
Subway-style maps of roads of the Roman Empire - bookofjoe
https://sashamaps.net/docs/maps/roman-roads-index/
======
astine
Fun fact about Roman roads: The Romans would build roads as straight as
physically possible. Unlike the modern day, where we will wrap a road around
the landscape to keep it relatively level, the Romans would direct their roads
straight up and down hills to keep them as short as possible.

Also, on the subject of maps of Rome that look like subway maps, the
Peutingeriana
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabula_Peutingeriana](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabula_Peutingeriana)
is supposedly based on a Roman original and definitely feels like a subway
map, prioritizing the connections between cities rather than their correct
spatial distribution.

~~~
WJW
This makes a lot of sense actually, motorized vehicles have a lot more trouble
with slopes than people (and pack animals) do.

Also, in Roman times road construction had to be done entirely by hand and out
of stone. Modern "pouring" of roads with asphalt or concrete was not yet a
thing back then, so it makes sense to try and limit the hard work of
construction as much as possible.

~~~
astine
Yeah they needed a lot of big paving stones which I'm guessing were a
relatively scarce resource,

Not to mention that road building was a military practice done by the army to
facility the moving of large armies. Travel time took priority.

------
SeanLuke
Among the very most famous Roman roads is the Via Aemilia (now Via Emilia), a
straight-as-an-arrow road running diagonally along the edge of the mountains
in Northern Italy, and connecting a string of now-famous towns: Rimini,
Cesena, Forli, Imola, Bologna, Modena, Reggio Emilia, Parma, Fidenza,
Piacenza. You can still bike the whole road: it's SS 9.

The "Italy" subway style map completely butchered it. For half of it, they put
all the towns on an east-west line, then bent the remainder north to Piacenza.
What the...? This isn't some little Roman Road: it's one of probably the top
three in the world. And it's a _straight line_ visible from space.

~~~
huffmsa
That's exactly what New Yorkers told Massimo Vignelli in the 70s when he
redesigned the subway map for easier readability, at the expense of actually
representing reality.

[https://youtu.be/OdDsV19DBCU](https://youtu.be/OdDsV19DBCU)

------
zenexer
I get the sense that there's quite a bit of humor embedded in these works. I
don't understand most of the references, but there's one that I got right
away.

Click the map of Italy. Roughly in the lower-right-center, there's what looks
like a gray volcano. Zoom in and read the caption:

    
    
        Vesuvius
    

And just south of it:

    
    
        Pompeii (clausa)
        Pompeii (closed)
    

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruption_of_Mount_Vesuvius_in_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruption_of_Mount_Vesuvius_in_79_AD)

------
Ftuuky
Not an authority in Roman history but looking at the Iberian map, the Roman
city of Conimbriga is not modern day Coimbra, it was around 15km away from it.
It's actually Aeminium [0]

This makes me a bit suspicious of the overall quality of the maps.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeminium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeminium)

~~~
ydnaclementine
I think it's the certain style and design liberties subway style maps use. For
comparison, look at the general sizing or shape of Central Park in NYC subway
maps [0].

[0] [https://new.mta.info/map/5256](https://new.mta.info/map/5256)

------
bewo001
Some time ago I visited some Italian cities from Germany by train. I could
have done that tour with little changes 2000 years earlier. Of course I would
have to get over the Limes first to enter the civilized parts of Germany in
Mogontiacum. Augusta Raurica is not far off present day Basel where I spent a
day. The Swiss train through the Brenner base tunnel was certainly preferable
to a mule trek across dangerous mountain passes. But al the cities were there,
Mediolanum, Florentia, and Roma.

------
supernova87a
What an impressive set of maps, and such work involved! Really impressive.

I was amused by the "future roads" dashed lines -- thinking about how even for
an empire like that, there were unfinished things after 500-600 years.

Also, how the ends of the subway lines in Scotland, etc. were really the end
of the world for them. You wouldn't want to be posted there compared to the
warm sunny home of the Mediterranean.

~~~
ch4s3
By the time they were post guy in Scotland, those guys would have been Gauls
or Brittons, with a general who had maybe been to Italy once. You may enjoy
SPQR by Mary Beard if this is your sort of thing.

------
oxAAAFFB
I’m about to be in Rome. If anyone has tips on under-rated things to see and
do then I would appreciate hearing about it. I’m already interested in that
road you can see from space.

~~~
Udik
Not sure if it qualifies as under-rated, but there is a night tour of the
Roman forums with what's basically a documentary about roman life projected on
the ruins, highlighting details and providing context. I found it great (also
because it's been produced- and narrated, in the Italian version- by Piero
Angela, a beloved science documentarist that has interested in science entire
generations of Italians, sort of an Italian David Attenborough). I was there
with a friend who's a native English speaker and she enjoyed it a lot as well.

[http://www.viaggioneifori.it/en/](http://www.viaggioneifori.it/en/)

~~~
oxAAAFFB
Thank you

------
mellosouls
This is excellent - really conveys the scope, power and engineering prowess of
Rome.

OT: For anybody interested, the original subway map (Harry Beck's for the
London Underground) was constructed in his spare time; it was a massive hit
with the public and his name is now printed with the map.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tube_map#Beck's_maps](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tube_map#Beck's_maps)

------
1cvmask
Here is another amusing maps source:

[https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/](https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/)

------
aschmid
This might be ignorance on my part, but why is Vienna to the west of Geneva?
Assuming that "Genava" along via Helvetica is modern day Geneva.

~~~
082349872349872
Not the Vienna you're thinking of:

[https://www.google.com/maps/place/38200+Vienne,+France/@45.5...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/38200+Vienne,+France/@45.5221367,4.8453116,13z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m13!1m7!3m6!1s0x47f4ea516ae88797:0x408ab2ae4bb21f0!2sLyon,+France!3b1!8m2!3d45.764043!4d4.835659!3m4!1s0x47f4df0824f5f985:0xc4e1bb60b45a03c3!8m2!3d45.5255925!4d4.8744965)

(shout out to Aventicum!)

------
082349872349872
To get a general idea of the engineering and moral progress mankind has made
from the first century to the twentieth, compare:

[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limeswachturm_Wp_3/26](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limeswachturm_Wp_3/26)

with

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flak_tower](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flak_tower)

~~~
smabie
I don't really know what you're getting at. Care to explain? But maybe it's
because I don't know German?

~~~
082349872349872
Just look at the pictures: I thought the tower-style fortification has stayed
recognisably the same from the mid-first century to the mid-twentieth century.

The major differences: scale (13m vs. 54m), materials (wood vs. concrete), and
intended use (terrestrial vs. aerial defence)

(that the need for fortification has remained current measures our moral
progress over these thousands of years X-P)

------
dragontamer
An aside: I'm going to bet that this website was made with Hugo and the Hugo
book template, which is pretty easy to use IMO.

[https://themes.gohugo.io/hugo-book/](https://themes.gohugo.io/hugo-book/)

