Editing Roman roads (section)

==Types==
[[File:Carved steps along Ancient Roman Road.jpg|thumb|Old [[Roman roads in Judaea/Palaestina|Roman road]], leading from [[Jerusalem]] to [[Bayt Jibrin|Beit Gubrin]], adjacent to regional highway 375 in Israel]]
Roman roads varied from simple [[corduroy road]]s to paved roads using deep roadbeds of tamped [[rubble]] as an underlying layer to ensure that they kept dry, as the water would flow out from between the stones and fragments of rubble instead of becoming mud in clay soils. According to [[Ulpian]], there were three types of roads:<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>
#''Viae publicae, consulares, praetoriae'' or ''militares''
#''Viae privatae, rusticae, glareae'' or ''agrariae''
#''Viae vicinales''

===''Viae publicae, consulares, praetoriae'' and ''militares''===

The first type of road included public high or main roads, constructed and maintained at the public expense, and with their soil vested in the state. Such roads led either to the sea, to a town, to a public river (one with a constant flow), or to another public road. [[Siculus Flaccus]], who lived under Trajan (98–117), calls them ''viae publicae regalesque'',<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> and describes their characteristics as follows:
# They are placed under ''curatores'' ([[commissioner]]s), and repaired by ''redemptores'' ([[General contractor|contractor]]s) at the public expense; a fixed contribution, however, being levied from the neighboring landowners.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>
# These roads bear the names of their constructors (e.g. [[Via Appia]], [[Via Cassia|Cassia]], [[Via Flaminia|Flaminia]]).<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

Roman roads were named after the [[Roman censor|censor]] who had ordered their construction or reconstruction. The same person often served afterwards as consul, but the road name is dated to his term as censor. If the road was older than the office of censor or was of unknown origin, it was named for its destination or the region through which it mainly passed. A road was renamed if the censor ordered major work on it, such as paving, repaving, or rerouting. With the term ''viae regales'' compare the [[Royal Road|roads of the Persian kings]] (who probably organized the first system of public roads) and the [[King's Highway (ancient)|King's Highway]].<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> With the term ''viae militariae'' compare the Icknield Way (''Icen-hilde-weg'', or "War-way of the Iceni").<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

There were many other people, besides special officials, who from time to time and for a variety of reasons sought to connect their names with a great public service like that of the roads.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> [[Gaius Gracchus]], when Tribune of the People (123–122 BC), paved or gravelled many of the public roads and provided them with milestones and mounting-blocks for riders. [[Gaius Scribonius Curio (praetor 49 BC)|Gaius Scribonius Curio]], when Tribune (50 BC), sought popularity by introducing a [[Lex Viaria]], under which he was to be chief inspector or commissioner for five years. [[Dio Cassius]] mentions that the [[Second Triumvirate]] obliged the [[Roman Senate|Senators]] to repair the public roads at their own expense.

===''Viae privatae, rusticae, glareae'' and ''agrariae''===
The second category included private or country roads, originally constructed by private individuals, in whom their soil was vested and who had the power to dedicate them to the public use.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> Such roads benefited from a [[right of way]] in favor either of the public or of the owner of a particular estate. Under the heading of ''viae privatae'' were also included roads leading from the public or high roads to particular estates or settlements; Ulpian considers these to be public roads.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

Features off the ''via'' were connected to the ''via'' by ''viae rusticae'', or secondary roads.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> Both main or secondary roads might either be paved or left unpaved with a gravel surface, as they were in North Africa. These prepared but unpaved roads were ''viae glareae'' or ''sternendae'' ("to be strewn"). Beyond the secondary roads were the ''viae terrenae'', "dirt roads".

===''Viae vicinales''===
The third category comprised roads at or in villages, [[district]]s, or [[wikt:crossroads|crossroads]], leading through or towards a ''[[Vicus (Rome)|vicus]]'' or village.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> Such roads ran either into a high road or into other ''viae vicinales'', without any direct communication with a high road. They were considered public or private, according to the fact of their original construction out of public or private funds or materials. Such a road, though privately constructed, became a public road when the memory of its private constructors had perished.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

Siculus Flaccus describes ''viae vicinales'' as roads "''de publicis quae divertunt in agros et saepe ad alteras publicas perveniunt''" (which turn off the public roads into fields, and often reach to other public roads). The repairing authorities, in this case, were the ''magistri pagorum'' or [[magistrate]]s of the [[Canton (administrative division)|cantons]]. They could require the neighboring landowners either to furnish laborers for the general repair of the ''viae vicinales'', or to keep in repair, at their own expense, a certain length of road passing through their respective properties.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

===Governance and financing===
With the conquest of Italy, prepared ''viae'' were extended from Rome and its vicinity to outlying municipalities, sometimes overlying earlier roads. Building ''viae'' was a military responsibility and thus came under the jurisdiction of a consul. The process had a military name, ''viam munire'', as though the ''via'' were a fortification. Municipalities, however, were responsible for their own roads, which the Romans called ''viae vicinales''. Roads were not free to use; tolls abounded, especially at bridges. Often they were collected at the city gate. Freight costs were made heavier still by import and export taxes. These were only the charges for using the roads. Costs of services on the journey went up from there.

Financing road building was a Roman government responsibility. Maintenance, however, was generally left to the province. The officials tasked with fund-raising were the ''curatores viarum''. They had a number of methods available to them. Private citizens with an interest in the road could be asked to contribute to its repair. High officials might distribute [[Evergetism|largesse]] to be used for roads. Censors, who were in charge of public morals and public works, were expected to fund repairs ''suâ pecuniâ'' <!-- ablative-->(with their own money). Beyond those means, taxes were required.

A ''via'' connected two cities. ''Viae'' were generally centrally placed in the countryside. The construction and care of the public roads, whether in Rome, in Italy, or in the provinces, was, at all periods of Roman history, considered to be a function of the greatest weight and importance. This is clearly shown by the fact that the censors, in some respects the most venerable of Roman magistrates, had the earliest paramount authority to construct and repair all roads and streets. Indeed, all the various functionaries, including emperors, who succeeded the censors in this portion of their duties, may be said to have exercised a devolved censorial jurisdiction.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

===Costs and civic responsibilities===
The devolution to the censorial jurisdictions became a practical necessity, resulting from the growth of the Roman dominions and the diverse labors which detained the censors in the capital city. Certain ''ad hoc'' official bodies successively acted as constructing and repairing authorities. In Italy, the censorial responsibility passed to the commanders of the Roman armies and later to special commissioners, and in some cases perhaps to the local magistrates. In the provinces, the consul or praetor and his legates received authority to deal directly with the contractor.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

The care of the streets and roads within the Roman territory was committed in the earliest times to the censors. They eventually made contracts for paving the street inside Rome, including the [[Clivus Capitolinus]], with lava, and for laying down the roads outside the city with gravel. [[Sidewalk]]s were also provided. The [[aedile]]s, probably by virtue of their responsibility for the freedom of traffic and policing the streets, co-operated with the censors and the bodies that succeeded them.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

It would seem that in the reign of [[Claudius]] the [[quaestor]]s had become responsible for the paving of the streets of Rome or at least shared that responsibility with the [[Quattuorvir|''quattuorviri viarum'']].<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> It has been suggested that the quaestors were obliged to buy their right to an official career by personal outlay on the streets. There was certainly no lack of precedents for this enforced liberality, and the change made by Claudius may have been a mere change in the nature of the expenditure imposed on the quaestors.

===Official bodies===
The official bodies which first succeeded the censors in the care of the streets and roads were:<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>
# ''Quattuorviri viis in urbe purgandis'', with jurisdiction inside the walls of Rome;
# ''Duoviri viis extra urbem purgandis'', with jurisdiction outside the walls.
Both these bodies were probably of ancient origin.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> The first mention of either body occurs in the ''Lex Julia Municipalis'' in 45 BC. The quattuorviri were afterwards called ''quattuorviri viarum curandarum''. The extent of jurisdiction of the [[Duumviri|duoviri]] is derived from their full title as ''duoviri viis extra propiusve urbem Romam passus mille purgandis''.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/><ref>Subordinate officers under the aediles, whose duty it was to look after those streets of Rome which were outside the city walls.</ref> Their authority extended over all roads between their respective gates of issue in the city wall and the first milestone beyond.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

In case of an emergency in the condition of a particular road, men of influence and liberality were appointed, or voluntarily acted, as ''curatores'' or temporary commissioners to superintend the work of repair.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> The dignity attached to such a curatorship is attested by a passage of [[Cicero]]. Among those who performed this duty in connection with particular roads was [[Julius Caesar]], who became ''curator'' (67 BC) of the Via Appia and spent his own money liberally upon it. Certain persons appear also to have acted alone and taken responsibility for certain roads.

In the country districts, the [[magistri pagorum]] had authority to maintain the ''viae vicinales''.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> In Rome each householder was legally responsible for the repairs to that portion of the street which passed his own house;<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> it was the duty of the aediles to enforce this responsibility. The portion of any street which passed a temple or public building was repaired by the aediles at the public expense. When a street passed between a public building or temple and a private house, the public treasury and the private owner shared the expense equally. 

===Changes under Augustus===
The governing structure was changed by [[Augustus]], who in the course of his reconstitution of the urban administration, both abolished and created new offices in connection with the maintenance of public works, streets, and [[Roman aqueduct|aqueducts]] in and around Rome. The task of maintaining the roads had previously been administered by two groups of minor magistrates, the ''quattuorviri'' (a board of four magistrates to oversee the roads inside the city) and the ''duoviri'' (a board of two to oversee the roads outside the city proper) who were both part of the ''[[collegia]]'' known as the ''[[vigintisexviri]]'' (literally meaning "Twenty-Six Men").<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

Augustus, finding the ''collegia'' ineffective, especially the boards dealing with road maintenance, reduced the number of magistrates from 26 to 20. Augustus abolished the ''duoviri'' and later granted the position as superintendent (according to Dio Cassius) of the road system connecting Rome to the rest of Italy and provinces beyond. In this capacity he had effectively given himself and any following emperors a paramount authority which had originally belonged to the city censors. The ''quattuorviri'' board was kept as it was until at least the reign of [[Hadrian]] (117 to 138 AD).<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> Furthermore, he appointed praetorians to the offices of "road-maker" and assigning each one with two [[lictor]]s, making the office of curator of each of the great public roads a perpetual magistracy rather than a temporary commission.

The persons appointed under the new system were of [[Roman Senate|senator]]ial or [[Equestrian order|equestrian]] rank, depending on the relative importance of the roads assigned to them. It was the duty of each curator to issue contracts for the maintenance of his road and to see that the contractor who undertook said work performed it faithfully, as to both quantity and quality. Augustus also authorized the construction of [[sanitary sewer|sewers]] and removed obstructions to traffic, as the ''aediles'' did in Rome.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/>

It was in the character of an imperial curator (though probably armed with extraordinary powers) that [[Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo|Corbulo]] denounced the ''[[magistratus]]'' and ''mancipes'' of the Italian roads to [[Tiberius]].<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> He pursued them and their families with fines and imprisonment and was later rewarded with a consulship by [[Caligula]], who also shared the habit of condemning well-born citizens to work on the roads. Under the rule of Claudius, Corbulo was brought to justice and forced to repay the money which had been extorted from his victims.

===Other ''curatores''===
Special ''curatores'' for a term seem to have been appointed on occasion, even after the institution of the permanent magistrates bearing that title.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> The emperors who succeeded Augustus exercised a vigilant control over the condition of the public highways. Their names occur frequently in the inscriptions to restorers of roads and bridges. Thus, [[Vespasian]], [[Titus]], [[Domitian]], [[Trajan]], and [[Septimius Severus]] were commemorated in this capacity at Emérita.<ref name="SmithDictionaryAntiquities"/> The Itinerary of Antoninus (which was probably a work of much earlier date and republished in an improved and enlarged form under one of the [[Nerva–Antonine dynasty|Antonine emperors]]) remains as standing evidence of the minute care which was bestowed on the service of the public roads.