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| A Roman aqueduct |
The Grandeur
of Rome, 75 AD
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| A she-wolf suckles the infants Romulus and Remis the founders od Rome |
Over the next seven centuries
Rome grew from a city state to an empire that dominated the known world
bordering the Mediterranean Sea and beyond.
In the process, the city itself
was transformed from a meager village to a metropolis that by the year 75 AD
numbered an estimated 1.5 million inhabitants.
It was the center of the known
world, the seat of imperial power and the home of numerous architectural wonders.
A Tour of Ancient Rome
The Roman historian Pliny the Elder provides us with a snapshot
of Rome's architectural grandeur in the year 75 AD that includes buildings
inhabited for over 700 years and newly erected wonders of the Ancient World:
The Great Buildings
"[In great buildings] as well as in
other things the rest of the world has been outdone by us Romans. If, indeed,
all the buildings in our City are considered in the aggregate, and supposing
them - so to say - all thrown together in one vast mass, the united grandeur of
them would lead one to imagine that we were describing another world,
accumulated in a single spot.
“Not to mention among our great works the
Circus Maximus, that was built by the Dictator Caesar - one stadium broad and
three in length - and occupying with the adjacent buildings no less than four
iugera [about 2 acres] with room for no less than 160,000 spectators seated -
am I not, however, to include in the number of our magnificent structures the
Basilica of Paulus with its admirable Phrygian columns [built also in Julius
Caesar's day], the Forum of the late Emperor Augustus, the Temple of Peace
erected by the Emperor Vespasian Augustus - some of the finest work the world
has ever seen? [and many others].”
The Sewer System
“Frequently praise is given to the great
sewer system of Rome.
“There are seven 'rivers' made to flow,
by artificial channels, beneath the city.
“Rushing onward like so many impetuous
torrents, they are compelled to carry off and sweep away all the sewerage; and
swollen as they are by the vast accession of the rain water, they reverberate
against the sides and bottoms of their channels.
“Occasionally too the Tiber, overflowing,
is thrown backward in its course, and discharges itself by these outlets.
Obstinate is the struggle that ensues
between the meeting tides, but so firm and solid is the masonry that it is able
to offer an effectual resistance.
“Enormous as are the accumulations that
are carried along above, the work of the channels never gives way.
“Houses falling spontaneously to ruins,
or leveled with the ground by conflagrations are continually battering against
them; now and then the ground is shaken by earthquakes, and yet - built as they
were in the days of Tarquinius Priscus, seven hundred years ago - these constructions
have survived, all but unharmed.”
Supplying Water to the City
“But let us now turn our attention to
some marvels that, if justly appreciated, may be pronounced to remain
unsurpassed.
“Quintus Marcius Rex [praetor in 144
B.C.] upon being commanded by the Senate to repair the Appian Aqueduct and that
of the Anio, constructed during his praetorship a new aqueduct that bore his
name, and was brought hither by a channel pierced through the very sides of
mountains.
“Agrippa, during his aedileship, united
the Marcian and the Virgin Aqueducts and repaired and strengthened the channels
of others. He also formed 700 wells, in addition to 500 fountains, and 130
reservoirs, many of them magnificently adorned.
“Upon these works too he erected 300
statues of marble or bronze, and 400 marble columns, and all this in the space
of a single year! In the work which he has written in commemoration of his
aedileship, he also informs us that public games were celebrated for the space
of fifty-seven days and 170 gratuitous bathing places were opened to the
public.
“The number of these at Rome has vastly
increased since his time. The preceding aqueducts, however, have all been
surpassed by the costly work which has more recently been completed by the
Emperors Gaius [Caligula] and Claudius.
“Under these princes the Curtian and the
Caerulean Waters with the 'New Anio' were brought a distance of forty miles,
and at so high a level that all the hills - whereon Rome is built - were
supplied with water. The sum expended on these works was 350,000,000 sesterces.
“If we take into account the abundant
supply of water to the public, for baths, ponds, canals, household purposes,
gardens, places in the suburbs and country houses, and then reflect upon the
distances that are traversed from the sources on the hills, the arches that
have been constructed, the mountains pierced, the valleys leveled, we must
perforce admit that there is nothing more worthy of our admiration throughout
the whole universe.”
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