CALIGULA’S GALLEY

Evening Star, Issue 20138, 1 April 1929, Page 6

CALIGULA’S GALLEY

PUMPING SUCCESSFUL THE PCGP REVEALED Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright, . .ROME, March 30. As a sequel to many months of pumping in Lake Nemi, the poop of Caligula’s galley lias been revealed, and the Italian flag has been hoisted on it. Thu timbers are well preserved after nearly 2,000 years of submersion. It is hoped to recover the whole galley, and also a second one lying deeper in the centre of the lake.— Australian Press Association. The two galleys were part of the pomp ami pride of the mad Emperor, Caligula, who reigned from 37 till 41 a.i). Legend declares that after a great entertainment he deliberately caused them to he sunk, with all Ids guests on hoard, iu _ order that he might crown an orgy with a tremendous spectacle, as Nero, for In's whim was supposed to have set (ire to Rome. The I me story may be more prosaic, but belief that the galleys lay under the lake's blue waters has persisted for ages, and if they belonged to Caligula and ministered to his pleasures they are likely to have been gorgeous vessels, lavishly adonied and provided. Attempts have been made at intervals during the last 300 years to raise them. I The first al tempt was made about the middle of (be fifteenth century by one Leon Battista Alberti, at the instance of Cardinal Prospero Colonna. then lord of the Castle of Nemi. One hundred years later the attempt was renewed by one Francesco do March!, with the assistance! of something like a modern diving dross which had just been invented. A quantity of timber was torn away and brought to the surface by a windlass, and a piece of paving, “ which was red and of a beautiful lint,” was recovered. Then the cable broke, and no more could he done. In 1427 one Annesio Fnsconi ripned off some more of the galley; and in 189-3 the fourth and latest attempt till now brought tin a beautiful head of Medusa, heads of lions and wolves a finely-mod-elled hand and arm. and other rich objects in marble and metal, which arc now in a museum at Rome. The present altemnt is being made by the best method —one, only possible to the resources of modern engineering—that of draining the lake.