Villa Adriana

Hadrian became the Emperor in AD 117, followed by Trajan, his Mentor. After ascending the throne, he decided to tackle the military problems left open by his predecessor. He had the strategy of restraining his existing boundaries rather to fight battles to expand his Empire.

Regularizing the law favored him to have lots of time for his own interests in culture and architecture. Four years after his coronation, he traveled across the country and inspected personally, all the provinces under his Empire. He had always been a peace-lover.

Of all his Construction projects in Rome, this Villa happens to be the Masterpiece known for its rich architecture and creativity.

He spent his last years devoting his time meetings philosophers and intellectuals, entertaining them hospitably and discussing various topics with them. He wanted to see his own tomb constructed, while still living which is the great mausoleum, which today is Castel Sant'Angelo.

Hadrian died at the age of 62 giving his successor Antonio, a prestigious empire.

Emperor Hadrian

The inimitable architecture and landscape embrace each other, with perfect buildings and Garden. The Villa was built completely during the first 10 years of Hadrian's rule. The construction began immediately after the emperor arrived in Rome, in mid AD118. The imperial palace is constructed on top of an older villa from the first century BC.

The villa occupies a large plain of 120 hectares southwest of Tivoli, 28 km east of Rome. It contains 30 complex buildings.

It stands one of the most remarkable examples of imperial and dynastic palace. One aspect of the Villa under study recently has been the existence of a system of underground tunnels for both vehicles and pedestrians. This system served as an underground service network, which functioned independently from the upper level thus not interfering with the official and formal nature of the ground level.

Building Materials and Art

The most famous statues are preserved in Capitoline Museums and Vatican Museums. About 500 valuable statues were removed from the Villa during 17th and 18th centuries.

The pavements in opus sectile employed one great precious, coming from marble variety from the hollow ones of all Mediterranean.

The pavements made of marbles, have geometric patterns of squares and triangles and mixed with glass and ivory too. The walls in the Central building are decorated with marbles. The other walls are covered with plaster painted with frescos or decorated with elaborate floral patterns. The ceilings constructed the same way are badly preserved.