The Roman Land Surveyors: An Introduction to the Agrimensores PDF
Preview The Roman Land Surveyors: An Introduction to the Agrimensores
THE ROMAN LAND SURVEYORS AUCTION MENSORES THE ROMAN LAND SURVEYORS O. A. W. DILKE The Roman Empire, vast and durable through the centuries, spread its colonies wide—to Africa, Asia Minor, the Balkan provinces, Spain, France, Britain. All these were on the Roman ‘map’, yet the thor¬ oughness, the ingenuity and detail which distinguish Roman maps and plans have never had the full acknowledgement due to their vitally important part in the fabric of a great civilisation. The Roman land surveyors, forerunners of modern cartographers, were highly profes¬ sional, trained at first on the job and then academically. What sort of instruments did they use? What system of mathe¬ matics? How did they tackle a job of land- surveying and mapping, laying out a new town or allotting an army veteran’s plot of ground, setting out the boundaries of a frontier, or making the roads for which they are justly renowned? Professor Dilke has written the first com¬ prehensive book to answer these and many other questions, and he has derived his material as much from aerial photographs and such relics as the inscribed stones at (Continued on back flap) O. A. W. Dilke, Professor of Latin at the University of Leeds, has been researching into the subject of this book for the past decade. He has written many articles on it. and on Latin poetry and Greek theatre, and has edited editions of Horace’s Epistles. Lucan's De Bello Civili, and the Achilleid of Statius. Front panel A land commission in session under the Empire Back panel A surveyor consulting an emperor From two of the prefatory pages to MS P, Vatican. Captions added by Metellus Sequanus in the 16th century The Roman Land Surveyors Land Commission in session under the Empire THE ROMAN LAND SURVEYORS An Introduction to the Agrimensores O. A. W. DILKE v\ \ Professor of Latin in The University of Leeds BARNES & NOBLE, INC: NEW YORK Publishers & Booksellers since 1873 ISBN 389-04165-3 First published in the United States of America in 1971 by Barnes & Noble, Inc 105 Fifth Avenue, New York NY 10003 COPYRIGHT NOTICE © O. A. W. Dilke 1971 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers Set in Monotype Bembo and printed in Great Britain
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