aqueducts: Founded in Rome, aqueducts are waterways that carry water throughout the city. The first aqueduct was built in 312 BCE. To accomodate for the large population, aqueducts were built to channel clean water to people. Republic: The Roman republic was a great influence on the republican government system. It led to other governments electing their leaders that were responsible for the citizens. Concrete: The Romans invented concrete, a strong and light building material. The Colosseum was built with thousands of tons of concrete, and it is still a popular monument today, enduring milleniums. Concrete is seen as a revolution to comtempary architecture because it is used worldwide today. Welfare program: Although it wasn't called welfare
The Roman Republic can be seen as a template for how the United States Government was formed, and still to this day consists of. The First influence that the Romans had on our government was their idea for a republic. They, our country as well, wanted their people to have a vote on who would represent them in government. The U.S. representative type of government was influenced by this. Today we vote for the people representing us in our Senate, House of Representatives, and our President. One of the main influences that the Ancient Romans had on the U.S. Government was the idea of the division of power. Today we have executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. The Ancient Romans had a very similar set-up. In Rome when organizing a government, there were many different styles between monarchies, the Senate that was the aristocracy, and the voice of democracy in the people. These acted as their different branches of government. As the U.S Government has an executive branch which consists of our President and Vice President, the Romans had counsels which acted as executive leaders for a year, and controlled the military (“The Roman Republic”). The Ancient Romans also obtained a Senate, similar to our government. In Rome, it was 300 members of the wealthy and self-serving. Today, there are career senators, and elite men in society. This is the legislative branch of our government that has been derived from the Ancient Romans. Also within the legislative branch of the Romans, they had numerous assemblies like that of the U.S. Government’s House of Representatives, based on where each member lives. Our judicial branch was based off of the Roman’s Praeto...
The Romans also saw a need for well-planned cities. They used the same basic layout as they would for an army encampment. Water would flow into a cistern through the aqueducts to be dispersed in the cities plumbing. The cities were laid out in small sections, each section having its own fountain. The wealthy citizens would have also had hot and cold running water. The Romans also made sure that the streets could accommodate heavy traffic. By allowing for extra traffic the Roman army could move through a city more easily and it allowed for future expansion.
This is because, before the significant innovation of Hydraulic cement-based concrete, clean water and sewerage were contained in nothing but a, “channel lined with stone, closed on top with … flat slabs and then covered over with earth.” At first, this system was thought to work very well and help with the health of the Roman empire. However, soon these early aqueduct structures began to collapse. Due to these aqueducts not being checked daily and no one knowing about what had happened, the Romans kept using these aqueducts. However, because these early aqueducts had collapsed, many bacteria could invade the water supply and Rome’s enemies were able to deliberately poison the water. However, on top of all this, one of the worst impacts that broken aqueducts caused was severe lead-poisoning. This was because many of the early aqueduct pipes were made from lead, and without these pipes being supported, they simply fell. Due to Rome’s water supply already being quite high in lead, the fallen lead pipes proved to be too much, causing much of Rome to become severely sick. Lead-poisoning from fallen aqueducts in Rome caused over, “30 000 residents to die each year.” However, if these early aqueducts were to have been reinforced with concrete, like all of the later
The Romans also excelled in the highly practical art, architecture. The Romans were the first people in antiquity to use concrete on a massive scale. By using concrete in their new architectural designs, the Romans were able to construct huge buildings, bigger than the Greeks ever could have dreamed of.
While the Roman Republic government was beneficial to all parties involved, it was most beneficial to the upper class and elite patricians. They had the most say in matters, as they held the highest seats in government offices, while the plebeians, at the beginning were forbidden to hold any seat in government. Though they were able to vote their public office officials, they had little say over anything else, until they decided that enough was enough and eventually formed their own assemblies and tribunes, writing their own laws and allowing for intermarriage and eventual plebian placement in the consulship. (The Roman Republic p. 119)
The Roman Republic began approximately around 509 B.C. when the nobles drove the King and his family out of Rome. This monumental incident helped shape the start to the transformation of the monarchy into a republican governmental system. This is known to have begun by that of the Roman nobles trying to hold their power that they had gained. The Republic was “[a] city-state [which] was the foundation of Greek society in the Hellenic Age; in the Hellenistic Age, Greek cities became subordinate to kingdoms, larder political units ruled by autocratic monarchs” (Perry 105)
The Colosseum is one of the most well-known structures in Rome, Italy. The Colosseum was built almost two thousand years ago to host games for gladiators. The Colosseum provided for entertainment for the Romans, a form of punishment for those who did not obey the laws, and a place of great architectural beauty.
it is thus clear to us as to why the Romans, as Thomas Wiedemann says,
They were made for transportation of water throughout different places. The oldest and simplest aqueducts were made of sections of inverted clay tiles or, sometimes, pipes which directed water through short distances. The earliest civilization to invent aqueducts was the Minoans who built them on Crete. They built the Aqua Appia, which was built in 312 B.C. and was the first aqueduct to serve Rome. A great innovation which helped the aqueducts cross valleys in Rome was the siphon. The Romans were great engineers and architects, which later mastered all types of ways to build aqueducts on rough terrain. Now these structures are a common sight throughout most of
Significance: It was a long lasting material, as some building made from this concrete is still standing today. Without it, the aqueduct system wouldn’t be there and the Roman population would be decreasing,
Most historians believe the Etruscans constructed arches before the ancient Romans, but the Romans were the first to use them extensively. The arch integration into building designs allowed the Romans to build massive buildings due to the increased strength and support capabilities of these structures. Additionally, the arch design in aqueducts permitted the Romans to move the immense amount of water into the city of Rome which was essential for the cities to thrive due the growing population demands of water. According to Cartwright, M (2013) “These sometimes massive structures, with single, double, or triple tiers of arches, were designed to carry fresh water to urban centers from sources sometimes many kilometers away. The earliest in Rome was the Aqua Appia (312 BCE), but the most impressive example is undoubtedly the Pont du Gard near Nimes (c. 14
The person who built the aqueduct in ancient Rome was Appius Claudius Coicus. The purpose of the building was to convey water. The water flowed from the river to the city. It was the easiest way of getting water back then. They had no filters or any type of treatment for the water. That was the reason the water aqueducts were made for.
Opus caementicium or Roman concrete is a synthetic construction substance that’s composed of an aggregate, a binding agent, and water. In Rome’s case, as discovered by UC Berkley with the extensive analysis of a sample of Roman concrete taken from a breakwater in Italy’s Pozzuoli Bay it was developed by using lime and volcanic rock which formed a mortar, the mortar and volcanic rock were then packed into wooden forms and when seawater was added a chemical reaction occurred, bonding everything together to create concrete (History, 2013). It is uncertain when Roman concrete was developed, but it was clearly in widespread and customary use from about 150 BC; some scholars believe it was developed a century before that.
Aqueducts brought clean water to the people of rome. Ancient masters of engineering and aqueduct builders created a vast network of pipes channels and bridges to bring water to rome. This evidence shows that public works project were the greatest of the roman contributions because it explains that aqueducts were an important part of roman society.
The city of Rome had a big population, and it needed a working water system. So the people of rome built an aqueduct that was 43 miles long, and the water had came from the surrounding highlands. They were made up of a combination of pipes that were underground. The water provided many things for the roman, from roman baths, water fountains, and only a few wealthy homes in the area. The aqueducts had to be on a slope so that the water could flow much easier into the city of Rome, and it had ended on the top of the seventh hill. Most of the roman towns had at least one aqueduct to provide fresh water.