Author Description

Excerpt from Rome and the Campagna: An Historical and Topographical Description of the Site, Buildings, and Neighbourhood of Ancient Rome My purpose in compiling this book has been to present to the student of ancient Roman history and literature a complete analysis of the latest results of archæological and topographical investigations in Rome and its neighbourhood. The idea of such a work first occurred to me some years ago during a winter vacation visit to Rome, and I have since made several journeys to Italy with the express object of correcting and enlarging the information acquired by study. Unfortunately for such researches, travelling in the less frequented parts of the neighbourhood of Rome has been attended with some difficulties of late years. Partly for this reason, and partly from the delayed publication of Cavaliere Rosa's long-looked-for map of the Campagna, I have been compelled to limit that section of my work which relates to the Campagna, and to follow a much less extensive plan in it than I had originally intended. The importance of archæological and topographical research, especially in the investigation of the early history of Rome, continually increases with the progress of criticism, and, the more mistrustful modern science renders us with regard to the primitive traditions recited by Roman historians, the more indispensable becomes the appeal to actually existing monuments and sites. How plentiful a harvest remains to be gathered in this field has been sufficiently proved by the new excavations on the Palatine Hill, and by the discoveries at the Marmorata, at Ostia, and at the Grove of the Dea Dia. If it should ever become possible to disinter the ruins of the north-east side of the Forum Romanum, or to carry out further explorations on the Capitoline Hill, or on the sites of the ancient Servian walls and gates, the gain to Roman history and antiquarian knowledge will be great in many ways, and many most interesting questions w