The main entrance to ancient Roman Verona in the Veneto, Italy, the Porta Borsari, was built in the 1st century AD as the Porta Iovia, after a nearby Temple of Jupiter. The present name recalls the bursarii, medieval tax collectors using ‘bursa’ leather purses to collect customs duty on goods entering or leaving the city. Amid fluted Corinthian columns, pediments and arched windows, Latin inscriptions tell of its rebuilding in 265 AD. The white limestone facade now spans traffic-free Corso Porta Borsari, at the start of the Via Postumia Roman road linking Verona to Genoa and Trieste.
Verona, Veneto, Italy: the Porta Borsari, with twin arches now spanning a pedestrianised shopping street, was once the main entrance to ancient Verona. In the days of the Roman Empire, it was named the Porta Iovia, from a nearby temple dedicated to Jupiter lustralis. The gateway derives its present name from the bursarii, medieval-era tax collectors using ‘bursa’ leather purses to collect customs duty on goods entering or leaving the city. The Porta Iovia, once flanked by guard towers, was a square fortress with an inner courtyard built in the 1st century AD to replace a 1st century BC brick gateway. Today, only one white limestone facade survives, roughly 13m (43 ft) high and wide. Its inner side is featureless, but the exterior has late imperial architectural detail such as fluted semi-columns with Corinthian capitals, pediments, decorated window arches and Latin inscriptions recording rebuilding work in 265 AD, in reign of Emperor Gallienus. Travellers approached the gate on the Via Postumia, an important Roman road linking Verona to Genoa in Italy’s far west to Trieste in the far east. Inside the city, the carriageway became the decumanus maximus, its main east-west thoroughfare. Today’s Corso Cavour was built on the Via Postumia and the traffic-free street seen through the archways is the Corso Porta Borsari. The Porta Borsari is an early example of a successful design developed by Roman military engineers to protect provincial cities in the empire’s Gallic provinces, as well as in ancient Hispania (modern Spain and Portugal). With its flanking towers and street facades accessible from the courtyard, Roman sentries would have maintained precise and careful control over everyone entering or exiting Verona. The structure underwent major restoration in the 1970s and 1980s, with decayed stonework strengthened with epoxy resin and brass rods, and lead plates installed over surfaces likely to collect rainwater.
Size: 2750px × 4132px
Location: Verona, Veneto, Italy
Photo credit: © Terence Kerr / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
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