Trajan’s Column was built in 113 AD, honoring Emperor Trajan. Standing at forty-two meters tall, Trajan’s column was built as another memoir, to remember Trajan’s victories in Dacia. A hill used to occupy the space that Trajan’s column now possesses, but it was leveled so that Trajan’s Forum could be built, encircling his column. It is made up of twenty-nine blocks of white marble, the largest being around eighty tons. It is decorated with a band of reliefs that winds around the column, the band being under two hundred meters long. All these figures on the column tell the story of the Dacian war between 101-102 and 105-106 AD. The carvings begin with the soldiers training and preparing for the war, and ends with the Dacians leaving the homeland. These reliefs also came in partial gilding and bright colors, and it’s possible that this column was decorated that way in the first century after its construction. An eagle once held the position at the top of the column, but after Trajan’s death, a six-meter statue of himself replaced it. A tale about the statue is that Pope Gregory, (in Papal rule from 590 to 604) saved it from being destroyed, because one image contains Trajan helping a dead soldier’s mother. This moved the Pope to beg God to save Trajan’s pagan soul from hell, and it is claimed that God told the Pope that Trajan’s soul had been saved.

         Even though it takes the last position on this list, Trajan’s Column is still an important structure because it is not only a column, but shows the strength and prowess of Roman rule and architecture, as maintaining a forty meter high column is not like maintaining a garden. It has taken lots of time and resources, but has paid off, because it is in very good condition for being near two thousand years old.