Last week I posted a blog about the very low water levels in the western U.S. and Lake Mead, where 2 skeletons were found in addition to missing boats. Today's blog is a similar story but it's about the Tiber River in Italy which is also experiencing drought. Here's the story from LIVE SCIENCE.
(Photo: Water levels of Rome's historic river the Tiber have fallen so low that it is now possible to see the remains of an ancient Roman bridge built by the Roman Emperor Nero. Photograph:( Twitter / WIONEWS)) Hidden ancient Roman 'Bridge of Nero' emerges from the Tiber during severe drought
LIVE SCIENCE, By Owen Jarus July 15, 2022
The bridge was built in a poorly chosen site, experts say.
A severe drought in Italy has revealed an archaeological treasure in Rome: a bridge reportedly built by the Roman emperor Nero that is usually submerged under the waters of the Tiber River.
The dropping water levels of the Tiber, which according to Reuters is flowing at multi-year lows, have exposed the stone remains of the Pons Neronianus (Latin for the Bridge of Nero), WION news(opens in new tab), a news agency headquartered in New Delhi, India, reported.
ABOUT EMPEROR NERO
Emperor Nero, who ruled as the Roman Empire's fifth emperor from A.D. 54 to 68, was a controversial sovereign who built public structures and won military victories abroad, but also neglected politics and instead focused much of his time and passion on the arts, music and chariot races. Rome's coffers were also drained during his rule, partly as a result of building the "Domus Aurea" (the Golden Palace), which Nero built in the center of Rome after the great fire. During his reign, he killed his mother and at least one of his wives, and he struggled to rebuild Rome after a huge fire ravaged the city in A.D. 64. Nero killed himself in A.D. 68 at the age of 30 after being declared a public enemy by the Roman senate.
THE BRIDGE BECOMES VISIBLE
Live Science talked to several experts, who noted that the remains of this bridge have become visible in the past due to low water levels. They also note that, despite its name, it's not certain if this bridge was built by Nero.
"The remains of this Roman bridge are visible whenever the water level of the Tiber falls, therefore whenever there are lengthy periods — like now — of very low rainfall," Robert Coates-Stephens, an archaeologist at the British School at Rome, told Live Science in an email.
BRIDGE KNOWN AS "PONS NERONIANUS"
Multiple sources told Live Science that the bridge was possibly built before Nero's rule. "The origins of the bridge are uncertain, given that it is likely a bridge existed here before Nero's reign and therefore the Pons Neronianus was probably a reconstruction of an earlier crossing," Nicholas Temple, professor of architectural history at London Metropolitan University, told Live Science in an email.
The name Pons Neronianus "appears for the first time only in the 12th-century catalogues of Rome's monuments," Coates-Stephens said. "It's true that Nero had extensive gardens and properties in the area of the Vatican, and so a bridge at this point would have given easy access to these."
CONSTRUCTED IN A BAD PLACE
The bridge "was built on a tight bend in a floodplain," which is "a terrible idea," Rabun Taylor, a classics professor at University of Texas at Austin, told Live Science in an email. "River bends cutting through pure sediment tend to wander and change shape, so their banks are prone to losing contact with bridge abutments" that connect the bridge to the ground, Taylor said.
He noted that "that's probably what happened to Nero's bridge — and it may well have happened by the mid-200s A.D., less than two centuries after Nero's death." Taylor's research into the bridge's history "suggests the bridge was dismantled at about that time, and the stone piers were reassembled to create a new bridge in a more stable area downstream.
The Pons Neronianus connected Rome to an area that didn't have a lot of development at the time.
No comments:
Post a Comment