is why Hülsen in his latest restoration (published by Rushforth in the Legacy of Rome, fig. 35, opp. p399) has omitted the statue of Severus which had previously been inserted in the central niche. The very existence of a main approach to the Palatine on this side at this period seems highly doubtful.
Dombart, however, retains it in his restoration, and inclines to refer to it the second colossus named in Not. Brev. He differs from Hülsen mainly (a) in placing the columns in the niches closer to their back walls, (b) in giving half domes to the niches.1 The design of the front (an ornamental façade with three large niches, and three orders of columns) owed much to the type of permanent stage decoration (scaenae frons) which is seen in the back walls of the stages of various provincial theatres of the Roman period; and it is not without parallels, of which the nymphaea (expressly so called in inscriptions) of Miletus and Side are the most striking. There appears indeed to be no doubt that it was actually decorated with fountains; and it also seems clear that the interior, which would have served no useful purpose, was not originally accessible except by means of ladders. There is no evidence for an external staircase at the back. Dombart (p96) has misquoted Demontosius, Gallus Romae Hospes, 25.
A very difficult problem is presented by the name and its meaning. The form septizodium is first found in the Pseudo-Dositheus (about 207 A.D.) and in an inscription, CIL VIII (Suppl.) 14372 (about 210 A.D.), but is probably to be treated as incorrect and may therefore be disregarded (Schürer, Zeitschr. f. d. neutestamentliche Wissenschaft VI. (1905), 29 ff., 63 ff.). Unsuccessful attempts have been made to interpret septizonium in a literal sense, and to see in it a building which is capable of division, whether horizontally or vertically, into seven sections or belts. There is no doubt, however, that the building only had three stories. The reference to the seven planets (Maass, Tagesgötter 106‑117) may, however, be accepted even so, if the meaning of ζώνη and ἑπτάζωνος be kept in mind (Dombart in RE II. A. 1582, who is inclined to suppose that the building was actually decorated with emblems representing the seven planetary divinities of the seven days of the week, and who also emphasises the importance of the number seven in connection with the Ziggurats of Babylonia; cf. his article in Jahrb. d. Inst. XXXIV (1919), 40‑64).
The mediaeval corruptions of the name are many — septem viae, septem solia (divided into maius and minus, referring to the east and west ends), while the name scuola di Vergilio came from the fact that mediaeval scholars found in the septodium the trivium et quadrivium liberalium artium. The church of S. Lucia de Septem solio is first mentioned in Eins. (11.5; 13.28; HCh 305); another church, S. Leone de Septem Soliis stood opposite to it, on the slopes of the Caelian (HCh 297‑298). The mediaeval history of the building, which served as a fortress, is interesting (Stevenson, BC 1888, 292‑298; Bartoli, BA 1909, 253‑269; LS IV.137‑139). Its destruction was completed by 14th September, 1588 (ASRSP 1910, 305).
The east angle of the building itself was preserved until the pontificate of Sixtus V who ordered its destruction, and the use of its materials for his own buildings. We learn from the records of its demolition that many columns, etc., of rare marbles had been employed in its construction, which probably came from various different sources. The columns of the three orders were all composite. We are therefore thrown back on the Forma Urbis (fr. 34) and the numerous Renaissance representations of the building for information about it; and hence there has been much discussion about its details, though its general form may be taken as certain (cf. the restorations of Dombart and Hülsen cited).
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Cite this page as: Darius Arya, The American Institute for Roman Culture, “Septizodium,” Ancient Rome Live. Last modified 28/01/2026. https://ancientromelive.org/septizodium
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