The park also runs tours, but those must be booked two weeks in advance. Here, you can buy a map of the park and rent bikes. To explore the road (and the three catacombs that are open to the public that line it), take the metro out to the Appia Antica stop and head to the Appia Antica Regional Park Information Point.

Sensing the importance of the road to Rome and its people, he became the curator of the Appian Way in 66 BC, and borrowed a significant amount of state funds to ensure its restoration. The move gained him political support, which proved crucial in advancing his political career. The Via Appia Antica became Rome's most important road-and perhaps the most important road in the world-opening Rome up to the East.īy the time Julius Caesar was ascending to power, the road had been worn down. The Via Appia Antica, the 'Queen of Roads,' was built in 312 BC, and by 191 BC, extended all the way to the port of Brindisi, almost 310 miles southeast of Rome on the Adriatic Sea. As dictator he instituted a number of reforms, from expanding who could be considered a Roman citizen to changing the Roman calendar, but his brief reign came to a bloody end when he was stabbed by a group of Roman senators in Pompey's Theater on March 15, 44 B.C.Īll roads might lead to Rome, but it wasn't always that way. after emerging victorious from a civil war. Through a combination of political savvy, charisma and backhanded dealings, he quickly rose to power, becoming dictator of Rome in 49 B.C.

Julius Caesar was born in Rome, on either the 12 or 13 of July in 100 B.C. But the archaeological hints that remain transport visitors into the footsteps of one of history's most heralded and controversial figures. To tour Caesar's Rome requires imagination. Many of the iconic structures that comes to mind when one thinks of Rome-The Coliseum, the Pantheon, the Baths of Caracalla-hadn't been built when Caesar ruled, and many of the important features of his daily life have long since been buried beneath the growing city. But, arguably, none changed its course more than Julius Caesar, the shrewd military leader and politician who greatly expanded the Roman Empire and eventually become its self-appointed dictator, paving the way for the imperial system. Rome doesn't want for famous residents-from artists to politicians, many notables have called the city home.

Caesars colosseum will call