Trajan’s Column in Rome: A Detailed Look
Trajan’s Column
Background
In 753 BC, a settlement called Rome was founded, which eventually became the capital of one of the mightiest empires. Its origins are sketchy; history and legend are mixed. Its creation is attributed to the brothers Romulus and Remus. Regarding Imperial Rome (31 BC – 476 AD), given the stage in which the inability to govern such a great empire, a new political system headed by an emperor was established, and the territory was divided into provinces. But since the 5th century AD, northern barbarian tribes of Europe embarked on the reconquest of their domains, including the one that, in the year 476 AD, defeated the last Roman Emperor of the Ostrogoths. Chronologically speaking of Rome, it goes from the year 509 BC, when the Etruscans were expelled, until 476 AD. However, from a cultural and artistic point of view, one cannot speak of an art properly Roman until the second century BC. The Imperial, in the centuries BC-AD, is distinguished from a late-Roman art from the late third century BC.
Formal Analysis
Trajan’s Column is made of marble. It is hoisted on a square pedestal, which sustains a cylindrical base decorated with ornamental motifs. It has a shaft of 29.78 m in altitude and a Doric capital. Above this, a structure topped by a bronze statue of Trajan was raised, which was later replaced by a statue of St. Peter. The shaft is sculpted with a 200-meter relief in a spiral, which increases as it moves away from the ground. The 155 sculpted scenes were going without interruption, and a total of 2,500 human figures appear. Emperor Trajan is represented 59 times, always realistic and not deified. The other characters are treated equally naturalistically since all the details are carefully taken care of. Resources are used for metaphorical representation of the springs and the Danube River, which appears as an old man. The sculptor does not show a naturalistic space and pays little attention to perspective. You can see some scenes where overlapping dimensions of dolls’ heads appear. However, the combination of vertical and diagonal lines provides a dynamic scene.
Content and Meaning
The theme is the commemoration of Trajan’s victory over the Dacians. To do this, the iconographic chronicles follow Dacia’s beautiful van. Over 200 meters of carved spiral are represented, and in ascending chronological order, the most relevant episodes of battles and war, and also different times of political importance, a fact that is a valuable source of historical information about the Roman army. At the bottom of the column, there is a cell in which the ashes of the emperor were kept in a golden urn. According to Renaissance documentation, the Pope gave this urn to a noble Andalusian family in this case, who returned the remains to their homeland, Seville. Above this chamber, a spiral staircase leads to the highest part, on which a bronze statue of the Roman emperor dominated, replaced in 1588 by another of San Pedro, by order of Pope Sixtus V. Such propagandistic monuments had a clear purpose and were a key policy of the Roman Empire.