Көне Римнің су тас жолы: Aqua Virgo тарихы

Ancient Roman aqueduct in Italy

The Aqua Virgo was one of the eleven Roman aqueducts that supplied the city of ancient Rome. It was completed in 19 BC by Marcus Agrippa, during the reign of the emperor Augustus and was built mainly to supply the contemporaneous Baths of Agrippa in the Campus Martius. At its peak, the aqueduct was capable of supplying more than of water per day. The name is thought to be derived from the purity and clarity of the water because it does not chalk significantly. According to a legend repeated by Frontinus, thirsty Roman soldiers asked a young girl for water, who directed them to the springs that later supplied the aqueduct; Aqua Virgo was named after her.

Its source is just before the 8th milestone north of the Via Collatina. It collected water from springs near the course of the Aniene, a large system (still functioning and inspectable) of aquifers and springs which were conveyed into a basin (existing until the 19th century) by a series of underground tunnels, and fed the canal by regulating the inflow with a dam. It was also supplemented by several feeder channels along its course. The aqueduct ran underground for nearly all of its length except the last stretch of running partly on arches in the Campus Martius area, of which two sections remain. The aqueduct dropped only along its length to its terminus in the centre of the Campus Martius. The route made a very wide arc, starting from the east and entering the city from the north. It ran along via Collatina up to the Portonaccio area, passed via Nomentana to via Salaria, and then turned south and entered the city under the Horti Lucullani and crossed to the area of the Pincian Hill and current Villa Medici, where a spiral staircase (called the Pincio snail) leads to the underground conduit. The long detour was justified because the aqueduct had to serve the northern suburb of the city, until then without water supply, and because the low level source (only above sea level) made it necessary to avoid the steep slopes that the shortest route would have encountered. Probably, the entry into the city from that side also allowed the Campus Martius to be reached without crossing densely populated city areas. After the limaria pool (settling basin) near the Pincian, the urban stretch began partially on arches, many discovered in 1871. It then passed through the area of the Trevi Fountain and then crossed the current Via del Corso on an arch which was subsequently transformed into a triumphal arch to celebrate the military successes of Claudius in Britain. Later interpretation has found that the aqueduct’s arches continued along the Via del Seminario to a point east of the Pantheon. It terminated in the Campus Martius in front of the Saepta Julia. A secondary branch reached the inadequately served regions VII, IX, and XIV in the Trastevere area. The route passed from the low area of the Campus Martius over the higher ground of the ridge surrounding the Pantheon basin, and then over the bridge of Agrippa. Tiber River. and Theodoric. Emperor Claudius renovated it in 46 AD, as witnessed by an inscription on the architrave in via del Nazzareno, which states that he rebuilt large sections of the aqueduct at this point because Caligula had removed stone for use in constructing an amphitheatre. In 537 AD, the Goths besieging Rome tried to use this underground channel as a secret route to invade Rome according to Procopius. After deteriorating and falling into disuse with the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the Aqua Virgo was repaired by Pope Adrian I in the 8th century. In 1453, Pope Nicholas V made a complete restoration and extensive remodelling from its source to its terminus points between the Pincio and the Quirinale and within Campo Marzio and consecrated it Acqua Vergine. This also led the water to the Trevi Fountain and the fountains of Piazza del Popolo, which it still serves today. In order to maintain the slight downward gradient, the aqueducts didn’t follow a direct route to Rome, but instead used the lay of the land. Typically, the gradient was shallow to make the water flow slower, so fewer repairs would be needed due to quicker water flows causing damage and too shallow of a gradient meant that the water would not flow at all. Different degrees of gradient were used for different reasons. While traveling through a tunnel, for example, a steeper gradient could be used to speed up water flow. Since inside the tunnel repairs were less likely to be needed the water could flow at a higher rate requiring a steeper gradient and then once through the tunnel the gradient would need to decrease in order for the water to be slowed back down to its average speed. In later times, the use of high arches across valleys and plains were employed for the aqueducts, and some were even as high as off the ground. The dioptra was another kind of level which rested on the ground and was adjusted on the top with precision screws for checking the angle of various objects by looking through pivoting sights. One concept contained in the De architectura is that the quality of an architectural work depends on the social relevance of an artist’s work, not the form or workmanship of the work itself. Another assertion from Vitruvius is that a structure must exhibit the three qualities of firmitas, utilitas, and vinustas (in English, it must be strong and durable, useful, and beautiful and graceful).

The Acqua Vergine is the Renaissance restoration of the Aqua Virgo aqueduct. In 1453, Pope Nicholas V renovated the main channels of the Aqua Virgo and added numerous secondary conduits under Campo Marzio. The original terminus, called a mostra, which means "showpiece", was the stately, dignified wall fountain designed by Leon Battista Alberti in Piazza dei Crociferi. Due to several additions and modifications to the end most points of the conduits during the years that followed, during the Renaissance and Baroque periods, the Acqua Vergine culminated in several magnificent mostre: the Trevi Fountain and the fountains of Piazza del Popolo.