| Almone | |
|---|---|
 The Almone where it flows through the Park of the Caffarella | |
| Location | |
| Country | Italy |
| Physical characteristics | |
| Mouth | Tiber |
• coordinates | 41°51′58″N12°28′35″E / 41.8662°N 12.4765°E |
| Basin features | |
| Progression | Tiber→ Tyrrhenian Sea |
The Almone (Latin: Almo) is a small river of the Ager Romanus, a few miles south of the city of Rome. Today the river is polluted and is channelled to a sewage treatment plant and no longer reaches its natural confluence with the Tiber.
The Latin name of the Almone, Almo (also the name of its corresponding deity), is derived from the Latin word almus , meaning "fertile" or "nourishing," which may derive from its connection to Cybele, also known as Magna Mater ("Great Mother"). [1] [2]
Since medieval times [3] the stream has been called Marrana della Caffarella. Marrana (or marana in Roman dialect) is a term that derives from the name of the ancient ager maranus, the fields that surround the Via Appia, and refers to the drainage channels that flow through the countryside near Rome. [4] "Caffarella" refers to the valley, now a park, that the river runs through. The river has also been known as Acquataccio, a name with two possible derivations. It either refers to the nearby Appian Way, a corruption of Acqua d'Appia (which became d'Accia), or the suffix -accio is to be taken in its pejorative sense, and it refers to the marshy waters of the Caffarella valley. [4]
The Almone originates in the Alban Hills from springs fed by the water of Lake Albano, [nb 1] and runs through the Appian Way Regional Park, fed by the waters of the numerous springs present in the area, including the so-called Acqua Santa ("Holy Water") of the Fonte Egeria. [6] [7] There, the Via Ostiensis crossed the river with a bridge known as the Travicella. [8]
In the second century, the river was used to provide water for the luxurious gardens of the villa called Triopio of Herodes Atticus, [9] erected on land brought to him by his wife, Aspasia Annia Regilla, and centuries after Rome's fall it was employed for agricultural purposes: to irrigate fields, to water cattle, and to move millstones. [7] The final stretch of the river flowed where the present-day Circonvallazione Ostiense in the Garbatella neighborhood lies. The Almone began to be used for industrial purposes in the early years of the twentieth century, when its waters were diverted to feed a paper mill on the Appian Way, but its decline accelerated in the 1920s, when its final course into the Tiber was covered over to allow the construction of the Rome-Lido railway, and also to provide water to the former thermal power plant on the Via Ostiense. [7]
Pollution of the stream has made it such that today, its waters are entirely channeled into the Magliana sewage treatment plant and no longer reach the Tiber at all. [7] It is diverted as soon as it runs under the Via Appia Antica, near Parco Scott, in back of the Piazza dei Navigatori. [7] The closest landmark to the place where it formerly emptied into the Tiber is the large Gazometro . [10] [nb 2]
The Almone's importance in Roman times was linked to the annual festival of the lavatio (ceremonial washing) of the sacred stone of the Phrygian goddess Cybele, which was held on March 27, the dies sanguinis , "day of blood". The sacred black stone, which was identified with the goddess herself, was taken in procession from its temple on the Palatine Hill, through the Porta Capena, and down the Appian Way to the Almone. [10] [11] There it was washed, along with the sacrificial knives pertaining to the deity's cult, at the place where the Almone flowed into the Tiber. [10] [11] The priestly college of the quindecimviri attended the lavatio ceremony, and the return trip was made with great festivity. [11]
The choice of the Almone for this ceremony was inspired by events supposedly surrounding the arrival of the cult of Cybele to the city. The sacred stone was brought to Rome in 204 BC, [7] during the Second Punic War, upon the recommendation of the Sibylline Books. [10] While the ship bearing the stone was navigating the Tiber, it became beached near the area where the Almone flowed into the larger river. The ship was able to sail again only after a ritual of purification was completed. [10] The ceremony therefore alluded to, even if it did not reenact, Cybele's original arrival in the city. [12]
Based on the discovery of a small tuff basin in the Temple of Magna Mater on the Palatine, some have hypothesized that the ritual bathing of the black stone originally occurred there, and that its annual journey to the Almone was only begun during the reign of Augustus. [13] Whatever the case, there is evidence for some kind of shrine connected to Cybele on the Almone, although it seems to have been closer to the Via Appia than the place where the stream flowed into the Tiber. [13]
The lavatio was carried out until AD 389, when pagan rites were abolished in favor of Christianity. [10]
Hic iuvenis primam ante aciem stridente sagitta,
natorum Tyrrhi fuerat qui maximus, Almo,
sternitur; haesit enim sub gutture volnus et udae
vocis iter tenuemque inclusit sanguine vitam.— Virgil, Aeneid VII, 531–534 [nb 3]
The stream lends its name to one of the heroes in Virgil's Aeneid , the eldest son of Tyrrhus and one of the first casualties of the war between the Trojans and the Latins in Book VII. [10] [2] [14]
Cicero, in his treatise De Natura Deorum , names the Almo as one of the local rivers and streams invoked by the Roman augurs. [nb 4]
Notes
References
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The Appian Way is one of the earliest and strategically most important Roman roads of the ancient republic. It connected Rome to Brindisi, in southeast Italy. Its importance is indicated by its common name, recorded by Statius, of Appia longarum... regina viarum . The road is named after Appius Claudius Caecus, the Roman censor who, during the Samnite Wars, began and completed the first section as a military road to the south in 312 BC.
Cybele is an Anatolian mother goddess; she may have a possible forerunner in the earliest neolithic at Çatalhöyük. She is Phrygia's only known goddess, and was probably its national deity. Greek colonists in Asia Minor adopted and adapted her Phrygian cult and spread it to mainland Greece and to the more distant western Greek colonies around the 6th century BC.
Vatican Hill is a hill in Rome, located on the right bank of Tiber river, opposite to the traditional seven hills of Rome. The hill also gave the name to Vatican City. It is the location of St. Peter's Basilica.
The Porta Capena was a gate in the Servian Wall in Rome, Italy. The gate was located in the area of Piazza di Porta Capena, where the Caelian, Palatine and Aventine hills meet. Probably its exact position was between the entrance of Via di Valle delle Camene and the beginning of Via delle Terme di Caracalla, facing the curved side of the Circus Maximus.
Albano Laziale is a comune (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, on the Alban Hills, in the Italian region of Lazio. Rome is 25 kilometres (16 mi) distant. It is bounded by other communes of Castel Gandolfo, Rocca di Papa, Ariccia and Ardea. Located in the Castelli Romani area of Lazio. It is sometimes known simply as Albano.
Portus was a large artificial harbour of Ancient Rome located at the mouth of the Tiber on the Tyrrhenian Sea. It was established by Claudius and enlarged by Trajan to supplement the nearby port of Ostia.
The Porta San Sebastiano is the largest and one of the best-preserved gates passing through the Aurelian Walls in Rome (Italy).
The Great Altar of Unconquered Hercules stood in the Forum Boarium near the Tiber River in ancient Rome. It was the earliest cult location of Hercules in Rome, possibly originally dating as early as the 6th century bc. Its foundations possibly lie beneath the present church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin in Rome, Italy.
A number of temples to Cybele in Rome have been identified. Originally an Anatolian mother goddess, the cult of Cybele was formally brought to Rome during the Second Punic War after a consultation with the Sibylline Books.
Cona is a quarter of Teramo, central Italy. It takes its name from the presence of the local church, Madonna della Cona. The Madonna della Cona is a religious symbol of abundance and fertility with a festival the first Sunday in September that is celebrated in her honor.
The Caffarella Park is a large park in Rome, Italy, protected from development. It is part of the Parco Regionale Appia Antica. The park is contained in the Caffarella Valley and is bordered on its northern side by the Via Latina and on its southern by the Appian Way. It stretches from the main Rome-Pisa railroad tracks near the Aurelian Wall at its western edge to the Via dell'Almone to the east. It contains several sites of archaeological interest, as well as a working farm, and has considerable ecological value, with 78 species of birds and fauna. The Catacombs of Rome and Colli Albani are nearby.
The Mons Sacer, Sacer Mons, or Sacred Mount is a hill in Rome, famed as the location of the first secession of the plebs, in 494 BC.
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The Regio I Porta Capena is the first regio of imperial Rome, under Augustus's administrative reform. Regio I took its name from the Porta Capena, a gate of the Servian Walls, through which the Appian Way entered the city prior to the construction of the Aurelian Walls.
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