Cloaca Maxima
For the CMX album, see Cloaca Maxima (album).The
Cloaca Maxima was one of the world's earliest
sewage systems. Constructed in ancient
Rome in order to drain local marshes and remove the waste of one of the world's most populous
cities, it carried effluent to the River
Tiber, which ran beside the city.
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Map of downtown Rome during the time of the Roman Empire, showing Cloaca Maxima |
The name literally means
Greatest Sewer. According to tradition it may have been initially constructed around
600 BC under the orders of the
king of Rome,
Lucius Tarquinius Priscus.
This public work was largely achieved through the use of
Etruscan engineers and large amounts of semi-forced labour from the poorer classes of Roman citizens.
Although
Livy describes it as being tunnelled out beneath Rome, he was writing a great deal after the event. From other writings and from the path that it takes, it seems more likely that it was originally an open drain, formed from streams from three of the neighbouring hills, that were channeled through the main
Forum and then on to the Tiber. This open drain would then have been gradually built over, as building space within the city became more valuable. It is possible that both theories are correct, and certainly some of the lower parts of the system suggest that they would have been below ground level even at the time of the supposed construction.
There were many branches off from the main sewer, but all seem to be 'official' drains that would have served public toilets, bath-houses and other public buildings. Private residences in Rome, even of the rich, would have relied on some sort of
cess-pit arrangement for sewage.
The Cloaca Maxima was well maintained throughout the life of the
Roman Empire and there is evidence to suggest it was still working long after the traditional fall of the
Western Empire. In
33 BC it is known to have received an inspection and overhaul from
Agrippa, and
archaeology reveals several building styles and material from various ages, suggesting that the systems received regular attention. In more recent times, the remaining passages have been connected to the modern-day sewage system, mainly to cope with problems of
backwash from the river.
The Cloaca Maxima was thought to be presided over by the goddess
Cloacina.
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Outfall of Cloaca Maxima as it appears today. |
The Romans are recorded — the veracity of the accounts depending on the case — to have dragged the bodies of a number of people to the sewers rather than give them proper burial, among them the emperor
Elagabalus and
Saint Sebastian: the latter scene is the subject of a well-known artwork by
Lodovico Carracci.
The outfall of the Cloaca Maxima into the river Tiber is still visible today near the bridge Ponte Rotto, and near Ponte Palatino. There is a stairway going down to it visible next to the Basilica Julia at the Forum. (Some pictures
here, and
here.) Some of it is also visible from the surface opposite the church of
San Giorgio al Velabro.
*
Sanitation in Ancient Rome*
Aqueduct (Roman)*
Cloaca Maxima: article in Platner's Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome*
Pictures taken from inside the Cloaca Maxima
