Roman sites in Switzerland
Roman Remains in Nyon
Little remains of Nyon’s Roman past. Apart from the Roman museum, a few Roman items can be seen around Nyon. Some decorative stones were used in later buildings but the most visual are the pillars erected above Parc du Bourg-de-Rive. These three pillars (well two and a third pillars) were discovered buried horizontally in old town Nyon and moved to overlook Lake Geneva in 1958. Here, they can easily be seen by travelers ...
Founded: 45 BC |
Location:
Nyon, Switzerland
Avenches Amphitheatre
Avenches (earlier known as Aventicum) became the capital of the Roman Helvetia province around 15-13 BC. The heyday of the city was in the 2nd century AD when it had over 20,000 inhabitants. The amphitheatre was also erected in the early 2th century. Today it is Switzerland's best preserved amphitheatre.
Founded: 2th century AD |
Location:
Avenches, Switzerland
Augusta Raurica
Augusta Raurica is a Roman archaeological site and an open-air museum in Switzerland located on the south bank of the Rhine river about 20 km east of Basel near the villages of Augst and Kaiseraugst. It is the oldest known Roman colony on the Rhine. Ancient history Augusta Raurica was founded by Lucius Munatius Plancus around 44 BC in the vicinity of a local Gallic tribe, the Rauraci, relatives of ...
Founded: 44 BC |
Location:
Augst, Switzerland
Lausanne-Vidy Roman Ruins
Lousonna was a Gallo-Roman port during Roman times. The port town was important for commerce with links on Lake Geneva to Roman towns such as the present-day Geneva, Nyon, and Villeneuve. However, during Roman times, Lausanne was never of political or military importance. Although borders shifted, Lausanne was mostly a backwater at the southern most parts of Germania, ruled from Mainz. Political and military power in the ...
Founded: 15 BC |
Location:
Lausanne, Switzerland
Chur Roman Ruins
Several prehistoric settlements and remains of a Roman road station have been discovered in Welschdörfli, the old town district in Chur. You can visit the excavations and discoveries on the Ackermann grounds on Seilerbahnweg. The protective structures covering the archaeological sites from the Roman era were built in 1986 according to designs by local architect Peter Zumthor. They do not only protect the finds, they are ...
Founded: 15 BCE |
Location:
Chur, Switzerland
Windisch Roman Amphitheatre
The Roman amphitheatre in Windisch was built in the first half of the 1st century AD in the immediate vicinity of the Roman legion camp Vindonissa. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre in Switzerland. During the reign of Emperor Tiberius (14 to 37 AD), when the Legio XIII Gemina was stationed in Vindonissa, a first wooden amphitheatre was built. It was destroyed by fire around 45 AD. The camp was rebuilt of st ...
Founded: c. 50 AD |
Location:
Windisch, Switzerland
Selley Roman Theatre
Built at the beginning of the 2nd century AD, the Selley Theatre could accommodate around 12,000 spectators, making it one of the largest buildings of its kind. It was modified in the Gallo-Roman age. Both the orchestra and the cavea (tiered seating) are more than semicircular, the rather modestly sized stage building was built onto the exterior of the linear façade wall, and the actual stage consists of a simple wooden ...
Founded: 2nd century AD |
Location:
Avenches, Switzerland
Cigognier Sanctuary
The building of the Cigognier, the largest sanctuary on the site (35m x 17m) began in the year 98 AD. Analysis of the wooden stakes beneath the building"s foundations allowed this date to be established. The plans, technology and materials used are inspired by Rome. It was a rectangular building with a courtyard framed with porticos. Only the priests had access to the room that contained the worshipped statue. The fa ...
Founded: 98 AD |
Location:
Avenches, Switzerland
Gallo-Roman Villa of Orbe-Boscéaz
Orbe-Boscéaz, also named Boscéay, is an archaeological site located at the territory of the town of Orbe (Vaud). On the site of Boscéaz, five pavilions protect the largest site of Roman mosaic in Switzerland. These mosaics decorated a vast Roman villa built between the first and the third century AD, including private baths and a temple dedicated to Mithra. The first known mosaics are discovered in 1841. Between 1986 ...
Founded: 1st century AD |
Location:
Orbe, Switzerland
Vitudurum
Vitudurum is the name of a Roman Vicus, those remains are located in Oberwinterthur, a locality of the municipality of Winterthur. The majority of the remains of commercial, residential, religious and public buildings are situated around the St. Arbogast church. Vitudurum was established nearby productive resources and a prehistorican route from Lake Geneva to Lake Constance in the late first century BC or early f ...
Founded: around 4 BC |
Location:
Winterthur, Switzerland
Irgenhausen Castrum
Irgenhausen Castrum is a Roman fort situated on Pfäffikersee lake shore. It was a square fort, measuring 60 metres in square, with four corner towers and three additional towers. The remains of a stone wall in the interior were probably a spa. In the Roman era, there was a Roman road from Centum Prata (Kempraten) on Obersee–Lake Zürich via Vitudurum (Oberwinterthur) to Tasgetium (Eschenz) on the Rhin ...
Founded: 294-375 AD |
Location:
Pfäffikon, Switzerland
Engehalbinsel Roman Vicus
A sanctuary with three fana (Gallo-Roman temples), a small bath building, an amphitheatre, several necropolis and remains of buildings where discovered in 1763 and excavated in 1956 near Bern. It has an ellipsis shape arena, whose axis are 28 x 26 metres, two walls which could be an entry at one end, and a niche at the other end. Its blenches were probably wooden made. Long regarded as an amphitheatre (it would one of th ...
Founded: 1st century BCE |
Location:
Bern, Switzerland