Arch of Augustus (Rimini): Roman City Gate and Honorary Monument
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.6
- Popularity
- High
- Country
- Italy
- Primary era
- Classical
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Classical, Medieval
- Civilizations
- Roman
- Site type
- Civic
- Remains
- Arch
On this page17 sections
History
The Arch of Augustus in Italy is a Roman monument built in 27 BC by decree of the Senate in honour of Augustus, the title adopted by Octavian after he became Rome’s first emperor. An important work of early Augustan architecture, it marked the city end of the Via Flaminia and commemorated the repair of that road and other major routes through Italy under Augustus’s authority.
Road, colony, and imperial monument
The Via Flaminia had been constructed in 220 BC by Gaius Flaminius to link Ariminum, ancient Rimini, with Rome. At the city, it joined the decumanus maximus, the principal east-west street now represented by Corso d’Augusto, which continued toward the Via Aemilia and Placentia, the Roman settlement now known as Piacenza. The arch therefore stood at the point where a major Roman road entered the city.
Its construction coincided with the restoration of the Via Flaminia and the renaming of Ariminum as Colonia Augusta Ariminensis. The city’s association with Augustus was reinforced in 21 AD when the Ponte d’Augusto, now called the Ponte di Tiberio, was completed. Although traditionally called a triumphal or honorary arch, the monument functioned primarily as a monumental city gate rather than as a structure built for a triumphal procession.
The Augustan gate probably replaced an earlier entrance, possibly dating from the period of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, whose dictatorship belonged to the early first century BC. Little is known about that predecessor. It was apparently buried within a thick cement structure when the new arch was built. At its inauguration, the monument was incorporated into the city’s existing fortifications and stood between square defensive towers that dated from the foundation of Ariminum in 268 BC. Coins recovered in excavations during the 1980s indicate that the earliest yellow-sandstone walls around the arch belonged to the third century BC.
Changes to the fortifications
During the third century AD, the sandstone defences were replaced by stone walls fitted with drainage arches. Between the third and seventh centuries, the original square towers were replaced by seven-sided structures with brick-and-mortar cores and outer stone casings. Their rebuilding is popularly linked with the redesign of Rimini’s fortifications under Emperor Aurelian.
Additional defensive gates stood immediately in front of and behind the arch from at least the third century. These fortified entrances were probably demolished around 1541, when preparations for Pope Paul III’s visit led to the removal of ancient structures that obstructed the view of the monument. Their foundations are believed to remain buried. The arch itself became known in the medieval period as the Gate of Saint Gaudentius, recalling Gaudentius of Rimini, who was buried in a necropolis outside the city walls.
After new outer walls were erected under Frederick II, the arch’s military role declined from the middle of the thirteenth century. A medieval outer entrance called the Porta Romana, also known as the Gate of Saint Genesio or Saint Bartolo, was later built beyond it. Severe earthquake damage led to the destruction of that gate in 1786.
Conflict, archaeology, and changing surroundings
In January 1528, during his retreat from Rimini after briefly recapturing the city, Pandolfo IV Malatesta allegedly tried to cut down the arch. The arrival of Papal States forces commanded by Odet of Foix, Viscount of Lautrec, brought Malatesta rule in Rimini to its definitive end. The monument was widely known during the Renaissance. Antonio da Sangallo the Younger drew it in 1526, and later depictions included works by Florent Fidèle Constant Bourgeois in 1806, Prosper Barbot in 1821, and Luigi Rossini in 1836.
Luigi Tonini led excavations at the bases of the flanking towers on 9 January 1846. The work confirmed that the arch had been inserted into pre-existing city walls. Restoration in 1912 repaired or renewed the inscription on the battlement, while the earthquakes of 1916 damaged the monument and brought down several merlons during shocks on 16 May and 17 August.
The Rimini-Novafeltria railway ran in front of the arch from 1916 to 1960. It crossed the Via Flaminia at a level crossing and carried passengers as well as sulphur. The railway, together with pedestrians and road traffic, made the location structurally dangerous and impractical. The arch remained open to vehicles until the 1950s.
Between 1937 and 1939, Fascist authorities demolished adjoining buildings and the surviving flanking towers to isolate the monument. Benito Mussolini contributed 500,000 lire and symbolically began the works with a pickaxe on 13 August 1936. The project formed part of a planned imperial road between the city centre and the new Stadio Romeo Neri, and it used the arch’s supposed triumphal character for Fascist political propaganda. The surrounding district, previously regarded as overcrowded and unsanitary, was redeveloped at the same time. The intervention exposed the arch’s attachment to the city walls, while the outer casing of the eastern tower became the principal visible remnant of the demolished defences.
War damage and modern conservation
During the Battle of Rimini in the Second World War, Marshal Willi Trageser of the German 2nd Parachute Division refused orders to blow up the arch in an attempt to delay the Allied advance. On the morning of 21 September, the 2nd Battalion of the 3rd Greek Mountain Brigade entered Rimini through the monument.
After Rimini’s liberation, the arch was threatened again. British technicians sought stone for road repairs, while engineers from South Africa and Mauritius mistakenly identified it as the Porta Montanara. Local historian Amedeo Montemaggi later reconstructed Trageser’s role in preserving the monument. In 1972, the diversion of the Ausa River into the Marecchia permitted redevelopment of the former riverbed in front of the arch. The Roman bridge there was replaced by an underpass, and the monument became the centre of a traffic island.
From 1997, surrounding car parks were converted into green spaces and urban gardens, followed by redevelopment of the arch and its surroundings in 2002. A restoration carried out from 10 October to 28 November 2022 removed weeds and applied a protective anti-graffiti coating to the lower sections. Together with the Ponte di Tiberio, the Arch of Augustus remains one of Rimini’s principal symbols and appears on the city’s coat of arms. It is also regarded as the oldest preserved Roman triumphal or honorary arch in Italy.
Remains
Structure and architectural form
The single-opening gate
The arch is a single-opening structure originally built into Rimini’s city wall. It is approximately 19 metres high and 15 metres wide. The passage measures about 8.84 to 9 metres across, 10.4 metres high, and 4.1 metres deep. Its unusually broad opening was unsuitable for a conventional closing door, a feature associated with the political symbolism of the Pax Romana, the period of relative internal peace and stability linked with Augustus and his successors. Whether a door was ever installed remains disputed among local historians.
The exterior is faced with Istrian stone, also described as Nabresina travertine, while the core consists of rocks, stones, and pebbles bound with mortar. The lower portion and the opening show Italic or Etruscan characteristics. The decoration above follows late Hellenistic forms, creating a combination characteristic of the transitional architecture of the early Augustan period.
Columns and upper order
Two engaged, fluted columns flank the opening. An engaged column is attached to a wall or pier rather than standing independently. These columns have Corinthian capitals, the ornate capitals associated with acanthus leaves, and rest on pedestal-like bases. Above them is an entablature, the horizontal architectural assembly carried by columns. It combines a two-fascia architrave, a plain frieze, a projecting cornice, and a console cornice. The arrangement is an early example of an entablature with projecting sections on an arch monument.
A low triangular pediment occupies the space between, rather than directly above, the column capitals. Its cornice and tympanum contain carved decoration including flowers, plants, a hippocampus, a griffin, and jellyfish. The original upper molding, or sima, carried a palmette-and-lotus anthemion, a decorative pattern based on palmette and lotus forms.
Sculpture and inscription
Divine figures and the keystone bulls
Four clipei, or shield-shaped image panels, fill the spandrels beside the opening. On the side facing the Via Flaminia, Jupiter holds a thunderbolt and eagle, while Apollo carries a lyre and is accompanied by a raven. On the city-facing side, Neptune bears a trident and is paired with a dolphin. The fourth figure is variously identified as Venus, Minerva, or Roma, and appears with a sword and trophy or armour.
The four divine figures have been interpreted as evoking fire, air, water, and earth, while also expressing Augustus’s authority over nature and religion. Apollo recalls the well-documented cult of Apollo at Ariminum, and Neptune reflects Rimini’s maritime importance. A projecting bull’s forepart appears in the keystone area on both faces. It has been interpreted in several ways, including as a symbol of Roman strength, human control over nature, a legion associated with Augustus, a purification rite, or an early emblem of Ariminum as a colony. Other interpretations connect it with Taurus or with Dionysus, the protector of Mark Antony, whom Augustus defeated.
Attic and dedicatory text
The arch originally had an attic, the raised upper section above the main architectural order. Cassius Dio stated that a statue of Augustus stood above it, probably showing him on horseback or driving a quadriga, a four-horse chariot. The statue’s appearance is unknown. A white-marble foot reportedly found near the battlement and later acquired by Giovanni Bianchi has been proposed as part of the group. A horse’s head with traces of gilded bridle fittings has also been considered possible evidence for an equestrian or chariot sculpture.
Local historian Danilo Re proposed an alternative identification of the summit sculpture with the Cartoceto Bronzes, ancient gilded bronzes discovered near Pergola in 1946 along the Via Flaminia. Re suggested that the group may have represented Caesar, Augustus, Augustus’s mother, and Augustus’s grandmother.
The dedicatory inscription on the outer face of the attic is partly lost. It presents the Senate and People of Rome as dedicating the monument to Augustus, described as the son of the deified Julius Caesar, acclaimed emperor seven times, consul seven times, and designated consul for an eighth time. The text explains that the dedication followed the repair of the Via Flaminia and the other distinguished roads of Italy under his authority.
Medieval battlements
The present battlement and its distinctive Ghibelline merlons are medieval additions, probably dating in their oldest surviving form from the thirteenth century. Ghibelline merlons are swallowtail-shaped battlements associated in medieval Italy with Ghibelline political identity. Their presence reflects a medieval alteration of the Roman monument. The original attic was probably destroyed before this rebuilding, possibly as a result of earthquakes.
Walls, towers, and approach
City fortifications
The arch’s original setting included the city wall and flanking polygonal towers. Only traces of the lower walling and a limited section of the eastern tower’s outer casing remain visible. The tower casing is the principal surviving physical reminder of the defensive structures removed during the twentieth-century isolation project.
Bridge beyond the gate
Outside the city, the arch led toward a two-arched bridge over the Aprusa, or Ausa, probably built in the Augustan period. The bridge was repaired in late antiquity, during the Middle Ages, and again in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It was enlarged in the 1930s before being replaced by an underpass in the twentieth century. Buildings near the arch had originally been among Ariminum’s most elaborately decorated, and later structures stood directly beside the monument until their demolition during the Fascist-era works.
Later interpretations and influence
A medieval seal of disputed authenticity depicts the arch with Ghibelline merlons. Luigi Tonini dated the seal to the early tenth century, while Gaetano Battaglini proposed a thirteenth-century date. The monument’s Renaissance visibility probably influenced Leon Battista Alberti’s design for the nearby, unfinished façade of the Tempio Malatestiano. Some scholars have also compared its architectural forms with those of Castel del Monte.
