Roman house and possible temple found beneath the streets of Fréjus, France

Beneath a busy street in southeast France, archaeologists have exposed a Roman house with a marble basin and, right beside it, a monumental building that may have been a temple. The finds lie in the historic centre of Fréjus, on top of the Roman city of Forum Julii, and they sit close to the point where the city’s two main streets once crossed.

A Roman city under a modern town

Fréjus lies in the Var department, on the Mediterranean coast of southeast France. Today it is a lively town with a Roman amphitheatre and the remains of an aqueduct. Roughly 2,000 years ago, the same ground held Forum Julii, a Roman city in the province of Gallia Narbonensis. Later buildings covered much of it, so archaeologists have to work in small gaps between the modern streets and houses.

The city’s own archaeological service leads the current work. Its director, Pierre Excoffon, presented the discoveries during a site visit, according to the regional news outlet Var Actu. The research programme in the city centre began in spring 2026, and in June the team opened one excavation site to the public during the European Archaeology Days.

What the team found on Rue Aubenas

The dig takes place on Rue Aubenas, opposite the Aulézy nursery school. The site lies near the crossing of the cardo maximus and the decumanus maximus. In Roman towns, those were the two principal axes: the cardo ran roughly north to south, and the decumanus ran east to west. A spot near their crossing usually put a building in the busiest part of town.

There, the archaeologists found a monumental complex. They think it may be a temple or a sanctuary, but they stress that this is only a working hypothesis. Var Actu describes the identification as an archaeological hypothesis, and the building’s exact function remains undetermined. The reports give no dimensions and no construction date, so the size and age of the structure are still unknown to the public.

Next to it, the team fully uncovered a Roman house, or domus. The house opened directly onto the cardo maximus and centred on an atrium, the inner courtyard that gave Roman homes light and air. Inside, the archaeologists recorded a floor of coloured concrete and a marble basin. Those details suggest a home of some comfort, although the reports do not say who lived there.

A quarter of two or three houses

The surrounding area may hold more. The city’s archaeologists believe that two or three houses could have made up this residential quarter. They have not confirmed that yet, and further excavation will have to show how many houses stood here and how they related to each other and to the monumental building beside them.

Why the location matters

A house with its front door on a main street, and a possible temple a few steps away, gives a rare view of everyday life in the centre of a Roman colony. Most visitors to Fréjus know the big public monuments, such as the amphitheatre. Finds like these show how ordinary households and religious or civic buildings shared the same streets. If the monumental building does prove to be a temple, it could also help archaeologists understand how the city organised its public space.

The work also adds to the long-running effort to map Forum Julii street by street. Because the modern town sits on top, every new excavation fills in a piece of a plan that no one can see from above.

What we still do not know

Several basic questions remain open. The team has not said when the house and the monumental building were built, how long people used them, or whether the large structure really served as a temple. The number of houses in the quarter is also an estimate. Var Actu reports that more discoveries could come in the coming weeks, and the next stage of work should clarify what the monumental building was and how the neighbourhood was laid out.

For now, the story shows how much of a Roman city can survive under a living town, and how a few trenches near a crossroads can bring a 2,000-year-old street scene back into view.

Sources

• Var Actu, “À Fréjus, des fouilles archéologiques révèlent une maison romaine et les vestiges d’un possible temple” (Luc Mikailoff), 25 October 2026: varactu.fr
• HeritageDaily, “Roman house and possible temple unearthed in ancient city of Forum Julii”, 25 October 2026: heritagedaily.com