Gardens of Lucullus (Rome, gardens on the Pincian Hill)

The Gardens of Lucullus (Horti Lucullani) were laid out by Lucullus. Tacitus writes that in AD 47 Messalina coveted them when Valerius Asiaticus was landscaping them beautifully, and she set an accuser on him. Asiaticus took his own life (Annals 11.1–3).

A year later it was in these gardens that Messalina sought refuge, wrote pleading letters and died on Narcissus’s orders (11.37–38).