The Roman Land Surveyors: An Introduction to the Agrimensores

270 Pages·1971·12.648 MB·English

by  O. A. W. Dilke

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