The Roman Road Project - Paving the Way

If you're anything like me, when I'm working on a project, I'm so into the research, that I can quote numerous authors down to the paragraph and page number. But after the project is over, I tend to forget details. This blog post is an attempt to document what I did to prepare for the Roman Road Project, not only as a means of sharing with others that want to do similar work but also for my own benefit. I'm including experts I reached out to, texts I read, articles I found, and books I bought or borrowed. I hope it helps you "pave the way" to your own Roman road project.

People:

Dr. Eric Poehler is a classics professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Having read his Traffic Systems of Pompeii, I emailed him for general information on Roman roads. He kindly sent me several of his articles, including my favorite one on the Romans' use of molten iron to repair streets. And by the way, if you're ever hesitating to reach out to a perfect stranger in the professional world, don't! Every expert I've ever contacted has been utterly thrilled to have someone ask about their work. Dr. Poehler was especially delighted that we were using his work in an ancient road project.

Dr. Tyson Rupnow, P.E., Ph.D., is the associate director of research at the Louisiana Transportation Research Center (the research arm of the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development) and an adjunct professor in construction management at Louisiana State University. Reaching out to him early was the best decision I made for this project. Tyson became our guide and civil engineering expert for the project. I learned an incredible amount of information from him as did my students. He taught the students famous engineering expressions like "We aren't buildin' a watch!" But please don't call this man - find your own local DOD or DOTD person in your state or area. They will have more specialized knowledge about YOUR specific location. All of these departments have education outreach programs too.

Dr. Courtney Roby is a classics professor at Cornell University. I met her when we presented on a STEM in Classics panel at CANE's annual conference. She talked about how she taught her students to use a groma in a surveying exercise, and I was hooked reading her work. Without her expert advice and generosity of time, I would not have seen some crucial texts about Roman surveying tools.

Books:

Jean-Pierre Adam's Roman Building: Materials and Techniques, 1994. I bought this one late in the game, and when it arrived, I wished immediately that I had gotten it sooner. The pictures and diagrams in this book are unmatched! I still haven't had a chance to read it completely, but I'm confident that I'll develop many future Roman Technology class lessons from the information in this book.

Hugh Davies' Roman Roads in Britain, 2008. More so about the legacy of Roman roads and their influence of modern roadways, this book was a nice read.

O. A. W. Dilke's The Roman Land Surveyors: an Introduction to the Agrimensores, 1971. Shoulda bought it, may still (stay tuned LOL) even though it's $90. He writes so clearly, and his conversion table of Roman measurement - chef's kiss! Thanks to Courtney Roby for introducing me to this work.

M. J. T. Lewis' Surveying Instruments of Greece and Rome, 2001. At first, I tried to get by with borrowing this book from the library, but I ended up just buying it because his explanations of groma surveying and road construction were so specific and helpful. Even better was his list of classical sources for all the instruments he discussed - I can't stress this enough! I like to show kids the literary evidence for all the technology we discuss, and sometimes, that's hard to find. So, this source list was a dream come true.

John Peter Oleson's (editor) The Oxford Handbook of Engineering and Technology in the Classical World, 2008. I use this text as my go-to for anything STEM related in classics, but the article on roads quoted Vitruvius (see Poehler below) and was not focused on the building process.

John Peter Oleson's (editor and author) Building for Eternity: The History and Technology of Roman Concrete Engineering in the Sea, 2014. I've been drooling over this book for a while, and I finally bought it...only to give it as a thank-you gift to Tyson. I liked reading about how the team used concrete core samples to identify the sources of volcanic ash. The process reminded me of how LaDOTD tests asphalt and cement cores in their lab. One day...maybe I'll have my own copy. It's a very niche book from which I doubt I'll develop lessons, but some books are just good foundations for knowledge. There's always a kid asking some crazy question about Roman concrete.

Eric Poehler's The Traffic Systems of Pompeii, 2017. On page 12, he clears up issues with Vitruvius' supposed explanation of how Roman roads were built: the ancient architect wasn't describing a road, but a building foundation. This point was critical for me because nearly every article I read about the building of Roman roads referenced it as fact. In addition, I enjoyed reading Poehler's work on digital cataloging and data analysis in archaeology. His team has made some interesting discoveries using these techniques including the fact that Romans drove on the right side of the road.

Articles:

Hugh McCague's "Learning from the Roman Land Surveyors: A Mathematical Field Exercise," in Hands-on History: A Resource for Teaching Mathematics (editor, Amy Shell Gellasch), 2007. The author explains how to construct and use Roman surveying equipment, a groma (ancient transit) and decempeda (measuring rod), to lay out the two main roads of a Roman town. Very precise instructions and great exercise if you have a small class. Otherwise, you'll have to divide into smaller teams and lay out different towns. I didn't use this lesson, but I plan to in the future.

Poehler, Van Roggen, and Crowther's "The Iron Streets of Pompeii" (2019) in the American Journal of Archaeology gave us ideas on how to repair busted streets. The Romans used molten iron. We decided that might be too dangerous with 11-year-olds so we approximated - metal-colored resin. Here's a synopsis of the article.

I wish there were an article about the remains of a groma found in the shop of the blacksmith in Pompeii. Courtney Roby sent me this link to a picture of it. Also of interest are two gravestones featuring the surveying equipment: the one in Boscoreale and the one in Bologna.

Videos:

Fantastic video on how the Romans built straight roads in ancient Britain using a groma. It's a snippet of a longer series uploaded to YouTube by a fan so I've been unable to locate it the name of the series. If you know, please email me!

A Roman surveyor re-enactor shows in this video how they set up a military camp with a groma. He demonstrates perfectly the use of an oil pot to dampen the swing of the plum bob caused by the wind.

Rami Tamimi is a civil engineer with a fantastic YouTube channel all about how to survey land using modern tools. His pacing tutorials - perfection!! One of our first lessons on the Roman Road Project was pacing, and he offered great suggestions on the basics of this process.

Vitruvius' hodometer is bound to come up when talking about measuring distance. His description is in De Architectura, IX, and this video of Da Vinci's version was helpful for students to visualize how the device worked.

Archaeologist Darius Arya recently completed a YouTube video series on the Via Appia - helpful for background knowledge about this particular Roman road.

Websites:

Whenever I'm searching for images of Roman soldiers doing just about anything, I look to Trajan's column. Dr. Roger Ulrich's Website, Trajan's Column in Rome is a comprehensive collection of high-resolution images of the monument as well as research on it. I found great images of road-building here.

Orbis: the Stanford Geospatial Network Model of the Roman World offered my students some fun imagining travel through the Roman world. I incorporated this fantastic tool into a lesson about milestones.

We really wanted our road to have milestones, but for a variety of reasons, it didn't happen. However, I sure loved learning about the Tabula Peutingeriana - I didn't know that its original version was dated to the first century BCE due to the inclusion of Pompeii on the map. I also introduced the students to the Forma Urbis - can I just mention how awesome this thing was?! And this Website by the Stanford folks was super helpful. In all this searching about how the Romans mapped their world, I was hoping to find a comprehensive list of milestones from the Roman world, but I found no such thing. Many in the British countryside have been repurposed as stones in later-built castles.

I'm sure there's more that I've already forgotten. Putting together a huge project like this is time-consuming but fun. I hope this little bit of background saves someone (and me) some time later on. Maybe I "paved the way" for someone!

The Roman Road Project - Front Page Story!

Yesterday, I attended a lecture at Tulane University about Roman army re-enacting by Dr. Jonathan Zarecki. Focused on the lorica segmentata that visually marked soldiers as Roman, his talk detailed how his experience as a re-enactor gave him insight into the daily life of ancient soldiers. When I raised my hand to ask a question, I introduced myself as an instructor who teaches a class called Roman Technology in Baton Rouge, LA. He interrupted my question to ask if we "were the ones who built the Roman road."  LOL In addition, three more people approached me at the lecture reception to ask about the Roman Road Project. We're famous, y'all!!

On Monday of this past week, we showed up on the FRONT PAGE of the Baton Rouge Advocate! Huzzah!!!

Here's the online article that has live links to blog posts.

Here's a link to a PDF version of the article as it appears in this picture.
















Back to the excellent lecture...Dr. Zarecki went into great detail about the Roman army cuirass - the body armor worn by nearly every Roman soldier (pictured here on Trajan's Column in Rome).

He stated that most re-enactors don't make their own because metalworking is difficult and expensive. As I looked at pictures of it with its segmented pieces, I realized that it could easily be made with cardboard in the style of Raphael Urbain's Epic Cardboard Props. (If you haven't heard of Raphael, I urge you to run over to his YouTube Channel to check out his masks and other props.) It's hard to believe they are made of cardboard!

After my own experience making a Demogorgon mask out of cardboard this past Halloween, I think this armor would be pretty simple. New Roman Technology challenge loading...the students will LOVE this!!

Me wearing the Demogorgon mask I made from cardboard. (Stranger Things: Season 1)

Roman Technology - All STEM Leads to Rome 2

A few years ago before Covid, my #RomanTechnology students got accepted to present as makers at the local Mini Maker Faire. These faires celebrate creativity in making cool stuff - mini-crochet characters, homemade robots, weaving, homemade pickles, etc. We thought others would enjoy learning how to make concrete, and wow, DID they! We guided nearly 500 visitors in making tiny cups of ancient Roman concrete (labeled with an advertisement, "Study Roman Technology at Glasgow Middle School!") My students had a blast teaching others what they had learned in class, and we realized that we were offering "classics outreach," or promoting classical studies to the general public.

When the Louisiana Department of Education named me its 2021 State Teacher of the Year and I couldn't offer in-person events due to the Covid shutdowns, I dreamed up an online event called "All STEM Leads to Rome." Over 200 kids from all over the world (some in England and Romania) signed up to participate in a Roman Technology workshop with me. I got funding from the American Classical League to mail them tiny kits so they could make along with me. Excellence Through Classics, a committee of the ACL, partnered with me to assist with an online presentation platform, and we built tiny catapults, made a game, and wrote with squid ink on papyrus. The kids had a great time and asked me when the next one was going to happen.

Soon after, I developed a wonderful relationship with the Louisiana Art and Science Museum. For many years, I had taken my students on field trips here to view their Ptolemaic Egyptian Gallery which contains Roman artifacts. The education director invited me to host a classical STEM event in their huge lobby on one of their "Free First Sundays." I immediately reached out to the Classical Association of the Middle West and South to acquire outreach funding. CAMWS's outreach funding committee quickly approved my request (as they always do because they are set up to be nimble and so helpful), and I got busy planning our first "All STEM Leads to Rome: Classics Day at the Museum." 

Nearly 50 students from my school, Glasgow Middle, and another local school, Baton Rouge Magnet High School, volunteered to run the stations. It was a joy to work with one high school student in particular, Marwan Mikdadi, whose passion for outreach and STEM is unmatched. With the pandemic still a force to be reckoned with, we didn't know what to expect, but when the doors to the museum opened, we were flooded with visitors. All told we ended up with 701 participants! The museum immediately asked us if we would repeat the event the following year.

Flash forward to this past spring, and we are now in the books with "All STEM Leads to Rome 2: Classical Chemistry and Engineering." We were sponsored by BASF, the international chemical company with a local plant in our city of Baton Rouge. Frequent sponsors of free Sundays and chemistry workshops for kids at the museum, they paid for the free admission for the "Free First Sunday" event (about $6000), and the Society for Classical Studies, another classics organization, paid for our activity supplies and t-shirts ($1000) with an Ancient Worlds, Modern Communities grant. With a nod to our sponsor, we focused on chemistry and engineering from the classical world.

Here's a breakdown of what we did:

Greeting Station We had friendly students dressed up in Roman tunics and togas to welcome visitors and tell them how the event was set up. Each visitor received a "passport" with an explanation of each station to keep them on track. Those who returned the passport completely stamped were entered in a drawing to win a pyramid block building set.

In addition the the passport, visitors also received a small bag labeled with our Roman Technology logo to put collected items into.

Station 1: Mini Scorpions Visitors built this tiny scorpion out of large popsicle sticks, tape, and rubber bands. Then, they tried out their catapult model by firing cotton swabs at a small tower of cups.

Station 2: Arches Student leaders guided visitors in building a Roman arch with this building kit. We had taped off the floor in large squares so that block kits stayed in each square and didn't wander off to random spots on the floor.

Station 3: Bridges After contemplating what Julius Caesar's bridge over the Rhine may have looked like,  visitors attempted to recreate it using large popsicle sticks and rubber bands with a plastic container acting as the river. Once built, the strength of the bridges was tested by placing a 5-pount weight on it. You can see the anticipation in this young builder's eyes as her bridge is tested!

These next two stations focused on chemistry as a thanks to our sponsor, BASF.

Station 4: Concrete My students had just studied concrete in the context of their #RomanRoadProject so they were raring to teach this lesson to visitors. Each participant had to wear eye goggles to handle the lime mortar which added to the mystique of this station. Visitors were so excited to take home their very own container of Roman concrete.

Station 5: Oak Gall Ink Visitors learned how this ink was made from the tannin of oak galls made by tiny wasps, and then tried out writing ancient Roman cursive with that ink and a simple stylus on papryus paper. Last year, we used squid ink which was much smellier, but oak gall ink has its own iron scent too.

As I wander around during the event, I'm constantly stopped by adults who want to know who our students are and where their kids can go to learn this content. One of the best things about this event is that I do nothing during it except take pictures. Students handle all visitor questions and work with young children and adults to complete the activities.

This year, my students and I partnered with the Junior Classical League from the Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts in Natchitoches, LA. After a brief online training with me getting them ready for the event, their wonderful Latin teacher, Dr. Morris Tichenor, drove them to the museum to spend the afternoon with us. They had clearly soaked up much of his knowledge of epigraphy. They were thrilled to be with us, and I hope this partnership lasts! In addition, we had a few stellar students from St. Joseph's Academy in Baton Rouge - they had assisted us with the #RomanRoadProject and were excited to join us.

Overall, we ended the day with almost 675 visitors, but to be fair, we were competing against the National Women's College Basketball Championship game. Baton Rouge's own LSU Tigers were competing so we think most people were understandably watching the game. Partnering with this local museum, allowing students to take the lead, has made for a wonderful annual classics in STEM outreach event. The museum has already asked us for All STEM Leads to Rome 3 for next spring, and we plan to be there! 

The Roman Road Project - All Journeys Come to an End

On Thursday of last week, we held the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Roman Road Project. Sadly, this project has come to an end, but not without some reflection before I say goodbye. 

In no particular order, here are a few thoughts I don't want to forget about this experience.

Being outside is a balm for souls. As our project came to an end, I asked the students to write some thoughts about the project, and so many of them mentioned how much they loved working outside on a project, even in cold weather. I have to concur. I craved being outside, and many times, it seemed as though the outdoor world was calling us. Nearly every day on the project, we were joined by a feathered friend in a nearby tree. He sang the same tune to us that I listened for every time we worked outside. I recently found out he is a Carolina Chickadee. The Romans paid close attention to the flight of birds and attached great meaning to it. I like to think that this little bird was telling us to keep going with our project and offering his special blessing to it. On the last day of our project, I got this recording of him.

Listen to kids. They have the best ideas, and they really are capable of big things. You could not have paid me to hold a ribbon-cutting ceremony for anything. I normally find these affairs to be performative and pretentious, but when my students said they wanted to have one, I took them seriously. My DOTD expert on the project encouraged me to plan it, and with the kids' help, we did. And OH. MY. GOODNESS. Am I glad I submitted to this idea! The event was incredibly joyful. We honored donors, got interviewed by the newspaper, celebrated our achievement, and best of all, ate cake. Here's a video of the actual cut - the clouds look so fluffy. It was a perfect day!

Find your nerds. Initially, I was reluctant to reach out to DOTD for this project for so many reasons, but mainly, because requesting significant help from a working adult is a big ask. Fortunately, I found the exact right person in Dr. Tyson Rupnow. As a civil engineer, he not only works to better the lives of others, but he's committed to passing on that passion to young students. His extensive knowledge of ancient Roman and modern roads was the perfect mix of nerdiness that was needed for this project. He spent nearly every day of the project with us, lecturing about different aspects of civil engineering, calling contacts to get supplies donated, and guiding us in the road building itself. He was so patient with all the students and just a true trooper. We could NOT have done it without him! And I already miss having him as an education partner in my classroom.

Show kids how to struggle with grace. This project tested the limits of my knowledge and patience. It was chaotic at times, physically challenging, and disappointing - I nearly cried when I found out about the bike ruts that a Mardi Gras parade goer made in the wet concrete we had just poured on the last day of our build. The students were incensed, but I tried my best to model dealing with a setback in a constructive way. In fact, a civil engineer that came to our ribbon-cutting ceremony stated that he loved the ruts because it taught students about real-life on-site issues that come up frequently in engineering and construction. We have since poured bronze-colored resin into the ruts. It's not the most beautiful fix, but it will have to do. And we are not going to let this setback ruin our overall experience.

All journeys must come to an end. When the Roman poet Catullus traveled to his brother's grave in a faraway land, he said his hello and goodbye in one short phrase: "Ave atque vale." Hello because he hadn't seen him in a long time; goodbye because he would never see him again. Even though I'll see our little road every day, my time with this project is over. I'll say my hello every morning when I get to school, but my official goodbye right now.