The Aurelian Walls

The walls that surround Rome were built in the third century, nearly a thousand years ago, although characters would know that information only through magic. Educated characters would know that the walls of the city are mentioned both by Pliny the Elder in his Naturalis Historia, and in the Mirabilia Urbis Romae. Both works describe the walls in different degrees, Pliny writing much earlier than the anonymous author of the Mirabilia, and indeed before the current walls were built, thus possibly confusing the characters. 13th-century Romans know that the walls are ancient, as old as the ruins that serve as the city's foundation.

The walls make a 22-mile circuit around the city, surrounding the Seven Hills of Rome, crossing the Tiber to enclose the Trastevere region and the Leonine City. 150 feet tall and 11 feet thick, the brick-faced concrete wall includes buildings that were standing before its construction, creating a conglomeration of styles and defensive fortifications. In total, 361 towers stand at 100-foot intervals along the wall, which also includes castles, battlements, arches, major gates, and postern gates. Like many medieval cities, the inhabitants' housing needs have spilled outside its gates, so while the city wall encompasses several square

The wall has two types of gates: main gates and smaller postern gates. Both main and postern gates are a single arch, made of irregular stones, protected on both left and right sides by brick-faced concrete towers. The difference is size: a postern gate is one-half to one-third the size of a main gate. Because the wall is 11 feet thick, a gate seems like a tunnel running through the wall. For spell effect purposes, the tunnel area within the gate is considered Target: Room. Both the exterior and interior faces of the gate are protected by stout wooden doors and iron portcullises. The main gates have an upstairs room built into the gate, allowing archers to protect the gates through a series of windows.

Matteo Orsini's garrison is not large enough to man such a huge circumference of wall, and it concentrates its energy on staffing the city's main gates and the castles closest to those gates. Thus there are large expanses of wall that are virtually unprotected. Even if the characters weren't powerful sorcerers, they could easily find a way into the city.