626 ([return])
[ The Via Salaria was so called from the Sabines using it to fetch salt from the coast. It led from Rome to the northward, near the gardens of Sallust, by a gate of the same name, called also Quirinalis, Agonalis, and Collina. It was here that Alaric entered.]
627 ([return])
[ The Via Nomentana, so named because it led to the Sabine town of Nomentum, joined the Via Salara at Heretum on the Tiber. It was also called Ficulnensis. It entered Rome by the Porta Viminalis, now called Porta Pia. It was by this road that Hannibal approached the walls of Rome. The country-house of Nero’s freedman, where he ended his days, stood near the Anio, beyond the present church of St. Agnese, where there was a villa of the Spada family, belonging now, we believe, to Torlonia.]
628 ([return])
[ This description is no less exact than vivid. It was easy for Nero to gain the nearest gate, the Nomentan, from the Esquiline quarter of the palace, without much observation; and on issuing from it (after midnight, it appears), the fugitives would have the pretorian camp so close on their right hand, that they might well hear the shouts of the soldiers.]
629 ([return])
[ Decocta. Pliny informs us that Nero had the water he drank, boiled, to clear it from impurities, and then cooled with ice.]
630 ([return])
[ Wood, to warm the water for washing the corpse, and for the funeral pile,]