Rome Behind the Scenes: The Machine — Trajan’s Markets, when Rome stops being just a backdrop

These aren’t romantic ruins; they’re a machine. Six storeys climbing up the Quirinal, interior spaces that open out and stitch themselves back together, ramps locking different levels into place, a covered gallery linking rooms and functions. As you walk, you realise the plan was drawn to keep people, goods and documents moving – like a contemporary shopping centre, except the idea was born here two thousand years ago. Not a local street market with overlapping voices, but the operational back-room of imperial Rome: tabernae on the street front and, above all, storerooms, offices and archives serving the great Forum of Trajan. Grain, oil, cloth and spices reached Rome through a capillary system of ports, warehouses and administrations. The Markets belong to that network – not the shopfront, but the mechanism that makes the rest possible.