Ancient Si^ty °f Water to Towns. 261 



modern city ; from the excellent quality of which it has received 

 the name of Aq-uafelice. 



The Aqua Marcia supplied the best water of all the Eoman 

 aqueducts ; that brought by the old Anio from near Tibur was 

 not fit for drinking, and it was in consequence of this, and its 

 bad repair, that the senate commissioned Q. Marcius Rex, the 

 prsetor (b.c. 144), to build another aqueduct, which was after- 

 wards called after him. The Aqua Marcia commenced thirty- 

 six miles from Rome \ the greater part of it was under ground ; 

 the arcades were seventy feet high, and it supplied the 

 Capitoline Hill with water. When we consider the great 

 number of aqueducts which poured their waters into Rome, 

 some for drinking purposes, others for baths, naumachia, etc., 

 etc., we can realize the words of Strabo, that whole rivers 

 flowed through the streets of Rome. Supposing all the 

 aqueducts to have been in operation at the same time, it has 

 been roughly calculated that they would have supplied fifty 

 million cubic feet of water daily. Taking the population of 

 Rome to have been one million, each inhabitant might have 

 had fifty feet every day. 



The aqueducts were built with very strong masonry ; the 

 channels were made of brick or stone, and lined with a 

 coating of cement. They were arched over, in order to keep 

 the water pure and safe, and to exclude the sun and rain. 

 The covering was generally an arched coping; holes were 

 made at regular intervals in the coping to provide a vent for 

 the air, which would otherwise have burst the roof or walls 

 of the channel by its compression. Reservoirs were generally 

 constructed at different points on the aqueduct in order to 

 catch any deposit or sediment contained in the water. A vast 

 reservoir, called castellum, received the water when it reached 

 the city, from whence it flowed into other castella, whence it 

 was distributed for use by the inhabitants. 



But not alone in Rome did a magnificent aqueductal system 

 obtain; it was extended through all the large cities of the 

 vast empire. At Antioch, at Pyrgos, near Constantinople, at 

 Metz, at Nismes, at Segovia in Spain, may still be seen relics 

 of Roman grandeur. " The aqueducts of Rome/'' says Mont- 

 faucon, " were, without doubt, wonderful, on account of their 

 great length — arcades continued over the space of forty or 

 fifty miles ; their great number, with which 'the Campagna of 

 Rome was filled on every side, all this surprises us. But it 

 must be confessed that if, without considering the total 

 extent, wo only ]ook at any of the parts which remain round 

 Rome, there is nothing that approached the aqueducts of 

 Metz, of Nismes (Pont du Gard), or of Segovia." The aque- 

 duct of Metz extended across the Moselle, and conveyed water 



