GALLIA ROMANA

Keiser 1968 ; Leblanc 1880, pp. 89-97 ; Pelletier 1982, pp. 124-125 ; Le Roy Ladurie 1995 ; Le Roy Ladurie 2000 ; Lemerle 2003, pp. 10-14 ; Lemerle 2005, pp. 28-31, 97

The passage in italics was added by Platter subsequently to the period in which the rest of the text was written (1604-1605). The double arch bridge that he identifies as Roman and the drawing of which he inserted between pages 22 and 23 of his manuscript, is in reality the 'Pont de Gère', then still known as the 'Pont de Saint-Sever' (Chorier 1828, p. 59), and not the 'Pont de Trajan' (comprising five arches and a tower at each end) which connected the left and the right banks of the Rhone River

« Es hatt ein gewelbte bruk von stein gar hoch über den Roddan gebauwen, hatt nur zwen bogen, unndt sagt man, es seye ein mechtige tieffe deß wassers daselbst, weil Pilatus, wie ettlich melden, under der bruck ertrunken sein soll. [...] Cäsar Tiberius Grachus solle die bruck undt 2 schlösser zu beyden seiten anno der welt 3790, vor Christo 180 Jahr, gebauwen haben. »
= “Over the Rhone, there is a very high, vaulted stone bridge; it only has two arches and the water beneath it is reputedly very deep; it is said that it was under this bridge that Pilate drowned. […] Caesar Tiberius Gracchus built this bridge, as well as the fortresses on either side, in the year 3790 starting from the creation of the world, that is, the year 180 before Christ.”