Samuel Ball Platner, Thomas Ashby, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome

PORTA FONTINALIS

a gate known only from two passages in literature (Fest. 85; Liv. xxxv. 10. 12) and three inscriptions (CIL vi. 9514, 9921, 33914), but assumed to have been in the Servian wall. In 193 B.C. a porticus was built a porta Fontinali ad Martis aram qua in campum iter esset (Liv. loc. cit.; CP 9908, 73), and this is the only topographical indication that we have, apart from the connection with springs indicated by the name itself. The exact site of the ARA MARTIS (q.v.) is in dispute, but it was in the campus Martius, west of the via Lata, and therefore the view most generally held at present is that the porta Fontinalis was on the north-east side of the Capitoline, between it and the Quirinal, where a road ¹ certainly connected the campus with the forum (RhM 1894, 410-412; Richter 44). It has also been placed farther west, near the Piazza Magnanapoli ² (Jord. i. I. 209; Wissowa, Hermes 1891, 142-143; BPW 1912, 1734; for a very doubtful identification with the porta Capena, see Morpurgo, BC 1906, 209-223; for further discussion, see CP 1908, 67-68, 73). The occurrence of this gate in inscriptions indicates that it continued to exist in some form during the empire and was apparently a well-known locality.