The bridges of Rome

Ponte Sant’Angelo (Ponte Elio)•Adored by photographers and lovers alike, Ponte Sant’Angelo started out as the Pons Aelius, built in 136 AD by Emperor Hadrian to connect central Rome with his mausoleum (today Castel Sant’Angelo)•Although the stalwart bridge has never fallen during a flood, lives were lost in Holy Year of 1450, when 172 newly cleansed pilgrims, fresh from services at St Peter’s, were washed over the bridge by an apocalyptic rise in the Tiber•Later, in the 1480s, the popes decided it would be a good anti-crime measure to hang the bodies and severed heads of executed lawbreakers over the bridgeheads of Ponte Elio, whose western end led straight into Rome’s main prison, Castel Sant’Angelo•After this period of catastrophe and grisly exhibition in the Renaissance, Ponte Elio got classy in the 17th century, when the Baroque genius of Gian Lorenzo Bernini alighted on its parapets. Bernini’s students created the twelve theatrical statues of angels, all with various instruments of the Passion of Christ, that today line Ponte Sant’Angelo, as it’s been called for some time now.

Ponte Sisto A must on any walking itinerary of the heart of Rome, this 15th century pedestrian bridge connects the southern end of Via Giulia (Campo de’ Fiori area) with Piazza Trilussa in the Trastevere neighborhood•Today’s Ponte Sisto replaced a span that had been missing in this part of the river since the year 792, when a Tiber flood took it down. A certain Renaissance cardinal, Francesco della Rovere, vowed that if ever he became pope, he would commission a new bridge to be built to connect these two busy parts of town, and get rid of the slow and sometime perilous cable-ferry system that was being used to cross the Tiber here. Once he was in fact made Pope Sixtus I in 1471, Papa Sisto della Rovere kept his word by rebuilding the span, and naming it after himself (he also gave his name to a certain famous chapel in the Vatican) •It wouldn’t be long before Ponte Sisto began to boast some famous pedestrians, including the Renaissance master Raphael, who lived in an apartment in Via Giulia, on the eastern side of the river, but whose work (and mistress, a Trastevere baker’s daughter) often required his presence on the opposite shore.

Ponte Fabricio Still standing after 2062 years, this pedestrian bridge has linked the Tiber Island with the eastern bank of the river since the days of Julius Caesar. Minor repairs were carried out in 23 BC and 1679, but for the most part, this structure has had much better luck holding out against the Tiber’s capricious currents than its immediate neighbor downstream, the Ponte Rotto•The Ponte Fabricio has had a few nicknames applied to it over the centuries, like Ponte dei Giudei (Bridge of the Jews), when in the 1300s Rome’s Jewish community moved from Trastevere to the area across the river that would eventually become the Ghetto in 1556. The bridge’s best-known nickname, however, is Ponte Quattro Capi (Bridge of the Four Heads), for two herms that stand at the eastern end of its parapets, each with four faces looking in different directions. One version is that these heads represent the god Janus, god of boundaries. Another version is that a Renaissance pope (Sixtus V) had hired four architects to restore the bridge, but these four men turned out to be libertines of such objectionable morals that the pope had them decapitated. Sixtus, however, kept his head, and decided to have the capi of the four executed architects sculpted in marble effigy to honor their contribution to the preservation of the bridge. They must have been worthy, for Ponte Fabricio is the oldest bridge still standing in Rome.

Ponte Cestio The other bridge that connects the city with Tiber Island. The first Pons Cestius was built in 46 BC by a certain Lucius Cestius (brother of the pharaoh-complexed Gaius Cestius, who built himself the pyramid-shaped tomb that still stands in Testaccio-see article)•Today’s Ponte Cestio is a mere 1600 or so years old, having been restored in 370 AD, in part with travertine stones from the Theater of Marcellus across the Tiber to the east. Two narrow traffic lanes atop this ancient span now allow ambulances to travel back and forth over the river to serve the Fatebenefratelli hospital on Tiber Island.

Ponte Rotto A bridge with many ups and downs. The “Broken Bridge” has looked like this, an island of masonry overgrown with weeds, wild capers, and even trees, for about 400 years. The bridge’s first incarnation was in 193 BC, when a sturdy span (i.e. stone, not wood) was needed to cart building materials into Rome from quarries on the Trastevere side. That first bridge held out for almost 400 years; we know it was still intact in 221 AD when the angry people of Rome hurled the demented Emperor Elagabalus over its parapets into the Tiber. But the Pons Aemilius, as it was then called, was weakened by aggressive and turbulent waters, uniting below Tiber Island, and curving with the river bend, and in 280 AD, a disastrous flood reduced the bridge to a useless ruptured span. It was rebuilt, only to destroyed again by the impetuous Tiber in the 1200s. Pope Gregory IX carried out further restorations in 1230, but in 1422, yet another rise in the water level destroyed his work. The next repair job took more than a hundred years-perhaps the Romans sensed that as soon as they rebuilt it, it would just fall down again-and was finished in 1552. Guess what? A flood took it down five years later. Living up to his official title of Pontifex Maximus (”great bridge-builder”), Pope Gregory XIII was undiscouraged by the track record of the Pons Aemilius, and decide to give restoration another try. Unfortunately, however, the untractable Tiber acted up again, and the catastrophic flood of 1598-the highest recorded in Rome’s history-caused the ne’er-do-well bridge to fall. Again. At that point, the Romans accepted that perhaps there was never meant to be a crossing at this particular point in the river, and like any other defunct structure in the city, let the broken (and repeatedly re-broken) bridge become a ruin.

Ponte Sublicio The first Tiber span ever built, this bridge was erected in 614 BC, necessitated by the busy port activity at this point in the river. The name “Sublicius” seems to derive from the Latin word for the wooden boards that made up its supports and roadway in antiquity, a roadway over which many famous invaders of and escapees from Rome would have passed Although the wood has long since disappeared from this illustrious bridge, it has kept its name, acquired tram tracks, and continues to see a lot of traffic move back and forth between the two sides of the river.

The last major restoration was carried out from 1914-18; which cost the Comune di Roma

about $650.

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