VIA ARDEATINA
(Fest. 282;
CIL vi. 13074; Not. app.;
Jord. ii. 581):
the road leading to Ardea, 24 miles distant, which (according to the view
hitherto current) branched off to the southward from the
VICUS PISCINAE
PUBLICAE, passed through the
PORTA NAEVIA (as far as which it was
called Vicus
PORTAE NAEVIAE), and then ran just inside the Aurelian
wall (on the left of it is a large circular tomb-HJ 186; LF 45) as far
as the postern generally known as
PORTA ARDEATINA, which was removed
when the great bastion was built for Paul III by Antonio da Sangallo
the younger (
Mitt. 1894, 320-327). Nothing is left of the course of the
road just outside the gate. No milestones belonging to it have been
found, but an inscription (
CIL vi. 8469) records a manceps viarum
Laurentinae et Ardeatinae.
From this it has been concluded that these two roads diverged just
outside the porta Ardeatina (Mon.
L. xiii. 137-142); but it has also
been pointed out that the road which branches from the
VIA OSTIENSIS
(q.v.) at vicus Alexandri must be the via Laurentina mentioned by
Pliny (
Ep. ii. 17. 2:
et Laurentina et Ostiensis eodem ferunt); and it
is very likely that one was the vetus and the other the nova (EE ix. p. 375,
376), and probably the first mentioned would be the vetus.
Another solution is to suppose that the via Ardeatina diverged from the
via Appia to the right at the church of Domine quo vadis (?), as the modern
road which bears the name via Ardeatina does. In that case the road
which ran through the porta Naevia and the postern just mentioned
would be the via Laurentina (vetus ?). This avoids the necessity of
supposing the existence (which, if we accept the usual theory, we must
do) of three bridges
1 over the Almo, including that of the via Appia,
within a short distance of one another. The proper name for the postern
would then be porta Laurentina-if it had a name at all.
(Jord. i. I. 233, 363;
T. i. 72-104, 597;
ix. 409-46 ;
RE ii. 615 sq.;
HJ 185 ; Carcopino, Virgile et les Origines d'Ostie
(Paris 1919), 240-250.)
