[4] Originally located on the northern outskirts of Rome, a Roman mile from the boundary of the pomerium on the west side of the Via Flaminia,[5] the Ara Pacis stood in the northeastern corner of the Campus Martius, the former flood plain of the Tiber River and gradually became buried under 4 metres (13 ft) of silt deposits.

The lower register of its frieze depicts agricultural work meant to communicate the abundance and prosperity of the Roman Peace (Latin: Pax Romana).

The monument as a whole serves a dual civic ritual and propaganda function for Augustus and his regime, easing notions of autocracy and dynastic succession that might otherwise be unpalatable to traditional Roman culture.

The monument consists of a traditional open-air altar at its centre surrounded by precinct walls which are pierced on the eastern and western ends (so called today because of the modern layout) by openings and elaborately and finely sculpted entirely in Luna marble.

The upper register of the northern and southern walls depict scenes of the emperor, his family, and members of the regime in the act of processing to or performing a sacrifice.

[13] Peter Holliday[14] suggested that the Altar's imagery of the Golden Age, usually discussed as mere poetic allusion, appealed to a significant component of the Roman populace.

The program of the Ara Pacis addressed this group's very real fears of cyclical history, and promised that the rule of Augustus would avert the cataclysmic destruction of the world predicted by contemporary models of historical thought.

Scholars have variously suggested that the goddess is Italia, Tellus (Earth), Venus Genetrix or Pax (Peace),[15] although other views also circulate.

In the 1960s, Stephan Weinstock challenged this identification (and the very identity of the entire monument), citing numerous discrepancies that Sieveking and his followers had failed to notice between Vergil's version and the panel.

[22] The long friezes of the Ara Pacis (the North and South Walls) contain figures advancing towards the West, who participate in a state of thanksgiving to celebrate the Peace created by Augustus.

[23] The next set of figures consists of priests from the college of the Septemviri epulones, so identified by an incense box they carry with special symbols.

[25] Other figures in the entourage might include Marcella Major (a daughter of Octavia), Iullus Antonius (a son of Mark Antony), and two boys and a girl of the imperial family.

As Charles Brian Rose has noted, "The variable value of the Eastern costume and the uneasy interaction of Trojan and Parthian iconography can make it difficult to determine whether one is viewing the founders of the Romans or their fiercest opponents.

This same figure in Hellenistic dress has also been interpreted as Ptolemy of Mauretania representing Africa, along with the German boy (Europe) and the Parthian prince (Asia).

The figure of Augustus was not discovered until the 1903 excavation, and his head was damaged by the cornerstone of the Renaissance palazzo built on top of the original Ara Pacis site.

With Agrippa appear a majestic woman, a child of about seven, and a teenaged girl leaning forwards from the background, putting her hand on the boy's head.

Moretti, in making the glass museum for the Ara Pacis at Mussolini's command, guessed that the two consuls (Tiberius and Varus) of 13 flank Augustus, so he saw this figure as M. Valerius Messalla.

[42] In relation to the Domitii Ahenobarbi, von Domaszewski also proposed in the same 1903 article that the last family on the South Wall is that of the father of the emperor Nero (born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus).

John Pollini provides the best summary of this viewpoint in his article, "Ahenobarbi, Appuleii and Some Others on the Ara Pacis", where he points out that the writer Suetonius specifically mentions that Nero's father went "to the East on the staff of the young Gaius Caesar".

Stern claims that these figures cannot possibly be the Domitii Ahenobarbi, on the basis of the belief that Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus, whom von Domaszewski saw as the boy of the family, was born after the monument's completion.

Syme also proved somewhat unintentionally, based on the inscription ILS 6095 that Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus was governor of Africa in 13 BC and could not be in Rome for the Ara Pacis ceremony.

Kähler canonized the idea that Gaius was dressed in a "Trojan" costume for the equestrian boys event called the Troy Game, which was also held in 13 for the dedication of the Theater of Marcellus but on a different occasion.

So ingrained was Kähler's theory, however, that when the distinguished scholar Erika Simon (1968, 18) suggested the boy is a barbarian, she was subjected to intense criticism until she retracted it.

[48] Subsequently, led by Charles Brian Rose and Ann Kuttner, North American scholars have realized Kähler was wrong: the boy is a foreign prince.

Stern adds the costume is wrong for a Trojan (no Phrygian hat) and no bulla – worn by all Roman boys as protection from the evil eye.

[49] In 1938 the finally reconstructed Ara was placed near the Mausoleum of Augustus, and a big pavilion was built around it by architect Vittorio Ballio Morpurgo as part of Benito Mussolini's attempt to create an ancient Roman "theme park" to glorify Fascist Italy.

This led to a great number of complaints from locals, starting a long series of arguments and criticisms of the Ara Pacis project.

Nicolai Ouroussoff, of The New York Times called the building "a contemporary expression of what can happen when an architect fetishizes his own style out of a sense of self-aggrandizement.

"[54] Former mayor Gianni Alemanno, backed in July 2008 by culture undersecretary Francesco Maria Giro, pledged to tear down the new structure.

[55][56][57] He later changed his stance on the building and has agreed with Mr. Meier to modifications including drastically reducing the height of the wall between an open-air space outside the museum and a busy road along the Tiber river.