South-west of Rome, where the Grande Raccordo Anulare loops the city, lies Magliana Vecchia, the 40th administrative zone, and a place where the ancient world stubbornly pokes through the modern tarmac. The compilers of the Barrington Atlas marked it as holding both a “bridge” and a “settlement”, and the archaeology bears this out. A Roman bridge survives here, its stones still spanning some forgotten watercourse, while the remains of several villas scatter the surrounding fields. These were the country retreats of the Roman elite, places of agricultural production and otium, leisure, away from the clamour of the capital. The juxtaposition is wryly instructive: the ring road’s ceaseless traffic now performs its own kind of circulation, while the old bridge, long redundant, stands as a quiet, stubborn monument to a journey that no longer needs it.
Description via source. Coordinates and heritage data from the Atika atlas.
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