1 BOOK II. Region 3. Lazio 2 The border of Tuscany taking us to the river Tiber , in the normal course of things Rome would be the next to be described . 3 But this I did four years ago in my three books of Rome Restored , dedicated to the illustrious pontiff Eugenius IV , and so I shall omit Rome and describe the region of Lazio , in which it lies , in this new book . 4 The explanation of the region 's name is given by Vergil in these lines of Keneid Book VIII : 5 ` Then Saturn from airy Olympus first came down , in flight from the arms of Jove , exiled from his stolen kingdom . ' 6 ` The savage race scattered through the high hills he made an ordered society , and gave them laws . ' 7 ` He chose to call the place Latium because he had hidden ( latuisset ) unharmed on these shores . ' 8 The commentator Servius , explaining a passage in Aeneid VII , tells us that the peoples properly called Latins were those who took part in a communal sacrificial feast on the Alban Mount . 9 It is apparent that those Latins had such a strong attachment to Rome that Livy in Book LXXII lists the Italic peoples who deserted her in the Social War and then says that the Latin communities and foreigners sent auxiliaries to help the Romans . 10 I shall follow the usage of this and earlier times , illogical as it is , and call the region Campania and Marittima . 11 We know that the ancients called the territory around Capua Campania , and that the name Latium from the outset embraced the rather few tracts that are comprehended at present by the name Campania and Marittima . 12 On the other hand , we note that in his Geographia the Cretan Strabo ( who flourished in the time of the emperor Tiberius ) locates the lands of the Latins in the coastal region that extends from the Tiber mouth to the Gulf of Sitano ( where the coastal city of Sinuessa was ) , while in the interior he places the aboriginals , the Rutuli , Volsci , Hernici , Aequicoli , Marsi and those who inhabit the Apennines next to the Marsi right up to the borders of old Campania . 13 And since I intend to follow Strabo , a writer well versed in antiquity , and Pliny too , who drew on him , I am obliged to attach the region of the Latins to our present-day Campania and Marittima . 14 Nor am I confident that I shall be able to give satisfaction in the case of contemporary Lazio in the way that Livy , the emperor Augustus , Vergil , Strabo , and Pliny will help me to do justice to the regions antiquities . [15-old] Lazio no longer flourishes as it did in ancient times , so much so that Aelius Spartianus could write that the renowned emperor Hadrian was dictator , aedile , and duumvir of the towns of the region . 15 To begin with the coast , 16 Ancus Marcius founded the city of Ostia between the sea and the Tiber . [17-old] Commenting on Aeneid VII , however , Servius says that the outlet of the Tiber was only natural around Ostia , where Aeneas first set up his camp , though he later founded a great encampment in the territory of Lavinium , traces of which were to be seen in Servius ' time . 17 Strabo in fact describes Ostia as having no harbor because of the silting up of the Tiber . 18 He says that they had to use a supply of lighters to service the boats , to take off cargoes and put them on again , so that with their loads lightened the ships might more easily reach the Tiber . 19 In those days there was no harbor at Rome , though Claudius later had one built . 20 In Strabo 's time Tiberius began work on a harbor at Anzio . 21 Reading and writing this provokes in me the reflection - and it is something that should make every person of good sense wary of trusting too much in human capacities - that lavish expense and considerable effort on the part of emperors ( very powerful emperors too ) were not enough to keep the structures of the city of Ostia , the city and port of Anzio , or the harbor of Rome intact for as much as a thousand years ; but , as in the days of old , Ostia still remains without a harbor after 500 years . 22 Ostia suffered her first disaster in the time of Cinna and Marius . [24-old] Livy writes in Book LXXIX that they laid siege to Rome with four armies ( of which two were given to Q. Sertorius , and two to Carbo ) , captured the colony at Ostia and cruelly sacked it . 23 Ostia had at one time massive buildings , no trace of which remains now . 24 Flavius Eutropius writes that the emperor Aurelian began to build by the sea at Ostia a forum named after himself , where later a municipal magistrates ' court was established , it is worth mentioning that Ostia had excellent melons . 25 According to Julius Capitolinus the emperor Clodius Albinus sometimes devoured ten of them , among much else , at a single sitting . 26 Because Ostia always had an atmosphere oppressive to its inhabitants ( as happens in coastal regions ) , she enjoyed by solemn law of the Roman People exemption from military service and civic responsibilities .29 In Book XXVII Livy writes that the exemption was suspended for thirty days when Hasdrubal came to Italy , so that the Republic might have more soldiers . 27 After Ostia was destroyed by the Saracens , Pope Leo IV restored it and repopulated it with Corsicans . 28 So long has it remained ruined and derelict that no trace of the city survives , except for the tower that the famous pope Martin V had erected , to protect the city of Rome rather than the mouth of the Tiber and the port of Ostia . 29 Anzio comes next , a Roman colony of which Livy says in Book VIII : 30 ` A new colony was planted at Anzio . ' 31 ` The warships of the Antiates were taken away and they were forbidden to take to the sea . ' 32 And further on : 33 ` Some of the ships of the Antiates were taken into the docks at Rome , others were burnt and their prows ( rostra ) fastened on the front of a raised gallery which was constructed in the Forum , and which from this circumstance was called the Rostra . ' 34 Strabo says that the city of Anzio was 260 stades from Ostia and was built on a cliff in his time by the emperors Tiberius , Drusus , and Germanicus for their leisure and relief from cares of state . [37-old] Many very costly residences were built there , whereas earlier the Antiates shared with the Tyrrhenians a common enthusiasm for piracy , even though they were Roman subjects . 35 This is the reason that when they sent back to the Romans pirates they had captured , Alexander of Epirus and afterwards Demetrius his successor said that though they were handing over their persons in view of the kinship between the Greeks and the Romans , they took exception to the fact that the very men who were masters of Italy should be at the same time sending out galleys on pirate raids . 36 The forum of Anzio had a temple of Castor and Pollux , whom the Antiates called their Saviors . 37 Thus Strabo , 38 yet in these lines addressed to her , Horace seems to have thought that Fortuna was the chief deity cultivated by the Antiates : 39 ` O goddess , you that rule over pleasant Anzio , with power to raise our mortal bodies from the lowliest estate or to turn proud triumphs into funerals . ' 40 In Book LXXX Livy writes that Cinna and Marius stormed Anzio . 41 Later we find Suetonius and others writing that Nero piled up such extravagant buildings at the port and city of Anzio that he drained not just the treasury but the whole Roman empire of cash . 42 Thereafter he was so obsessed by turning up treasure that he would minutely interrogate fraudulent astrologers , enjoyed solemn exemption from civic duties , which was equally suspended at the same time as Ostia 's . 43 The city of Anzio no longer exists , but I have seen wonderful ruins still there in the sea , on the beach , and in the woods . 44 The town of Nettuno , however , built in a comer of the remains of Anzio , gives rise to a further agreeable reflection : 45 a small matter , admittedly , but I am always surprised that Pliny makes no mention of it since it must have been around since the creation of the world . 46 The quite substantial population of Nettuno provides for itself by fishing , fowling , and hunting , while the former territory of Anzio , which in those days was extremely fertile in wheat and wine , as Strabo indicates , is now covered by a strip of forest eighteen miles wide all the way from Civita Indivina , Cardinal Prospero Colonna 's town , to the seashore . 47 Nor is this town Lavinia , Aeneas ' first city , whose inhabitants the Romans spared in the Latin War in honor of his memory . 48 Of which Livy in Book VIII writes as follows : 49 ` The citizens of Lavinium received civic status and the restitution of their sacred things , with the proviso that the temple and grove of Juno Sospita should belong in common to the Roman people and the citizens living at Lavinium . ' 50 Lanuvium , instead , is the town from which came the distinguished Roman family of the Murenae . [50-old] It is celebrated in nearly all the historical records of ancient Rome . 51 But to return to Nettuno . 52 The sea there has lots of rocks , or rather gravel , and many excellent fish . 53 Dense forests offer , as ever , good hunting of boar and deer . 54 Fowling is of two sorts , depending on the time of year . 55 At the first sign of spring , swallows and quail ( now known as ` quaglie ' from their call ) return together to Italy across the Tyrrhenian sea . [56-old] The people of Nettuno then cover the whole shoreline of old Anzio with continuous netting for a space of five miles . 56 Each man sits on his own patch of ground , purchased at great expense , and with a pipe lures the quail as they arrive at night on to his own bit of the nets . 57 When they are entangled in the nets in large numbers , the fowler picks up any that fall on to the sand beyond the net , exhausted by the long flight . 58 I have heard that in a single month when the fowling was carried over several days , 100,000 of these little birds may be caught every single day . 59 These are the very quail of which Pliny says : 60 ` The quail always arrive before the cranes . ' 61 ` It is a small bird , and when it has arrived , more generally keeps to the ground than flies aloft . ' 62 ` Their flight is not without danger to mariners , for when they approach land they often smash into the sails of a ship , and that too always in the night , and the vessel often sinks . ' 63 ` They will not fly when the south wind is blowing , as that wind is humid and apt to weigh them down . ' [64-old] They like , however , to be borne along on the breeze , the body being so light and their strength so limited . 64 And further on : 65 they are observed to breed first in Campania in early spring , before it is realised they have arrived . 66 They also catch birds at Anzio in the autumn . 67 After they have flown over the sea , wood pigeons gather for a while in the woods of Anzio as they prepare to leave Italy . 68 The expert fowlers of Nettuno hang up huge nets specially made for this sort of fowling at great expense . 69 When they see a great number of pigeons gathered together and roosting in the trees , they terrify them by throwing stones and shouting , and make them fly off . 70 In their flight the birds are forced into a great flock . [71-old] When the fowlers see them above the snares of the nets they have spread , they sling small stones at them ( either naturally white or coated with gypsum ) with a great shout . 71 Terrified by the whirring noise , the pigeons try to save themselves by dodging the hawks ( what Pliny called ` Chilyones ' and are now called ` falcons ' ) , which in their terror they imagine in the whirring of the slingshots . [73-old] Flying as quickly as they can , they come near to the ground and thus distracted hurtle into the nets . 72 Pliny says that every year these pigeons fly over the sea to the territory of Velletri , a district which borders that of Anzio . 73 And he writes elsewhere : 74 ` The wood pigeons leave Italy after the swallows , starlings and thrushes , but whither is unclear . ' 75 ` The swallows go away to seek sunny mountain retreats in nearby countries . ' 76 Most of the present-day people of Rome catch wood pigeons for weddings and banquets , 77 for these small birds are better in flavor and more nutritious than other cock pigeons . 78 Strabo locates Ardea , where the Rutili once dwelt , between the two coastal cities that I have described , about seven stades from the sea , and he says that Aphrodisium , where the Latins held their panegyris , was nearby . 79 Pliny calls it the sacred grove of Jupiter Indiges , close to which is the river Numicus . 80 Vergil in Book VII writes as follows : 81 ` To the city of bold Rutilus , Allecto the fury came , a city that Danae is said to have founded for her Argive settlers when she had been carried to shore by the swift south wind . ' 82 ` The place was called Ardea by our forebears , and now only the great name Ardea remains . ' 83 And later he says : 84 ` Five cities , no less , established mighty smithies and make new arms : ' 85 ` powerful Atina , proud Tibur , Ardea , Crustumerium and Amiternae crowned with towers . ' 86 Servius on Aeneid VII writes : 87 ` Hyginus says that the name Ardea comes from augury of birds . ' 88 ` And Ovid tells us , mistakenly and with a poet 's licence , that Hannibal burned Ardea and the city was transformed into that bird . ' 89 Servius again , expounding a phrase ` battle lines of the Sacrani ' in the same Book VII , says : 90 ` A corybant is said to have come to Italy and to have occupied a region near where Rome now is , and that is why the people were called Sacrani , ' 91 ` the corybants being sacred to Cybele , mother of the gods . ' 92 ` Others hold that the Sacranae acies are the battle lines of the Ardeans , who when they were suffering from plague sometimes made a spring sacrifice , ver sacrum , ' 93 ` and so were called Sacrani . ' 94 Pliny says that Ardea was founded by Danae , the mother of Perseus . 95 When Hannibal was pressing the Romans hard , Ardea was one of the eighteen colonies that declined to furnish them with soldiers and capital levies . 96 The town is now the property of Jacopo Colonna and has a scant farming population . [90-old] It has the distinction of having produced the Roman pontiff Leo - Leo II , as I surmise . 97 The river Numicus , which Strabo says is near Ardea , is celebrated by Vergil in Book VII in these words : 98 ` The sacred waters of Numicus spring , ' 99 and below : 100 ` And the pools of Numicus spring . ' 101 On which Servius writes : 102 ` We gather from the present inhabitants that the word `` pools '' in Vergil is accurate . ' 103 ` The Numicus used to be a mighty river ; Aeneas corpse was found in it and he was deified there . ' 104 ` The river later shrank little by little and was reduced to a spring , which itself was held sacred , ' 105 ` for libations could be made to Vesta only from this river . ' 106 Five miles from Anzio is Torre Astura , the stronghold of Antonio Colonna surrounded by the sea . [107-old] Nearby dwelt the Astures of long ago , on whom Vergil writes : 107 ` Astyr , trusting in his horse . ' 108 Here Cicero put in as he fled Antony 's swords , unluckily for him ; 109 had he there continued the voyage he had begun , he would have escaped them . 110 Similar bad luck attended Conradin , son of Henry ( whose own father , the emperor Frederick II , king of Sicily , made him die in prison ) , when he fled to Torre Astura . 111 King Pedro of Aragon had seized Sicily by force of arms on the grounds that it belonged to his wife Costanza by hereditary right from her grandfather , the Frederick mentioned above . 112 Conradin , believing that he could drive Charles I of Anjou out of the Kingdom of Naples in the same way that Pedro had expelled him from Sicily , fought a disastrous battle at Benevento . 113 Accompanied by a single attendant he took to flight , but was intercepted at Astura and brought before Charles , and then publicly beheaded in a manner as abominable as it has been uncommon at other times and with other kings and princes . 114 Then comes Monte Circeo , largely surrounded by sea , where the Circe of fable is supposed to have lived . 115 In Strabo 's time this promontory had a small city ( as he calls it ) with a temple of Circe and grottoes of Minerva . [116-old] Strabo says that it was customary to show visitors a sort of cup that had belonged to Ulysses . 116 Servius says on the passage ` they skirt the shores of Circes realm ' in Aeneid VII : 117 ` The present mountain was formerly an island ' 118 ` separated from the mainland by marshes , which mud flowing down from the Alban Hills cut off , and it was called `` Aeaeus '' from the wandering of those passing by , through which men would be changed into wild animals . ' 119 On this matter , St. Augustine says in the course of building his City of God : 120 ` Varro adds that Circe changed the companions of Ulysses into beasts . ' 121 And below : 122 ` Indeed , when I was in Italy , I myself used to hear of such cases from one region of that country . ' 123 ` It was said that females with knowledge of these wicked arts would , when they wished and were able to do so , administer drugs on a piece of cheese to travelers , who were thereupon turned into beasts of burden and used to carry articles of all kinds , ' 124 `returning to their original form only when they had finished their tasks . ' 125 ` Yet their minds did not become bestial , but were kept rational and human . ' 126 The mountain has a town which is also called Circeium , and Livy calls both promontory and town Circeii . 127 I have often seen mentioned in the History of the Roman Church ( particularly in the time of Gelasius II , about the year 1120 ) a citadel of Circe on Monte Circeo . [112-old] It was the most stoutly fortified of all the citadels of the Roman Church and often brought succour to the Church in time of trouble . 128 At the foot of the mountain there is now the town of S. Felice Circeo . 129 The river which flows into the sea close to S. Felice , Strabo calls Storax and Pliny Nymphaeus . [115-old] Above the river , Strabo and Pliny say , was the town of Formia , 130 then the open sea . 131 The region of the Pontine plain stretches inland . [117-old] All of it was inhabited in very ancient times , long before the founding of Rome , by the Ausonians , who also occupied Campania . 132 This is why Italy was called Ausonia , and the Tyrrhenian sea the Ausonian , according to Strabo . 133 After the Ausonians came the Oscans , and they too had a share in Campania . 134 Later on the whole region as far as Sinuessa belonged to the Latins . 135 But whatever Strabo might have to say here , Pliny expresses himself as follows : 136 ` It is remarkable what we can add to the sum of human knowledge on this matter . ' 137 ` Theophrastus , the first foreigner who treated of the affairs of Rome with any degree of accuracy , I say , following something more than mere rumor , gave the circuit of the island of Circeo as being eighty stadia in the work he wrote during the archonship of Nicodorus at Athens , the 440th year of our city [ 314 b.c. ] . ' [123-old] ` ( For Theopompus , before whose time no Greek writer made mention of Rome , only spoke of the capture of the city by the Gauls , and Clitarchus , the next after him , only of the Roman embassy to Alexander . ) ' 138 ` Whatever land , therefore , has been annexed to that island beyond a circumference of about ten miles , has been added to Italy after that year . ' 139 ` Another wonderful circumstance : ' 140 ` near Monte Circeo are the Pontine Marshes , formerly the site , according to Mucianus , who was three times consul , of twenty-four cities . ' 141 ` Next to this comes the river Uffente , on which is the town of Terracina , called in the language of the Volsci Anxur , the spot too where Amyclae stood , a town destroyed by serpents . ' 142 I have sought to retrieve from Strabo and from Pliny the very earliest material , which they themselves had from the earliest sources . 143 In Book XLVI Livy writes that the Pontine Marshes were drained by the consul Cornelius Cethegus , to whom the task had been assigned . 144 And Strabo reports that the arable land created from them stretched for a hundred stades from the Pontine plains to the territory of Terracina , though the distance is reckoned nowadays to be eight miles . 145 Even now part of the Pontine Marsh adjoins Terracina ( the marsh is formed by two rivers , the larger of which , called the Uffente , formerly reached the Tyrrhenian sea at Terracina on the Appian Way ) . 146 Livy says that it was the plunder of Terracina that first caused the Romans to pay their soldiers : 147 ` Fabius marched to Anxur , which was the chief objective , without losing time in devastating the country . ' 148 ` Anxur ( modern Terracina ) was a city that sloped down towards the marshes . ' [133-old] ` Fabius made a show of attacking the city on that side . ' 149 ` Four cohorts were despatched with C. Servilius Ahala by a circuitous route to seize the hill which overhung the town on the other side . ' [135-old] ` After doing so they made an attack amid loud shouts and uproar from their higher position upon that part of the town where there was no defence . ' 150 ` An order was issued that none but those taken with arms should be injured . ' 151 ` On this Fabius disarmed the whole of the rest of the population without resistance and prisoners to the number of 2500 were taken alive . ' 152 ` He would not allow his men to touch the other spoils of war . ' 153 ` Then when the tribunes arrived , the three armies sacked the town , which owing to its long-continued prosperity contained great wealth . ' 154 ` It was thanks to this booty that it came about that the Roman soldier was for the first time paid a wage . ' [141-old] ` Previously , each man had served at his own expense . ' 155 In Book VIII , Livy has : 156 ` One cohort , which was stationed not far from Anxur , took up a position at Lautulae in a narrow pass between the mountains and the sea . ' 157 And Servius on the phrase ` Circes ridge ' in Aeneid VII says : 158 ` Jupiter was raised as a boy around this part of Campania , and he was called Anxyrus as though from aneu xurou , meaning without a razor , because he had never shaved his beard ; and the maiden Juno , called Feronian Juno , was also worshipped . ' 159 There is a spring near Terracina formerly called ` Anxur ' . 160 And Servius , further on : 161 ` Not far from Terracina is the town of Satura and the river Ufens [ Uffente ] of that cognomen which supplies the second element of the town 's name [ Satura Ufens ] , and which Vergil says is narrow , and it winds its way through the valleys to the sea . ' 162 Suetonius , in his Life of the Emperor Tiberius writes : 163 ` In a place called Praetorium near Terracina , a great many large rocks fell by accident from the ceiling as the emperor dined . ' 164 ` Though many of his friends and servants were crushed , he made an incredible escape . ' 165 Suetonius also writes that in the time of the emperor Tiberius 20,000 souls perished in the collapse of an amphitheater at Terracina . 166 Later , writing of the life of Nero , he says that that monstrous and insatiably cruel emperor longed for a similar disaster to occur in his time so that the memory of the calamity might make his reign too seem remarkable to posterity . 167 Aelius Spartianus in his Life of Hadrian says that it was at Terracina that Palma , a man of consular rank who had conspired against the emperor , was put to death . 168 The same Aelius writes that Antoninus Pius restored the harbor of Terracina . 169 And Livy in Book XXVI says that the colony of Anxur enjoyed irrevocable exemption from military levies , which was suspended at the time of Hasdrubal 's advent in Italy . 170 In Book XXI , Livy says that the dictator Fabius Maximus sent Minucius ahead to secure the pass that overlooked the sea below Terracina . [154-old] This was to prevent Hannibal from using the Appian Way to plunder the territory of Rome . 171 When he describes Caesars first arrival in Italy after he had ridden roughshod over the law at the Rubicon , Lucan says : 172 `And now he had passed over the precipitous heights of Anxur and the point where the waterlogged road cuts through the Pontine Marshes . ' 173 On Anxur , the poet Martial the cook has this to say to Faustinus : 174 ` Ah , wood and fountains and the firm shore of moist sand , and Anxur gleaming in her sea waters ! ' 175 And to Frontinus : 176 ' The calm retreat of Anxur by the sea , Frontinus . ' 177 The grammarian Servius , commenting on the verse he ruled over silent Amyclae in Book IX of the Aeneid , has this to say : 178 ` The town was founded between Gaeta and Terracina by Spartans , who came as followers of Castor and Pollux from Amyclae , a city of Laconia . ' 179 ` As adherents of the sect of Pythagoras , they refrained from all slaughter of animals , to the extent that they were unwilling to kill the snakes that bred in the marshes nearby , by whom they were killed . ' 180 An alternative explanation : 181 ` because the arrival of an enemy was often announced and the city would tremble with baseless dread , they forbade by law any report of an approaching enemy . ' 182 ` But afterwards when an enemy really did appear and no one reported it , they were destroyed . ' 183 ` And so it was that Amyclae perished in silence , whence Lucilius the satirist : ' 184 ` I had to speak , for I know that Amyclae perished by staying silent . ' 185 Strabo says that the territory of Terracina reaches inland as far as Formia , Minturno , and Sinuessa , 186 and he adds that travelers from Brindisi to Rome reach a canal near Terracina which is fed in many places by marsh and river water . [164-old] It lies beside the Appian Way and is navigated mostly by night , sometimes by day ; those who take to it at night leave it in the morning . 187 Next , he says , comes Formia , a Spartan foundation , which was formerly called Hormiae from its good anchorage or mormon as the Spartans sap . 188 Cicero had his Formian villa in this picturesque setting but the city was destroyed by the Saracens about the year 856 . [167-old] Thereafter the remains of the martyr Erasmus were transferred to Gaeta , and Formia 's first bishop was given to church of Gaeta by the Roman pontiff Gregory IV . 189 Servius on Aeneid VII , on the other hand , says that as a girl Juno was called Formia 190 and the place where she was worshiped was named after her . 191 Livy says in Book VIII : 192 ` Because they had always allowed free passage through their territory , the citizens of Formia were given Roman citizenship without the vote . ' 193 And Strabo , adds to what he said above that the Gulf of Gaeta ( so named by the Spartans because they call all hollow things caieta ) began at Formia . 194 Yet Strabo allows that some writers say that Gaeta was named after Aeneas ' nurse , as Vergil says at the beginning of Book VII : 195 ` You too , Caieta , nurse of Aeneas , have brought in death eternal fame to our shores . ' 196 But though the bay and citadel of Gaeta were celebrated in remotest antiquity , the town itself did not exist before the Saracens destroyed Formia , as I showed above . 197 The citadel of Gaeta ( as in Strabo ) and the present-day town of Gaeta are a hundred stades from Terracina , a distance nowadays reckoned as twenty miles . 198 Gaeta has always had an excellent harbor on its bay , though Aelius Spartianus writes that Antoninus Pius made extensive restorations there . 199 Aelius also writes that Antoninus Pius 's wife Faustina used to arrange liaisons with sailors and gladiators at Gaeta . 200 The first town on the Appian Way is Fondi , ten miles from Terracina , on which Livy writes in Book VIII : 201 ` Because they had always allowed free passage through their territory , the citizens of Formia were given Roman citizenship without the vote . ' 202 And below : 203 ` Vitrubius Bacchus of Fondi offered himself to the people of Priverno as leader of their rebellion , and forced the Romans to dispatch the consul Lucius Papirius against them . ' 204 ` The Privernates were put to flight . ' 205 ` The other consul Plautius led his army against Fondi . ' 206 ` As he was crossing their frontier , the senate of Fondi met him ' 207 ` and explained that they had not come to intercede for Vitrubius and those who had belonged to his party , but for the people of Fondi . 181 They pointed out that Vitrubius himself had cleared them of all responsibility by seeking shelter in Priverno and not in Fondi , though it was his own city .' 208 ` The consul commended the citizens of Fondi and granted them leniency . ' 209 Martial the cook suggests that the wines of Fondi are not the kind to need maturing : 210 The rich autumn of Opimius consulship bore this wine of Fondi ; ' 211 ` the consul squeezed out the must , and he himself will drink it . ' 212 Those heading leftwards from Fondi to Formia reach the town of Villa , where the emperor Galba was born , 213 while to the right is the Lago di Fondi . 214 Five miles further on is Itri , which was the city of the Lemurnae , of which Horace says : 215 ` At last , exhausted , we came to the city of the Lemurnae . ' 216 Another five miles from Itri , but off the Appian Way , is Gaeta . 217 This ten-mile stretch of road is paved with flint in the old Roman fashion as it makes its way through high and rugged hill country - though with its vines , olives and stands of trees , the landscape is perfectly charming . 218 Following the coast and seashore from Terracina one comes upon Torre Anastasia , then the town called Sperlonga , where , Strabo says , there are wide-open caverns of immense size which have been occupied by large and splendid residences . 219 After Sperlonga comes Gaeta on the shore : ten miles from the present town of Gaeta , at the river Traetto ( or Liri ) , now called the Garigliano , is the most beautiful countryside , not just of Italy but in all the world , for the springs that bubble up there give bright clear water that flows all over land planted with lemons and oranges ( as we Latins call the citrus-tree ) , irrigating it . 220 The principal spring , only ten paces from its first emergence from the ground , turns a good number of mills that are dotted around about a pretty and well-known village . 221 In this neighborhood , Cicero tells us in Book II of De oratore , 222 ` Scipio and Laelius gathered shells and cockles : Scipio and Laelius would always go off into the country together and would become marvellously boyish again , once they had flown to the countryside from the city as if slipping their shackles . [192-old] At Gaeta and Laurentum they used to gather seashells and cockles , and indulge themselves in all manner of diversions and mental relaxation . ' 223 On this ten-mile stretch was the Herculanean Way , the pleasantest of all the roads of the Roman Empire . 224 In his second oration Against the Agrarian Law of Rullus ' , Cicero has this to say of it : 225 ` Add to these the osier beds of Minturno . ' 226 ` Besides them , that very saleable road to Herculaneum , a road of many delights and of considerable value . ' 227 Next come the town of Castellone and then Castellonorato , which Onorato , count of Fondi , built in most impressive style . 228 Within sight of the caverns , which as I said are on the Bay of Gaeta , two islands are set in the sea , 229 Ventotene and Ponza , the latter a colony planted by the Romans , as Livy says . 230 Strabo says that these islands , small but with a healthy population , are close to one another but 250 stades from the mainland . 231 After Strabo 's time , these islands were honored by the exile of many martyrs and confessors of Christ . 232 The Caecuban Mount , famous for its excellent wine , touches the Gulf of Gaeta , as does Caecubum , a town in the district of Fondi on the Appian Way . 233 Strabo says that the whole region has an abundance of good wine . 234 And Pliny says : 235 ` Caecuban vines ripen in the Pontine Marshes . ' 236 Both of the cities there are ancient and each has been graced by a Roman pontiff , Gaeta by Gelasius II and Fondi by Soter , the son of Concordius . 237 Now we are coming to the border of our region of Lazio 238 at Sinuessa and the mouth of the Liri ( or Garigliano ) , and have finished our description of the sea coast . 239 But before we return to the interior , we shall mention the places on the left bank of the Liri in the region of Lazio . 240 Three miles from the sea , above the town of Traetto , is the castle of Spigno Saturnia beside the Liri , 241 and eight miles from Spigno is Fratte , a town some eight miles again distant from Pontecorvo ( that town , as we have shown , was once Fregellae ) . 242 It is a further eight miles inland to the well-known town of Ceprano . 243 ( The remaining places closer to the source of the Liri will be discussed when we come to the territory of the Vestini and the Samnites . ) 244 In the interior of Lazio there were numerous cities and almost numberless towns and castles , from which , according to Pliny , fifty-three peoples have perished without trace . 245 In describing this inland region , we shall not be able to adhere to the plan used in other regions , orienting ourselves by the mouths , sources and course of rivers . 246 We shall adopt another method ( one suited to this region alone ) which will meet our needs better , 247 by proceeding along three roads , the Appian , Latin , and Tiburtine , which lead in different ways to the river Liri and to Sinuessa and Gaeta . 248 Nor will our path on these roads be so clear as to avoid apparent slips and aberrations , inevitably so , since the roads have sometimes been diverted when bridges were destroyed , while at other points all trace of them has been lost and they can not be recognized at all . 249 Present-day travelers from Rome to Terracina come first to a place called Marino , twelve miles out : the villa of Lucius Murena next to it , still fairly well preserved , and the estate commonly known as Porzio , leads me to think that Marino may not improbably have been the villa of Marius . 250 This villa of Murena , if it actually kept its ancient name , I have hitherto been led to believe was either Marino ( if it was not , as I said , the estate of Marius ) or Zagarolo - the name of the town is modern but its ruins indicate that it was the ancient Lanuvium . [215-old] Cicero in his speech Pro Murena asserts that the patrician and consular Murenae had their origin in the very old and famous municipality of Lanuvium near Rome . 251 Recently , however , in a town owned by Cardinal Prospero Colonna and corruptly called ` Civita Indivina ' , a stone inscribed in capital letters was found showing that that town is Lanuvium . 252 Eight miles from Marino is the ancient city of Velletri . [218-old] In Book VIII Livy says of it : 253 ` The Veliternians , who had been Roman citizens from ancient times , were in consequence of their numerous revolts severely dealt with ; their walls were pulled down , their senate deported and ordered to live on the other side of the Tiber . ' 254 ` Colonists were sent on to the land they had possessed , and their numbers made Velitrae look as populous as before . ' 255 The city is famous not only on account of its antiquity but for the fact that the forebears of Augustus originated there . 256 Five miles to the left of Velletri is a town with the ancient name of Cori ; it was founded by one of three brothers , of whom the second built Tivoli , and the third gave his name to Monte Catillo near Tivoli . 257 On whom Vergil in Book VII : 258 ` Then the twin brothers Catillus and fierce Corax , youth of Argos , leave behind the walls of Tivoli and the race named for their brother Tiburtus . ' 259 After that comes the town of Sermoneta , thirteen miles as the crow flies from Velletri . 260 And three miles from Sermoneta are the ` Aquae Foetidae ' , Stinking Waters , where the marshland begins , though navigable now , no less than it was in Strabos day , all the way to Terracina . 225 The neighborhood is mentioned by the poet Martial the cook in these lines : 261 ` Ah wood and fountains and the firm shore of moist sand , and Anxur gleaming in her sea waters , and the couch that gazes on double wave , seeing on one side river craft , on the other sea-going vessels ! ' 262 Sezze , an ancient town set on a high hill , is five miles from Aquae Foetidae , and according to Pliny produces excellent wine . 263 And the poet Martial : 264 ` Sezze , that perched aloft looks down upon the Pontine flats , sent old jars from a tiny city . ' 265 And elsewhere : 266 ` Setine wine , masterly snows , cup hard on cup , when shall I drink you without a doctor 's ban ? ' 267 Priverno , also ancient , is five miles from Sezze . [230-old] It is not as formerly a town of the plains but was moved to a steep hillside after its destruction by the fury of Germans and Bretons . 268 Camilla was a child of Priverno , the maiden that Vergil praises to the skies as 269 Camilla of the Volscian race . 270 Servius ad loc. explains that she was from Priverno , 271 a more concrete and definite commendation of the Privernates came in the famous witticism of their ambassador to the Roman Senate : 272 when asked what kind of peace it was that the Privernates were so keen to have , he replied , one that would last forever , provided the terms were good . 273 The river that flows past the town of Priverno was formerly called the Amasenus , whom Vergil addresses in Book VII as : 274 ` father Amasenus . ' [235-old] And , in Book VIII : 275 ` while they were in mid-flight , behold , Amasenus in spate foamed to the top of his banks . ' 276 Around Priverno are the little towns of Maenza , Roccagorga , and Roccasecca . 277 Five miles from Priverno ( and from Terracina too ) is the town of Sonnino set on a steep hill named after the town . 278 This road is in the mountains all the way , and between it and the road along the shore described earlier lies the Appian Way . [239-old] The first city on the Appian Way is Alba , sixteen miles from Rome . [240-old] Along the road , there are the remains of buildings and monuments and foundations of enormous structures , much more extensive than one might believe without an attentive examination . 279 This is the Alba that Vergil mentions in Book I : 280 ` and the Senate of Alba . ' 281 There were thirteen Alban kings of the line of Aeneas and Lavinia . 282 Livy writes that once Alba was destroyed by the Romans , the Albans were transferred to Rome and lived on the Caelian Hill . 283 On the origin of Alba , Vergil says in Book VIII : 284 ` Ascanius will found the famous town called Alba . ' 285 The city was founded 300 years before Rome but lately stripped of its defenses by the German king Henry III . 286 In a small corner of Alba there is now a village owned by the Roman Savelli . [244-old] They also own the town of Castel Savelli , long celebrated in history , from which the noble family now derives its name . 287 The papal chamberlain Ludovico , Cardinal of Aquileia , restored at great expense the monastery that Honorius III ( himself of the Savelli family ) built in Alba after it had been almost completely destroyed . [246-old] Whether it was to have a country retreat in a monastery or in a villa more splendid than any other in Italy , he went so far as to repair the water supply and restored to a dead city some semblance of a town . 288 Six miles further on the Appian Way from Alba is Ariccia , an old town in bygone days , about which Livy says in Book VIII : 289 ` The men of Ariccia were given the same political rights as the Lavinii . ' 290 Ariccia is now utterly derelict , and its marble and other ornaments adorn the churches of the town of Marino . 291 Ariccia was one of the five cities that Vergil has supplying armor to Aeneas , in a passage of Book VII where he calls it ` mighty ' , because it was the foremost city of the region . 292 Servius says that it got its name from the sicknesses to which it gave rise from being near the Pontine Marshes . 293 Elsewhere Servius says that Vergil calls Ariccia ` mother ' to congratulate and flatter Augustus , since his mother was born there . 294 ( Julia , Caesars sister , bore Atia to Balbus in Ariccia , and Atia bore Octavian to Octavius . ) 295 And thus Vergil has : 296 ` Hippolytus handsome son Virbius rode out to war , sent for glory by his mother Aricia . ' 297 This version of the Hippolytus myth was related by Ovid . 298 Diana recalled Hippolytus from the underworld and sent him to Aricia . [258-old] The goddess had taken care that he should be nursed by the nymph Egeria , the friend of Numa Pompilius , by whose advice and counsel Numa pretended to run the state . 299 Vergil accordingly calls Hippolytus ` Virbius ' , that is , ` twice a man '. 300 There is a well-known ancient tradition 301 that the Etruscans had advanced under Aruns , son of Porsenna , to attack Aricia . [261-old] When they lost their leader , the Etruscans returned to Rome , where they were kindly received and given hospitality . 302 They were assigned a district to live in , a populous part of the city which was ever afterwards called the ` Tuscan ' quarter . 303 On that account Porsenna in a friendly spirit returned the hostages he held under the treaty . 304 Livy writes in Book LXXX that Cinna and Gaius Marius took the colony of Ariccia by storm . 305 Pliny says that the cabbage of Ariccia , though of no great height , is looked upon as the most useful of them all , for beneath nearly all of the leaves there are small sprouts peculiar to this variety , though he says that the leaves of the Sabine cabbage are wonderfully crisp - 306 their thickness makes the stalk thin , but that stalk is said to surpass all others in sweetness . 307 And the poet Martial praises Ariccian leeks in these words : 308 ` Wooded Ariccia sends wonderful leeks . ' 309 Next on the Appian Way , on the site of the ancient town of Forum Appii along the river Storax ( or Nymphaeus ) , there is now a monastery called Fossanova . [268-old] Though it once housed a hundred monks or more , it remained for many years in a state of dereliction until five years ago the Cistercian abbot - with the help and support of that most devout pope Eugenius IV - saw to it that it was occupied by ten or twelve monks . 310 A little further on is the city of Fondi which I described above , a possession of the cultivated prince Onorato Caetani . 311 The second road , which takes us to the border of Lazio , is the Via Latina . [271-old] On this road some ten miles outside Rome , we first see the remains of the town of Colonna , from where many centuries ago the famous Colonna family took their origin and their name . 312 And there begins a forest with the ancient name of Algidus , much mentioned in history , in the middle of which our route bifurcates : 313 on one side , to the right , lies Valmontone , fourteen miles from Colonna , which I shall show was the site of Labico at the edge of Lazio ; on the other , to the left , not so far from Colonna , is Gallicano , which I believe was the ancient Gabii . 314 At the very beginning of the forest of Algidus on that route is Lake Regillus , where the dictator Aulus Postumius fought a successful battle against Tarquinius Superbus ( who had been thrown out of the city ) and an army of Latins then making war on Rome . 315 Three miles from Gallicano ( Gabii ) , is the city of Palestrina , of which we shall speak in detail below . 316 Two miles from Palestrina is Rocca di Cave , a town of Odoardo Colonna , and another two miles from Cave is Genazzano . 317 In the splendor of its buildings , the liveliness of its populace , and its affluence , this little town can compare with any in Italy . [277-old] The illustrious pontiff Martin V and many cardinals of the Roman Church , as well as the leading figures of the Curia , often made Genazzano their residence in the summer heat . 318 Ten miles from Genazzano is the ancient city of Anagni , in the territory of the Hernici . [279-old] Vergil says of it : 319 ` Those that rich Anagnia nurtures dwell among the Hernican rocks , ' 320 Servius explains that Vergil was making an historical allusion : 321 ` When Antony had spurned Augustus ' sister Fulvia and married Cleopatra , queen of Egypt , he ordered coinage to be struck at Anagni in her honor , which is why Vergil called the place rich . ' 322 Servius thinks they were called Hernici in the Sabine tongue from their rocky land , the Sabines calling rock hernae , 323 and Livy writes in Book IX : 324 ` In the consulship of P. Cornelius Arvina and Marcius Tremulus , the men of Anagni convened a council of all the tribes in what they call the Circus Maritimus , and all the Hernicans , with the exception of the men of Aletrium and Verulae , declared war on Rome . ' 325 And below : 326 ` The consul Marcius accepted the surrender of the entire Hernican people , ' 327 and below that : 328 ` Because they had borne arms against the Roman people , the men of Anagni were given citizenship without the vote ; they were deprived of their municipal self-government and the right of intermarriage with each other , and their magistrates were forbidden to exercise any functions except those connected with religion . ' 329 The city of Anagni has been graced by two of her citizens who became pope , Innocent IIP and Boniface VIII , 330 the great distinction of Boniface lay in the fact that he was the first Roman pontiff to hold a Jubilee year . 331 The Jubilee being celebrated this year , the fourth , has attracted far greater throngs than all others up till now and seemed destined to become ever more successful , had the plague that began to flare up this June not carried off so many , and persuaded the Curia to leave , and discouraged pilgrims from coming to Rome . 332 Boniface was unlucky thereafter in pursuing Sciarra Colonna with unremitting hatred , razing to the ground the ancient city of Palestrina which Sciarra owned by ancestral inheritance . 333 He also divested two Colonna cardinals of their office ( though Clement V immediately restored them ) . 334 Boniface subsequently so angered the king of France that the latter sent Sciarra against him and helped him to seize Boniface in his family home at Anagni and take him off to Rome as a prisoner , where he died . [286-old] It was believed that Boniface came to this bad end chiefly because he had compelled Celestine V - a simple soul and a saintly man who had honored Boniface with the papacy that he himself resigned - to die in prison at Fumone . 335 Pliny writes that the Fucine Lake , also known as the Lake of the Marsians , has subterranean cavities through which water flows at regular intervals and creates a river . 336 It may be that Pliny 's text has been corrupted at this point ( as is often the case ) or is otherwise faulty or mutilated , but I was not able to determine where he maintains that this river rises . 337 But I do know a spring at Anagni called the Tufano , which is dry in winter when the Fucine Lake is frozen over , but later in the spring , summer , and autumn discharges a great quantity of water to swell the river Liri ( which itself rises at San Vito ) . 338 Ferentino is five miles from Anagni , once a Roman colony and another town of the Hernicans . [291-old] In Book III Livy says of it : 339 ` Tullius arrived at the source of the river Ferentina . ' 340 And , in Book VII : 341 ` He stormed the Hernican city of Ferentino . ' 342 And in Book IX : 343 ` Three of the Hernican communities - Alatri , Veroli , and Ferentino - had their municipal independence restored to them as they preferred that to the Roman franchise . ' 344 And below : 345 ' The next place to be attacked was Ferentino , and though no rest was allowed the men , they marched there with high spirits . ' 346 ` Here , however , they had more trouble and more risk . ' 347 ` The position had been made as strong as possible by nature and by art , and the walls were defended with the utmost energy , but a soldiery habituated to plunder overcame all obstacles . ' 348 ` As many as 3000 of the enemy were killed ; ' 349 ` the plunder was given to the troops . ' 350 Suetonius writes that the ancestors of the emperor Otho , who succeeded Galba , came from the town of Ferentino , his family being old and distinguished and descended from an Etruscan royal house . 351 Another five miles takes us to Frosinone . [300-old] On Frosinone Livy writes : 352 ` The Frusinates were fined a third of their land when it was discovered they were behind the Hernican rebellion . ' 353 Frosinone had the distinction of producing two Roman pontiffs , Hormisdas , the son of Justus , in the time of the consulate of Symmachus and Boethius , and Silverius , the son of the same Hormisdas . [302-old] ( The king of the Goths Theodatus III bought Silverius ' appointment as pope when Justinian I was emperor . ) 354 Ceprano , the second border town of our region , is fourteen miles from Frosinone . 355 But on the first stretch of the route to Frosinone , there are to the right of Genazzano 356 the towns of Paliano , Serrone , Piglio , Acuto , Trivigliano , Collepardo , Anticoli in Campagna [ now Fiuggi ] , and the ancient town of Veroli . [305-old] On Veroli , Livy writes in Book IX : 357 ` The citizens of Veroli had their municipal independence restored to them as they preferred that to the Roman franchise , ' 358 ` and the right of intermarriage with each other was granted them , a privilege which for a considerable period they were the only community among the Hernicans to enjoy . ' 359 Fumone is famous for the imprisonment and death there of Pope Celestine . 360 Then comes Alatri , an ancient city whose citizens had their laws restored and the right of intermarriage granted by the Romans at the same time as those of Veroli . 361 Next Bauco , formerly a town known by the name Bovillae in Livy , then Torrice , Pofi , Vico nel Lazio , Ripi , Porcigliano , Trevi nel Lazio , Filettino . 362 The second branch of the road ( which we left in the middle of the forest of Algidus ) has as its first town Labici , on which Livy in Book IV writes as follows : 363 ` It was reported that a new enemy , the Labicans , was forming a coalition with their old foes . ' 364 ` Envoys were sent to Labici , the reply they brought back was evasive ; it was evident that while there were no immediate preparations for war , peace would not last long . ' [310-old] ` The Tusculans were requested to be on the watch for any fresh movement on the part of the Labicans . ' 365 ` Envoys came and reported that the Labicans had taken up arms and in conjunction with the Aequi had ravaged the Tusculan territory and fixed their camp on Algidus , ' 366 ` having seized and destroyed their camp , the dictator Q. Sulpicius Priscus completely surrounded the town of Labici , took it with scaling ladders and plundered it . ' 367 ` The Senate decided that a body of colonists should be settled at Labici . ' 368 ` Fifteen hundred colonists were sent from Rome , and each received two iugera of land . ' 369 The town of Labici is now called Valmontone , which has recently lost its great ornament in the Cardinal Deacon Lucido , a member of the Conti family , who own the place in their own right . 370 He was a fervent supporter of humanist studies , but his brother Aldo , a man both learned and wise , and Aldos son Giovanni , who brings him credit with the martial distinction he has achieved at Venice , ensure the continuance of the glory of Valmontone and the other towns over which they hold sway . 371 Labici once had an abundance of fine grapes , of which Julius Capitolinus writes that Clodius Albinus devoured twenty pounds at a single sitting . 372 Next to Valmontone is Montefortino [ now Artena ] , the town of my friend Stefano , who was born on an estate in his home town to the noble family named after it . 373 Then there are Zancato , Gavignano , and the ancient town of Segni . [320-old] Pliny says it produces the wine called Segnine , a very effective astringent for the stomach , 374 the poet Martial says : 375 ` Will you drink Segnine wines , that constricts loose bowels ? ' 376 ` Let your thirst be sparing , lest you repress them too much . ' 377 The Roman pontiff Vitalianus , son of Anastasius , was an ornament of Segni . 378 Beyond Segni there are Sgurgola , Morolo , Supine , Patrica , Ceccano , and Castro dei Volsci , where we again reach the border of our region of Lazio ( or Campania , as it now is ) . 379 A third road awaits us , the Tiburtine Way , named after Tivoli , which takes us to the other borders of our region . [325-old] Strabo maintains that the town of Tivoli , sixteen miles from Rome , had a Greek origin well before the foundation of Rome , and Vergil has it founded by Tiburtus , whose brother Catillus gave his name to the nearby mountain . 380 Tivoli was one of the five cities that Vergil has fashioning armor for Aeneas , where he calls it ` proud ' . 381 Servius comments : 382 ` either because Tivoli was illustrious , or because the Tiburtines once received a response from the Senate saying that they were `` haughty '' . ' 383 In the passage where Vergil also says in Book VII , ` under Albunea ' , Servius explains that Albunea was a spring high in the Tiburtine mountains , so called from the nature of the water in it . 384 Pliny says that it is commonly thought that Travertine , the limestone of Tivoli , was not so much useful for ( in the well-worn Roman phrase ) paving , adorning , and preserving Rome as for being durable and adaptable to all purposes . 385 Horace indicates that the vine greatly favors Tiburtine soil in these words : 386 ` Plant no tree , ' [331-old] ` Varus , before the holy vine in the mild soil round Tivoli and the walls of Catillus . ' 387 There are huge and impressive ruins in the neighborhood of Tivoli : apart from all the other sumptuous buildings , almost without number , there are the remains of the villa that the emperor Hadrian constructed . 388 Aelius Spartianus writes of it : 389 ` His villa at Tibur was marvellously constructed , and he actually gave to parts of it the names of provinces and places of the greatest renown . ' 390 ( We shall give other material from Strabo about Tibur a little later when we treat of Praeneste . ) 391 Tivoli bore the Roman pontiff Simplicius , and the German Roman emperor Frederick I rebuilt it after it had been sacked and destroyed some years earlier by other Germans . 392 Above the town is a wide sweep of rugged mountains . [337-old]There once dwelt the hardy Aequicoli , of whom Vergil speaks in Book VII of the Aeneid : 393 ` the Aequicoli , an exceptionally rough people that constant hunting in the forests has inured to the harsh terrain . ' 394 ` They plough the earth in armor and always delight in carrying off fresh spoils and living on plunder . ' 395 They were in fact among the first of the Latin peoples to be wiped out as the Roman Republic grew in strength . 396 Livy says in Book IX : 397 ` The Roman people ordered war to be declared against the Aequi : ' 398 ` within sixty days they stormed and captured all forty towns . ' [341-old] Most of these were sacked and burnt , and the nation of the Aequi was almost exterminated . 399 To the left of the river Aniene in these mountains is first a town called Vicovaro , distinguished by the pleasant dwellings of the Orsini , counts of Tagliacozzo . 400 Higher up are the little towns of Portella and Cantalupo . 401 Then there is Riofreddo on a steep hill , and once this hill is crossed there are other , even higher mountains to be surmounted , comparable to any peak of the Apennines . [345-old] On the highest point there are a number of shafts , as they are called . 402 Two that I have examined still exist , sunk so deep that you could drop a heavy stone and recite two lines of Vergil without undue haste before hearing it reach the bottom . 403 A channel was cut through the base of the mountains , either by the aedile Marcius or the emperor Claudius , to carry water from the Fucine Lake to Rome , and the shafts were connected to it as vents so that trapped air might not stem the flow of water . 404 Suetonius says that the emperor Claudius employed 30,000 slaves over eleven years on the job of draining the lake and getting the water to Rome . 405 Directly above Riofreddo is Arsoli , and beside it begins a plain , all the more welcome among these mountain heights . 406 In the plain is the site of ancient Carsoli , of which Livy writes in Book X : 407 ` That same year a colony was settled at Carsoli in the country of the Aequicoli , ' 408 and in Book XXVII he says that Carsoli was one of the eighteen colonies that declined to give the Senate soldiers and money during Hannibal 's time in Italy . 409 Then there are Celle , Scurcola , and Pereto , from where you descend into Tagliacozzo . 410 Though it is of recent foundation , the town is rich and populous . [353-old] It recently lost its great ornament in Cardinal Giovanni , Archbishop of Tarento , a distinguished philosopher and theologian . 411 We have now reached the land of the Marsians , to which , as Livy relates in Book XXII , Hannibal laid waste , marching through the territory a second time as he returned from Rome , as he says in Book XXVI . 412 The town of Valeria in this region has disappeared , the home of Pope Boniface IV at whose request the emperor Phocas had the Pantheon at Rome consecrated a basilica to all the martyrs of Christ . 413 The name of the town of Marsi was changed to Valeria in the time of the Lombards . 414 Pliny in fact maintains that the region got its name from the town of the Marsi : 415 ` According to Gellianus , a town of the Marsi , founded by the Lydian captain Marsyas , was swallowed up by the the Fucine Lake . ' 416 From what follows , it is clear that the famous cities of Alba and Marruvium lay in that region . 417 Vergil in Book VII writes : 418 ` Yes , and there came a priest from the race of the Marruvii . ' 419 And Servius comments : 420 ` When Medea left Colchis to follow Jason , she came to Italy and taught the peoples living around the great Fucine Lake ( who were called Marruvii as if living by the sea [ mare ] , because of the size of the swamp ) remedies against snakes - although others would have them called Marruvii after their king . ' 421 ` The Marruvii called Medea `` Angitia '' because her spells distressed the snakes . 422 And Pliny : 423 ` A similar people , the Marsi , linger on in Italy . ' [363-old] ` They are said to descend from the son of Circe and so to have a certain natural power . ' 424 ` Yet all men have a kind of innate poison against snakes . ' 425 ` They say that snakes that are spat on flee as if from scalding water , because if the saliva gets into their throats , they can actually die , especially if the saliva is from someone fasting , ' 426 Julius Capitolinus confirms the prevalence of snakes in the region and the skill of the Marsi in incantation . [366-old] In his Life of Heliogabalus , he says that the emperor would collect snakes using Marsian spells and suddenly let them loose just before dawn , when the people were gathering in crowds for the games , and that many were bitten or crushed trying to get away . 427 These remarks on snake charming are not to be thought false or fictitious . 428 The prophet David says in Psalm LVII : 429 ` Their madness is like the madness of a serpent , they are like the deaf adder that stops her ear , which will not hearken to the voice of charmers , charming never so wisely . ' 430 St. Augustine in his exposition of the psalm writes : 431 ` Note what is being said there as to the simile and the warning that is given by way of prohibition . ' 432 ` This , then , is an analogy of a Marsian who casts a spell to entice an adder out of a dark cave . ' 433 ` He means to lead her into the light at all costs . ' 434 ` But she loves the shadows in which she wraps herself , and hides herself away . ' [373-old] ` Being unwilling to come out and refusing to listen to the voice that she senses driving her on , it is said that she presses one ear to the earth and covers the other with her tail . ' 435 ` Avoiding that voice as best she can , she does not come out to the snakecharmer . ' 436 Writing on the Italic War ( which , because it began with the Marsi , was called the Marsian War ) in Book LXXII , Livy lists the Marrucini and Marsi among the peoples who rebelled against Rome . 437 And in Book LXXVI he says that the Marsi were defeated by the legates Lucius Cinna and Caecilius Pius and sought a peace with Sulla . 438 That war turned out well for the city of Rome in that while he was engaged in it , Cicero was repelled by the acts of cruelty perpetrated by the Romans and turned to literary studies : 439 and so it happened that Rome found a genius of a greatness equal to her own . 440 Ten miles from Tagliacozzo is the Fucine Lake of the Marsi , and on a high hill towards the Apennines is Alba of the Marsi , a Roman colony , as we noted Livy saying in Book X. Livy also says in Book XXVII that Alba was one of eighteen colonies that declined to make a military contribution in the troubled time of Hannibal . 441 Strabo wrote that only this city ( as he calls it ) in Lazio was like an inland city , being set , as he says , on a high hill overlooking the Fucine Lake . [380-old] The lake is so big as to seem like a sea , and from it springs led to the Aqueduct of Marcius , which supplied Rome with drinking water . 442 ( In my Rome Restored I showed that Marcius established the aqueduct named after him in his aedileship , and indeed it was more highly thought of than all the others . ) 443 And Pliny says that the Giovenco , which Marcius brought to Rome , flows on top of the surface of the Fucine Lake . 444 Pliny adds elsewhere that there is a fish in the lake that swims with eight fins , though all other fish everywhere swim with only four . 445 Strabo says that the Romans often used Alba as a secure place to keep criminals in custody , because its natural setting and fortified citadel made it impregnable . 446 I found in Livy , Book XXII , that the consul Quintus Fabius Maximus , grandson of Paulus , won a victory against the Allobroges and Bituitus , king of the Arverni . [386-old] One hundred and twenty thousand of Bituitus ' men were killed , and after the king himself had gone to Rome to make amends to the Senate , he was sent to Alba and imprisoned . 447 Around the lake stand the castles of S. Potito and Sta. Iona , and the towns of Paterno , Trasacco , Gagliano , Avezzano , and Magliano , and also Celano , which is the property of its count Lionello Acclozamora , a devotee of good letters and of history in particular . 448 Along the shore of Fucino and Celano there are also Pescina , the town of Venere , Viticcio , Rocca Vecchia , Goriano , towns that mark the limit of Lazio in this part of our region . 449 I have in fact omitted several castles and towns which do not lie in the vicinity of the three roads mentioned above : 450 in one and the same hill district , however , set between Palestrina , Tivoli , Vicovaro and Gennezano , is Rocca di Cave Capranica , which gave Rome the illustrious family of the Capranica . [391-old] According to the weighty testimony of the Roman pontiff Martin V , the archbishop Paolo Capranica was the wisest man of his time . 451 His brother Domenico , the Cardinal of Santa Croce , is now distinguished for his great wisdom and for his considerable learning in civil and canon law and in the liberal arts , while his brother Angelo Capranica , bishop of Ascoli , and their nephew the protonotary Niccolo are blessed with the same learning and virtue . 452 There follow the towns 453 of Guadagnolo , Poli , Casa Corbuli , S. Gregorio da Sassola and Rocca Lerici . 454 Next to these , there are the towns 455 of Ciciliano , Sambuci , Saracinesco , Rocha Mutiorum [ Rocca di Mezzo ? ], Gerano , Cerreto Laziale , Anticoli Corrado , Roiate , Affile , Civitella , and Olevano Romano - the favorite resort of that excellent and sagacious lady , Sveva , Countess of Alba dei Marsi , the mother of Cardinal Prospero Colonna and his brothers . 456 After Olevano come Pisoniano and San Vito Romano , a town notable for having nearby one source of the river Liri or Garigliano . 457 Higher up amid lofty mountains is Subiaco , or Sublaqueum as Pliny calls it , a well-known town that overlooks a lake of the same ancient name . 458 Both are famous not only for St. Benedicts lengthy sojourn at Subiaco but also for the magnificent monastery built there in his name , known throughout the world . 459 On the right bank of the Aniene one sees an aqueduct cut into the rock of the mountain and extending from the lake of Subiaco to Vicovaro : its channels are partly incised in this way , partly bored deep in the rock , at other points carried aloft on an arched wall , carrying the water that used to reach Rome forty miles away . 460 But to sum up what has been said about the region of Lazio : 461 Strabo says that Tivoli , Palestrina , and Tuscolo can be all seen from Rome . 462 Tivoli , he says , has a waterfall by the temple of Hercules which is created by the Aniene tumbling down from a great height into a deep valley and passing through the woods beside the city , where the river starts to be navigable . 463 From there it flows past the quarries of Travertine and Gabian stone ( also called redstone ) , of which many works of art at Rome are fashioned . 464 Of Palestrina , Vergil says in Book VII : 465 ` Nor was Caeculus , Palestrinas founder , absent . ' 466 Pliny says that the city was called Praeneste because of the abundance of holm-oak on the hill . 467 Strabo says that the city had a remarkable temple to Fortune built by Sulla , where oracles were once sought . 468 Pliny adds that the statue of Fortune there had been so durably gilded that the thickest kind of goldleaf was called Palestrina leaf . 469 And elsewhere , dealing with floors , Pliny says that mosaics came into use as early as Sulla 's time , with tiny cubes at least , a development which began in the temple of Fortune at Palestrina . 470 Strabo says that the two cities , Tivoli and Palestrina , are located in the same mountainous region but a hundred stades apart , and that the distance from Rome to Palestrina is twice that , but somewhat less to Tivoli . 471 Some people say both cities are Greek , Strabo continues , and that Palestrina was formerly called Polystephanum . 472 And in this regard I rather think he foresaw the future , since Palestrina may well be called Polystephanum now as the city of Stefano Colonna . 473 Strabo adds that , though each is naturally well protected , Praeneste is the more so because its topmost point is a high mountain , and to the rear of the city is a neck of land higher than the main mountain range from which it projects . [411-old] I am sure that this must be the mountain with the heavily fortified stronghold called Rocca di Cave . 474 Strabo also says that in addition to the natural strength of its position , Palestrina has secret passages bored through it from all sides as far as the plains - some for water-supply , others for secret attacks . [413-old] In one of these Marius died while he was under siege . 475 Livy writes in Book LXXXVII : 476 ` Sulla laid siege to Marius at Palestrina after he had routed and destroyed his army at Sacriportus . ' 477 And in Book LXXXVIII : 478 ` He ordered the non-combatant citizens of Palestrina to be killed . ' 479 This tale of terrible cruelty is touched on by Lucan in Book II : 480 ` How many corpses fell at Sacriportus , pray ? ' 481 And later : 482 ` The Fortune of Palestrina saw her settlers taken by the sword all together , a whole people slain as by a single death . ' 483 And Livy again , further on : 484 When Marius was besieged at Palestrina by Lucretius Ofella of the Sullan faction , he tried to escape through a tunnel but realized that he could not get away . ' [419-old] ` He and Thelesius , his companion in flight , ran onto each other 's drawn swords and were killed . ' 485 The Roman emperors liked to retire to Palestrina to relax from their cares . 486 But the good emperor Marcus Aurelius had a great misfortune there , 487 for Julius Capitolinus writes that while he was on holiday at Palestrina , he lost his seven-year-old son Verus Caesar , whom he mourned not more than five days . 488 In Pliny 's discussion of metals , he writes as follows : 489 In 671 a.u.c. , ` the gold that Marius ' son Gaius had taken to Palestrina from the conflagration of the Capitoline temple and from all the other shrines amounted to 13,000 pounds , which with a placard above it to that effect was carried along in his triumphal procession by Sulla , along with 6000 pounds of silver . ' 490 ` Sulla had likewise on the previous day carried in procession 15,000 pounds of gold and 115,000 pounds of silver as the proceeds of all his other victories . ' 491 In Book XXIII Livy praises the soldiers of Palestrina to the skies : when they heard of the disastrous battle at Cannae , they made for Casilinum and there endured with utmost bravery a terrible siege , a siege more remarkable than any other , 492 in the light of which the Senate decreed that the men of Palestrina should be granted double pay and an exemption from further service for five years . 493 Strabo adds something discovered by experience in our own time , as it has been on many occasions in the past : 494 that is , that good defenses , which in other cities are generally accounted a blessing , have often proved calamitous to the citizens of Palestrina on account of civil strife at Rome . 495 Revolutionaries seek refuge there , and when they have been defeated it turns out that the blame is turned on the Praenestines and they too have to abandon the city . 496 This bears on what I said earlier , 497 for Strabo 's explanation seems to account for the destruction of Palestrina in the days of Sciarra Colonna . 498 And we have seen it happen that the city was besieged , captured , and razed to the ground because she took in Ponceletto and Niccolo Fortebraccio and other enemies of Rome . 499 Strabo calls the river that flows through this district the Verrestis . 500 He adds that in the mountainous area where these cities are found , there is another ridge which leaves Mt. Algidus with spurs on either side , 501 and that this ridge is high as far as Mt. Alban . 502 The well-built city of Tusculum is located on this ridge . 503 The city was an enemy of the early Roman Republic on account of Mamilius of Tusculum having brought help to his father-in-law Tarquinius Superbus when he was ejected from Rome ; this was the genesis of the battle at Lake Regiilus . 504 The Romans spared the Tusculans following the uprisings that they staged with the Latins , as Livy writes in Book VIII : 505 ` They were allowed to keep the civic rights they had before , and responsibility for the rebellion was removed from the people as a whole and fastened on a few individuals . ' 506 Pliny gives the case of Lucius Furius of Tusculum as a striking example of the vagaries of fortune : 507 ` The consul of the rebellious Tusculans , L. Furius , came over to the Romans and obtained from them the same honor . ' [437-old] ` He is the only individual who , in the same year in which he had been its enemy , enjoyed the honour of a triumph in Rome , and that too , over the people whose consul he had previously been . ' 508 Describing the coming of Hannibal to Rome in Book XXVI , Livy says : 509 ` Hannibal came through the district of Anagni into the neighborhood of Labico . ' [439-old] ` From there he made for Tusculum over Mt. Algidus , ' 510 ` but was refused admittance , so he turned to the right below Tusculum towards Gabii . ' 511 Strabo adds to the account quoted above as follows : 512 Tusculum is graced by groves and villas on every side , particularly towards Rome , 513 the hill on which it is situated being fertile and well watered . [442-old] The hill rises gradually , to a considerable height in many places , and has a magnificently laid out royal estate . The places round about that stretch towards Mt. Alban are equally fertile and have the same style of buildings . 514 Then , he says , come the plains , some extending to Rome and its suburbs , others to the sea . 515 On this district , which has for the most part been subject to the Colonna family for the last 400 years , just as it is today , I have taken my information from Strabo almost to the letter . 516 Certainly he gives an expert description of the mountainous area around Palestrina , 517 but he does not include sites of lesser importance and omits , for example , the villa of the poet Horace which is located in those hills , a place now called S. Giovanni in Campo Orazio . 518 Strabo omits other places too that we know existed 500 years ago , if not in his time . 519 Cave , for instance , which is named for its position in a deep hollow where today is a town possessed by Odoardo Colonna : in the time of Pope Paschal II , Pietro Colonna owned it by ancestral inheritance from his father , as the writer Pandolfo the Ostiary tells us , just as others of the Colonna family used to own in those days Palestrina , Pullum and Pullanum ( now Pugliano and Paliano ) as well . 520 But what Strabo says of the hills of the former city of Tusculum is shown to be still true by the monastery of Santa Maria di Grottaferrata ( built on Cicero 's Tusculan estate ) , and Marino , and Rocca di Papa on its high hill , all towns of Cardinal Prospero Colonna . 521 We can see the great fertility of the soil and abundance of water around these towns , situated two or three miles from Tusculum . 522 I am sure the foundations of the magnificently laid out royal estate ( as Strabo puts it ) still exist , and we can observe in places adjacent to both Grottaferata and Marino its vaults and man-made caverns that could comfortably accommodate the populace of an entire town . 523 Also near Tusculum is the former Lucullanum , the estate of Lucius Lucullus . [454-old] It is now known as Frascati , a place where it is believed the Aqua Virgo originated : this aqueduct alone now goes all the way to Rome . 524 The citizens of Tusculum under their leader , the tyrant Rainone , joined forces with the emperor Frederick Barbarossa and dealt the Roman people a great defeat : in the number of slain it is said to have almost matched the disaster at Cannae , so that Rome would never be able to raise its head again . 525 And so it came about that seven years later the Romans demolished the city with such ferocity that scarcely a trace of its foundations can now be seen . 526 This ancient and famous former city , now a township in name only , was the place of origin of the Porcia clan and so had as its citizens the illustrious Catos . 527 Long afterwards Tusculum was graced by three Roman pontiffs : Benedict VI ( who crowned the German king Henry I ) , his brother John XIX , and their nephew Benedict VII . 528 Nothing remains to the city of her ancient prosperity and renown , save for its being ruled by an excellent bishop , profoundly learned in Greek and Latin , a man of consummate goodness and humanity , Bessarion , the Greek cardinal of Nicaea , now Apostolic Legate to Bologna and the Exarchate of Ravenna . 529 Of the fields that Strabo says extend to Rome or the sea , it is plainly all too true that what was once built up with suburbs and country villas is now covered only with ruins and woods and really may be called with more justice fields . 530 At the outset Strabo mentioned Alba but he omitted the neighboring town of Ariccia , which , though it is now razed to the ground , was then a city on the Appian Way , as I mentioned above . 531 The Lago di Albano is close to Alba and Marino ; its water is let out through an ingeniously made drain , though the flow is meager . 532 The lake is nowadays believed to be the source of the river that flows by the place where the Apostle Paul was martyred and forms a marsh called `` Ad Aquas Salvias '' . 533 We learn from Livy that this is the lake of which an Etruscan seer predicted that if its water was ever drained off , the Romans would gain possession of Veii . 534 A lake which Suetonius calls the Lacus Nemorensis , or Lago di Nemi , is about four miles away from both the Lago di Albano and Ariccia . [466-old] He says that Caesar began to build a villa there which he left incomplete . 535 The water of this lake is drawn off by an ingenious drain and forms the Numicus , or Rio Torto , which as we said [ 8 ] reaches the sea at Ardea . 536 The town called Nemi lies on the lake . 537 The grammarian Servius , commenting on the line of Aeneid , Book VII , and Dianas lake heard it from afar , says that there is a grove not far from Ariccia called Nemus , or Wood , in which there is a lake called Diana 's Mirror . 538 The town of Cynthianum likewise lies beside the Lago di Nemi : it got its name from the goddess Cynthia ( also known as Trivia ) , though the name has been corrupted . 539 No one who has seen its present beauty will doubt that it lives up to the name Dianas Mirror given it by our forebears in the days of Rome 's grandeur . 540 The lake occupies half of a hollow depression which is two miles in circumference . 541 The rest ( where , as I mentioned , Julius Caesar made a start on his villa ) was apparently wooded in those days , and the present town of Nemi takes its name from that fact . 542 The district has splendid stands of fruit trees , so much so that its orchards yield to nowhere else in Italy , however well looked after it may be . 543 Strong evidence of how attractive this lake was to our forebears has recently come to light . 544 Prospero Colonna , the Roman cardinal and patrician who inherited from his ancestors the town of Nemi and the castle of Genzano , once heard the fishermen of Nemi saying that there were two ships sunk in the lake . [477-old] They were not so rotten that they would be torn apart and come away when ropes were attached to them for the purpose , nor when they happened to become tangled up in their nets . 545 Neither could they be hauled out entire by the main strength of all the inhabitants together . 546 Devoted as he is to the liberal arts , especially history , and being the painstaking antiquarian that he is , the cardinal accordingly applied himself to discovering why those great ships should be found in a small lake completely surrounded by high mountains . [480-old] My friend Leon Battista Alberti , the great mathematician of our age and author of a graceful work on the art of building , was summoned to help in the task . 547 Leon Battista arranged wine barrels tied together in a number of rows on the lake with the idea of setting up winches on either side , as from a bridge . [482-old] With these experienced carpenters could use an iron hook suspended from especially thick ropes to catch the ship and draw it up . 548 Some workers - more like fish than men - were hired from the seagoing city of Genoa . [484-old] It was their job to swim down into the deeper parts of the lake to find out how much remained of the ship and in what state of preservation , and to use the hooks let down on ropes to dig into the ship and grab hold of it . 549 Though the ship was at length gripped by the prow and tied up with rope , it would not follow in one piece and fell apart , a fragment of it coming up with the grapples . 550 This fragment greatly diverted all the fine minds of the Roman Curia gathered there . 551 It seems to have been constructed in the following fashion . 552 The ship was entirely made of larchwood , braced by beams three inches thick and caulked on the outside with pitch . 553 The pitch was covered and protected by a coating of yellow or red material , as can be seen even now , and the entire surface was clad with sheets of lead to protect the ship and the caulking from the waves and rain , 554 a mass of bronze nails ( not iron as we use now ) was driven into the sheets of lead to seal them and permanently keep out all moisture . 555 The interior of the ship was just as well protected against fire and iron missiles as against rain and damp . 556 When all the solid wood inside the ship had been coated and caulked with an inch of clay and chalk , they poured over it molten iron that had been heated in an intense fire . 557 The metal gradually spreading out an inch thick , in places two inches , the iron ship ( so to say ) became as big as the one of larch before it . 558 On top of the iron they poured another coating ( or ` plastering ' , as it used to be called in building work ) of clay and chalk . 559 It was apparently their practice , once the iron had been liquified by boiling and before it had cooled , to lay the mixture of clay and chalk on top of the iron so that it might be baked by its heat . [495-old] The layer underneath and the clay laid on top would then fuse together , just as today we make a sealant of brick and iron . 560 A great throng poured in from all about to watch the ship being fished out of the water . [497-old] Meanwhile , some lead pipes were found at the bottom of the lake , three feet long and very strong and thick , which could be combined , as they mated one another with interlocking parts , to any desired length . 561 Elegant letters were inscribed on each of them to indicate , so I thought , that the emperor Tiberius was the creator of the ship . 562 Leon Battista thought that the very plentiful and clear spring waters that bubble up in the town of Nemi , where they nowadays turn mill wheels , were brought all the way to the middle of the lake through a long series of these pipes , to be used in the very large and luxurious houses that were placed , I believe , on top of the ships mentioned above . 563 It was a fine and wonderful sight to see the great eighteen-inch-long bronze nails used in the construction of the ship , so well-preserved and shiny that they seem to have just come from the blacksmith 's anvil . 564 Prompted by the example , holy father Nicholas , you have reinforced the lead tiles that protect the church roofs of Rome with bronze rivets . 565 In Book III Lucan describes the road on which Caesar first came to Rome after the outbreak of the Civil War ( as mentioned above ) in the following lines - which will also serve as our description of Mt. Alban . 566 It will be clear from Lucan that Caesar came from Terracina to Genzano above Ariccia , and thence to Mt. Alban , where Castel Gandolfo now is , from whose heights he first saw Rome : 567 ` And now he had passed over the precipitous heights of Anxur and the point where the waterlogged road cuts through the Pontine Marshes , where there is a lofty grove , the realm of Scythian Diana , and where lies the road for Latin fasces to the height of Alba ; from a high cliff Caesar now glimpses the city in the distance . ' 568 And he said : 569 ` Why , have men deserted you , seat of the gods , though not forced to by war ? ' 570 ` What sort of city will the fight be for ? ' 571 The last part of the region of Lazio now remaining to us is that near the city of Rome towards Tivoli and the Aniene , directly opposite the Tiber mouth , where we began . 572 To return to the point from which we digressed a while ago : 573 at the foot of the hill of Praeneste , close to Algidus , is a town in the possession of Lorenzo Colonna , now called Gallicano but once , as I said , the very ancient city of Gabii . [510-old] Livy says in Book I that Tarquinius Superbus captured Gabii through a trick played by his son Sextus . 574 Also Vergil in Aeneid VII : 575 ` Those who hold the fields of Juno of Gabii ' , where Servius explains : 576 ` Having long dwelt in the fields , the Gabinians at last founded the town of Gabii . ' 577 ` This is the reason that Vergil said `` fields '' and not walls . ' 578 Elsewhere , though , Servius writes on the passage ` Nomentum and Gabii ' that these cities were founded by the kings of Alba . 579 A few miles from Gabii is the river Aniene , which Vergil calls the ` chilly Anio ' . 580 The river originates at Subiaco . [516-old] Pliny writes of it : 581 ` The Aniene takes its rise in the mountain of the Trebani and carries into the Tiber the waters of three lakes remarkable for their beauty , which have given Subiaco its name . ' 582 Livy writes that after Rome had been won back , Camillas slaughtered the retreating Gauls at the Aniene , in the place where Manlius got the name Torquatus for tearing a torque from the neck of a Gaul . 583 A marble bridge crosses the river on the Tiburtine Way , though it has been practically stripped of the very considerable decoration it used to have , and is now called Ponte Mammolo . 584 I found in the history of the Roman Pontiff Gelasius II that the bridge was built by Mamaea , the mother of that good emperor Alexander Severus and a Christian . 585 It is unclear to me who built the next bridge , on the road from Rome to Mentana , but I am more confident that all three bridges over the Aniene were destroyed by the Romans as they nervously awaited Totila 's arrival , after Rome had been restored by Belisarius . 586 There is a second bridge on the road to Mentana , and though it is in itself intact , it has been robbed of the extensive decoration it once had . 587 Finally , there is a third bridge , on the Via Salaria , which was built by the valiant captain Narses the eunuch , destroyer of the Ostrogoths , as an inscription carved in the marble records . 588 Near the mouth of the Aniene , where it enters the Tiber , but beyond it in the region of Umbria , was where I reckon the ancient city of Fidenae was located . 589 In the Life of Tiberius Suetonius writes of Fidenae : 590 ` In the collapse of an amphitheater at Fidenae , 20,000 perished . ' 591 The inhuman emperor Caligula prayed for a similar catastrophe to happen during his own reign . 592 Pliny also says : 593 ` In the territory of Fidenae near Rome , storks neither produce offspring nor do they nest . ' [527-old] In another place he remarks that the Romans got excellent stone for building from Fidenae near Rome . 594 I said above that the river Tiber separates the territories of Veii and Fidenae , and shortly thereafter it separates Lazio and the Vatican . 595 Vergil in Book VI mentions 596 the ` city of Fidenae ' . 597 And Livy writes in Book IV 598 that statues of the Roman envoys who had been killed by the Fidenates were erected on the Rostra , because they had been killed serving the republic . 599 Fidenae was brought back under Roman control and colonists sent there , but when the Fidenates rebelled , they too were killed . [532-old] They were conquered by the dictator Marcus Aemilius , and the town was taken and laid waste . 600 I have already referred in various places to Hannibal 's coming to the walls of Rome from Capua , which the Romans had laid under siege and surrounded with a triple palisade . 601 I mean accordingly to trace the route he took in its proper order . 602 In Book XXVI Livy says in the first place that the consul Quintus Fulvius Flaccus followed Hannibal , who was heading towards Rome , along the Appian Way and that he sent men ahead to Sezze and Lanuvium to arrange provisions for the army on its march . 603 Sezze and Lanuvium are very well known , and I described them above . 604 Livy says that Hannibal marched past Gales into Sidicine territory , then by way of Suessa , Alife , and Cassino , Interamna and Fratte , as far as the river Liri . [538-old] Some of these places are in old Campania , now called the Term di Lavoro , some in Samnite territory , and I have indicated them below . 605 Afterwards , Hannibal crossed the Liri to arrive in the modern region of Lazio . 606 First , there is the territory of Fregellae , which though it was Samnite , had its land in Lazio . 607 It is now called Pontecorvo . 608 In Book VI Livy writes : 609 ` Hannibal completely destroyed the territory of Fregellae in revenge for the destruction of the bridges . ' 610 And in Book VIII : 611 ` A colony was established at Fregellae in the consulship of Publius Plautius Proculus and Publius Cornelius Scapula . ' 612 And below : 613 ` On learning that the citadel of Fregellae had been captured by the Samnites , he raised the siege of Bovianum and marched to Fregellae . ' 614 ` The place was retaken without a fight , the Samnites having evacuated it in the night , and after leaving a strong garrison there , the dictator returned to Campania . ' 615 Marcus Sextilius gave luster to the colony at Fregellae ; according to Livy , he responded on behalf of the eighteen colonies that promised to contribute the soldiers and tribute monies previously denied . 616 Livy continues to follow Hannibal 's path . 617 He afterwards came into the districts of Frusinum , Ferentinum and Anagnia , all of them , with a slight change of name , well-known places now . 618 From the district of Anagnia he entered that of the Labici , a place which has undergone a considerable change of name , as I said , and is now called Valmontone . 619 Livy says that Hannibal , who was in the territory of the Labicani , moved adroitly over Mt. Algidus , for Labico was then , as it is now , close to and almost touching the mountain . 620 He then reached Tusculum , doubtless by the same road which today leads through the forest from Valmontone to Marino . 621 And because Livy follows Hannibal 's route 622 with ` when Hannibal was refused admission by the Tusculans , he turned down to the right towards to Gabii ' , I am quite sure that , as I said above , Gabii was what is now the town of Gallicano . 623 What the Pupinia was to which Hannibal proceeded after Gabii , I do not know . 624 The region has a great many remains of towns and estates where no one lives and whose ancient names no one knows . 625 We have now completed the great circuit from the Tiber mouth on the shore of the Tyrrhenian Sea to the river Liri ( or Garigliano ) , and from there through the territory of the Marsi and the places inland to the river Aniene , and so back to the Tiber . 626 With that circuit the whole region of Lazio ( or Campania and Marittima , as Latium is now called ) is concluded .