Roman Engineering Research Articles

A Classical Modernization of the V‐Model

AbstractThis paper provides new iconography for the Systems Engineering “V‐Model” or “Vee‐Model.” The “Arch Model” resets and refreshes the original iterative intent of the “V‐Model” in a modern context integrated with digital engineering (DE). We will highlight common misperceptions that reduced the efficacy of the “V‐Model” and explore how a “classical Roman engineering” metaphor can inspire a modern view of systems development based on historically successful, foundational engineering.

Structural Health Monitoring of the Roman bridge S. Angelo on the Savuto river (Scigliano, Italy), by integration of a new sensor and geomatic techniques

The Roman Bridge of S. Angelo, located along the road that connected Capua to Reggio Calabria (Via ab Regio ad Capuam), constitutes an important remain of Roman engineering works and is the best-preserved bridge along the road itself. Located in the middle valley of the Savuto river, this bridge is currently subject to structural monitoring by using various integrated techniques. The monitoring is carried out as part of a series of initiatives aimed at gaining in-depth knowledge and safeguarding a series of historic buildings in the same area. A new type of sensor, characterized by features not offered at the same time by those currently on the market, has been developed to aid structural and environmental monitoring. Previous surveys had been carried out with geomatic techniques; one of the products of these surveys is a 3D model of the bridge, used as input to carry out a Finite Element Modeling (FEM) analysis. The results of this FEM analysis will be compared with those obtained by the measurements carried out with the new sensor. The monitoring campaign, which has just begun, and the expected results are described and commented on. The main results obtained to date are the model of the bridge, a structural analysis and the settlements that have occurred over time as well as the creation of the new sensor.

Hydraulic Approach into Olden Agricultural Aqueducts at the Mexican Region of Zacatecas

Civilizations have been able to bloom because of the way they have been historically associated with water resources, especially in seeking strategies to ensure a supply to diverse sectors that require them. Thus, challenges in satisfying water demand are shaped by the particular epoch and geographical area. In this sense, Roman engineering represents a new view of waterworks construction. Above all, it concerns building arched structures to convey water from supply sources to cities; even the hydraulic technology developed by Romans would transcend beyond the time this empire ruled the world. Consequently, this paper shows a brief outlook of some hydraulic systems in Asia, Europe and America settled thousands of years ago. Additionally, a historiographic approach is made for several aqueducts built within the limits that currently constitute the state of Zacatecas during colonial times and independent Mexico in order to evaluate their transcendence for mining, agriculture, and cattle. In addition to the allusion to historical context, the main goal has been to evaluate the hydraulic design of eight olden aqueducts based on current engineering approaches, with the purpose of typifying coincidences between constructive procedures inherited from Roman culture and those used by Spanish conquerors to erect similar civil works in this region.

Sustainable abstraction of karst water spring for two Roman cities in Croatia

This paper presents a reconstruction of two ancient water intake facilities at the Jadro spring in Croatia. The Jadro spring was the water source for Salona, the capital of the Roman province of Dalmatia, and Emperor Diocletian’s Palace. The water supply system of Salona functioned from the first century BC to the seventh century AD, while Diocletian’s operated from the fourth to seventh centuries AD. The engineering approach of the abstraction facilities is reconstructed based on analysis of the physical characteristics of the spring and Roman engineering practices. The simple, flexible and robust water intake solutions that were applied functioned in a satisfactory way over a long period that included significant climate changes. This confirms the reliability and resilience of water abstraction from karst springs. A solution similar to the Tyrolean weir, a bottom intake system was integrated into the physical system, enabling the sustainability of the water supply. This solution is a fine example of a water intake structure at a karst spring that could be applied today to solve the problems caused by development and post-industrial climate change.

Recent Developments in Aqueduct Research

The engineering spirit of antiquity is marked by astonishing pragmatism. The results of the measurement of elevations, angles, and distances in the construction of aqueducts, for example, show a precision that amazes us even today. With simple surveying instruments, the ancients achieved an accuracy that would satisfy even modern requirements. Intensive research over the past decades has led to the reconstruction and to an understanding of the handling of the chorobates and the groma, two surveying instruments mentioned in ancient sources. The results permit only one possible verdict on Roman engineering: simple and ingenious—simply genius.

PUTTING ROMAN DAMS IN CONTEXT: A VIRTUAL APPROACH

Abstract. Water resources and management have become a critical global issue. During the half-millennium of its existence, the Roman Empire developed numerous strategies to cope with water management, from large-scale urban aqueduct systems, to industrial-scale water mills designed to cope with feeding growing city populations. Roman engineers encountered, adopted, and adapted indigenous hydraulic systems, and left lasting imprints on the landscape of the Mediterranean and temperate Western Europe by employing a range of water technologies. A recent academic study has enabled the identification of remains of and references to seventy-two dams from the Roman era, constructed in Spain between the 1st and 4th century AD. Such unique heritage, without comparisons in the Mediterranean makes Spain an emblematic case study for the analysis of Roman hydraulic engineering and water management policies. Fifty dams have been located and detailed. The twenty-two outstanding, although identified on the ground, have not been able to be acceptably characterized, due in some cases to their being ruins in a highly degraded state, others due to their being masked by repairs and reconstructions subsequent to the Roman era. A good example of such neglected dams is the buttress dam of Consuegra , in Toledo province (Castilla-La Mancha). Dating to the 3rd - 4th century AD, the Dam of Consuegra, on the basin of the Guadiana, with its over 600 metres length and 4,80 metres height, is a remarkable case of Roman engineering mastery. It had a retaining wall upstream, numerous buttresses and perhaps an embankment downstream, of which no remains are left. The application of 3D digital imaging technique to create a high quality virtual model of such monuments has proved to be successful especially for the study of the technological aspects related its construction. The case study of the Roman dam of Muel (Zaragoza) has shown, in fact, as best practices in digital archaeology can provide an original and innovative perspective on a long time studied monument. In this paper it will be explored how deploying recent computer technologies to the Roman dam at Consuegra can advance our understanding of the history of local and regional landscape change and the technology of water management. In summer 2016, the dam has been documented with terrestrial laser scanning with two FARO Focus 3D x330 and aerial photogrammetry image capturing with a DJI Phantom 4 drone. Data was processed in various 3D software applications to generate 3D representations of the dam including 3D point clouds, animations, and meshed models.

Building for Eternity: the history and technology of Roman concrete engineering in the sea J. P. OLESEN (Ed.) with CHRIS J. BRANDON, M. D. JACKSON, R. L. HOHLFELDER and other Contributors 368 pp., 384 figures and maps some colour, 51 tables Oxbow Books, 1

Building for Eternity: the history and technology of Roman concrete engineering in the sea J. P. OLESEN (Ed.) with CHRIS J. BRANDON, M. D. JACKSON, R. L. HOHLFELDER and other Contributors 368 pp., 384 figures and maps some colour, 51 tables Oxbow Books, 1

Longstanding Design: Roman Engineering of Aqueduct Arcades

Ancient Roman engineers are famous for their use of arcades, or arched bridges, to elevate roads and aqueducts across valleys. The Romans first designed and built arches using stone blocks and then later changed to special concrete construction. In this paper, we illustrate how early unmortared arches could have been built using geometric design principles. This simplified analysis is sufficient to demonstrate, via retrospective analysis, the need for reconstruction efforts for arches violating these design criteria. Well-preserved remnants at the Simian Bridge and Vallon des Arcs arcades, located in southern France near Arles, are excellent examples of Roman arch engineering and are used as case studies to understand geometric arch design in practice. These arcades are vital parts of a larger aqueduct system used to provide the water-powered industrial Barbegal Mill and city of Arles with water in the first century A.D. Analysis of currently standing arches implies that Roman engineers may have relied extensively upon geometrical rules of thumb for design of these structures. In particular, modern stability analysis demonstrates the effectiveness of geometrical rules of thumb in determining structural failure requiring reconstruction at the Simian Bridge. The reconstruction that exists at the Simian bridge shows a shift from stone blocks to concrete. This shift may have occurred as a result of the Roman engineers’ increased awareness of geometrical criteria for arch design.

An entire universe of the Roman world’s architecture found in the human skull

ABSTRACTToday’s neuroanatomical terminology has its origins in the Romans’ way of life, in their civil and military house architecture, as well as in the fields of engineering and technology. Despite the fact that they did not know how the nervous system worked and what the role of each neuroanatomic structure was, over time, especially in Renaissance and early modern times, the anatomists sought descriptive names for the nervous structures they have identified by way of similarity with some ancient items. This study aims to briefly review the influence of Roman architecture, engineering, and technology on neuroanatomic nomenclature, the precursor of modern neuroanatomical terminology.

От античных мавзолеев к ротондальным постройкам эпохи классицизма. Генезис архитектурной формы и конструкции

The author of the article examines the examples of using annular barrel vault with central pier in the Late Antique domed constructions. Studies of such buildings in the 16th–18th centuries did a lot for the emergence of the similar constructions in the architecture of that period. Architects of Western Europe adopted Ancient Roman engineering experience, which allowed them to use rotunda forms not only in the church architecture or fortification, but in residential constructions as well. Its wide expansion into palatial residences, villas, and particular private hotels built in the age of Classicism has contributed to significant changes in the outward appearance of buildings. Descriptions of annular barrel vault with central pier are left in treatises, ouvrages and practical manuals published within that period. The knowledge of these, together with architectural analysis of the surviving buildings, whose representational domed lounges are based on the said type of vault, help identify characteristic features of numerous edifices created by representatives of various West European architectural schools. Research of the use of such constructions in Russian architecture both via surviving historical monuments and the drafts of lost buildings or unrealized designs is under consideration in the article. This study is useful for architectural attribution of the monuments of Russian Classicism.

Reconstruction of the appearance and structural system of Trajan's Bridge

Abstract Trajan's Bridge, built by Romans over the Danube River in the first years of the II century, was the first kilometer-long bridge ever built. It was a marvel of Roman engineering, especially taking into account challenging site conditions, available resources and record time for construction. The bridge's still-standing columns are witnesses to its masterful construction. The bridge was later intentionally destroyed by Romans, and several researchers in the past studied the bridge and attempted to reconstruct its appearance and structural system. However, the dearth of information generally associated with destroyed ancient structures makes their reconstruction extremely challenging. In the case of Trajan's Bridge, the only confirmed representation of the structure is on Trajan's Column, found just north of the Roman Forum. Nevertheless, several studies performed in the past proposed a structure different from the one shown in the Column. Most of these studies are not based on detailed structural analysis, and thus some of them do not seem to be credible from the engineering point of view. The aim of this paper was to reconstruct the structural system and appearance of Trajan's Bridge using structural analysis, and to determine to what extent the representation of the structure on Trajan's Column could be accurate. This is successfully performed by determining the number of degrees of freedom associated with the structure and by analyzing the materials, stresses, and the bridge construction technique.

Excavation across the Dere Street Roman Road at Dun Law, Scottish Borders

Dere Street Roman Road was strategically important to the Roman army. It was built in the late 1st century ad to enable the advance of the Roman Army, commanded by Agricola, into the hostile territories of what is now Scotland. This eastern arterial road linked the Roman legionary forts of Eburacum (York) and Inchtuthil near Perth, and continued to be used through the medieval period, its longevity of use standing as a testament to Roman engineering and road construction. In 2007 an archaeological excavation made an exciting discovery which sheds new light on construction techniques employed by Agricola’s legionnaires and demonstrates their adaptive ability to use whatever local resources were at hand to engineer a solution for crossing difficult terrain. As an archaeological response to a proposal to extend the existing Dun Law Windfarm, excavations were conducted by CFA Archaeology Ltd across what was believed to be the course of Dere Street running across Dun Law, a prominent, but wet and boggy, hillside in the Scottish Borders (NGR: NT 4643 5663). The excavations discovered a surviving section of the road, which at that point traversed a palaeochannel by means of a latticework of logs and a mat of branchwood.

Uncovering a masterpiece of Roman engineering: The project of Via Appia between Colle Pardo and Terracina

Abstract Via Appia, built around 312 BC, is an engineering masterpiece, its most striking feature being the segment between Colle Pardo and Terracina, which goes “straight” for about 61 km. We investigate this segment by GPS techniques: results lead to uncover that the original project of the road was based on a complex interplay between geometry and astronomy. The project was indeed carried out with the help of an orthogonal centuriation grid, with all probabilities starting from a node located at the south easternmost point of the grid itself. The road however does not run along the grid's diagonal: it was orientated astronomically to the setting of the star Castor at the time of construction. Since the Gemini twins were patrons of the Roman army, the project turns out to be a work entertained for both practical and symbolic reasons, during a key moment of the Roman history.

Ancient water quality: Roman engineering of the Barbegal Mill

Studying mineral deposits in rocklike layers formed over millennia can reveal the makeup of ancient water sources as well as form a picture of their uses.

First results of a study of the Etruscan tunnel and other hydraulic works on the Ponte Coperto stream (Cerveteri, Rome, Italy)

The Etruscan tunnel called Ponte Coperto is located NW of Rome, near the town of Cerveteri. The Ponte Coperto tunnel, mapped for the first time during the present research and dug mainly in volcanic tuff lying below the lava flow, was built to drain a valley of about 8.5 km2, probably between the VII and VI century B.C. Before the tunnel construction, part of the valley was occupied by a swamp, whose reclamation was carried out by digging a long rectilinear canal of about 800 metres to the tunnel opening. Several hundred metres upstream of the tunnel entrance a secondary canal flows into the main one; this tributary canal drains a secondary valley, next to the principal one. Nowadays the Ponte Coperto tunnel, 170 m long, looks much larger than its original shape due to natural erosion that has widened and deepened it: during the dry season its discharge is negligible, but some calculations show that the peak discharge can be in the order of several dozens of cubic metres per second. The efficiency of the Ponte Coperto system is outstanding, as the hydraulic setup of the area is still that left by the Etruscans engineers more than two millennia ago: the tunnel and the canals keep draining both the surface and the ground waters from the more permeable rocks, and the valley is still healthy and cultivated. The Ponte Coperto system is a good example of the fact that Roman water engineering has its roots in Etruscan technology.

The pencil, the pin, the table, the bowl and the wheel

The commodity created under global capitalism originates from everywhere and seems to have been made by everyone. Endlessly fungible, it is also endlessly divisible. Analysis of the commodity reveals the indissoluble link between commodification and technologization. Although the medieval commodity is a very different kind of object, not issuing from an economy dedicated to commodity production, and being produced more regionally, the link between production and technology applies to the Middle Ages as much as it does to now. Medieval technology, in particular road-building, is commonly regarded as a regression in comparison to Roman engineering skills. I argue, however, for the directedness of medieval technology, even when in apparent regress. This ‘regression’ calls into question the narratives of progress that inform debates about the posthuman, with all its attendant anxieties and heady possibilities. The case of medieval roads exposes the contingency of ‘efficiency’ as any standard of measure.

How Roman engineers selected their water supplies

An account of a historical Roman water supply system in Zonguldak, northwest Turkey on the Black Sea coast is presented. This ancient water supply system demonstrates Roman engineering expertise in water management and hydraulic engineering applications. Although there is a river located near the Roman city (Filyos) with an average annual discharge of 89 m3/s (1970–2005 data), Roman engineers preferred to provide water from a 15 km distant karstic spring. The region, unlike the Mediterranean region, has good rainfall (1100 mm), which indicates another water quality criterion for selecting the karst spring as a water source. The most important factor in the Roman choice appears to be water temperature. This selection criterion closely agrees with suggestions on water quality issues made by the Roman architect Vitruvius.

Geoarchaeology of Sidon's ancient harbours, Phoenicia

Geoarchaeological data from Sidon's ancient harbour areas elucidate six evolutionary phases since the Bronze Age. (1) At the time of Sidon's foundation, during the third millennium BC, medium sand facies show the city's northern and southern pocket beaches to have served as proto-harbours for Middle to Late Bronze Age societies. (2) Towards the end of the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age, expanding international trade prompted coastal populations into modifying these natural anchorages. In Sidon's northern harbour, transition from shelly to fine-grained sands is the earliest granulometric manifestation of human coastal modification. The lee of Zire island was also exploited as a deep-water anchorage, or outer harbour, at this time. (3) Although localised sediments evoke developed port infrastructure during the Phoenician and Persian periods, high-resolution reconstruction of the northern harbour's Iron Age history is problematic given repeated dredging practices during the Roman and Byzantine periods. (4) Fine-grained silts and sands in the northern harbour are coeval with advanced Roman engineering works, significantly deforming the coastal landscape. Bio- and lithostratigraphical data attest a leaky lagoon type environment, indicative of a well-protected port. (5) The technological apogee of Sidon's northern harbour is recorded during the late Roman and Byzantine periods, translated stratigraphically by a plastic clays unit and brackish lagoon fauna. (6) A final semi-abandonment phase, comprising coarse sand facies, concurs silting up and a 100–150 m progradation of the port coastline after the seventh century AD. We advance three hypotheses to explain these stratigraphic data, namely cultural, tectonic and tsunamogenic. Finally, our results are compared and contrasted with research undertaken in Sidon's sister harbour, Tyre.

7.4.2 Europe's First System of Systems

AbstractSystems thinking is as old as civilization. The question is can today's systems engineers benefit from examining the accomplishments of early system builders? This thought is examined in the context of roman engineering achievements.The birth of the Roman republic around 500 B.C. led to the building of an unprecedented array of remarkable systems. The needs of the republic, followed by those of the empire, produced important advances in building construction, water supply, mining and the building of bridges, roads, harbors, ships. Many complex systems such as the aqueducts supplying Rome's water were created.This paper postulates that the Romans developed Europe's first system of systems. The backbone of the system, a network of roads radiating out from Rome, began as a strategic initiative to maintain government control throughout the empire. Over time, this super system evolved into the means for Romanizing the many different cultures dragged into Rome's dominion. The resulting cultural harmonization left a lasting imprint on the world.

Roman engineering [overhead power line history

A modern engineer visiting Rome, as the author did recently, cannot fail to be impressed by the work of the Roman engineers of 2000 years ago. However much manual labor was available in the capital of the empire, the planning and construction of the Colosseum and the Pantheon were magnificent engineering achievements. Large numbers of stone blocks weighing up to 9 t were cut accurately to size and lifted as much as 10 m into the air and placed accurately in position. The roof of the Pantheon alone, a dome more than 40 m across, would be a noteworthy feat today. Aqueducts on brick or stone arches carried water more than 20 km into the city from sources in the Appenine hills. One came from Tivoli, an area noted for its natural beauty, which since classical times has provided a country retreat for wealthy Romans. One hundred ten years ago, on 4 July 1892, Roman engineering reached another achievement. On that day, an overhead transmission line first brought electricity at 5000 V into the city from a new hydroelectric station at Tivoli. Today one can stand in the power station grounds and see an ancient aqueduct, which looks as if it will still be there in another 2000 years. Will the power station last that long?.