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How did the Romans measure over long distance

• Message 1.Β 

  Posted by Douneman (U2119478) on Sunday, 25th September 2005

  Hi Folks,
  Asking the question of how the Romans knew that the point between the Solway & the North East was the narrowest point to build Hadrians Wall, likewise with the Antonine wall between the Clyde & The Forth
  Regards.

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• Message 2

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  Posted by Richie (U1238064) on Sunday, 25th September 2005

  they measured
  
  
  seriously though, I watched an Adam Hart program that addressed this and the romans built whar was essential a mileometer which could measure a roman mile and just like we do today someone walked with this device and measured the distance between points.
  
  Also a Roman army marched to a regualr pace. Therefore by timing how long they marched in one day you could work out how far you had marched fairly accurately

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  Posted by fascinating (U1944795) on Monday, 26th September 2005

  douneman, I don't think Richie's post answers your question, for while the Romans could measure distances quite well, that does not in itself mean they would know the narrowest point of Britain, without measuring all distances ie making a map.
  
  Ancient geographers did try to locate places on the globe. Ptolemy, in the 2nd century, listed longitude and latitude of hundreds of places, from which we are able to draw a map of the world as the ancients saw it. The map of Britain is fairly crude, with Scotland grossly misaligned.
  
  The Romans had travel books which consisted of series of tables listing distances between towns. The figures would have been taken from milestones on roads. If you have a whole network of roads which are reasonably straight (so that the mileage of the roads was fairly close to the distance as the crow flies) you could quite easily draw a fairly accurate map. This was done in the 3rd century, but the map, rendered in marble, has been lost to us.
  
  It is something of a mystery how the Romans were able to align their roads so straight, without first having a map.

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  Posted by Richie (U1238064) on Monday, 26th September 2005

  my appologies
  
  I was being rather flipant and now feel rather foolish having had a chance to revisit both the original post and my rather feeble attempt to answer it
  
  Fascinating is of course right with what he has posted.
  
  The only thing I can think of is that they asked the locals. Rome was an empire not only built on conquest but by co-opting those it conquered into helpful citizens of the Empire.
  
  Between the marching that the Romans did over this country and the local's knowledge one could assume that they would be able to picture a primitive form of map.
  
  One question that does puzzle me though now I have rethought the original question. Does Carlise predate the wall?? If Carlise (Caer Ligle??sp) does pre-date the wall, then again it would not be surprising if the fairly effiecient Roman commanders thought about sending scouts armed to "map out" the locale, and one could take it from there.
  
  With the Antonine Wall, I might be forgiven here for another error, but wouldn't it be possible to see the coast from the mid point in both directions?
  
  Again my appologies for being a little too clever and ending up looking the fool
  
  Richie

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  Posted by TonyG (U1830405) on Monday, 26th September 2005

  <QUOTE' USER='Richie' USERID='1238064'><BR />With the Antonine Wall, I might be forgiven here for another error, but wouldn't it be possible to see the coast from the mid point in both directions? <BR /><BR /></QUOTE><BR /><BR />Don't think so. Too many hills. As far as I know, while you can certainly see the Forth from some distance, you can't see the Clyde at the same time.<BR /><BR />

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• Message 6

  , in reply to message 3.

  Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Tuesday, 27th September 2005

  Re: Message 3.
  
  Fascinating,
  
  I remember from the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ program: "What the Romans did for us" that they were able to make one line even with the obstacle of a hill between the beginning and the end. If I remember it well but I can be wrong, (if some one has seen the program he or she will recall it perhaps better) it was with a stake on a distance and then someone looked between two stakes on a distance, and moved so that he came in allignement with the first stake and the second two stakes. And so you could go on even over hills?
  
  It is now my personal reasoning...If they could make right lines in the landscape and using the sun for the general direction, they have to have had some guidance where they would arrive at some miles from the starting point.
  
  If they with trial and error making many times the distance by walking and measuring and found out that the distance between the two entrances of the rivers in the West and in the East, was the shortest distance to cut England, it would be possible I think if they started from the East and the West with two right lines that they met somewhere in the middle and saw there what was the error from being parallel and than adjusting the angle till they came in the same line from the East to the West or vice versa?
  
  Kind regards,
  
  Paul.
  
  

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• Message 7

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  Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Tuesday, 27th September 2005

  Re: Messages 4 and 5.
  
  Tony and Richie,
  
  see my message 6 to Fascinating, if you want.
  
  Kind regards,
  
  Paul.

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• Message 8

  , in reply to message 3.

  Posted by Douneman (U2119478) on Thursday, 29th September 2005

  Hi Fascinating,
  Thanks for taking the time to reply, your explanation was very informative. Thanks also to all who took time to reply.
  Regards,
  Douneman

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• Message 9

  , in reply to message 6.

  Posted by Hasse (U1882612) on Thursday, 29th September 2005

  Paul
  
  My friend,Its correct that you can make straight lines through the lansdcape using three poles and that the Romans did use this.
  If you do know the lengt of each pole could you even with simple trigometri,well known to the greeks and romans even messure the distance with high precission.
  With poles made of a standard lenght could you easily with just a wodden triangle measure long distance range with less error than 1%.
  
  From this is it easy to make a grid and making a reliable map.
  
  To roughly make out where an Island going in mainly North South direction are widest or most narrow,is the easiest course to sail around it and making a pilot book. A thing the Phonicians,did master more than 500 year before the Romans,and was in use well into 17 cent.
  
  Y friend
  
  Hasse

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• Message 10

  , in reply to message 9.

  Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Thursday, 29th September 2005

  Re: message 9.
  
  Hasse, my dear friend,
  
  thank you very much for this interesting reply. And it sounds all reasonable, what you say.
  
  Thanks again and lev väl,
  
  Paul.

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• Message 11

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  Posted by TonyG (U1830405) on Saturday, 1st October 2005

  <QUOTE' USER='TonyG' USERID='1830405'><BR />Don't think so. Too many hills. As far as I know, while you can certainly see the Forth from some distance, you can't see the Clyde at the same time.<BR /><BR /></QUOTE><BR /><BR />Sorry, I meant to add that, just because you can't see a river or coast, doesn't mean you don't know it is there.

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Wednesday, 5th October 2005

  I am also more close on what Hasseth mentioned about the use of trigonometric laws, laws that all ancient civilsiations employed in any large-building project. In Hadrian's Wall the objective was to find the narrowest point: Romans of course had already a rough idea of the shape of the island in that locality, hence all they had to do is place signs (flags and standards on poles of standard height etc.) on each of the surrounding hills thus creating something like a grid - a process that would take them 2-3 days maximum if only employing one small team (or only 1 day with a larger team project). Then using instruments like the astronomers' 'astrolabus' (of course simpler than that! Why use complex things?), they could find their shortest path through the grid they constructed by trigonometric analogies.
  
  Trigonometry was employed by Eratosthenes in the 3rd BC century to measure the circumference of the earth with an error of only 2% (that could be smaller if the ancient stadium was in fact just a bit larger (say some cm!) than 157 metres (currently mentioned!!!).
  
  Romans also used a nice invention by the same Archimedes: the well known to us road meter (!) utilising practically the same concept as the the modern one: it was one pulley with two wheels connected to a mechanic system that measured and noted down in the form of metal bullets (one metal bullet was dropping each 10 stadiums thus if you saw a hundred metal bullets at your first stopped then you had crossed a distance of 100 stadiums thus 15 km. Of course yuo could use whatever accuracy you wanted (every stadium or every 100 stadiums). Romans used the roadmeter to measure the exact lengths of their roads so as to be able each time to calculate the time needed for their armies to move from one place to the other (taking for granted of course the roads were free of annoying barbarians!)

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