The Via Valeria from Tivoli to Collarmele

The Via Valeria is the central section of the great highway which in antiquity connected Rome with the Adriatic coast at Ostia Aterni (now Pescara). The first section, the Via Tiburtina, has been described by Thomas Ashby with his usual thoroughness ( PBSR , iii, 1906, p. 84 ff.). The third section, the Via Claudia Valeria (Collarmele-Pescara) has been dealt with in more summary fashion by Robert Gardner ( PBSR , ix, 1920, p. 75 ff.). The central section has never been described. The present paper does not intend to compete with Ashby's monumental achievement, the result of a life-time dedicated to work on the ground and in archives. It is intended only to present a straight-forward account of the surviving remains, based on personal survey over the whole length of the section discussed. I have also added extracts from Ashby's and Miss Van Deman's works on the Roman aqueducts giving the modern numbering of the road, for the use of those who wish to check them; I myself had no opportunity to do so. The reconstruction of the course of this ancient road is very instructive as regards the behaviour of modern and earlier traffic systems, the more so since the railway everywhere accompanies it. A section along the Via Valeria Antica would show it as a series of steps

Section (typography · Sociology · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Archaeological Research and Protection · Archaeology and Historical Studies · Classics · Computer Science · History