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The Roman Baths are a well-preserved in the city of Bath, Somerset, England. A temple was constructed on the site between 60-70CE in the first few decades of Roman Britain. Its presence led to the development of the small Roman urban settlement known as Aquae Sulis around the site. The Roman baths-designed for public bathing-were used until the end of Roman rule in Britain in the 5th Century CE. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the original Roman baths were in ruins a century later. The area around the natural springs was redeveloped several times during the Early and Late Middle Ages.

The Roman Baths are preserved in four main features: the Sacred Spring, the Roman Temple, the Roman Bath House, and a museum which holds artefacts from Aquae Sulis. However, all buildings at street level date from the 19th century. It is a major tourist attraction in the UK, and together with the Grand Pump Room, receives more than 1.3 million visitors annually. Visitors can tour the baths and museum but cannot enter the water.

The water which bubbles up from the ground at Bath falls as rain on the nearby Mendip Hills. It percolates down through limestone aquifers to a depth of between 2,700 and 4,300 metres (8,900 and 14,100 ft) where geothermal energy raises the water temperature to between 69 and 96 °C (156.2 and 204.8 °F). Under pressure, the heated water rises to the surface along fissures and faults in the limestone. This process is similar to an enhanced geothermal system, which also makes use of the high pressures and temperatures below the earth's crust. Hot water at a temperature of 46 °C (114.8 °F) rises here at the rate of 1,170,000 litres (257,364 imp gal) every day, from a geological fault (the Pennyquick fault). In 1982 a new spa water bore-hole was sunk, providing a clean and safe supply of spa water for drinking in the Pump Room.

Water quality

Bath was charged with responsibility for the hot springs in a Royal Charter of 1591 granted by Elizabeth I. This duty has now passed to Bath and North East Somerset Council, who carry out monitoring of pressure, temperature and flow rates. The thermal waters contain sodium, calcium, chloride and sulphate ions in high concentrations.

The Roman Baths are no longer used for bathing. In October 1978, a young girl swimming in the restored Roman Bath with the Bath Dolphins, a local swimming club, contracted meningitis and died, leading to the closure of the bath for several years. Tests showed Naegleria fowleri, a deadly pathogen, in the water. The newly constructed Thermae Bath Spa nearby, and the refurbished Cross Bath, allow modern-day bathers to experience the waters via a series of more recently drilled boreholes.

Archaeological evidence indicates that the site of the baths may have been a centre of worship used by Celts; the springs were dedicated to the goddess Sulis, whom the Romans identified with Minerva. Geoffrey of Monmouth in his largely fictional Historia Regum Britanniae describes how the spring was discovered by the pre-Roman British king Bladud who built the baths there. Early in the 18th century Geoffrey's obscure legend was given great prominence as a royal endorsement of the waters' qualities, with the embellishment that the spring had cured Bladud and his herd of pigs of leprosy through wallowing in the warm mud.

Roman Britain

The name Suliis continued to be used after the Roman invasion, leading to the town's Roman name of Aquae Sulis ("the waters of Sulis"). The temple was constructed in 60-70 AD and the bathing complex was gradually built up over the next 300 years. During the Roman occupation of Britain, and possibly on the instructions of Emperor Claudius, engineers drove oak piles to provide a stable foundation into the mud and surrounded the spring with an irregular stone chamber lined with lead. In the 2nd century it was enclosed within a wooden barrel-vaulted building, and included the caldarium (hot bath), tepidarium (lukewarm bath), and frigidarium (cold bath). After the Roman withdrawal from Britain in the first decade of the 5th century, these fell into disrepair and were eventually lost due to silting up, and flooding. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle suggests the original Roman baths were destroyed in the 6th century.

About 130 curse tablets have been found. Many of the curses are related to thefts of clothes whilst the victim was bathing.

Post-Roman use

The baths have been modified on several occasions, including the 12th century, when John of Tours built a curative bath over the King's Spring reservoir, and the 16th century, when the city corporation built a new bath (Queen's Bath) to the south of the spring. The court physician Théodore de Mayerne bathed Anne of Denmark in the King's Bath on 19 May 1613. She returned in August 1615. Anne of Denmark was surprised by a flame caused by natural gas in King's Bath, and thereafter used the New Bath or Queen's Bath where a column with a crown and the inscription "Anna Regnum Sacrum" was added in her honour.

The spring is now housed in 18th-century buildings, designed by architects John Wood, the Elder and John Wood, the Younger, father and son. Visitors drank the waters in the Grand Pump Room, a neo-classical salon which remains in use, both for taking the waters and for social functions. Victorian expansion of the baths complex followed the neo-classical tradition established by the Woods. In 1810 the hot springs failed and William Smith opened up the Hot Bath Spring to the bottom, where he found that the spring had not failed but had flowed into a new channel. Smith restored the water to its original course.

The visitor entrance is via an 1897 concert hall by J. M. Brydon. It is an eastward continuation of the Grand Pump Room, with a glass-domed centre and single-storey radiused corner. The Grand Pump Room was begun in 1789 by Thomas Baldwin. He resigned in 1791 and John Palmer continued the scheme through to completion in 1799. The elevation on to Abbey Church Yard has a centre piece of four engaged Corinthian columns with entablatures and pediment. It has been designated by Historic England as a grade I listed building. The north colonnade was also designed by Thomas Baldwin. The south colonnade is similar but had an upper floor added in the late 19th century. The museum and Queen's Bath including the "Bridge" spanning York Street to the City Laundry were by Charles Edward Davis in 1889. It comprises a southward extension to the Grand Pump Room, within which some parts of the 17th-century Queen's Bath remain.

The museum houses artefacts from the Roman period including objects that were thrown into the Sacred Spring, presumably as offerings to the goddess. These include more than 12,000 Denari coins, which is the largest collective votive deposit known from Britain. A gilt bronze head of the goddess Sulis Minerva, which was discovered nearby in 1727, is displayed. An audio guide is available in 12 languages.

The Bath Roman Temple stood on a podium more than two metres above the surrounding courtyard, approached by a flight of steps. On the approach there were four large, fluted Corinthian columns supporting a frieze and decorated pediment above. The pediment, parts of which are displayed in the museum, is the triangular ornamental section, 26 feet (7.9 m) wide and 8 feet (2.4 m) from the apex to the bottom, above the pillars on the front of the building. It featured the powerful central image of a possible " Gorgon" head glowering down from a height of 15 metres (49 ft) on all who approached the temple. The great head itself has snakes entwined within its beard, wings above its ears, beetling brows and a heavy moustache although there is some controversy about what this really represents, as Gorgons are usually female. An alternative interpretation sees the central head as the image of a water god such as Oceanus, and yet another as a Celtic sun god. In early 2010 various stones on the pediment were conserved and rearranged.

Also on display are the remains of the elaborate hypocaust heating system, which served the sweat rooms.

In 2016 planning permission was received for a new learning centre aimed at schoolchildren and linked to the baths by a tunnel. Funding is being sought from the Heritage Lottery Fund and, if successful, it is hoped the centre will open in 2019.

The late 19th century carvings of Roman Emperors and Governors of Roman Britain on the terrace overlooking the Great Bath are particularly susceptible to the effect of acid rain and are protected with a wash of a sacrificial shelter coat every few years. Exhibits within the temple precincts are susceptible to warm air which had the effect of drawing corrosive salts out of the Roman stonework. To help reduce this, a new ventilation system was installed in 2006.

In 2009 a grant of £90,000 was made to Bath and North East Somerset Council to contribute towards the cost of re-developing displays and improving access to the Roman Baths, by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport/Wolfson Fund, which was established to promote improvements in Museums and Galleries in England. Subsequent grants have funded further work on the exhibition design and layout by London-based specialist firm, Event Communications.

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The Roman Baths are a well-preserved in the city of Bath, Somerset, England. A temple was constructed on the site between 60-70CE in the first few decades of Roman Britain. Its presence led to the development of the small Roman urban settlement known as Aquae Sulis around the site.

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Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.

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File:Roman Baths in Bath Spa, England - July 2006.jpg ...

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Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.

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Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.

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Would you rather use a Roman bath or your own bath 

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The Roman Domus - World History Encyclopedia

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The Roman Baths are a well-preserved in the city of Bath, Somerset, England. A temple was constructed on the site between 60-70CE in the first few decades of Roman Britain. Its presence led to the development of the small Roman urban settlement known as Aquae Sulis around the site. The Roman baths-designed for public bathing-were used until the end of Roman rule in Britain in the 5th Century CE. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the original Roman baths were in ruins a century later. The area around the natural springs was redeveloped several times during the Early and Late Middle Ages.

The Roman Baths are preserved in four main features: the Sacred Spring, the Roman Temple, the Roman Bath House, and a museum which holds artefacts from Aquae Sulis. However, all buildings at street level date from the 19th century. It is a major tourist attraction in the UK, and together with the Grand Pump Room, receives more than 1.3 million visitors annually. Visitors can tour the baths and museum but cannot enter the water.

The water which bubbles up from the ground at Bath falls as rain on the nearby Mendip Hills. It percolates down through limestone aquifers to a depth of between 2,700 and 4,300 metres (8,900 and 14,100 ft) where geothermal energy raises the water temperature to between 69 and 96 °C (156.2 and 204.8 °F). Under pressure, the heated water rises to the surface along fissures and faults in the limestone. This process is similar to an enhanced geothermal system, which also makes use of the high pressures and temperatures below the earth's crust. Hot water at a temperature of 46 °C (114.8 °F) rises here at the rate of 1,170,000 litres (257,364 imp gal) every day, from a geological fault (the Pennyquick fault). In 1982 a new spa water bore-hole was sunk, providing a clean and safe supply of spa water for drinking in the Pump Room.

Water quality

Bath was charged with responsibility for the hot springs in a Royal Charter of 1591 granted by Elizabeth I. This duty has now passed to Bath and North East Somerset Council, who carry out monitoring of pressure, temperature and flow rates. The thermal waters contain sodium, calcium, chloride and sulphate ions in high concentrations.

The Roman Baths are no longer used for bathing. In October 1978, a young girl swimming in the restored Roman Bath with the Bath Dolphins, a local swimming club, contracted meningitis and died, leading to the closure of the bath for several years. Tests showed Naegleria fowleri, a deadly pathogen, in the water. The newly constructed Thermae Bath Spa nearby, and the refurbished Cross Bath, allow modern-day bathers to experience the waters via a series of more recently drilled boreholes.

Archaeological evidence indicates that the site of the baths may have been a centre of worship used by Celts; the springs were dedicated to the goddess Sulis, whom the Romans identified with Minerva. Geoffrey of Monmouth in his largely fictional Historia Regum Britanniae describes how the spring was discovered by the pre-Roman British king Bladud who built the baths there. Early in the 18th century Geoffrey's obscure legend was given great prominence as a royal endorsement of the waters' qualities, with the embellishment that the spring had cured Bladud and his herd of pigs of leprosy through wallowing in the warm mud.

Roman Britain

The name Suliis continued to be used after the Roman invasion, leading to the town's Roman name of Aquae Sulis ("the waters of Sulis"). The temple was constructed in 60-70 AD and the bathing complex was gradually built up over the next 300 years. During the Roman occupation of Britain, and possibly on the instructions of Emperor Claudius, engineers drove oak piles to provide a stable foundation into the mud and surrounded the spring with an irregular stone chamber lined with lead. In the 2nd century it was enclosed within a wooden barrel-vaulted building, and included the caldarium (hot bath), tepidarium (lukewarm bath), and frigidarium (cold bath). After the Roman withdrawal from Britain in the first decade of the 5th century, these fell into disrepair and were eventually lost due to silting up, and flooding. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle suggests the original Roman baths were destroyed in the 6th century.

About 130 curse tablets have been found. Many of the curses are related to thefts of clothes whilst the victim was bathing.

Post-Roman use

The baths have been modified on several occasions, including the 12th century, when John of Tours built a curative bath over the King's Spring reservoir, and the 16th century, when the city corporation built a new bath (Queen's Bath) to the south of the spring. The court physician Théodore de Mayerne bathed Anne of Denmark in the King's Bath on 19 May 1613. She returned in August 1615. Anne of Denmark was surprised by a flame caused by natural gas in King's Bath, and thereafter used the New Bath or Queen's Bath where a column with a crown and the inscription "Anna Regnum Sacrum" was added in her honour.

The spring is now housed in 18th-century buildings, designed by architects John Wood, the Elder and John Wood, the Younger, father and son. Visitors drank the waters in the Grand Pump Room, a neo-classical salon which remains in use, both for taking the waters and for social functions. Victorian expansion of the baths complex followed the neo-classical tradition established by the Woods. In 1810 the hot springs failed and William Smith opened up the Hot Bath Spring to the bottom, where he found that the spring had not failed but had flowed into a new channel. Smith restored the water to its original course.

The visitor entrance is via an 1897 concert hall by J. M. Brydon. It is an eastward continuation of the Grand Pump Room, with a glass-domed centre and single-storey radiused corner. The Grand Pump Room was begun in 1789 by Thomas Baldwin. He resigned in 1791 and John Palmer continued the scheme through to completion in 1799. The elevation on to Abbey Church Yard has a centre piece of four engaged Corinthian columns with entablatures and pediment. It has been designated by Historic England as a grade I listed building. The north colonnade was also designed by Thomas Baldwin. The south colonnade is similar but had an upper floor added in the late 19th century. The museum and Queen's Bath including the "Bridge" spanning York Street to the City Laundry were by Charles Edward Davis in 1889. It comprises a southward extension to the Grand Pump Room, within which some parts of the 17th-century Queen's Bath remain.

The museum houses artefacts from the Roman period including objects that were thrown into the Sacred Spring, presumably as offerings to the goddess. These include more than 12,000 Denari coins, which is the largest collective votive deposit known from Britain. A gilt bronze head of the goddess Sulis Minerva, which was discovered nearby in 1727, is displayed. An audio guide is available in 12 languages.

The Bath Roman Temple stood on a podium more than two metres above the surrounding courtyard, approached by a flight of steps. On the approach there were four large, fluted Corinthian columns supporting a frieze and decorated pediment above. The pediment, parts of which are displayed in the museum, is the triangular ornamental section, 26 feet (7.9 m) wide and 8 feet (2.4 m) from the apex to the bottom, above the pillars on the front of the building. It featured the powerful central image of a possible " Gorgon" head glowering down from a height of 15 metres (49 ft) on all who approached the temple. The great head itself has snakes entwined within its beard, wings above its ears, beetling brows and a heavy moustache although there is some controversy about what this really represents, as Gorgons are usually female. An alternative interpretation sees the central head as the image of a water god such as Oceanus, and yet another as a Celtic sun god. In early 2010 various stones on the pediment were conserved and rearranged.

Also on display are the remains of the elaborate hypocaust heating system, which served the sweat rooms.

In 2016 planning permission was received for a new learning centre aimed at schoolchildren and linked to the baths by a tunnel. Funding is being sought from the Heritage Lottery Fund and, if successful, it is hoped the centre will open in 2019.

The late 19th century carvings of Roman Emperors and Governors of Roman Britain on the terrace overlooking the Great Bath are particularly susceptible to the effect of acid rain and are protected with a wash of a sacrificial shelter coat every few years. Exhibits within the temple precincts are susceptible to warm air which had the effect of drawing corrosive salts out of the Roman stonework. To help reduce this, a new ventilation system was installed in 2006.

In 2009 a grant of £90,000 was made to Bath and North East Somerset Council to contribute towards the cost of re-developing displays and improving access to the Roman Baths, by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport/Wolfson Fund, which was established to promote improvements in Museums and Galleries in England. Subsequent grants have funded further work on the exhibition design and layout by London-based specialist firm, Event Communications.

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The Roman Baths are a well-preserved in the city of Bath, Somerset, England. A temple was constructed on the site between 60-70CE in the first few decades of Roman Britain. Its presence led to the development of the small Roman urban settlement known as Aquae Sulis around the site.

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The city of Rome was home to roughly 450,000 people. But where did they all live? From cramped insulae to the most decadent domus, Lauren Good explores the spaces Romans lived in…

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1. The use of Roman Bath

The Ancient Roman Baths contain natural spring water which still flows in the River Avon. The main purpose of the baths was to allow the Romans to purify themselves. Most Romans living in the city went to the bath house every day to cleanse themselves. They used to put olive oil on their skin and then rubbed it with a metal scraper called a strigil.

The baths were also a place for socialising. Friends met at the baths to talk and have meals. Sometimes men held business meetings or discussed politics.

2. Conversations with the Goddess of the Baths

The first sanctuary on the site of the hot springs was built by an Iron Age tribe, the Dobunni, who dedicated it to Sulis, the Celtic goddess of sacred waters and healing. In 43 AD, Britain was invaded by the Romans. They identified Sulis and equated her with Minerva, the Roman goddess of wisdom, arts and crafts.

In 75 AD, the Romans built a religious spa complex on the site, which later became a bathing and social centre called Aquae Sulis, 'the waters of Sulis'. The goddess Sulis Minerva was a hybrid of the Roman and Celtic religions. Regarded as the goddess of justice, people who had their possessions stolen would go to the Roman baths to seek her help in recovering their lost property. The ultimate belief of the Romans was that the goddess Minerva would punish the thief and return their lost property.

Some people addressed the goddess while others wrote a note on a soft lead, folded it and threw it at the source, which was taken by the goddess. She would then read the note and grant their wish by creating a miracle to recover the stolen object.

In addition to justice, she was also honoured as the goddess of healing powers and peace. People turned to her to ask for happiness, peace and good health for their family members and loved ones. People from all over the world, including the Romans, visited her and honoured her with precious jewellery, coins, bracelets and stones.

3. Rediscovered In the 18th Century

After the Romans withdrew from Britain in the early 5th century, the bath complex was neglected and fell into disrepair. Major Charles Davis, the town surveyor, discovered the Roman remains of the baths in 1878. The excavation was carried out after the King's Bath spring had leaked and the floor of the baths had to be explored and tested. It took about two years to uncover and the Roman baths were finally discovered in 1880.

The site was opened to the general public in 1897 and was excavated, expanded and conserved throughout the 20th century. The architects John Wood, the Elder and John Wood, the Younger, father and son, worked on its design. In 2011, the Roman Baths underwent a massive £5.5 million redevelopment to make them more accessible and preserve them for the next 100 years.

4. Presence of numerous artefacts in the museum

As ancient Rome was renowned for its creativity in making unique architecture and objects, many objects have been discovered around the Roman baths. These include precious stones, rings, bracelets, vases, bronze materials and approximately 12,000 coins. All these objects were given by the Romans as gifts in honour of the goddess Sulis Minerva. In 1727, the bronzed head of the sacred goddess Sulis Minerva was also discovered.

5. Presence of Gorgon in the Roman Bath

The entrance to the Roman temple at Bath was designed to resemble the face of a Gorgon. The Gorgon is the monster that resides in the underworld. There were three Gorgons in Greek mythology: Medusa, Stheno and Euryale.

They looked monstrous, with snake-like hair, huge wings, sharp claws and a body covered with dragon-like scales. People were afraid to look at the Gorgons' faces, thinking that looking at them could kill them or turn them to stone.

6. Presence of hot room - Laconicum

The Laconicum was a small but intense room, with a dry heat that could be turned into steam simply by splashing water. It was one of the most unusual in the Roman bath. It was circular in shape with a conical roof and a circular opening at the top. The special feature of this room was that it allowed visitors to wipe themselves dry.

There was also the caldarium, which is a very hot room. It was heated by an underground heating system. There is also another room called the tepidarium which is located inside the baths. The pools are filled with hot water.

7. Healing Powers

There is speculation that the Roman baths in the UK have healing powers to help cure certain diseases. The healing powers of the Roman baths were noticed by the Romans after the bath cured Bladud's leprosy.

Bladud, son of the King of England, suffered from leprosy which was not cured even after many attempts. However, bathing in the famous Roman bath miraculously cured his leprosy.

The legend made people believe that hot springs had healing powers and that any disease could be cured by bathing in them. King Bladud, pleased with the result, created the city of Bath, where many pools of natural mineral springs were opened. The other reason was the presence of the goddess Sulis Minerva at the baths. She had the power to heal, according to the ancient Dobunni tribe.

8. Unsafe for bathing

The Roman baths were built and opened for the public to bathe and relax. The baths used heated spring water, curing many diseases, cleansing and relaxing the body. However, bathing in the Roman Baths was discontinued at the end of Roman rule in Britain, around the 5th century AD.

The water in the thermal baths is passed through still functioning lead pipes that were installed by the Romans. The quality of the water available is therefore not ideal.

You can still enjoy the atmosphere of the Roman baths at the Thermae Bath Spa, a luxurious thermal spa which opened in September 2004. This is the perfect getaway for modern bathers who want to experience the Roman baths in a historic setting. This famous thermal water contains 43 minerals.

9. Statues of Roman Governors and Emperors

The Roman baths were perfectly designed on all sides. The inner part had a hot spring pool, while the outer part, mainly the terrace, was lined with Victorian statues of Britain's governors and the greatest Roman emperors. The statues include the Roman Emperor Claudius, Emperor Vespasian, Julius Caesar, Emperor Hadrian, Emperor Constantine and the statue of Agricola. These statues were erected in 1894 in preparation for the official opening in 1897.

The original statue of Julius Caesar was vandalised in the 1980s and was redone about 18 years ago. In addition to the emperors, there are also statues of some kings, including King Edgar and King Cole, made in the 15th century. Edgar became king on 11 May 973, while Cole became king in 125.

10. The Great Bath

The Great Bath forms the heart of the spa complex. It is a lead-lined pool filled with steaming, geothermally heated water that gushes from the sacred spring at a depth of 1.6 metres. Although it is now open-air, the bath was originally covered by a barrel-vaulted roof 40 metres (130 feet) high.

The Roman Baths remain a major tourist attraction today. Around 1 million visitors come to the Roman Baths each year, making it one of the most visited sites in the UK. Tootbus invites you to discover the various additional attractions in the city of Bath.

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Top 10 interesting facts about the Roman Baths

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Bath is home to many historic monuments which you can explore at your own pace on our Bath Discovery tour. The Roman baths are one of the city's major attractions. Tootbus invites you to discover 10 fascinating facts about these well-preserved baths.

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Roman Baths - World History Encyclopedia

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Would you rather use a Roman bath or your own bath 

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roman housing and homes - Kiddle - visual search engine for kids

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roman housing and homes - Kiddle - visual search engine for kids

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Would you rather take a bath in a Roman bath or your own bath?

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Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.

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What Were Homes Like in Ancient Rome? (4 Types)

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Life in Ancient Rome varied significantly between rich and poor. Read on to find out more about the different homes they lived in.

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Would you rather live in the poor home or the rich home?

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Do you think Roman houses had a good design?

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Should Rome have added windows to their homes

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Would you rather live in the Insulae or Domus?

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The Romans constructed aqueducts throughout their Republic and later Empire, to bring water from outside sources into cities and towns. Aqueduct water supplied public baths, latrines, fountains, and private households; it also supported mining operations, milling, farms, and gardens.

Aqueducts moved water through gravity alone, along a slight overall downward gradient within conduits of stone, brick, or concrete; the steeper the gradient, the faster the flow. Most conduits were buried beneath the ground and followed the contours of the terrain; obstructing peaks were circumvented or, less often, tunneled through. Where valleys or lowlands intervened, the conduit was carried on bridgework, or its contents fed into high-pressure lead, ceramic, or stone pipes and siphoned across. Most aqueduct systems included sedimentation tanks, which helped to reduce any water-borne debris. Sluices and castella aquae (distribution tanks) regulated the supply to individual destinations. In cities and towns, the run-off water from aqueducts scoured the drains and sewers.

Rome's first aqueduct was built in 312 BC, and supplied a water fountain at the city's cattle market. By the 3rd century AD, the city had eleven aqueducts, sustaining a population of over a million in a water-extravagant economy; most of the water supplied the city's many public baths. Cities and towns throughout the Roman Empire emulated this model, and funded aqueducts as objects of public interest and civic pride, "an expensive yet necessary luxury to which all could, and did, aspire".

Most Roman aqueducts proved reliable and durable; some were maintained into the early modern era, and a few are still partly in use. Methods of aqueduct surveying and construction are noted by Vitruvius in his work De architectura (1st century BC). The general Frontinus gives more detail in his official report on the problems, uses and abuses of Imperial Rome's public water supply. Notable examples of aqueduct architecture include the supporting piers of the Aqueduct of Segovia, and the aqueduct-fed cisterns of Constantinople.

Before the development of aqueduct technology, Romans, like most of their contemporaries in the ancient world, relied on local water sources such as springs and streams, supplemented by groundwater from privately or publicly owned wells, and by seasonal rain-water drained from rooftops into storage jars and cisterns. The reliance of ancient communities upon such water resources restricted their potential growth. Rome's aqueducts were not strictly Roman inventions - their engineers would have been familiar with the water-management technologies of Rome's Etruscan and Greek allies - but they proved conspicuously successful. By the early Imperial era, the city's aqueducts supported a population of over a million, and an extravagant water supply for public amenities had become a fundamental part of Roman life. The run-off of aqueduct water scoured the sewers of cities and towns. Water from aqueducts was also used to supply villas, ornamental urban and suburban gardens, market gardens, farms, and agricultural estates, the latter being the core of Rome's economy and wealth.

Hundreds of similar aqueducts were built throughout the Roman Empire. Many of them have since collapsed or been destroyed, but a number of intact portions remain. The Zaghouan Aqueduct is 92.5 km (57.5 mi) in length. It was built in the 2nd century to supply Carthage (in modern Tunisia). Surviving aqueduct bridges include the Pont du Gard in France and the Aqueduct of Segovia in Spain. The longest single conduit, at over 240 km, is associated with the Valens Aqueduct of Constantinople (Mango 1995). "The known system is at least two and half times the length of the longest recorded Roman aqueducts at Carthage and Cologne, but perhaps more significantly it represents one of the most outstanding surveying achievements of any pre-industrial society". Rivalling this in terms of length and possibly equaling or exceeding it in cost and complexity, is the provincial Aqua Augusta that supplied an entire region, which contained at least eight cities, including the major ports at Naples and Misenum; sea voyages by traders and the Roman navy required copious supplies of fresh water.

Rome's aqueducts

Rome had several springs within its perimeter walls but its groundwater was notoriously unpalatable; water from the river Tiber was badly affected by pollution and waterborne diseases. The city's demand for water had probably long exceeded its local supplies by 312 BC, when the city's first aqueduct, the Aqua Appia, was commissioned by the censor Appius Claudius Caecus. The Aqua Appia was one of two major public projects of the time; the other was a military road between Rome and Capua, the first leg of the so-called Appian Way. Both projects had significant strategic value, as the Third Samnite War had been under way for some thirty years by that point. The road allowed rapid troop movements; and by design or fortunate coincidence, most of the Aqua Appia ran within a buried conduit, relatively secure from attack. It was fed by a spring 16.4 km from Rome, and dropped 10 metres over its length to discharge approximately 75,500 cubic metres of water each day into a fountain at Rome's cattle market, the Forum Boarium, one of the city's lowest-lying public spaces.

A second aqueduct, the Aqua Anio Vetus, was commissioned some forty years later, funded by treasures seized from Pyrrhus of Epirus. Its flow was more than twice that of the Aqua Appia, and it entered the city on raised arches, supplying water to higher elevations of the city.

By 145 BC, the city had again outgrown its combined supplies. An official commission found the aqueduct conduits decayed, their water depleted by leakage and illegal tapping. The praetor Quintus Marcius Rex restored them, and introduced a third, "more wholesome" supply, the Aqua Marcia, Rome's longest aqueduct and high enough to supply the Capitoline Hill. The works cost 180,000,000 sesterces, and took two years to complete. As demand grew still further, more aqueducts were built, including the Aqua Tepula in 127 BC and the Aqua Julia in 33 BC. Aqueduct-building programmes reached a peak in the Imperial Era. Augustus' reign saw the building of the Aqua Virgo, and the short Aqua Alsietina that supplied Trastevere with large quantities of non-potable water for its gardens and to create an artificial lake for staged sea-fights to entertain the populace. Another short Augustan aqueduct supplemented the Aqua Marcia with water of "excellent quality". The emperor Caligula added or began two aqueducts completed by his successor Claudius; the 69 km (42.8 mile) Aqua Claudia, which gave good quality water but failed on several occasions; and the Anio Novus, highest of all Rome's aqueducts and one of the most reliable but prone to muddy, discoloured waters, particularly after rain, despite its use of settling tanks.

Most of Rome's aqueducts drew on various springs in the valley and highlands of the Anio, the modern river Aniene, east of the Tiber. A complex system of aqueduct junctions, tributary feeds and distribution tanks supplied every part of the city. Trastevere, the city region west of the Tiber, was primarily served by extensions of several of the city's eastern aqueducts, carried across the river by lead pipes buried in the roadbed of the river bridges, thus forming an inverted siphon. Whenever this cross-river supply had to be shut down for routine repair and maintenance works, the "positively unwholesome" waters of the Aqua Alsietina were used to supply Trastevere's public fountains. The situation was finally ameliorated when the emperor Trajan built the Aqua Traiana in 109 AD, bringing clean water directly to Trastavere from aquifers around Lake Bracciano.

By the late 3rd century AD, the city was supplied with water by 11 state-funded aqueducts. Their combined conduit length is estimated between 780 and a little over 800 kilometres, of which approximately 47 km (29 mi) were carried above ground level, on masonry supports. They supplied around 1 million cubic metres (300 million gallons) a day: a capacity 126% of the current[when? ] water supply of the city of Bangalore,[citation needed ] which has a population of 10 million.

312 BC Aqua Appia, Rome's first aqueduct is built by Appius Claudius Caecus, the aqueduct is nearly all underground.

272 BC Aqua Anio Vetus

144 BC Aqua Marcia, 90 km (56 miles) in length, construction starts.

33 BC Aqua Julia is built by Octavian (Emperor Augustus)

19 BC Aqua Virgo is built to supply the thermal baths in the Campus Martius.

38-52 AD Aqua Claudia built

109 AD Aqua Traiana brings water from Lake Bracciano to supply Rome's suburbs, now called Trastevere.

Planning, surveying and construction

Whether state-funded or privately built, aqueducts were protected and regulated by law. Any proposed aqueduct had to be submitted to the scrutiny of civil authorities. Permission (from the senate or local authorities) was granted only if the proposal respected the water rights of other citizens; on the whole, Roman communities took care to allocate shared water resources according to need. The land on which a state-funded aqueduct was built might be state land (ager publicus) or privately owned, but in either case was subject to restrictions on usage and encroachment that might damage the fabric of the aqueduct. To this end, state funded aqueducts reserved a wide corridor of land, up to 15 feet each side of the aqueduct's outer fabric. Ploughing, planting and building were prohibited within this boundary. Such regulation was necessary to the aqueduct's long-term integrity and maintenance but was not always readily accepted or easily enforced at a local level, particularly when ager publicus was understood to be common property. Some privately built or smaller municipal aqueducts may have required less stringent and formal arrangements.

Springs were by far the most common sources for aqueduct water; for example, most of Rome's supply came from various springs in the Anio valley and its uplands. Spring-water was fed into a stone or concrete springhouse, then entered the aqueduct conduit. Scattered springs would require several branch conduits feeding into a main channel. Some systems drew water from open, purpose-built, dammed reservoirs, such as the two (still in use) that supplied the aqueduct at the provincial city of Emerita Augusta.

The territory over which the aqueduct ran had to be carefully surveyed to ensure the water would flow at an acceptable gradient for the entire distance. Roman engineers used various surveying tools to plot the course of aqueducts across the landscape. They checked horizontal levels with a chorobates, a flatbedded wooden frame fitted with a water level. They plotted courses and angles could be plotted and checked using a , a relatively simple apparatus that was probably displaced by the more sophisticated dioptra, precursor of the modern theodolite. In Book 8 of his De architectura, Vitruvius describes the need to ensure a constant supply, methods of prospecting, and tests for potable water.

Greek and Roman physicians knew the association between stagnant or tainted waters and water-borne disease. They also knew the adverse health effects of lead on those who mined and processed it, and for this reason, ceramic pipes were preferred over lead. Where lead pipes were used, a continuous water-flow and the inevitable deposition of water-borne minerals within the pipes somewhat reduced the water's contamination by soluble lead. Nevertheless, the level of lead in this water was 100 times higher than in local spring waters.

Most Roman aqueducts were flat-bottomed, arch-section conduits that ran 0.5 to 1 m beneath the ground surface, with inspection-and-access covers at regular intervals. Conduits above ground level were usually slab-topped. Early conduits were ashlar-built but from around the late Republican era, brick-faced concrete was often used instead. The concrete used for conduit linings was usually waterproof. The flow of water depended on gravity alone. The volume of water transported within the conduit depended on the catchment hydrology - rainfall, absorption, and runoff - the cross section of the conduit, and its gradient; most conduits ran about two-thirds full. The conduit's cross section was also determined by maintenance requirements; workmen must be able to enter and access the whole, with minimal disruption to its fabric.

Vitruvius recommends a low gradient of not less than 1 in 4800 for the channel, presumably to prevent damage to the structure through erosion and water pressure. This value agrees well with the measured gradients of surviving masonry aqueducts. The gradient of the Pont du Gard is only 34 cm per km, descending only 17 m vertically in its entire length of 50 km (31 mi): it could transport up to 20,000 cubic metres a day. The gradients of temporary aqueducts used for hydraulic mining could be considerably greater, as at Dolaucothi in Wales (with a maximum gradient of about 1:700) and Las Medulas in northern Spain. Where sharp gradients were unavoidable in permanent conduits, the channel could be stepped downwards, widened or discharged into a receiving tank to disperse the flow of water and reduce its abrasive force. The use of stepped cascades and drops also helped re-oxygenate and thus "freshen" the water.

Some aqueduct conduits were supported across valleys or hollows on arches of masonry, brick or concrete; the Pont du Gard, one of the most impressive surviving examples of a massive masonry multiple-piered conduit, spanned the Gardon river-valley some 48.8 m (160 ft) above the Gardon itself. Where particularly deep or lengthy depressions had to be crossed, inverted siphons could be used, instead of arched supports; the conduit fed water into a header tank, which fed it into pipes. The pipes crossed the valley at lower level, supported by a low "venter" bridge, then rose to a receiving tank at a slightly lower elevation. This discharged into another conduit; the overall gradient was maintained. Siphon pipes were usually made of soldered lead, sometimes reinforced by concrete encasements or stone sleeves.

Less often, the pipes themselves were stone or ceramic, jointed as male-female and sealed with lead. Vitruvius describes the construction of siphons and the problems of blockage, blow-outs and venting at their lowest levels, where the pressures were greatest. Nonetheless, siphons were versatile and effective if well-built and well-maintained. A horizontal section of high-pressure siphon tubing in the Aqueduct of the Gier was ramped up on bridgework to clear a navigable river, using nine lead pipes in parallel, cased in concrete. Modern hydraulic engineers use similar techniques to enable sewers and water pipes to cross depressions. At Arles, a minor branch of the main aqueduct supplied a local suburb via a lead siphon whose "belly" was laid across a riverbed, eliminating any need for supporting bridgework.

Roman aqueducts required a comprehensive system of regular maintenance. The "clear corridors" created to protect the fabric of underground and overground conduits were regularly patrolled for unlawful ploughing, planting, roadways and buildings. In De aquaeductu, Frontinus describes the penetration of conduits by tree-roots as particularly damaging. The aqueducts conduits would have been regularly inspected and maintained by working patrols, to reduce algal fouling, repair accidental breaches, to clear the conduits of gravel and other loose debris, and to remove channel-narrowing accretions of calcium carbonate in systems fed by hard water sources. Inspection and access points were provided at regular intervals on the standard, buried conduits. Accretions within syphons could drastically reduce flow rates, due to the already narrow diameter of their pipes. Some had sealed openings that might have been used as rodding eyes, possibly using a pull-through device. In Rome, where a hard-water supply was the norm, main pipework was shallowly buried beneath road kerbs, for ease of access; the accumulation of calcium carbonate in these pipes would have necessitated their frequent replacement.

The aqueducts were under the overall care and governance of a water commissioner ( curator aquarum). It was a high status, high-profile appointment. In 97, Frontinus served both as consul and as curator aquarum, under the emperor Nerva. Little is known of the day-to-day business of aqueduct maintenance teams ( aquarii). Under the emperor Claudius, Rome's contingent of imperial aquarii comprised a familia aquarum of 700 people both slave and free, funded through a combination of Imperial largesse and water taxes. They were supervised by an Imperial freedman, who held office as procurator aquarium. Theirs was probably a never-ending routine of patrol, inspection and cleaning, punctuated by occasional emergencies. Full closure of any aqueduct for servicing would have been a rare event, kept as brief as possible, with repairs preferably made when water demand was lowest, which was presumably at night. The water supply could be shut off at its aqueduct outlet when small or local repairs were needed, but substantial maintenance and repairs to the aqueduct conduit itself required the complete diversion of water at any point upstream or at the spring-head itself.

Aqueduct mains could be directly tapped, but they more usually fed into public distribution terminals, known as castellum aquae, which supplied various branches and spurs, usually via large-bore lead or ceramic pipes. Thereafter, the supply could be further subdivided. Licensed, fee-paying private users would have been registered, along with the bore of pipe that led from the public water supply to their private property - the wider the pipe, the greater the flow and the higher the fee. Tampering and fraud to avoid or reduce payment were commonplace; methods included the fitting of unlicensed outlets, additional outlets, and the illegal widening of lead pipes; any of which might involve the bribery or connivance of unscrupulous aqueduct officials or workers. Official lead pipes carried inscriptions with information on the pipe's manufacturer, its fitter, and probably on its subscriber and their entitlement. During the Imperial era, lead production became an Imperial monopoly, and the granting of rights to draw water for private use from state-funded aqueducts was made an imperial privilege.

Rome's first aqueduct (312 BC) discharged at very low pressure and at a more-or-less constant rate in the city's main trading centre and cattle-market, probably into a low-level, cascaded series of troughs or basins; the upper for household use, the lower for watering the livestock traded there. Most Romans would have filled buckets and storage jars at the basins and carried the water to their apartments; the better-off would have sent slaves to perform the same task. The outlet's elevation was too low to offer any city household or building a direct supply; the overflow drained into Rome's main sewer, and from there into the Tiber. At this time, Rome had no public baths. The first were probably built in the next century, based on precursors in neighboring Campania; a limited number of private baths and small, street-corner public baths would have had a private water supply, but once aqueduct water was brought to the city's higher elevations, large and well-appointed public baths were built throughout the city, and drinking water was delivered to public fountains at high pressure. Public baths and fountains became distinctive features of Roman civilization, and the baths in particular became important social centres.

The majority of urban Romans lived in multi-storeyed blocks of flats (). Some blocks offered water services, but only to tenants on the more expensive, lower floors; the rest would have drawn their water gratis from public fountains.

Between 65 and 90% of the Roman Empire's population was involved in some form of agricultural work. Farmers whose villas or estates were near a public aqueduct could draw, under license, a specified quantity of aqueduct water for summer irrigation at a predetermined time; this was intended to limit the depletion of water supply to users further down the gradient, and help ensure a fair distribution among competitors at the time when water was most needed and scarce. Water was possibly the most important variable in the agricultural economy of the Mediterranean world. Roman Italy's natural water sources - springs, streams, rivers and lakes - were unevenly distributed across the landscape, and water tended to scarcity when most needed, during the warm, dry summer growing season. Columella recommends that any farm should contain a spring, stream or river; but acknowledges that not every farm did.

Farmland without a reliable summer water-source was virtually worthless. During the growing season, the water demand of a "modest local" irrigation system might consume as much water as the city of Rome; and the livestock whose manure fertilised the fields must be fed and watered all year round. At least some Roman landowners and farmers relied in part or whole on aqueduct water to raise crops as their primary or sole source of income but the fraction of aqueduct water involved can only be guessed at. More certainly, the creation of municipal and city aqueducts brought a growth in the intensive and efficient suburban market-farming of fragile, perishable commodities such as flowers (for perfumes, and for festival garlands), grapes, vegetables and orchard fruits; and of small livestock such as pigs and chickens, close to the municipal and urban markets.

A licensed right to aqueduct water on farmland could lead to increased productivity, a cash income through the sale of surplus foodstuffs, and an increase in the value of the land itself. In the countryside, permissions to draw aqueduct water for irrigation were particularly hard to get; the exercise and abuse of such rights were subject to various known legal disputes and judgements, and at least one political campaign; in the early 2nd century BC Cato tried to block all unlawful rural outlets, especially those owned by the landed elite - "Look how much he bought the land for, where he is channeling the water!" - during his censorship. His attempted reform proved impermanent at best. Though illegal tapping could be punished by seizure of assets, including the illegally watered land and its produce, this law seems never to have been used, and was probably impracticable; food surpluses kept prices low. Grain shortages in particular could lead to famine and social unrest. Any practical solution must strike a balance between the water-needs of urban populations and grain producers, tax the latter's profits, and secure sufficient grain at reasonable cost for the Roman poor ( the so-called "corn dole") and the army. Rather than seek to impose unproductive and probably unenforcable bans, the authorities issued individual water grants (though seldom in rural areas) and licenses, and regulated water outlets, with variable success. In the 1st century AD, Pliny the Elder, like Cato, could fulminate against grain producers who continued to wax fat on profits from public water and public land.

Some landholders avoided such restrictions and entanglements by buying water access rights to distant springs, not necessarily on their own land. A few, of high wealth and status, built their own aqueducts to transport such water from source to field or villa; Mumius Niger Valerius Vegetus bought the rights to a spring and its water from his neighbour, and access rights to a corridor of intervening land, then built an aqueduct of just under 10 kilometres, connecting the springhead to his own villa. The senatorial permission for this "Aqua Vegetiana" was given only when the project seemed not to impinge on the water rights of other citizens.

Some aqueducts supplied water to industrial sites, usually via an open channel cut into the ground, clay lined or wood-shuttered to reduce water loss. Most such leats were designed to operate at the steep gradients that could deliver the high water volumes needed in mining operations. Water was used in hydraulic mining to strip the overburden and expose the ore by hushing, to fracture and wash away metal-bearing rock already heated and weakened by fire-setting, and to power water-wheel driven stamps and trip-hammers that crushed ore for processing. Evidence of such leats and machines has been found at Dolaucothi in south-west Wales.

Mining sites such as Dolaucothi and Las Medulas in northwest Spain show multiple aqueducts that fed water from local rivers to the mine head. The channels may have deteriorated rapidly, or become redundant as the nearby ore was exhausted. Las Medulas shows at least seven such leats, and Dolaucothi at least five. At Dolaucothi, the miners used holding reservoirs as well as hushing tanks, and sluice gates to control flow, as well as drop chutes for diversion of water supplies. The remaining traces (see palimpsest) of such channels allows the mining sequence to be inferred.

A number of other sites fed by several aqueducts have not yet been thoroughly explored or excavated, such as those at Longovicium near Lanchester south of Hadrian's wall, in which the water supplies may have been used to power trip-hammers for forging iron.

At Barbegal in Roman Gaul, a reservoir fed an aqueduct that drove a cascaded series of 15 or 16 overshot water mills, grinding flour for the Arles region. Similar arrangements, though on a lesser scale, have been found in Caesarea, Venafrum and Roman-era Athens. Rome's Aqua Traiana drove a flour-mill at the Janiculum, west of the Tiber. A mill in the basement of the Baths of Caracalla was driven by aqueduct overspill; this was but one of many city mills driven by aqueduct water, with or without official permission. A law of the 5th century forbade the illicit use of aqueduct water for milling.

During the fall of the Roman Empire, some aqueducts were deliberately cut by enemies but more fell into disuse because of deteriorating Roman infrastructure and lack of maintenance, such as the Eifel aqueduct ( pictured right). Observations made by the Spaniard Pedro Tafur, who visited Rome in 1436, reveal misunderstandings of the very nature of the Roman aqueducts:

Through the middle of the city runs a river, which the Romans brought there with great labour and set in their midst, and this is the Tiber. They made a new bed for the river, so it is said, of lead, and channels at one and the other end of the city for its entrances and exits, both for watering horses and for other services convenient to the people, and anyone entering it at any other spot would be drowned.

During the Renaissance, the standing remains of the city's massive masonry aqueducts inspired architects, engineers and their patrons; Pope Nicholas V renovated the main channels of the Roman in 1453. Many aqueducts in Rome's former empire were kept in good repair. The 15th-century rebuilding of an aqueduct at Segovia in Spain shows advances on the Pont du Gard by using fewer arches of greater height, and so greater economy in its use of the raw materials. The skill in building aqueducts was not lost, especially of the smaller, more modest channels used to supply water wheels. Most such mills in Britain were developed in the medieval period for bread production, and used similar methods as that developed by the Romans with leats tapping local rivers and streams.

1. Cited by Quilici, Lorenzo (2008). "Land Transport, Part 1: Roads and Bridges" in ^ Oleson, John Peter (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Engineering and Technology in the Classical World. Oxford University Press. New York. ISBN 978-0-19-518731-1. pp. 551-579 (552).

2. ^ Historical and Archaeological Context Constantinople and the longest Roman aqueduct Accessed August 28, 2016.

3. The Roman general and hydraulic engineer ^ Frontinus later calculated its delivery at 1825 quinariae (75,537 cubic meters) in 24 hours; see Samuel Ball Platner (1929, as completed and revised by Thomas Ashby): A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome. London: Oxford University. p. 29.

4. "At that time the ^ Decemvirs, on consulting the Sibylline Books for another purpose, are said to have discovered that it was not right for the Marcian water, or rather the Anio (for tradition more regularly mentions this) to be brought to the Capitol. The matter is said to have been debated in the Senate, in the consulship of Appius Claudius and Quintus Caecilius, Marcus Lepidus acting as spokesman for the Board of Decemvirs; and three years later the matter is said to have been brought up again by Lucius Lentulus, in the consulship of Gaius Laelius and Quintus Servilius, but on both occasions the influence of Marcius Rex carried the day; and thus the water was brought to the Capitol." Sextus Julius Frontinus, The Aqueducts of Rome, 6-20, [1]

5. The Aqua Alsietina was also known as "Aqua Augusta"; Frontinus distinguishes its "unwholesome" supply from the "sweet waters" of the Aqua Augusta that fed into the Aqua Marcia. On the one hand, he says the Naumachia's supply is "nowhere delivered for consumption by the people... [but the surplus is allowed] to the adjacent gardens and to private users for irrigation". On the other hand, "It is customary, however, in the district across the Tiber, in an emergency, whenever the bridges are undergoing repairs and the water supply is cut off from this side of the river, to draw from Alsietina to maintain the flow of the public fountains." Frontinus, The Aqueducts of Rome 1, 6-20.

6. Taylor, R., Public Needs and Private Pleasures: Water Distribution, the Tiber River and the Urban Development of Ancient Rome, (Studia Archaeologica), L'ERMA di BRETSCHNEIDER, 2000, pp. 56-60

7. ^ Taylor, R. (2012). Rome's Lost Aqueduct. (Cover story). Archaeology, 65(2), 34-40.

8. ^ Delile, Hugo; Blichert-Toft, Janne; Goiran, Jean-Philippe; Keay, Simon; Albarède, Francis (6 May 2014). "Lead in ancient Rome's city waters". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 111 (18): 6594-6599. Bibcode:2014PNAS..111.6594D. doi:10.1073/pnas.1400097111. PMC . PMID 24753588.

9. The sense of ^ venter as "belly" is apparent in Vitruvius 8.6: "if there be long valleys, and when it [the water] arrives at the bottom, let it be carried level by means of a low substruction as great a distance as possible; this is the part called the venter, by the Greeks koilia; when it arrives at the opposite acclivity, the water therein being but slightly swelled on account of the length of the venter, it may be directed upwards... Over the venter long stand pipes should be placed, by means of which, the violence of the air may escape. Thus, those who have to conduct water through leaden pipes, may by these rules, excellently regulate its descent, its circuit, the venter, and the compression of the air."Vitruvius, 8.6.5-6, trans Gwilt

10. Gill N.S. (2007). Aqueducts, Water Supply and Sewers in Ancient Rome. Web. 22 Apr. 2013. ^ http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/aqueducts/p/RomanWater.htm

11. Columella, De Re Rustica, Book 1, English translation at Loeb Classical Library, 1941 ^ [4]

12. Cynthia Bannon, ^ Gardens and Neighbors: Private Water Rights in Roman Italy. University of Michigan Press, 2009, pp. 5−10; citing Hodge, Roman Aqueducts, pp. 246 - 247 for estimate on water consumption by irrigation.

13. Cynthia Bannon, ^ Gardens and Neighbors: Private Water Rights in Roman Italy. University of Michigan Press, 2009, pp. 5−10; citing Hodge, Roman Aqueducts, pp. 246−247 for estimate on water consumption by irrigation; p. 219 for Cato's legislation on misuse of water: the quotation is from Cato's speech against L. Furius Purpureus, who was consul in 196 BC.

14. ^ Wilson, Andrew (2002): "Machines, Power and the Ancient Economy", The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 92, pp. 1-32 (21f.), p. 21f.

15. ^ Lewis, M.J.T., "Millstone and Hammer: the Origins of Water Power", Hull Academic Press, 1998, Section 2.

16. ^ Gross, Hanns (1990). Rome in the Age of Enlightenment: the Post-Tridentine syndrome and the ancien regime. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 28. ISBN 0-521-37211-9.

Blackman, Deane R., Hodge, A. Trevor (2001). "Frontinus' Legacy". University of Michigan Press.

Bossy, G.; G. Fabre, Y. Glard, C. Joseph (2000). "Sur le Fonctionnement d'un Ouvrage de Grande Hydraulique Antique, l'Aqueduc de Nîmes et le Pont du Gard (Languedoc, France)" in Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences de Paris. Sciences de la Terre et des Planètes. Vol. 330, pp. 769-775.

Chanson, H. (2002). "Certains Aspects de la Conception hydraulique des Aqueducs Romains". Journal La Houille Blanche. No. 6/7, pp. 43-57.

Chanson, H. (2008). "The Hydraulics of Roman Aqueducts: What do we know? Why should we learn ?" in Proceedings of World Environmental and Water Resources Congress 2008 Ahupua'a. ASCE-EWRI Education, Research and History Symposium, Hawaii, USA. Invited Keynote lecture, 13-16 May, R.W. Badcock Jr and R. Walton Eds., 16 pages (ISBN 978-0-7844-0976-3)

Coarelli, Filippo (1989). Guida Archeologica di Roma. Milano: Arnoldo Mondadori Editore.

Claridge, Amanda (1998). Rome: An Oxford Archaeological Guide. New York: Oxford University Press.

Fabre, G.; J. L. Fiches, J. L. Paillet (2000). L'Aqueduc de Nîmes et le Pont du Gard. Archéologie, Géosystème, Histoire. CRA Monographies Hors Série. Paris: CNRS Editions.

Gebara, C.; J. M. Michel, J. L. Guendon (2002). "L'Aqueduc Romain de Fréjus. Sa Description, son Histoire et son Environnement", Revue Achéologique de Narbonnaise, Supplément 33. Montpellier, France.

Hodge, A.T. (2001). Roman Aqueducts & Water Supply, 2nd ed. London: Duckworth.

Kamash, Zena (2010). Archaeologies of Water in the Roman Near East. Gorgias Press.

Leveau, P. (1991). "Research on Roman Aqueducts in the Past Ten Years" in T. Hodge (ed.): Future Currents in Aqueduct Studies. Leeds, UK, pp. 149-162.

Lewis, P. R.; G. D. B. Jones (1970). "Roman gold-mining in north-west Spain". Journal of Roman Studies 60 : 169-85.

Lewis, P. R.; G. D. B. Jones (1969). "The Dolaucothi gold mines, I: the surface evidence". The Antiquaries Journal, 49, no. 2: 244-72.

Martínez Jiménez, J. (2019). Aqueducts and Urbanism in post-Roman Hispania. Gorgias Press.

Sánchez López, E. & Martínez Jiménez, J. (2016). Los Acueductos de Hispania: Construcción y Abandono, Madrid .(Text online).

Taylor, R., Public Needs and Private Pleasures: Water Distribution, the Tiber River and the Urban Development of Ancient Rome, (Studia Archaeologica) L'ERMA di BRETSCHNEIDER, 2000.

Tucci, Pier Luigi (2006). "Ideology and technology in Rome's water supply: castella, the toponym AQVEDVCTIVM, and supply to the Palatine and Caelian hill". Journal of Roman Archaeology 19 : 94-120.

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The Romans constructed aqueducts throughout their Republic and later Empire, to bring water from outside sources into cities and towns. Aqueduct water supplied public baths, latrines, fountains, and private households; it also supported mining operations, milling, farms, and gardens.

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Robert Harding Picture Library

The Roman aqueduct was a channel used to transport fresh water to highly populated areas. Aqueducts were amazing feats of engineering given the time period. Though earlier civilizations in Egypt and India also built aqueducts, the Romans improved on the structure and built an extensive and complex network across their territories. Evidence of aqueducts remain in parts of modern-day France, Spain, Greece, North Africa, and Turkey.

Aqueducts required a great deal of planning. They were made from a series of pipes, tunnels, canals, and bridges. Gravity and the natural slope of the land allowed aqueducts to channel water from a freshwater source, such as a lake or spring, to a city. As water flowed into the cities, it was used for drinking, irrigation, and to supply hundreds of public fountains and baths.

Roman aqueduct systems were built over a period of about 500 years, from 312 B.C.E. to C.E. 226. Both public and private funds paid for construction. High-ranking rulers often had them built; the Roman emperors Augustus, Caligula, and Trajan all ordered aqueducts built.

The most recognizable feature of Roman aqueducts may be the bridges constructed using rounded stone arches. Some of these can still be seen today traversing European valleys. However, these bridged structures made up only a small portion of the hundreds of kilometers of aqueducts throughout the empire. The capital in Rome alone had around 11 aqueduct systems supplying freshwater from sources as far as 92 kilometers away (57 miles). Despite their age, some aqueducts still function and provide modern-day Rome with water. The Aqua Virgo, an aqueduct constructed by Agrippa in 19 B.C.E. during Augustus' reign, still supplies water to Rome's famous Trevi Fountain in the heart of the city.

National Geographic Society

October 19, 2023

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The Roman aqueducts supplied fresh, clean water for baths, fountains, and drinking water for ordinary citizens.

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Kids learn about the housing and homes of the people of Ancient Rome including homes in the city, insulae, private homes, typical rooms in a Roman house, villas in the country, and fun facts.

# data[].attributes.wish_content.attachment_props.question
Would you rather shower in Rome or at home.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids learn about the housing and homes of the people of Ancient Rome including homes in the city, insulae, private homes, typical rooms in a Roman house, villas in the country, and fun facts.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids learn about the housing and homes of the people of Ancient Rome including homes in the city, insulae, private homes, typical rooms in a Roman house, villas in the country, and fun facts.

# data[].attributes.wish_content.attachment_props.question
Would you rather drink from a pond or an aqueduct?

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Robert Harding Picture Library

The Roman aqueduct was a channel used to transport fresh water to highly populated areas. Aqueducts were amazing feats of engineering given the time period. Though earlier civilizations in Egypt and India also built aqueducts, the Romans improved on the structure and built an extensive and complex network across their territories. Evidence of aqueducts remain in parts of modern-day France, Spain, Greece, North Africa, and Turkey.

Aqueducts required a great deal of planning. They were made from a series of pipes, tunnels, canals, and bridges. Gravity and the natural slope of the land allowed aqueducts to channel water from a freshwater source, such as a lake or spring, to a city. As water flowed into the cities, it was used for drinking, irrigation, and to supply hundreds of public fountains and baths.

Roman aqueduct systems were built over a period of about 500 years, from 312 B.C.E. to C.E. 226. Both public and private funds paid for construction. High-ranking rulers often had them built; the Roman emperors Augustus, Caligula, and Trajan all ordered aqueducts built.

The most recognizable feature of Roman aqueducts may be the bridges constructed using rounded stone arches. Some of these can still be seen today traversing European valleys. However, these bridged structures made up only a small portion of the hundreds of kilometers of aqueducts throughout the empire. The capital in Rome alone had around 11 aqueduct systems supplying freshwater from sources as far as 92 kilometers away (57 miles). Despite their age, some aqueducts still function and provide modern-day Rome with water. The Aqua Virgo, an aqueduct constructed by Agrippa in 19 B.C.E. during Augustus' reign, still supplies water to Rome's famous Trevi Fountain in the heart of the city.

National Geographic Society

October 19, 2023

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The Roman aqueducts supplied fresh, clean water for baths, fountains, and drinking water for ordinary citizens.

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Would you like to have a Rome bath by your house

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Would you rather shower in Rome or at home.

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The Romans constructed aqueducts throughout their Republic and later Empire, to bring water from outside sources into cities and towns. Aqueduct water supplied public baths, latrines, fountains, and private households; it also supported mining operations, milling, farms, and gardens.

Aqueducts moved water through gravity alone, along a slight overall downward gradient within conduits of stone, brick, or concrete; the steeper the gradient, the faster the flow. Most conduits were buried beneath the ground and followed the contours of the terrain; obstructing peaks were circumvented or, less often, tunneled through. Where valleys or lowlands intervened, the conduit was carried on bridgework, or its contents fed into high-pressure lead, ceramic, or stone pipes and siphoned across. Most aqueduct systems included sedimentation tanks, which helped to reduce any water-borne debris. Sluices and castella aquae (distribution tanks) regulated the supply to individual destinations. In cities and towns, the run-off water from aqueducts scoured the drains and sewers.

Rome's first aqueduct was built in 312 BC, and supplied a water fountain at the city's cattle market. By the 3rd century AD, the city had eleven aqueducts, sustaining a population of over a million in a water-extravagant economy; most of the water supplied the city's many public baths. Cities and towns throughout the Roman Empire emulated this model, and funded aqueducts as objects of public interest and civic pride, "an expensive yet necessary luxury to which all could, and did, aspire".

Most Roman aqueducts proved reliable and durable; some were maintained into the early modern era, and a few are still partly in use. Methods of aqueduct surveying and construction are noted by Vitruvius in his work De architectura (1st century BC). The general Frontinus gives more detail in his official report on the problems, uses and abuses of Imperial Rome's public water supply. Notable examples of aqueduct architecture include the supporting piers of the Aqueduct of Segovia, and the aqueduct-fed cisterns of Constantinople.

Before the development of aqueduct technology, Romans, like most of their contemporaries in the ancient world, relied on local water sources such as springs and streams, supplemented by groundwater from privately or publicly owned wells, and by seasonal rain-water drained from rooftops into storage jars and cisterns. The reliance of ancient communities upon such water resources restricted their potential growth. Rome's aqueducts were not strictly Roman inventions - their engineers would have been familiar with the water-management technologies of Rome's Etruscan and Greek allies - but they proved conspicuously successful. By the early Imperial era, the city's aqueducts supported a population of over a million, and an extravagant water supply for public amenities had become a fundamental part of Roman life. The run-off of aqueduct water scoured the sewers of cities and towns. Water from aqueducts was also used to supply villas, ornamental urban and suburban gardens, market gardens, farms, and agricultural estates, the latter being the core of Rome's economy and wealth.

Hundreds of similar aqueducts were built throughout the Roman Empire. Many of them have since collapsed or been destroyed, but a number of intact portions remain. The Zaghouan Aqueduct is 92.5 km (57.5 mi) in length. It was built in the 2nd century to supply Carthage (in modern Tunisia). Surviving aqueduct bridges include the Pont du Gard in France and the Aqueduct of Segovia in Spain. The longest single conduit, at over 240 km, is associated with the Valens Aqueduct of Constantinople (Mango 1995). "The known system is at least two and half times the length of the longest recorded Roman aqueducts at Carthage and Cologne, but perhaps more significantly it represents one of the most outstanding surveying achievements of any pre-industrial society". Rivalling this in terms of length and possibly equaling or exceeding it in cost and complexity, is the provincial Aqua Augusta that supplied an entire region, which contained at least eight cities, including the major ports at Naples and Misenum; sea voyages by traders and the Roman navy required copious supplies of fresh water.

Rome's aqueducts

Rome had several springs within its perimeter walls but its groundwater was notoriously unpalatable; water from the river Tiber was badly affected by pollution and waterborne diseases. The city's demand for water had probably long exceeded its local supplies by 312 BC, when the city's first aqueduct, the Aqua Appia, was commissioned by the censor Appius Claudius Caecus. The Aqua Appia was one of two major public projects of the time; the other was a military road between Rome and Capua, the first leg of the so-called Appian Way. Both projects had significant strategic value, as the Third Samnite War had been under way for some thirty years by that point. The road allowed rapid troop movements; and by design or fortunate coincidence, most of the Aqua Appia ran within a buried conduit, relatively secure from attack. It was fed by a spring 16.4 km from Rome, and dropped 10 metres over its length to discharge approximately 75,500 cubic metres of water each day into a fountain at Rome's cattle market, the Forum Boarium, one of the city's lowest-lying public spaces.

A second aqueduct, the Aqua Anio Vetus, was commissioned some forty years later, funded by treasures seized from Pyrrhus of Epirus. Its flow was more than twice that of the Aqua Appia, and it entered the city on raised arches, supplying water to higher elevations of the city.

By 145 BC, the city had again outgrown its combined supplies. An official commission found the aqueduct conduits decayed, their water depleted by leakage and illegal tapping. The praetor Quintus Marcius Rex restored them, and introduced a third, "more wholesome" supply, the Aqua Marcia, Rome's longest aqueduct and high enough to supply the Capitoline Hill. The works cost 180,000,000 sesterces, and took two years to complete. As demand grew still further, more aqueducts were built, including the Aqua Tepula in 127 BC and the Aqua Julia in 33 BC. Aqueduct-building programmes reached a peak in the Imperial Era. Augustus' reign saw the building of the Aqua Virgo, and the short Aqua Alsietina that supplied Trastevere with large quantities of non-potable water for its gardens and to create an artificial lake for staged sea-fights to entertain the populace. Another short Augustan aqueduct supplemented the Aqua Marcia with water of "excellent quality". The emperor Caligula added or began two aqueducts completed by his successor Claudius; the 69 km (42.8 mile) Aqua Claudia, which gave good quality water but failed on several occasions; and the Anio Novus, highest of all Rome's aqueducts and one of the most reliable but prone to muddy, discoloured waters, particularly after rain, despite its use of settling tanks.

Most of Rome's aqueducts drew on various springs in the valley and highlands of the Anio, the modern river Aniene, east of the Tiber. A complex system of aqueduct junctions, tributary feeds and distribution tanks supplied every part of the city. Trastevere, the city region west of the Tiber, was primarily served by extensions of several of the city's eastern aqueducts, carried across the river by lead pipes buried in the roadbed of the river bridges, thus forming an inverted siphon. Whenever this cross-river supply had to be shut down for routine repair and maintenance works, the "positively unwholesome" waters of the Aqua Alsietina were used to supply Trastevere's public fountains. The situation was finally ameliorated when the emperor Trajan built the Aqua Traiana in 109 AD, bringing clean water directly to Trastavere from aquifers around Lake Bracciano.

By the late 3rd century AD, the city was supplied with water by 11 state-funded aqueducts. Their combined conduit length is estimated between 780 and a little over 800 kilometres, of which approximately 47 km (29 mi) were carried above ground level, on masonry supports. They supplied around 1 million cubic metres (300 million gallons) a day: a capacity 126% of the current[when? ] water supply of the city of Bangalore,[citation needed ] which has a population of 10 million.

312 BC Aqua Appia, Rome's first aqueduct is built by Appius Claudius Caecus, the aqueduct is nearly all underground.

272 BC Aqua Anio Vetus

144 BC Aqua Marcia, 90 km (56 miles) in length, construction starts.

33 BC Aqua Julia is built by Octavian (Emperor Augustus)

19 BC Aqua Virgo is built to supply the thermal baths in the Campus Martius.

38-52 AD Aqua Claudia built

109 AD Aqua Traiana brings water from Lake Bracciano to supply Rome's suburbs, now called Trastevere.

Planning, surveying and construction

Whether state-funded or privately built, aqueducts were protected and regulated by law. Any proposed aqueduct had to be submitted to the scrutiny of civil authorities. Permission (from the senate or local authorities) was granted only if the proposal respected the water rights of other citizens; on the whole, Roman communities took care to allocate shared water resources according to need. The land on which a state-funded aqueduct was built might be state land (ager publicus) or privately owned, but in either case was subject to restrictions on usage and encroachment that might damage the fabric of the aqueduct. To this end, state funded aqueducts reserved a wide corridor of land, up to 15 feet each side of the aqueduct's outer fabric. Ploughing, planting and building were prohibited within this boundary. Such regulation was necessary to the aqueduct's long-term integrity and maintenance but was not always readily accepted or easily enforced at a local level, particularly when ager publicus was understood to be common property. Some privately built or smaller municipal aqueducts may have required less stringent and formal arrangements.

Springs were by far the most common sources for aqueduct water; for example, most of Rome's supply came from various springs in the Anio valley and its uplands. Spring-water was fed into a stone or concrete springhouse, then entered the aqueduct conduit. Scattered springs would require several branch conduits feeding into a main channel. Some systems drew water from open, purpose-built, dammed reservoirs, such as the two (still in use) that supplied the aqueduct at the provincial city of Emerita Augusta.

The territory over which the aqueduct ran had to be carefully surveyed to ensure the water would flow at an acceptable gradient for the entire distance. Roman engineers used various surveying tools to plot the course of aqueducts across the landscape. They checked horizontal levels with a chorobates, a flatbedded wooden frame fitted with a water level. They plotted courses and angles could be plotted and checked using a , a relatively simple apparatus that was probably displaced by the more sophisticated dioptra, precursor of the modern theodolite. In Book 8 of his De architectura, Vitruvius describes the need to ensure a constant supply, methods of prospecting, and tests for potable water.

Greek and Roman physicians knew the association between stagnant or tainted waters and water-borne disease. They also knew the adverse health effects of lead on those who mined and processed it, and for this reason, ceramic pipes were preferred over lead. Where lead pipes were used, a continuous water-flow and the inevitable deposition of water-borne minerals within the pipes somewhat reduced the water's contamination by soluble lead. Nevertheless, the level of lead in this water was 100 times higher than in local spring waters.

Most Roman aqueducts were flat-bottomed, arch-section conduits that ran 0.5 to 1 m beneath the ground surface, with inspection-and-access covers at regular intervals. Conduits above ground level were usually slab-topped. Early conduits were ashlar-built but from around the late Republican era, brick-faced concrete was often used instead. The concrete used for conduit linings was usually waterproof. The flow of water depended on gravity alone. The volume of water transported within the conduit depended on the catchment hydrology - rainfall, absorption, and runoff - the cross section of the conduit, and its gradient; most conduits ran about two-thirds full. The conduit's cross section was also determined by maintenance requirements; workmen must be able to enter and access the whole, with minimal disruption to its fabric.

Vitruvius recommends a low gradient of not less than 1 in 4800 for the channel, presumably to prevent damage to the structure through erosion and water pressure. This value agrees well with the measured gradients of surviving masonry aqueducts. The gradient of the Pont du Gard is only 34 cm per km, descending only 17 m vertically in its entire length of 50 km (31 mi): it could transport up to 20,000 cubic metres a day. The gradients of temporary aqueducts used for hydraulic mining could be considerably greater, as at Dolaucothi in Wales (with a maximum gradient of about 1:700) and Las Medulas in northern Spain. Where sharp gradients were unavoidable in permanent conduits, the channel could be stepped downwards, widened or discharged into a receiving tank to disperse the flow of water and reduce its abrasive force. The use of stepped cascades and drops also helped re-oxygenate and thus "freshen" the water.

Some aqueduct conduits were supported across valleys or hollows on arches of masonry, brick or concrete; the Pont du Gard, one of the most impressive surviving examples of a massive masonry multiple-piered conduit, spanned the Gardon river-valley some 48.8 m (160 ft) above the Gardon itself. Where particularly deep or lengthy depressions had to be crossed, inverted siphons could be used, instead of arched supports; the conduit fed water into a header tank, which fed it into pipes. The pipes crossed the valley at lower level, supported by a low "venter" bridge, then rose to a receiving tank at a slightly lower elevation. This discharged into another conduit; the overall gradient was maintained. Siphon pipes were usually made of soldered lead, sometimes reinforced by concrete encasements or stone sleeves.

Less often, the pipes themselves were stone or ceramic, jointed as male-female and sealed with lead. Vitruvius describes the construction of siphons and the problems of blockage, blow-outs and venting at their lowest levels, where the pressures were greatest. Nonetheless, siphons were versatile and effective if well-built and well-maintained. A horizontal section of high-pressure siphon tubing in the Aqueduct of the Gier was ramped up on bridgework to clear a navigable river, using nine lead pipes in parallel, cased in concrete. Modern hydraulic engineers use similar techniques to enable sewers and water pipes to cross depressions. At Arles, a minor branch of the main aqueduct supplied a local suburb via a lead siphon whose "belly" was laid across a riverbed, eliminating any need for supporting bridgework.

Roman aqueducts required a comprehensive system of regular maintenance. The "clear corridors" created to protect the fabric of underground and overground conduits were regularly patrolled for unlawful ploughing, planting, roadways and buildings. In De aquaeductu, Frontinus describes the penetration of conduits by tree-roots as particularly damaging. The aqueducts conduits would have been regularly inspected and maintained by working patrols, to reduce algal fouling, repair accidental breaches, to clear the conduits of gravel and other loose debris, and to remove channel-narrowing accretions of calcium carbonate in systems fed by hard water sources. Inspection and access points were provided at regular intervals on the standard, buried conduits. Accretions within syphons could drastically reduce flow rates, due to the already narrow diameter of their pipes. Some had sealed openings that might have been used as rodding eyes, possibly using a pull-through device. In Rome, where a hard-water supply was the norm, main pipework was shallowly buried beneath road kerbs, for ease of access; the accumulation of calcium carbonate in these pipes would have necessitated their frequent replacement.

The aqueducts were under the overall care and governance of a water commissioner ( curator aquarum). It was a high status, high-profile appointment. In 97, Frontinus served both as consul and as curator aquarum, under the emperor Nerva. Little is known of the day-to-day business of aqueduct maintenance teams ( aquarii). Under the emperor Claudius, Rome's contingent of imperial aquarii comprised a familia aquarum of 700 people both slave and free, funded through a combination of Imperial largesse and water taxes. They were supervised by an Imperial freedman, who held office as procurator aquarium. Theirs was probably a never-ending routine of patrol, inspection and cleaning, punctuated by occasional emergencies. Full closure of any aqueduct for servicing would have been a rare event, kept as brief as possible, with repairs preferably made when water demand was lowest, which was presumably at night. The water supply could be shut off at its aqueduct outlet when small or local repairs were needed, but substantial maintenance and repairs to the aqueduct conduit itself required the complete diversion of water at any point upstream or at the spring-head itself.

Aqueduct mains could be directly tapped, but they more usually fed into public distribution terminals, known as castellum aquae, which supplied various branches and spurs, usually via large-bore lead or ceramic pipes. Thereafter, the supply could be further subdivided. Licensed, fee-paying private users would have been registered, along with the bore of pipe that led from the public water supply to their private property - the wider the pipe, the greater the flow and the higher the fee. Tampering and fraud to avoid or reduce payment were commonplace; methods included the fitting of unlicensed outlets, additional outlets, and the illegal widening of lead pipes; any of which might involve the bribery or connivance of unscrupulous aqueduct officials or workers. Official lead pipes carried inscriptions with information on the pipe's manufacturer, its fitter, and probably on its subscriber and their entitlement. During the Imperial era, lead production became an Imperial monopoly, and the granting of rights to draw water for private use from state-funded aqueducts was made an imperial privilege.

Rome's first aqueduct (312 BC) discharged at very low pressure and at a more-or-less constant rate in the city's main trading centre and cattle-market, probably into a low-level, cascaded series of troughs or basins; the upper for household use, the lower for watering the livestock traded there. Most Romans would have filled buckets and storage jars at the basins and carried the water to their apartments; the better-off would have sent slaves to perform the same task. The outlet's elevation was too low to offer any city household or building a direct supply; the overflow drained into Rome's main sewer, and from there into the Tiber. At this time, Rome had no public baths. The first were probably built in the next century, based on precursors in neighboring Campania; a limited number of private baths and small, street-corner public baths would have had a private water supply, but once aqueduct water was brought to the city's higher elevations, large and well-appointed public baths were built throughout the city, and drinking water was delivered to public fountains at high pressure. Public baths and fountains became distinctive features of Roman civilization, and the baths in particular became important social centres.

The majority of urban Romans lived in multi-storeyed blocks of flats (). Some blocks offered water services, but only to tenants on the more expensive, lower floors; the rest would have drawn their water gratis from public fountains.

Between 65 and 90% of the Roman Empire's population was involved in some form of agricultural work. Farmers whose villas or estates were near a public aqueduct could draw, under license, a specified quantity of aqueduct water for summer irrigation at a predetermined time; this was intended to limit the depletion of water supply to users further down the gradient, and help ensure a fair distribution among competitors at the time when water was most needed and scarce. Water was possibly the most important variable in the agricultural economy of the Mediterranean world. Roman Italy's natural water sources - springs, streams, rivers and lakes - were unevenly distributed across the landscape, and water tended to scarcity when most needed, during the warm, dry summer growing season. Columella recommends that any farm should contain a spring, stream or river; but acknowledges that not every farm did.

Farmland without a reliable summer water-source was virtually worthless. During the growing season, the water demand of a "modest local" irrigation system might consume as much water as the city of Rome; and the livestock whose manure fertilised the fields must be fed and watered all year round. At least some Roman landowners and farmers relied in part or whole on aqueduct water to raise crops as their primary or sole source of income but the fraction of aqueduct water involved can only be guessed at. More certainly, the creation of municipal and city aqueducts brought a growth in the intensive and efficient suburban market-farming of fragile, perishable commodities such as flowers (for perfumes, and for festival garlands), grapes, vegetables and orchard fruits; and of small livestock such as pigs and chickens, close to the municipal and urban markets.

A licensed right to aqueduct water on farmland could lead to increased productivity, a cash income through the sale of surplus foodstuffs, and an increase in the value of the land itself. In the countryside, permissions to draw aqueduct water for irrigation were particularly hard to get; the exercise and abuse of such rights were subject to various known legal disputes and judgements, and at least one political campaign; in the early 2nd century BC Cato tried to block all unlawful rural outlets, especially those owned by the landed elite - "Look how much he bought the land for, where he is channeling the water!" - during his censorship. His attempted reform proved impermanent at best. Though illegal tapping could be punished by seizure of assets, including the illegally watered land and its produce, this law seems never to have been used, and was probably impracticable; food surpluses kept prices low. Grain shortages in particular could lead to famine and social unrest. Any practical solution must strike a balance between the water-needs of urban populations and grain producers, tax the latter's profits, and secure sufficient grain at reasonable cost for the Roman poor ( the so-called "corn dole") and the army. Rather than seek to impose unproductive and probably unenforcable bans, the authorities issued individual water grants (though seldom in rural areas) and licenses, and regulated water outlets, with variable success. In the 1st century AD, Pliny the Elder, like Cato, could fulminate against grain producers who continued to wax fat on profits from public water and public land.

Some landholders avoided such restrictions and entanglements by buying water access rights to distant springs, not necessarily on their own land. A few, of high wealth and status, built their own aqueducts to transport such water from source to field or villa; Mumius Niger Valerius Vegetus bought the rights to a spring and its water from his neighbour, and access rights to a corridor of intervening land, then built an aqueduct of just under 10 kilometres, connecting the springhead to his own villa. The senatorial permission for this "Aqua Vegetiana" was given only when the project seemed not to impinge on the water rights of other citizens.

Some aqueducts supplied water to industrial sites, usually via an open channel cut into the ground, clay lined or wood-shuttered to reduce water loss. Most such leats were designed to operate at the steep gradients that could deliver the high water volumes needed in mining operations. Water was used in hydraulic mining to strip the overburden and expose the ore by hushing, to fracture and wash away metal-bearing rock already heated and weakened by fire-setting, and to power water-wheel driven stamps and trip-hammers that crushed ore for processing. Evidence of such leats and machines has been found at Dolaucothi in south-west Wales.

Mining sites such as Dolaucothi and Las Medulas in northwest Spain show multiple aqueducts that fed water from local rivers to the mine head. The channels may have deteriorated rapidly, or become redundant as the nearby ore was exhausted. Las Medulas shows at least seven such leats, and Dolaucothi at least five. At Dolaucothi, the miners used holding reservoirs as well as hushing tanks, and sluice gates to control flow, as well as drop chutes for diversion of water supplies. The remaining traces (see palimpsest) of such channels allows the mining sequence to be inferred.

A number of other sites fed by several aqueducts have not yet been thoroughly explored or excavated, such as those at Longovicium near Lanchester south of Hadrian's wall, in which the water supplies may have been used to power trip-hammers for forging iron.

At Barbegal in Roman Gaul, a reservoir fed an aqueduct that drove a cascaded series of 15 or 16 overshot water mills, grinding flour for the Arles region. Similar arrangements, though on a lesser scale, have been found in Caesarea, Venafrum and Roman-era Athens. Rome's Aqua Traiana drove a flour-mill at the Janiculum, west of the Tiber. A mill in the basement of the Baths of Caracalla was driven by aqueduct overspill; this was but one of many city mills driven by aqueduct water, with or without official permission. A law of the 5th century forbade the illicit use of aqueduct water for milling.

During the fall of the Roman Empire, some aqueducts were deliberately cut by enemies but more fell into disuse because of deteriorating Roman infrastructure and lack of maintenance, such as the Eifel aqueduct ( pictured right). Observations made by the Spaniard Pedro Tafur, who visited Rome in 1436, reveal misunderstandings of the very nature of the Roman aqueducts:

Through the middle of the city runs a river, which the Romans brought there with great labour and set in their midst, and this is the Tiber. They made a new bed for the river, so it is said, of lead, and channels at one and the other end of the city for its entrances and exits, both for watering horses and for other services convenient to the people, and anyone entering it at any other spot would be drowned.

During the Renaissance, the standing remains of the city's massive masonry aqueducts inspired architects, engineers and their patrons; Pope Nicholas V renovated the main channels of the Roman in 1453. Many aqueducts in Rome's former empire were kept in good repair. The 15th-century rebuilding of an aqueduct at Segovia in Spain shows advances on the Pont du Gard by using fewer arches of greater height, and so greater economy in its use of the raw materials. The skill in building aqueducts was not lost, especially of the smaller, more modest channels used to supply water wheels. Most such mills in Britain were developed in the medieval period for bread production, and used similar methods as that developed by the Romans with leats tapping local rivers and streams.

1. Cited by Quilici, Lorenzo (2008). "Land Transport, Part 1: Roads and Bridges" in ^ Oleson, John Peter (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Engineering and Technology in the Classical World. Oxford University Press. New York. ISBN 978-0-19-518731-1. pp. 551-579 (552).

2. ^ Historical and Archaeological Context Constantinople and the longest Roman aqueduct Accessed August 28, 2016.

3. The Roman general and hydraulic engineer ^ Frontinus later calculated its delivery at 1825 quinariae (75,537 cubic meters) in 24 hours; see Samuel Ball Platner (1929, as completed and revised by Thomas Ashby): A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome. London: Oxford University. p. 29.

4. "At that time the ^ Decemvirs, on consulting the Sibylline Books for another purpose, are said to have discovered that it was not right for the Marcian water, or rather the Anio (for tradition more regularly mentions this) to be brought to the Capitol. The matter is said to have been debated in the Senate, in the consulship of Appius Claudius and Quintus Caecilius, Marcus Lepidus acting as spokesman for the Board of Decemvirs; and three years later the matter is said to have been brought up again by Lucius Lentulus, in the consulship of Gaius Laelius and Quintus Servilius, but on both occasions the influence of Marcius Rex carried the day; and thus the water was brought to the Capitol." Sextus Julius Frontinus, The Aqueducts of Rome, 6-20, [1]

5. The Aqua Alsietina was also known as "Aqua Augusta"; Frontinus distinguishes its "unwholesome" supply from the "sweet waters" of the Aqua Augusta that fed into the Aqua Marcia. On the one hand, he says the Naumachia's supply is "nowhere delivered for consumption by the people... [but the surplus is allowed] to the adjacent gardens and to private users for irrigation". On the other hand, "It is customary, however, in the district across the Tiber, in an emergency, whenever the bridges are undergoing repairs and the water supply is cut off from this side of the river, to draw from Alsietina to maintain the flow of the public fountains." Frontinus, The Aqueducts of Rome 1, 6-20.

6. Taylor, R., Public Needs and Private Pleasures: Water Distribution, the Tiber River and the Urban Development of Ancient Rome, (Studia Archaeologica), L'ERMA di BRETSCHNEIDER, 2000, pp. 56-60

7. ^ Taylor, R. (2012). Rome's Lost Aqueduct. (Cover story). Archaeology, 65(2), 34-40.

8. ^ Delile, Hugo; Blichert-Toft, Janne; Goiran, Jean-Philippe; Keay, Simon; Albarède, Francis (6 May 2014). "Lead in ancient Rome's city waters". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 111 (18): 6594-6599. Bibcode:2014PNAS..111.6594D. doi:10.1073/pnas.1400097111. PMC . PMID 24753588.

9. The sense of ^ venter as "belly" is apparent in Vitruvius 8.6: "if there be long valleys, and when it [the water] arrives at the bottom, let it be carried level by means of a low substruction as great a distance as possible; this is the part called the venter, by the Greeks koilia; when it arrives at the opposite acclivity, the water therein being but slightly swelled on account of the length of the venter, it may be directed upwards... Over the venter long stand pipes should be placed, by means of which, the violence of the air may escape. Thus, those who have to conduct water through leaden pipes, may by these rules, excellently regulate its descent, its circuit, the venter, and the compression of the air."Vitruvius, 8.6.5-6, trans Gwilt

10. Gill N.S. (2007). Aqueducts, Water Supply and Sewers in Ancient Rome. Web. 22 Apr. 2013. ^ http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/aqueducts/p/RomanWater.htm

11. Columella, De Re Rustica, Book 1, English translation at Loeb Classical Library, 1941 ^ [4]

12. Cynthia Bannon, ^ Gardens and Neighbors: Private Water Rights in Roman Italy. University of Michigan Press, 2009, pp. 5−10; citing Hodge, Roman Aqueducts, pp. 246 - 247 for estimate on water consumption by irrigation.

13. Cynthia Bannon, ^ Gardens and Neighbors: Private Water Rights in Roman Italy. University of Michigan Press, 2009, pp. 5−10; citing Hodge, Roman Aqueducts, pp. 246−247 for estimate on water consumption by irrigation; p. 219 for Cato's legislation on misuse of water: the quotation is from Cato's speech against L. Furius Purpureus, who was consul in 196 BC.

14. ^ Wilson, Andrew (2002): "Machines, Power and the Ancient Economy", The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 92, pp. 1-32 (21f.), p. 21f.

15. ^ Lewis, M.J.T., "Millstone and Hammer: the Origins of Water Power", Hull Academic Press, 1998, Section 2.

16. ^ Gross, Hanns (1990). Rome in the Age of Enlightenment: the Post-Tridentine syndrome and the ancien regime. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 28. ISBN 0-521-37211-9.

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The Romans constructed aqueducts throughout their Republic and later Empire, to bring water from outside sources into cities and towns. Aqueduct water supplied public baths, latrines, fountains, and private households; it also supported mining operations, milling, farms, and gardens.

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Kids learn about the housing and homes of the people of Ancient Rome including homes in the city, insulae, private homes, typical rooms in a Roman house, villas in the country, and fun facts.

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2,000 years of history are waiting for you to discover and explore.

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The official website for the Roman Baths museum, 2,000 years of history are waiting for you to discover and explore.

# data[].attributes.wish_content.attachment_props.question
Would you rather shower in Rome or at home.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids learn about the housing and homes of the people of Ancient Rome including homes in the city, insulae, private homes, typical rooms in a Roman house, villas in the country, and fun facts.

# data[].attributes.wish_content.attachment_props.question
Would you like to have a Rome bath by your house

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.

# data[].attributes.wish_content.attachment_props.question
Do you think Roman builders influenced modern day builders.

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Roman houses were of several types. Those in Rome were of at least three different types.

Ordinary people lived in apartment blocks called Insulae, a kind of apartment building. It housed most people of lower- or middle-class status (the plebs). The wealthiest from the upper-middle class (the equites) had their own homes.

Insulae were of poor quality, but they did have running water and sanitation. Rooms could be owned or rented. They were built in timber, mud brick, and later primitive concrete. They were restricted in height to about 20 metres.

Fires and collapses happened. Among his many business interests, Marcus Licinius Crassus speculated in real estate and owned numerous insulae in the city. When one collapsed from poor construction, Cicero said that Crassus was happy that he could charge higher rents for a new building than the collapsed one.

Houses of the rich and upper classes were lavish. The atrium was the most important part of the house. It was where guests were greeted. The atrium was open in the centre, surrounded at least in part by porticoes with high ceilings, that often contained only a little furniture to give the effect of a large space. In the centre was a square roof opening in which rainwater could come, draining inwards from the slanted tiled roof. There were kitchens, bedrooms, a dining room, and a number of open rooms.

The master's office was placed so that the master could see what others were doing. The domus was not just a house; it was a place of business as well.

Servants would use a servants' entrance, not the main entrance. Slaves could not leave the house without permission of the master.

A Roman villa was a Roman country house built for the upper classes. There were two kinds of villas. The villa urbana, was a country seat in easy reach of Rome (or another city). The villa rustica was a farm-house estate, like the later English country house. It was occupied by servants who ran the estate.

In the Empire, there was a concentration of Imperial villas near the Gulf of Naples, on the Isle of Capri, at Monte Circeo on the coast and at Antium (Anzio). Wealthy Romans escaped the summer heat in the hills round Rome, especially around Frascati (such as Hadrian's Villa). Cicero had at least seven villas. The oldest of these was near Arpinum, which he inherited. Pliny the Younger had three or four, of which the example near Laurentium is the best known from his descriptions.

Large villas were important to the Roman economy. They dominated the Po valley, Campania, and Sicily, and were also found in Gaul. Villas were centres of mining, pottery, or horse raising. Villas specializing in shipping olive oil to Roman legions in Germany were a feature of the southern Iberian province of Hispania Baetica. Some luxurious villas have been excavated in North Africa in Africa Province and Numidia, or Fishbourne Palace in Britannia.

Images for kids

A late 19th-century artist's reimagining of an atrium in a Pompeian domus

The exterior of the domus depicting the entrance with ostium

House of Augustus, Palatine Hill, Rome

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Roman houses were of several types. Those in Rome were of at least three different types. Ordinary people lived in apartment blocks called Insulae, a kind of apartment building. It housed most people of lower- or middle-class status (the plebs). The wealthiest from the upper-middle class (the equites) had their own homes.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Kids learn about the baths of Ancient Rome including getting clean, socializing, a typical Roman bath, who went to the baths, why there were public baths, and where the water came from.