The original Monte property lay along this little road; and it was at the head of this thoroughfare, where it turned sharply to the north and therefore at some distance from the Via Flaminia and on much higher ground, that Pope Julius decided to build his villa. Its creation quickly became the absorbing passion of his life. The greatest archi­tects of the time were employed upon it and no expense was spared. After Pope Julius's death, the entire place was confiscated by the Camera Apostolica for thirty-seven thousand scudi, the estimated amount of Pope Julius's debts.

The Monte Pope (Julius III belonged to the Roman family of Monte) would leave the Vatican by the pas­sage leading to the Castle of St. Angelo, take there a magnificent barge and be rowed up the great sweep of the Tiber to the landing-place at the foot of the Arco Oscuro. Here a fine flight of steps was constructed leading up to a vaulted pergola which traversed the fields between the Tiber and the Via Flaminia. The pergola was a bower of verdure and terminated in a fine building and gateway bordering the Tiber side of the Via Flaminia. Here it was necessary to cross the great highway in order to begin the ascent of the Arco Oscuro, which led directly to his new villa. The highway was dusty, and the salita or ascent long and steep, and the Pope decided to create a resting-place at this point. He had begun digging for water very early, while cultivating his vineyard, "without ever having had the slightest indication that water could be found there." Eventually he accomplished his purpose, for he succeeded in bringing to his vineyard the leakage waters of the Virgo Aqueduct. The "leakage" was very much in the nature of a tap, and the proceeding was high­handed and reprehensible to a degree. In imperial days such tampering with the aqueducts was visited by pun­ishment which Frontinus considered not too severe for so great a crime against the public welfare.

Julius Ill's pontificate lasted only five years; but in the year following his death the Virgo Aqueduct had already ceased to supply the city, and his successors, Pius IV, Pius V, and Gregory XIII, were obliged to begin and carry on a systematic and thorough restoration and enlargement of the aqueduct. For Julius HI the wonderful water was only a perquisite belonging to the "good gift of the papacy," and he devoted his short pontificate to its exploitation and adornment, possibly silencing his scruples by the thought that the construction of a public fountain on this highway justified his manner of obtaining the water.