The so-called Arco di San Lazzaro is a stubborn remnant of a vaulted structure, now ruinous, that stands along Rome’s Via Marmorata. Its name is a medieval fancy, for this is no triumphal arch but the fragment of something more utilitarian. This part of the city was once the ancient Emporium, the great river-port and warehouse district of imperial Rome, where goods from across the Mediterranean were landed and stored. It is plausible, then, that these brick-and-concrete remains belonged to a horreum, a vast, arched storage complex typical of the area. Medieval folklore, however, preferred a more heroic origin, associating the building with Horatius Cocles, the legendary defender of the Pons Sublicius. The arch now sits stranded in a modern cityscape, a mute, stubborn piece of infrastructure whose true purpose is as elusive as the stories that have clung to it.
Description via source. Coordinates and heritage data from the Atika atlas.
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