Il Foro di Rusellae e il suo Augusteo

Excavations in the 1960s uncovered a building decorated with numerous imperial portraits, the Augusteum, in the southwestern corner of the forum of Rusellae. The building and its cycle of statues have only been the subject of preliminary publications. The forum was completely rebuilt between the Augustan and Flavian periods and its development can be followed up to the beginning of the 5th century AD. The construction of the Augusteum can only be understood in the context of the reorganisation of the forensic area in the early imperial period. The new survey has made it possible to propose a restitution and articulation of its construction phases, visualised by means of 3D modelling. At the same time, the study of the relationship between the architecture and the sculptural heritage continued. An important issue is the relationship of the Augusteum to the portico of the south-west corner of the forum, which shows a more articulated sequence of phases than previously thought. It must be understood in relation to the geomorphology of this slope. The prospect is to extend the new survey to the other buildings in the forensic area in order to better understand their urban evolution, their routes, their accesses, and to clarify, through visibility analyses, some problematic nodes that have not yet been sufficiently studied.