Rostra

From Freepedia

The Rostra located in the Roman Forum was the platform besides the Curia from which orators spoke to the assembled people, its name taken from the bronze ships' beaks (rostrum) that decorated the front (some of the first were from the victory at Mylae in 260 BC), their supporting vertical slots and large dowel holes still to be seen. Planned by Caesar but given its final form by Augustus in 42 BC.

It was here that Mark Antony delivered his funeral speech for Caesar, and here that the Triumvirs proscribed Cicero and other political foes. Image:Rostra-decennalia base.jpg Five honorary columns were erected behind the Rostra: a taller one in the middle, carrying a statue of Jupiter (the patron god of Diocletian), the others, the Augusti and Caesars when Diocletian visited Rome for the first time in 303 AD to celebrate the twentieth year (vicennalia) of his reign and the tenth year (decennalia) of the Tetrarchy.

The ruins now visible of the Rostra are an early twentieth-century restoration.