The History of the Pantheon: From Ancient Rome to Today

How old is it?

• The standing building: about 1,900 years old, built in the early second century AD.
• The site as a temple: about 2,050 years, since Agrippa's foundation of roughly 27 BC.
• As a church: continuously since 609.

Timeline at a glance

c. 27 BC — Agrippa's temple

Marcus Agrippa, Augustus's son-in-law and chief builder, founded the first Pantheon as part of a wider programme in the Campus Martius that also included baths and the Aqua Virgo. What his temple looked like is unresolved: excavated remains beneath the rotunda have been reconstructed as a rectangular temple, and as a building on a different orientation. Confident descriptions of a south-facing Augustan Pantheon are one reading of ambiguous evidence.

80 and c. 110 AD — two fires

The fire of 80 AD destroyed Agrippa's building. Domitian rebuilt it. Around 110 AD a second fire, reported as a lightning strike, damaged or destroyed that rebuild. No ancient source describes a deliberate demolition afterwards, so statements that Hadrian "razed it and started again" go beyond the evidence.

c. 113–128 AD — the rebuild

The building standing today went up in roughly a decade of work beginning around 113–114, under Trajan, and was completed in Hadrian's reign. Specialists therefore describe it as Trajanic–Hadrianic. Whether the design changed hands between the two reigns is unknown; whether Hadrian intervened personally is a matter of speculation rather than record.

The architect is not named in any surviving ancient source. Apollodorus of Damascus is often proposed because he was Trajan's leading engineer, but the attribution is inference — see who built the Pantheon.

How the building is dated

Roman bricks carry stamps naming the workshop, estate and, often, the consuls of the year — an effective date code. Twentieth-century surveys read the Pantheon's stamps as Hadrianic and dated the whole building to his reign. Later study identified stamps of Trajan's reign in the lower fabric, which is what pushed the start date back. This is ongoing scholarship, not a closed question, and figures such as "the dome bricks are of 123 AD" are more precise than the evidence supports.

202 AD — Severan restoration

A smaller second inscription below Agrippa's records repairs by Septimius Severus and Caracalla. It is easy to miss from the piazza and is the only ancient text on the façade besides the dedication.

609 — consecration as a church

The Byzantine emperor Phocas gave the building to the papacy, and Boniface IV consecrated it as Santa Maria ad Martyres. Tradition records the translation of relics from the catacombs; the numbers given in medieval accounts (twenty-eight cartloads is the usual figure) are legendary rather than documentary. The consecration is the single most important event in the building's survival.

Medieval centuries

Rome shrank; the Campus Martius became one of the inhabited quarters, and the Pantheon stood in a dense, muddy neighbourhood with market stalls against its walls and ground level rising around it. The gilded bronze roof tiles were reportedly stripped by Constans II in 663. The structure was maintained because it was a church, and it also served at times as a fortified point in the city's factional conflicts.

Renaissance and Raphael

Fifteenth- and sixteenth-century architects measured the building obsessively; it shaped how Brunelleschi, Alberti, Bramante and Palladio thought about domed space. Raphael was buried here in 1520 at his own request, in the third niche on the left-hand side of the rotunda as you walk clockwise from the doors. His tomb was opened in 1833 to confirm the remains, and they were reinterred in the ancient sarcophagus now visible.

1620s — the Barberini bronze

Urban VIII had the bronze structure of the portico ceiling removed. Cannon for Castel Sant'Angelo is the best-documented destination; the popular claim that the same metal became Bernini's baldachin in St Peter's is traditional and contested by later research. The pasquinade quod non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt Barberini — "what the barbarians did not do, the Barberini did" — dates from this episode. The two bell towers added in the same century were removed in 1883.

19th–21st centuries

After Italian unification the Pantheon became the burial place of the monarchy: Vittorio Emanuele II in 1878, Umberto I in 1900, Queen Margherita in 1926. Volunteers of a royal honour guard still keep watch at the tombs.

Paid admission began in 2023. Standard entry is €7; €2 for eu citizens aged 18–25 with id; under-18s enter free. It remains a working basilica, and the rotunda closes to sightseeing during Mass. Current practicalities are in our Pantheon visitor guide.

Sources and further reading

• L. M. Hetland, 'Dating the Pantheon', Journal of Roman Archaeology 20 (2007) — the brick-stamp argument for a Trajanic start (one influential redating, not an uncontested consensus)
• Encyclopaedia Britannica — Pantheon, Rome: structure, dating and history
• Platner & Ashby, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome — Pantheon (LacusCurtius)
• Cassius Dio, Roman History Book 69 (Hadrian) — English text, LacusCurtius
• Direzione Musei nazionali della città di Roma (Ministry of Culture) — official Pantheon page: hours, tickets and access
• Ministry of Culture — official Pantheon tariff notice (€7 full price effective 1 July 2026) and free-entry categories
• Sovrintendenza Capitolina ai Beni Culturali — Rome's monuments and conservation

Facts on this page last checked: August 2026. Prices, opening hours and transport routes in Rome change — always confirm with the official source before your visit.

Continue reading about the Pantheon

Frequently Asked Questions

How old is the Pantheon?

The standing building is roughly 1,900 years old: construction is now generally placed from about 113–114 AD, with completion under Hadrian in the 120s. A temple has stood on the site since about 27 BC, and the building has been a church since 609.

Was the Pantheon built in 27 BC or in the 120s AD?

Both dates belong to the site. Agrippa's temple of about 27 BC burned in 80 AD; a rebuilt version burned around 110 AD. The present rotunda is the Trajanic–Hadrianic building that followed, and it kept Agrippa's dedication on the façade.

How is the Pantheon dated?

Mainly by brick stamps, which record consular dates. Older studies put them all in Hadrian's reign; more recent analysis found Trajanic stamps in the lower fabric, moving the likely start back to about 113–114 AD.

When did the Pantheon become a church?

In 609, when Pope Boniface IV consecrated it as Santa Maria ad Martyres. It has been in continuous Christian use since.

Who removed the Pantheon's bronze?

Urban VIII (Maffeo Barberini) in the 1620s. The bronze went at least partly to cannon at Castel Sant'Angelo; the claim that it also supplied Bernini's baldachin in St Peter's is traditional and still disputed.

Do EU citizens get in free?

No. Under-18s enter free; EU citizens aged 18–25 pay a reduced €2 rate with ID.