Aqua Claudia

The two most magnificent aqueducts were the Aqua Claudia and the Anio Novus (or Aqua Aniena Nova), both commenced by Caligula in A.D. 36, and finished by Claudius in A.D. 50. The water of the Aqua Claudia was derived from two copious and excellent springs, called Caerulus and Curtius, near the thirty-eighth milestone on the Via Sublacensis, and it was afterwards increased by a third spring, Albudinus. Its water was reckoned the best after the Marcia. Its length was 46,406 passus (nearly 46-1/2 miles), of which 9567 were on arches. Of a still greater length was the Anio Novus, which began at the forty-second milestone , on the Via Sublacensis, and received in addition, at the thirty-eighth milestone , opposite the sources of the Aqua Claudia, a stream called the Rivus Herculaneus. It was the longest and the highest of all the aqueducts, its length being nearly 59 miles (58,706 passus), and some of its arches 109 feet high. In the neighbourhood of the city these two aqueducts were united, the Claudia below and the Anio Novus above. An interesting monument connected with these aqueducts, is the gate now called Porta Maggiore, which was originally a magnificent double arch, by means of which the aqueduct was carried over the Via Labicana and the Via Praenestina. The Porta Labicana was blocked up by Honorius; but the arch has been lately cleared of his barbarous constructions. Over the double arch are three inscriptions, which record the names of Claudius as the builder, and of Vespasian and Titus as the restorers of the aqueduct (see the woodcut below). By the side of this arch the aqueduct passes along the wall of Aurelian for some distance, and then it is continued upon the Arcus Neroniani or Caelimontani, which were added by Nero to the original structure, and which terminated at the temple of Claudius, which was also built by Nero, on the Caelius, where the water was probably conveyed to a castellum already built for the Aqua Julia, and for a branch of the Aqua Marcia, which had been at some previous time continued to the Caelius: the monument called the Arch of Dolabella is probably a remnant of this common castellum (Becker, Handb. d. r”m. Alterth., vol. i pp499-502). These nine aqueducts were all that existed in the time of Frontinus, who thus speaks of them collectively, in terms which can hardly be called exaggerated: "Tot aquarum tam multis necessariis molibus pyramidas videlicet otiosas compares, aut inertia sed fama celebrata opera Graecorum." It has been calculated that these nine aqueducts furnished Rome with a supply of water equal to that carried down by a river thirty feet broad by six deep, flowing at the rate of thirty inches a second.

P. Smith BA (in: A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities 1875, W. Smith DCL LLD)

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Last modified: March 25, 2005 - Wilke D. Schram (wilke@cs.uu.nl)

Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus
Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus
Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia / Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus
Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus
Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus	Aqua Claudia/Anio Novus
Aqua Claudia and Anio Novus	Via di Porta Furba	Porta Maggiore, entrance for aqueducts	Piazza di Porta Maggiore
Porta Maggiore	Comparative heights	Porta Maggiore	Text on the Porta Maggiore
Plazza di Porta Maggiore	Mediaeval view	Plazza di Porta Maggiore	Piazza di Porta Maggiore
View on Ad Spem Veterem	Castellum Aquae	Piazza di Porta Maggiore	Via Eleniana
Via Grattoni	Via Grattoni	Villa Wolkonski I	Villa Wolkonski II
Via Statilia	Via Statilia	Via Statilia	Via Statilia
Via Statilia	Nero's branche / Arcus Neroniani	Nero' branche to the Palatine	Nero' branche to the Palatine
Nero's branch at Mons Caelius	Via di Stefano Rotondo	Nero's branch at Mons Caelius	Via di Stefano Rotondo
Via Domenico Fontana	Nero's branche on the Caelius	Piazza della Navicella	Piazza della Navicella
Crossing the Servian wall	Via San Paolo della Croce	Close to the Aventine	SE of the Circus maximus
Palatine (south side)	Palatine (north side)	View from the Palatine