Walking along the bank, the Tiber looks like a formidable river. During the flood season the current is swift — carrying branches and other debris down the river— and the water level can rise above the bike paths that are now populated by bicyclists,…

Before the embankment project of the late 19th century, flooding of the Tiber river was a fact of Roman life. Built on a natural floodplain, Rome would experienced catastrophic floods at least twice per century. Waters would engulf houses and…

Ponte Sisto connects connecting the east bank of the Tiber River to its west bank at Trastevere. The original bridge, called Pons Agrippae, Pons Antoninus, Pons Aurelianus, Pons Janiculensis, or Ponte Valentinianus, depending on the source, was an…

The Ponte Sant’Angelo (the ancient Roman Aelian bridge) was one of only four bridges that spanned the Tiber in medieval Rome. Previous Roman bridges, nine of which had crisscrossed the Tiber along the whole length of Aurelian walls, had collapsed by…

The Porto di Ripetta was a small port on the Tiber. Pope Clement XI officially built the physical port in 1703, but that spot had been used as a landing for boats since ancient Roman times. Though the port was mostly a just a well-used riverbank…

By the time Pope Leo IV (847-855) fortified Porta Portese (Rome's southernmost gate) with three defensive towers to combat Muslim pirates, the Ripa Grande (depicted on Antonio Tempesta's map of Rome, seen above) had emerged as one of Rome's premiere…