VILLA MEDICI, ROME. 
SS 
was well chosen by Lucullus, by Domitian, and by Sallust, for their pleasure gardens. A votive 
tablet discovered in 1868 proves that the site of the villa formed part of the gardens of the 
Acilii Glabriones, a family conspicuous in Roman history from the time of the battle of 
Thermopylae. Two members of the family, Maximus Acilius and Priscilla, embraced 
Christianity about a.d. 152, and were buried in the Catacomb of Priscilla on the Via Salaria. 
In the gardens of Lucullus 
avenues of carefully cut 
ilexes, bay and cypress over- 
shadowed fountains and 
were grouped round temples, 
shrines and porticoes gar- 
landed with roses and jas- 
mine. There stood that 
marvellous Hall of Apollo 
wherein Lucullus once 
feasted Cicero and Pompey 
at a cost of fifty thousand 
drachma. Near by Messa- 
lina took desperate refuge, 
and heard the garden gates 
behind her being broken 
down by the centurion 
Euodus, bent on making an 
end of her. Here on the 
site of the gardens of Sallust, 
the millionaire historian, the 
statue of the dying Gaul 
was found. 
On the eastern side the 
villa garden is built upon 
the actual walls of Rome, 
those walls of Aurelian 
which were stormed at this 
very point by the Goths. A 
gate was opened by traitors, 
and the villa of Sallust was 
given over to fire and sword, 
its flaming towers providing 
a light to guide the con- 
querors to the first sack of 
Rome. On the south the 
ground slopes down by gentle 
degrees in gardens and ter- 
races. It adjoins that to 
which, long ages ago, the 
old senator Pincius gave 
his name, gardens which 
are still the favourite promenade of the Romans. From the height of the eastern wall we look 
down on those slopes where Alaric marshalled his army of Goths, and where on a later day 
was pitched the camp of Belisarius and his Byzantine host. Procopius says, ‘ The greater 
68.-- ROM.AN M.ARBLE RELIEF BUILT 
VILL.A MEDICI. 
INTO THE WALLS OF THE 
(1) Entrance li) villa. 
(2) Open vestibule. 
(3) tlraml gallery of antiques. 
{4} Terrace. 
(5) Grotto under same. (9) Citv walls. 
(6) Pavilion on tlic wall of the citv. (10) \'inevartls. Nowa road down to the Borghese Gardens 
(7) Slfi))ing carriage way. (ii) Slope down to Piazza di Spagna, 
(8) Great terrace witli view over Rome. {12} Bosquet dcs Jardins. 
(Sfe plan on page 54,) 
