Roman Roads

The lifestyle of this generation is seen as advanced, convenient, and comfortable however, in the past if was full of despair, hunger, survival, and extremely difficult to accomplish anything. In comparison, in present day when our presence is required at a certain place we simply just get in a vehicle and drive on a highway to our designated destination and arrive with no trouble. While arriving, one arrives to a freshly paved concrete driveway to our houses every single day. When one requires a surgery, the surgeons already possess all the necessary tools for the operation. However, this lifestyle of luxury has not always been in these conditions and as luxurious. The way the lives today are free from hardship is on account of the Romans’

This expression is said because the Romans were the ones who came up with the ideas of roads. In ancient Rome roads were developed for military purposes to be able to move armies. The roads were also great to be able to trade goods and to communicate (Crystalinks). However, the Romans did not possess a compass to help them build roads, instead they used a tool called a “groma” (Trueman). The groma had two pieces of wood nailed together which formed a square containing right angles in all corners. Each wood piece possessed lead weights on the end when one of the lead weights lined up perfectly with the one in front of it the designer of the road knew that he made a straight line (Davies). Once the line was in place, wooden posts were dug into the ground and the road was ready to be built along these lines with usually either gravel, dirt, or granite (Civilizations, Historical Figures). The first and most famous great Roman road was the Via Appia. The Via Appia was constructed from 312 BCE and it covered over 132 Roman miles which is equivalent to 196 kilometers (Cartwright). The road connected Rome to Capua in as straight a line and the Romans knew this road as the Regina viarum or “Queen of Roads” (Cartwright). The Romans developed the ideas of roads and on today’s society the roads were modernized and are now made out of concrete which was also innovated by the Romans. The role of roads in

The Romans had a “Roman Calendar” which only contained ten months in a year of three hundred and four days. The Romans failed to recognize the missing sixty-one days that would take place during the winter season (Calendars Exhibit). The ten months were named “Martius, Aprilis, Maius, Junius, Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, and December.” The calendar began not to function as it did not align with the seasons (Calendars Exhibit). In 45 BC Julius Caesar introduced his version of a calendar which was named the “Julian Calendar.” This calendar included 365 days, with adding an extra “leap day” every four years (Wilson). Julius Caesar named a month after himself which is the month of July. Once Augustus Caesar became the new emperor after a few years, he named a month after himself as well, the month of August. The Julian Calendar has 12 months and every fourth year is a leap year, that includes a leap day added to the month of February. The Julian calendar was soon replaced with the Gregorian Calendar that still contains the 12 months and 365 days. However, the Julian calendar is still used in some Orthodox churches in Russia, the Berber people North Africa, and on Mount Athos (Julian Calendar). The Julian calendar which resembles and inspired our calendar today was idea of the great Roman Emperor Julius