Roman Art & Architecture

Roman Arches

Roman Arches

• Where do we draw the line between functional engineering and ornamental art & architecture? Is one less gratifying than the other? We are as amazed when we happen across the Pont du Gard at Nimes as we are when we walk through the portico into the rotunda of Hadrian’s Pantheon.

Roman Arches• It has been said that the vast amount of slave labour in the Roman

World arrested some of the Roman’s capabilities for technological advancement. “Necessity being the mother of invention”.

• However the truth of the matter is that the Romans moved on technologically, just like the slave owning Greeks before them.

• The difference between the two civilisations was perhaps the greater maturity of the Romans. The Greeks tried many new avenues constantly changing ideas, while the Romans selected a few ideas, and then drove them to their fullest extent. For example the arch.

• As engineers the Romans were unsurpassed. Their roads were known as the arteries of their empire. Here however we will look only at their aqueducts, (bridges) and drains.

Roman Arches

• An aqueduct is essentially a transport vehicle for water bringing it from its source to where it needs to be distributed. Our more narrow sense of its meaning is that an aqueduct is an arched structure used to bring water across a valley.

• Most of the Roman aqueducts were underground. They were timber lined and followed the natural contours of the land.

• Approximately 170,000,000 litres of water were supplied to the city of Rome per day. This fed the bath houses, the fountains, and the more salubrious private houses.

Roman Arches

• In Side, on the south coast of Asia Minor, Water was carried vast distances just to flow in channels down the main street. A most excessive luxury which was not unique, especially in the eastern empire.

• The most well known extant aqueduct is of course the Pont du Gard. This elaborate carrying device supplied water to ancient Nimes.

• It was built in 14AD to a length of 275metres and a height of 50 metres.

Roman Arches

• The whole structure is three tiered. On the level immediately above the valley floor was a road.

• The third level carried the water channel.

• The construction is made entirely of unfaced brick.

Roman Arches• This huge construction, and others at Segovia, and

Alacantra, were as much symbols of power as they were functional necessities. One can only imagine what a tribal Gaul or German would think when faced with the majesty of the Pont du Gard. Any empire which could construct such monstrosities was deserving of respect.

• This complies with other Roman strategies of control in conquered areas. Functional symbols of power and strength were constructed everywhere. The luxuries of Rome were fast tracked into the new provinces so, at least, the power brokers of the area, could experience what it was like to live as a Roman. When they experienced running water, bath houses, wine, circuses, and gladiatorial contests, would they want to return to their more primitive ways?

Roman Arches

• For an empire as wealthy as Rome it was only a small step to move from functional construction to ornamental. The arch, being a symbol of power and strength, was an ideal insignia of the imperial brand.

• It was not always expedient to build huge aqueducts in every town so the triumphal arch was born. Single, isolated but supreme in its own power, it

• was the perfect symbol for strong men. The emperors loved them and built them every where in the empire. Fifty are recorded, alone, in Rome itself. One must consider that walking under these constructions was like an act of submission to the strength and power of its creator. No wonder these types of monuments are used in Napoleonic Paris, Imperial London, and Nazi Berlin.

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Roman Arches

• The triumphal arch, erected to commemorate important military victories had pre-dated imperial Rome by two centuries.

• The first recorded mention is of an L Stertinius devoting some of the money he made campaigning in Spain, to the setting up of two arches. One in the forum Boarium, the other in the Circus Maximus.

• However it was not until Augustus and his immediate successors that the triumphal arch became an established convention.

Roman Arches

• The Augustan examples are simple rectangular masses normally containing just one arch framed by pilasters. The inscription would be overhead, surmounted, normally, by a chariot group. A good example being the Arch of Titus.

• Later in the imperial period the three arched variety began to appear. The best extant example probably being the Arch of Constantine.

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