How Were Ancient Roman Aqueducts Made?
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The Aqueduct
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The Romans used aqueducts to provide drinkable water to serve its large cities and industrial sites. Utilizing ancient but sophisticated methods and tools for construction, the Romans were able to provide a large amount of water into a place with little potable water. Many of the aqueducts ran in underground channels, but if the water needed to cross over a low area such as a valley, large bridges of stone arches were constructed to maintain the flow of water down to the city.
Construction
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Before an aqueduct was built, the Romans first had to find a spring with a sufficient amount of water for the city. These springs were chosen for their purity and were examined for stagnation. After a spring was found, an engineer would plot the angle needed to bring the water into the city. With a plan created, day laborers and slaves constructed the tunnels, arches and trenches that made up the aqueducts.
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The Chorobate
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To plot a sloping line that would allow the water to flow down from its source into the city with the help of gravity, Roman engineers used chorobates to measure the angle of the line. The chorobate is similar to a level on a very large scale. Twenty feet long, the instrument is supported by two legs with diagonal struts connecting the body to the legs. Two plumb lines hung from the instrument, which allowed an angle or a straight line to be measured.
Five Parts of the Aqueduct
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A Roman aqueduct was a complex system utilizing five different building techniques to bring water into the cities. When the slope of the land allowed for water to flow at the angle needed to travel, the Romans built covered trenches, which accounted for four of every five miles of the aqueducts. When a mountain presented an obstacle, the Romans employed tunnels rather than dig a trench around it. Shafts were dug into the mountains, allowing more than one group of workers at a time to carve a tunnel through the mountain, as well as affording the opportunity to clean the tunnels periodically. When confronted with a deep valley, the Romans used pressurized pipes, which drew water down one side of the valley in watertight lead pipes and then up the other by the pressure of the water flowing in the downward pipe. When the aqueduct needed to be raised by up to five feet, engineers built a wall. When the water flow needed to be raised higher, the signature of the Roman aqueducts was employed---the arcade, bridges constructed from arches.
Materials for Construction
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One innovation that the aqueducts brought to architecture and engineering was the use of concrete as a building material. The pressurized pipes that were used to bring water through the valley were made primarily of lead, which could withstand the water pressure. Smaller aqueducts built for towns outside of large cities were often constructed from earthenware pipes.
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