Water-Supply and Public Health Engineering

Denis Smith, Denis Smith

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351873550
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Geschichte
• Subtopic: Weltgeschichte

This volume traces the evolution of the concept of Public Health and reveals the importance of political will and public spending in this field of civil engineering. Design, construction, operation and maintenance of water-supply and main drainage works are discussed. The period covered extends from Roman engineering through to the early 20th century, with examples from Europe, America and Japan.

1
Attitudes to Roman engineering and the question of the inverted siphon

Norman A.F. Smith

I. A general introduction

Because much has been written on Roman technology and because what has been written bears an air of great authority it is tempting to suppose that the subject has been thoroughly researched and is well understood. In discussions of many aspects of Roman technology the temptation to follow an established pattern has proved irresistible. Continual repetition of the same facts and figures and a sustained commitment to certain ideas and interpretations have consolidated a stereotyped view of history. Not infrequently the original authority for what has become a firmly held and rarely questioned position is disturbingly venerable.

Many of the views that are rigidly adhered to were first advanced in the nineteenth century at a time when the study of classics reigned supreme, architectural history was flourishing and, most influential of all, archaeology was uncovering new material at an unprecedented rate. Such was the enthusiasm to make use of archaeological findings that conclusions were prematurely drawn by people who in many cases were not well qualified to assess the work and capabilities of ancient engineers. Even less excusable, on occasions, were the pronouncements of engineers who, inspired to dabble in ancient history and archaeology for a variety of motives, were prone to expound some manifestly extravagant views, not least in the area of hydraulic technology. Regrettably the fashion is by no means dead even now and the legends continue to be given an occasional airing.

It would be foolish and unjust to deny the value of a large part of the earlier work done by classicists, architectural historians and archaeologists. As a source of basic information awaiting the scrutiny and appraisal of modern historians of technology theirs is important material. This is especially true of the archaeological evidence which in many cases cannot now be examined, so thoroughly have modern developments and re–developments obliterated the traces of Roman engineering over, on and under the ground. On the other hand new archaeological studies continue to add to our knowledge; they range from the more modern applications of underwater archaeology and aerial photography¹ to definitive treatments of Roman remains in geographical areas previously only casually explored.² Without doubt, town planners, farmers, soldiers and so on.

The translation and annotation of a variety of classical texts has made available a wide range of material which is of importance to historians of engineering and technology. To the established and definitive works of E. A. Thompson³ on military technology, A. G. Drachmann⁴ on Roman (and Greek) mechanical technology and L. A. Moritz⁵ on grain–milling have recently been added H.Plommer’s⁶ work on Roman building manuals, O. A. W. Dilke’s⁷ study of Roman surveying and K. D. White’s⁸ extensive research into Roman agriculture.

The body of information accumulated by classicists and archaeologists is impressive and of substantial interest. Never-theless, a very real question remains. Do we yet have a full appreciation of the nature and purpose of Roman engineering which does justice to the material on which such a study could be based? The answer is no, not by a long way. Historians of engineering have as yet failed to compose anything like a coherent and complete account of Roman engineering. Worse, and in many ways surprising, is their failure to address themselves, with a few exceptions, even to specific areas of Roman technology. There is after all every reason to suppose that the engineering historian, looking in a fresh way at the evidence and asking new and more pertinent questions of it, may arrive at interpretations and conclusions different from those of linguists and archaeologists.⁹

The study of ancient engineering generally and Roman engineering in particular is beset with difficulties. Professor M. I. Finley has aptly remarked:¹⁰

Paradoxically, there was both more and less technical progress in the ancient world than the standard picture reveals. There was more, provided we avoid the mistake of hunting solely for great radical inventions and we also look at developments within the limits of the traditional techniques. There was less – far less – if we avoid the reverse mistake and look not merely for the appearance of an invention, but also for the extent of its employment.

There is more than a hint here that a major obstacle to comprehending ancient technology is the difficulty of coming to terms with attitudes to technological change and purpose which are unfamiliar to ourselves. Modem technology is characterised, amongst other features, by rapid change and development, by the presence of a profit motive, by an immense reliance on labour saving techniques and by the massive production of consumer goods and services. In antiquity these characteristics were, for the most part, conspicuous by their absence.

Ancient technology evolved in a different social, economic and cultural climate from our own and it reflects this fact. What today we would classify as civil engineering was immensely important throughout a wide repertoire from irrigation and land reclamation to road– and bridge–building, water–supply works and the construction of docks and harbours. The building and agricultural arts also flourished but, comparatively, the mechanical ones did not. Machines characteristically fell into the province of the military engineer; they played only an ancillary rble in the civilian techniques of building, irrigation (for water–raising), mining and to a small extent farming. The case of water–power is instructive.

Vitruvius’ description¹¹ of the vertical water–wheel is so lucid and unambiguous that there is no way of denying the Romans’ familiarity with at least the idea of water–power at an early date, about 25 B.C. Three and more centuries later evidence for a handful of working installations has been unearthed by archaeology.¹²

Modern writers have favoured two interpretations of these facts. Convinced that once the water–wheel was known it must have been widely and enthusiastically adopted, some historians turn a blind eye to the slightness of the written and archaeological evidence. At the other extreme the infrequent use of water–power is accepted but surprise is expressed at Roman society’s failure to capitalise on what ought to have been a revolutionary new idea (as the Middle Ages did). In reality we must face the fact that although the Romans knew how to use water–power they chose not to, at least not to any extent and then only at a late date. The real question is why not, and the answer, ultimately, is that we do not know.¹³ What is clear, however, is that an attitude to mechanical power prevailed which was fundamentally different from that adopted in later periods, and the fact is important.

Generalisations about the nature of technology – its purpose, the way it progresses and the influences which bear upon it (especially science) – are commonplace. Such generalizations are almost always too sweeping and too simple; as a result they are misleading and often nothing less than erroneous. Two important points have to be borne in mind. Technology’s role and man’s expectations of it have not been the same in different periods; and the fundamental natures of various technologies are intrinsically different. To what extent these considerations help to account for the relative importance of different branches of technology in antiquity it is difficult to say.

Basic needs–irrigation, transport, water–supply, mining and so on – were met partly because they were inescapable but partly also because what was required in these cases was more obvious. The building and agricultural arts embodied, to a large extent, essentially simple technical propositions (and components which were static). They also required massive organization and abundant labour for their execution on a grand scale and time, in other words the accumulation of experience, for their technological development.

By comparison the mechanical arts involve concepts which are most difficult to grasp and their application requires labour which is skilful rather than plentiful. Quite what promotes and cultivates mechanical ingenuity – the capacity, in short, to visualize combinations and couplings of moving parts which will perform a rather precise function – is a most fundamental question. Some peoples have demonstrated mechanical ingenuity, medieval European and Chinese for instance; others have not. The Roman Empire’s failure to mechanize is perhaps attributable to a measure of mechanical ‘blindness’ in addition to all the other factors which have been proposed.

To quote Professor Finley again:

There was more, provided we avoid the mistake of hunting solely for great radical inventions and we also look at developments within the limits of the traditional techniques.

This notion is borne out convincingly by Roman civil engineering. There is virtually no aspect of Roman structural and hydraulic engineering which had not been practised, to some extent, by earlier societies. And in fact Roman engineering generally drew heavily on the accomplishments of captive peoples: the Carthaginians (mining, ship-building and harbour construction); the Etruscans (irrigation, land drainage and reclamation, and arcuate construction); the Greeks (a host of techniques amongst which surveying, hydraulic cement, water-supply, harbour works and ship-building were particularly significant); the Egyptians (irrigation and canal-building); and the Nabataeans (desert irrigation using dams).

Even though the Romans contributed nothing that was fundamentally new to the civil engineering repertoire they did nevertheless apply this repertoire on an unprecedentedly grand scale and achieve an impressive result. Moreover, Roman engineering emphasized three significant developments which had never been prominent before: a widespread application of the semicircular arch, the extensive use of concrete and the concept of public works. In these important respects the Roman civil engineer was the peer of his predecessors.

The catalogue of Roman civil engineering attainments is impressively long. Regrettably many histories of the topic are little more than a chronological ordering of that catalogue. The number of engineering historians who have addressed themselves to a critical assessment of techniques, methods, organization, personnel, costs and so on is conspicuously small. Perhaps the means to probe such issues do not exist, at least not sufficiently to reach substantial conclusions or a complete insight. But until the effort is made and the questions are asked of the evidence there is no knowing what might be revealed.

At present we know virtually nothing about Roman engineers. How many can be named? Far fewer than must have been involved in so many projects. Who carried out the work? Evidently it was very frequently corps of military personnel’¹⁴ in which case it would be most interesting to know how many men were involved, to what extent they specialized, how they were organized, where and when they were employed and what techniques they used. Professor Dilke’s work¹⁵ on Roman surveying is disappointingly uninformative about the problems of setting out large construction jobs and levelling and aligning routes for roads and aqueducts, not agrimensorial work strictly speaking but unquestionably closely related.

Especially interesting is the nature of the improvements and progress achieved by Roman civil engineers. It is evident that structural evolution, a process which is typical of civil engineering’s development in other periods, did occur; it is manifest in aqueduct bridge–building, in dam–construction and in road bridges. Changing shapes and increasing size are probably related to improved methods and new materials, notably concrete. But the nature of the relationship is anything but clear. The need (and ambition) to build on a larger scale perhaps prompted the development of concrete construction; alternatiavely, the development of concrete and a growing awareness of its strength and capabilities could have been the basis for confident steps towards bigger structures and structural units, a culmination being the amazing roof of the Pantheon.

There is another important issue, and a central one: Roman technical writings, or rather the lack of them. In relation to the immense amount of engineering work carried out the surviving texts – Vitruvius, Frontinus, and a handful of later works¹⁶ – are exceedingly few and not especially relevant. It might be argued of course that another era of great building, the Middle Ages, has not bequeathed to us a very large literature either. But there is a difference. Medieval notebooks and drawings are strictly relevant. There is no escaping the purpose and practicality of Villard de Honnecourt’s ‘Sketchbook’ or Mathias Roriczer’s On the Ordination of Pinnacles.¹⁷ That surviving drawings of cathedral facades and ground plans really were the ones used is evident from comparison with the existing structures.

What can be said of the status or indeed the purpose of Vitruvius’ De Architectura? In the first place i...