Rome's Demographics and Urban Morphology

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Figure 4

Rome’s Urban Form Through the Ages

The city of Rome is rich in history for the Roman Empire was one of the most powerful empires in history. The Roman Empire expanded over numerous countries, and went inland, civilizing unurbanized areas. As the Roman Empire expanded, the population of Rome increased exponentially. It became the first city to reach 1 million inhabitants very early on in history, at 90 BC. As this city is very old, it had many emperors. Traditionally, these emperors would build their own forum in Rome, essentially increasing the complexity of Rome. These forums, along with commemorated monuments, were built to denote a sense of authority to the civilians of Rome. There was also a clear division of public and private space, emphasizing authority again over women and children who were not allowed to access such public space.1

As the population of Rome expanded fast, the Aurelian wall was built in 275 AD. This wall is built

around the central downtown district of Rome, enclosing the Seven Hills of Rome (Figure 2).2 The Romans made a living off of the spoils from the conquests of other civilizations. After Rome was invaded from 100 – 500 AD, the Empire finally fell in 476 AD, where its population dropped drastically. Just a few years before the fall of the Ancient Roman Empire, the population of Rome was only 500,000 inhabitants, a decrease of half a million in only roughly 350 years (Figure 1).

The Baroque planning period of Rome began in the 14th century. The Baroque Grand Manner is characterized by the use of regular trapezoids and ovals, perspectival deformations and distortions, overlap of regular shapes, and places to move through that work as nodes in a network.3 An example of this type of urban planning is Michelangelo’s Capitoline Hill. The shape of the plaza is a trapezoid, with an oval in the center. However, when looked at straight forward, the trapezoid appears as a square, where as the oval appears to be a circle, playing with the distortion of perspective. The Grand Manner of Rome also had to factor in Rome’s topographic landscape, and design for heights. The use of artful landings, viewing points, and broke up upward progression in a straight line by implementing unavoidable diversions, such as a monument or statue on the axis, forcing movement around it.4

The Grand Manner planning attempts to rebuild new cities from scratch, but Rome was an exception due to its complex topography and preexisting land subdivisions. An important factor in Baroque planning is the implementation of public squares (plazas), and boulevards.5 The implementation of the Trivium greatly changed form of the urban streets. A Trivium is the meeting place of three radial streets, often meeting at a plaza. The first application of the Trivium was in Rome, with the meeting of the roads at the Piazza Del Popolo shown in Figure 4, where it is highlighted in red.

The application of the Vista framed a distanced view, to be seen “through a composed foreground and is fixed at the opposite end by some worthy marker.”6 The street channel between the foreground brackets and the terminal object do not need to have uniform elevation, provided they are aligned in a straight line and create a strong sense of perspective.7 An example of the vista in Rome is the strade Pia in Rome terminates at Michelangelo’s Porta Pia, executed in the antique tradition of the street ended at an arched gateway. This area also contains and nymphea, which consists of a hinge building that provides a climax at the street end, in order to conceal and awkward bend in the street line.8

Rome todays still consists of many Baroque-planning elements that have not been altered. However, in 1932, Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini ran the 30-meter wide Via dei Fora Imperiali avenue between the Colosseum and the Piazza Venezia. This avenue ran through a dense 18th century residential district, and demonstrated a brutal disregard for the current settlement pattern. 9 The implementation of this street was directly related to the increase of wheel-carriages and their need for wider streets. This street is highlighted in red, running down from Piazza Venezia in Figure 4.

In order to tie all the applied elements together, the Grand Manner was inspired by preexisting freestanding monuments. These can accent a vista, or also fix the space of a formal square. A single monument can fulfill both purposes when the squares and avenues leading into it are correlated.10 These monuments can include: triumphal arches, commemorative columns, and equestrian statues, which all reappeared in Rome in the 15th century and onward. In the later Middle Ages, fountains were transformed into ornamented public monuments, and the scale of them expanded along with the scale of the public spaces.11 Triumphal arches inspiring modern phases of the grand manner date back as early as the Republic era of 2nd century BC. Examples include the arch of Titus, Septimius Severus, and Constantine. These triumphal arches replaced simple arched city gates in the Augustan era.12

Rome’s population in recent years has surpassed what it was when it was at its highest in 90 BC. Rome’s current population is 2.8 million, with most of it concentrated in the downtown core, as shown in Figure 3. Buildings are built together quite compactly, with high-density areas. In the 20th century many apartments were built to compensate for the large population, ultimately building densely in the core.

In conclusion, Rome went from being a thriving city with a powerful Empire, to being invaded and losing most of its population. The city’s fabric was redesigned by implementing Baroque’s Grand Manner form of planning, which resulted in the use of perspective as a form of design, as well as the use of geometric shapes and the emphasis on gathering spaces such as plazas. Today Rome’s population is thriving, with certain modern design elements implemented in the city, such as the Via dei Fora Imperiali, as well as modern housing to house such a large population.

1 Benjamin Gianni. “Morphology of the City” (Lecture, Carleton University, Ottawa, Winter 2016). 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid. 4 Spiro Kostof. The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History. (Boston: Little Brown, 1991), 228.

5 Gianni. “Morpology of the City”.

6 Kostof. The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History. 263.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid. 9 Ibid., 230. 10 Ibid., 266. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid., 267.

References Gianni, Benjamin. “Morphology of the City.” Lecture, Carleton University, Ottawa, Winter 2016. Kostof, Spiro. The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History. Boston: Little, Brown, 1991.

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