The Forum of Hippo Regius

Measuring 76 x 43 m, the forum at Hippo Regius is one of the largest in North Africa.

Aristocrats commissioned the building of monuments and public works. They displayed their names prominently on what they paid for. A large inscription in the forum’s paving names C. Paccius Africanus, patron of Hippo Regius and proconsul of Africa Proconsularis in the latter part of the 1st century CE, as the man who had the pavement built.

Lavish use of marble in rooms on the east side of the forum apparently suggests that they were shrines, not shops.

A fragmentary inscription (AE 1953. 73) was found in the forum in honor of Suetonius, the famed author of imperial biographies born around 70 CE. It is evidence that Suetonius was a native of Hippo Regius. Indeed, many authors called Roman were actually from Africa.

For more images of Hippo Regius, see the Flickr Album!