Via Domitia
Segusio to Ad Pyrenaeum
The route
The surveyed line begins at Segusio, Susa, where the arch raised for Augustus by the local king Cottius still stands. It climbs the Dora Riparia valley to Ad Martis at Oulx, crosses the Col de Montgenèvre at about 1,850 metres and drops to Brigantio, Briançon. From there it follows the Durance past Eburodunum at Embrun and Caturigomagus at Chorges to Vapincum, Gap, then the small station of Alabonte near Monêtier-Allemont.
Below Segustero, Sisteron, the road turns west through Apta Iulia at Apt and Cabellio at Cavaillon, passing close to Glanum outside Saint-Rémy-de-Provence. The survey shows two ways over the Rhône, one by Arelate, Arles, the other by Ugernum, Beaucaire; both converge on Nîmes.
West of Nîmes it crossed the Vidourle at Ambrussum, skirted Montpellier and reached Forum Domitii, probably at Montbazin, then Cessero on the Hérault at Saint-Thibéry. After Baeterrae, Béziers, came Narbonne, where the road to Aquitaine branched off. The last stage passed Ruscino outside Perpignan and climbed to Ad Pyrenaeum at the Col de Panissars, where Pompey had set up a trophy in 71 BC to mark his victories in Spain.
The surveyed line
- Mapped length
- 620 km
- Mapped segments
- 40
- Line certainty
- Conjectured
Measured across every Itiner-e segment attributed to this road. A conjectured stretch is one whose course is inferred from evidence either side of it; that covers 100% of the mapped length here. This describes how precisely the line is known, not whether the road existed.
The road today
In the mountains the modern road keeps to the valley floor the Roman surveyors chose. The Italian SS24 runs from Susa over Montgenèvre. On the French side the N94 follows the Durance from Briançon through Embrun to Gap. Between Gap and Sisteron the N85 stays close to the same corridor.
West of the Durance the line is broken, surviving as lanes, field edges and the occasional straight stretch of departmental road through the Luberon country. In Languedoc the old Route Nationale 113, since renumbered as departmental roads, shadows it from Nîmes towards Narbonne; the A9 motorway runs roughly parallel all the way to the border. South of Perpignan the old N9 through Le Boulou and Les Cluses keeps very close to the inland branch over the pass.
Where to see it
Ambrussum, near Villetelle between Nîmes and Montpellier, is the best place to stand on the road itself. About 200 metres of paving, scored with cart ruts, climbs beside an Iron Age hillfort. A single arch of the Pont Ambroix still stands in the Vidourle. A small museum sits on the site. In Narbonne a section of the road found in 1997 lies open in the Place de l'Hôtel de Ville, a few steps below the modern square.
The three-arched Pont Julien near Bonnieux carried the road over the Calavon and took car traffic until 2005; it is now on a cycle route. At Les Cluses, below the Pyrenean pass, a late Roman gate tower stands on the road and two forts guard it, built partly with blocks taken from Pompey's trophy. Excavation at Panissars in 1984 found the trophy's foundations and wheel ruts cut into the rock.
Common questions
Who built the Via Domitia?
Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus, the Roman commander who conquered the region in 121 BC, laid it out around 118 BC. The road carries his name. A milestone found at Treilles, south of Narbonne, in 1949 bears his name with the title imperator and the figure XX; it is often described as the oldest Latin inscription found in Gaul.
Did Hannibal use the Via Domitia?
No. Hannibal crossed southern Gaul in 218 BC, about a century before the road was built, though he travelled much the same corridor from the Pyrenees to the Rhône. Which Alpine pass he used is still argued over; Montgenèvre is only one of several candidates.
Is the A9 motorway a Roman road?
Not as built. The A9 runs roughly parallel to the Via Domitia from Nîmes to the Spanish border, but the Roman line lies a little inland in places, closer to the old N113 and N9.