The best-preserved Roman temple in existence, its proportions following Vitruvian ratios so precisely that Thomas Jefferson used it as the model for the Virginia State Capitol. The building survived 2,000 years by being continuously used. As church, town hall, stable, and now museum.
A textbook temple
The Maison Carrée is a near-perfect example of the architectural principles described by Roman architect Vitruvius in his famous first-century BCE treatise, De architectura. Built from local limestone, the temple is a pseudoperipteral hexastyle design of the Corinthian order. This means it has six freestanding columns across the front porch and twenty engaged columns—attached to the walls—around the sides and back of the central chamber, or cella.
The structure sits on a podium 2.85 meters (9.35 feet) high, making it visible in what was once the forum of the Roman colony of Nemausus. The building itself measures 26.42 meters (86.7 feet) long by 13.54 meters (44.4 feet) wide, a ratio of nearly 1:2. Its deep front porch, or pronaos, takes up almost a third of the building's length, a feature that shows the frontal approach typical of Roman temples. The decorative elements are precise, with an architrave divided into three levels and a frieze of carved acanthus leaves and rosettes. The temple was constructed around 20 BCE and dedicated between 4 and 7 CE to Gaius and Lucius Caesar, the grandsons and adopted heirs of Emperor Augustus.
An American ideal
In 1785, Thomas Jefferson, then the United States Minister to France, encountered the Maison Carrée. He had only seen it in books before but liked its classical proportions. He described it as "one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful and important example of architecture left us by antiquity" and spent hours gazing at it. Determined to use it as a model for the new Virginia State Capitol, he commissioned a plaster model to be made and shipped to America. Jefferson, with assistance from French architect Charles-Louis Clérisseau, adapted the temple form for a civic building, introducing the Classical Revival style to the United States.
The Maison Carrée’s exceptional preservation is because of its continuous use after the fall of the Roman Empire. In the 4th century, it became a Christian church. In the Middle Ages, it functioned as a meeting hall for city consuls, a house, and even a stable. After the French Revolution, it became the office for the first prefect of the Gard department and later housed the town's archives. From 1823 until 1907, it was the city's first art museum. This constant occupation prevented it from being quarried for stone. The building was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2023.
💡Fun Facts
The name "Maison Carrée" is an archaism; in 16th-century French, a rectangle was called a *carré long*, or "long square".
The original bronze dedication to Gaius and Lucius Caesar was removed in the Middle Ages. In 1758, a local scholar reconstructed the text by studying the pattern of holes left behind by the letters' metal pins.
Thomas Jefferson admired the temple so much he wrote he gazed at it for hours "like a lover at his mistress."
The temple is one of the earliest Roman temples established to promote the imperial cult in the provinces.
Hours vary seasonally. January, February, November, December: 10:00 am - 4:45 pm. March, October: 10:00 am - 6:15 pm. April, May, September: 10:00 am - 6:45 pm. Check the official website for extended summer hours and exceptions.
Admission
Full price: €6.50. Reduced rates are available. The "Pass Nîmes romaine" includes the Arena and Tour Magne for a combined price.
Accessibility
The temple is elevated on a high podium accessed by a large frontal staircase. The interior is a single, small chamber.