Streets and Roads
by Unice Yoo
The first roads were paths made by animals. The first constructed roads were stone-paved streets and date back to around 4000 BCE in Ur. When the Bronze Age arrived, metal tools had made it easier to pave roads and the invention of the wheel increased the demand for roads.
In Crete, the Minoans built a road 12 feet wide and stretching 30 miles from Gortyna (southern coast), over the mountains, and to Knossos (northern coast). The road was constructed of layers of stone, and even contained a drainage system with a crown throughout and gutters in some parts. The pavement was composed of sandstone laid with a clay-gypsum mortar. The center consisted of two layers of basalt slabs, each two inches thick. This is the oldest extant paved road.
Around 3500 BCE, the first long-distance road was created. It stretched 1500 miles between the Persian Gulf and the Mediterranean Sea. Later, around 1200 BCE, the Assyrians controlled this road. They utilized it to travel between Susa on the Persian Gulf and Smyrna and Ephesus on the Mediterranean coast. Unlike the Cretan road, this road was not constructed.
The Processional Way was constructed by the Chaldeans in Babylon in 615 BCE to connect temples to the royal palaces. It was built by burning bricks and laying the stones in a bituminous mortar.
The Egyptians constructed roads to carry the limestone used for building the pyramids. These roads were constructed between 2600 and 2200 BCE. Egypt also paved roads leading to temples. Travel routes included from Thebes and Coptos on the Nile (near the middle) to the Red Sea, and Memphis to Asia Minor.
The Greeks did not have an impressive road system because they mostly traveled by sea, but they did construct a few roads. These were constructed around 800 BCE, used for mostly religious purposes. The roads were paved with stone, and wheel marks can be found about 55 inches apart.
The Amber Routes were a series of trade routes connecting Europe. This system consist of four routes. One is from modern Hamburg, Germany, through Cologne and Frankfurt, to Lyon and Marseille. The second one travels from Hamburg, Germany, through Passau and Brenner Pass, to Venice. Another road stretches from Samland, through the Vistula River and Moravian gate, and arrives in Aquileia. The last route, the Baltic-Pontus road, follows the main rivers (Vistula, Saw, Sereth, Prut, Bug, Dnieper).
The Indus river valley civilizations developed many roads that contained drainage systems. The streets were paved with burned bricks laid in bitumen. Homes in these civilizations had drainage systems that transported water to the street drains that were two to four feet deep and and surrounded with slabs or bricks.
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"roads and highways." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online School Edition.
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