RUSOVCE MANOR HOUSE, SLOVAKIA—Archaeologists from Trnava University were baffled by a discovery they made while working at Rusovce Manor House outside of Bratislava, the Slovak Spectator reports. Records indicate that there has been a castle on the site since the thirteenth century, but the current standing Neo-Gothic building dates to the mid-nineteenth century. While carrying out rescue work on the property, a team unearthed a section of a second-century a.d. subterranean Roman aqueduct. The find is unparalleled in Slovakia and the first one of its kind ever investigated in the country. The stone and brick structure lays just two-and-one-half feet below the ground and has thus far been traced for a length of 125 feet. Experts estimate that it took engineers 56 tons of material to build. An inscription on one brick connects the aqueduct's construction with the private brickworks of Gaius Valerius Constans, whose workshop operated during the second century in Carnuntum, in modern-day Austria. The aqueduct’s exact purpose is still unknown, but it seems that it was intended to supply water to an unknown Roman structure currently buried beneath the Rusovce Manor House. It is possible that the site once had a bathhouse used by Roman soldiers stationed in the area. To read more about the Roman water supply, go to "How Much Water Reached Rome?"
