Читать книгу Highways and Highway Transportation - George R. Chatburn - Страница 22

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—The roads in Rome bore such a prominent part in the civilization that they could not be entirely overlooked by contemporaneous writers. The roads are often described as military roads because they were primarily planned to transport soldiers quickly and easily to any desirable part of the empire. But no doubt the greatness of Rome was due more to the traffic in goods and people brought to and taken away from her precincts by these roads than to military prowess. Her roads were the arteries and veins through which the life blood of the nation pulsated; were the sensory and motive nerves which fetched and carried intelligence, which prompted action. She received and she disseminated. She was the hub of the universe, her roads the spokes radiating to and holding together the limits of her vast domain.