Fig. 111.—Plan of the Stabian Gate.
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The patron divinity of city gates, Minerva, was probably honored with a small statue in the niche still to be seen in the wall of the vantage court. Two inscriptions commemorate the making of repairs on the thoroughfare passing under the gateway. One of them (at d) is the Oscan inscription recording the work of the aediles Sittius and Pontius, to which reference has already been made ([p. 184]). The other (at e) is in Latin, and of much later date. It informs us that the duumvirs L. Avianius Flaccus and Q. Spedius Firmus at their own expense paved the road 'from the milestone,' which must have been near the gate, 'to the station of the gig drivers (cisiarios), at the limits of the territory of the Pompeians.' The Roman gigs, cisia, were very light, and adapted for rapid travelling; they were drawn by horses or mules, and were kept for hire at stations along the highways. The site of the station between Pompeii and Stabiae is not known.

The Nola Gate, and the partially excavated Vesuvius and Sarno gates, follow the plan just described in all essential particulars. The inner keystone of the Nola Gate, facing the city, is ornamented with a helmeted head of Minerva, in high relief, which being of tufa has suffered from exposure to the weather. There was once an Oscan inscription near by, which stated that the chief executive officer of the city, Vibius Popidius, let the contract for building this gate, and accepted the structure from the contractor.

Fig. 112.—Plan of the Herculaneum Gate.
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The front of the Porta Marina has the appearance of a tower projecting from the wall. The gateway consists simply of two vaulted entrances, of unequal width; one for vehicles, the other, at the left, for pedestrians. Both were closed by doors. In the niche at the right of the wider passage the lower part of a terra cotta statue of Minerva was found. There was no vantage court, no inner passage; but in the early years of the Roman colony the steep lower end of the Via Marina for a distance of 70 feet was covered with a vaulted roof, which still remains. Opening into this corridor on the right is a long narrow room, which formed a part of the foundations of the court of the temple of Venus Pompeiana, and is now used as a Museum.

This gate in its present form could hardly have been intended for defence; it was adapted rather for administrative purposes, and must have been built—probably in the place of an earlier structure—in a period when the possibility of war seemed remote. Such a time, as previously remarked, was the second century B.C., particularly the latter half, after the destruction of Carthage.