Parker, John Henry: The archaeology of Rome (1,text): I. The primitive fortifications (Oxford [u.a.], 1874)

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Appendix.

or foss-way just outside of Rome; this deep hollow way, even after
it is united with the present road to Tivoli near the Campo Santo,
is cut out of the rock to the depth of seven yards, or twenty-one feet.
The Praetorian Camp is on high ground outside of the Wall of
Aurelian; but between that and the Sessorium, now Santa Croce, is
a wide and deep foss of the time of the Kings of Rome, probably
made by Tarquinius Superbus, when he raised his great outer bank,
with these two fortresses to protect the two ends of it. The old
road going through the Porta Chiusa skirted the end of this great
foss; the old road in the first century passed under the arch of
Augustus at the Porta S. Lorenzo, about fifteen feet below the pre-
sent level, and went at the bottom of the old foss, or was slightly
raised on a bank across it. But in the fourth century, when the
fortress of Honorius was built round the old gate on the level of
the soil (which is the same now that it was then, in the year 400),
the road was also made on the same level, and carried upon a high
bank across the foss; this is partly concealed here by walls and
sloping banks made for cultivationf. At two miles on the Via
Tiburtina is the Ponte Mammolo, and at fourteen miles the Ponte
Lucano, near to which is the circular tomb or mausoleum of the
Consul Marcus Plautius Silvanus.
The Via Nomentana goes to Nomentum near Mentana, passes
the Porta Nomentana near the Porta Pia. The picturesque bridge
called “Ponte Nomentano” still remains visible at two miles from
Rome. The pavement may also be seen at six miles from Rome
on this road. Beyond the bridge are the branch roads of Cecchina,
and of the Vigne Nuove to the left, the ancient Via Patinaria, where,
in the villa of his freedman Phaons, about four miles from Rome,
Nero killed himself, according to Suetonius.
The Via Salaria and the Via Flaminia issued from the Porta
Collina and the Porta Ratumena near the north-east corner of the
City, and retain still their old names; but of the fine Ponte Salaro
nothing remains but the piers of the arches ; the bridge was blown up
by the Pontifical soldiers to prevent the approach of the Garibaldians
in 1867. The line of the Via Salaria can be recognised in the old
road to Monte-Rotondo at the waters called Labanae, near Grotta
Marozza8 and Rieti.
On the Via Flaminia still exist the tomb of Bibulus, the mauso-

f The same thing is now distinctly
visible at the Porta S. Giovanni and
the Porta Asinaria by the side of it,
20 ft. below the level.

See Gori, “ Studi dal Ponte Sa-
lario di Roma a Fidene, Crustumerio
ed. Ereto. Roma, Tip. delle Belle Arti,
1863,” pp. 31, 32, 68.