Читать книгу Roman Antiquities, and Ancient Mythology - Charles K. Dillaway - Страница 23

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The Romans expended immense sums of money on their bagnios. The most remarkable were those of the emperors Dioclesian and Antonius Caracalla—great part of which are standing at this time, and with the high arches, the beautiful and stately pillars, the abundance of foreign marble, the curious vaulting of the roofs, and the prodigious number of spacious apartments, may be considered among the greatest curiosities of Rome.

The first invention of aqueducts, is attributed to Appius Claudius, four hundred forty-one years from the foundation of the city, who brought water into the city, by a channel of eleven miles in length—but afterwards several others of greater magnitude were built: several of them were cut through the mountains, and all other impediments for about forty miles together, and of such a height that a man on horseback might ride through them without the least difficulty. But this is meant only of the constant course of the channel, for the vaults and arches were in some places one hundred and nine feet high. It is said that Rome was supplied with five hundred thousand hogsheads every twenty-four hours by means of these aqueducts.

The cloacæ or sewers were constructed by undermining and cutting through the seven hills upon which Rome stood, making the city hang, as it were, between heaven and earth, and capable of being sailed under.

Marcus Agrippa in his edileship, made no less than seven streams meet together under ground, in one main channel, with such a rapid current, as to carry all before them, that they met with in their passage. Sometimes in a flood, the waters of the Tiber opposed them in their course, and the two streams encountered each other with great fury: yet the works preserved their old strength, without any sensible damage: sometimes the ruins of whole buildings, destroyed by fire or other casualties, pressed heavily upon the frame: sometimes terrible earthquakes shook the foundation: yet they still continued impregnable.

The public ways were built with extraordinary care to a great distance from the city on all sides; they were generally paved with flint, though sometimes, and especially without the city, with pebbles and gravel.

The most noble was the Appian way, the length of which was generally computed at three hundred and fifty miles: it was twelve feet broad, made of huge stones, most of them blue. Its strength was so great, that after it had been built two thousand years, it was, in most places, for several miles together, perfectly sound.