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Porta San Paolo
The ancient Porta Ostienesis
is one of the best-conserved
gates in the circuit
of the Aurelian
Walls.
Provided
with a double-arched
entrance flanked
by towers of semicircular
plan, it was reinforced
in the time of
the Emperor Maxentius
(306-312) with
two converging
walls and a counter-gate
of two arches.
Under Honorius,
between 401 and
402, the two principal
entrance passages
were reduced to
one and the towers
heightened.
From
here the Via
Ostiense led
directly to the
harbour of Rome.
An older stretch
of the road,
still visible
in the vicinity
of the Pyramid
of Cestius, emerged
from a small
gate (posterula)
in the Aurelian
Walls; it was
closed perhaps
at the time of
the changes made
by Maxentius
.
Aurelian
Walls
Monte
Testaccio
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