سؤال قراءة ستيب محلول — فهم التفاصيل (تدريب 5762)

(1) Rome is known for many things: its military conquests, its civic architecture, temples, roads, emperors, and sculpture. Yet none of these would have been possible without the most vital resource of all: water. Now, as then, water is life, and without effective distribution, there would have been no great Roman civilization. Even until relatively modern times, Roman techniques to collect, store, and channel water over huge distances remain unsurpassed. (2) Such technology, was not, of course, invented from scratch by the Romans, and many earlier Mediterranean peoples had poured resources and expertise into managing water. On the island of Crete, the Minoans developed sophisticated rain-harvesting and filtering systems as early as the middle of the third millennium B. C. Cretan water management techniques were later adopted across the Greek-speaking world, and examples abound of tunnels, drainage systems, and cisterns, sometimes of considerable size. (3) Yet although the water management tradition Rome inherited was rich and extensive, no previous system came close to the sophistication and reach of the Roman aqueduct. Striding across the landscape from Spain to Syria, these awe-inspiring structures not only carried life and livelihood but also proclaimed the greatness of Rome. (4) Aqueducts were costly public works, and not all Roman cities necessarily required them. Some cities, such as Pompeii, had their water needs met by wells or public and private cisterns dug beneath houses. Some cisterns could reach a colossal size, such as the Basilica Cistern (Yerebatan Sarnıcı) in Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) and the Piscina Mirabilis in Miseno, Italy. The better built to provide drinking water to the populations such as Rome's—thought to have reached one million in the first century AD. needed an entire system of aqueducts not only for drinking water but also for supplying ornamental public fountains and baths. (5) Rome was supplied by aqueducts totaling 315 miles in length. Of that, 269 miles ran underground and 46 total miles above ground; however, only about 36 miles consisted of arched structures, just under 12 percent in all. (6) Rome had as many as 11 aqueduct systems, the most ancient of which was the mile-long Aqua Appia, first operational in 312 B.C. It was named for its sponsor, the censor Appius Claudius Caecus, better known for another great pioneering structure of ancient Rome: the Appian Way, one of the first major Roman roads. (7) Three more aqueducts were built in the third and second centuries B.C.: Aqua Anio Vetus, Aqua Marcia, and Aqua Tepula. Aided by his son-in-law Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, Emperor Augustus was particularly active in improving the capital's water supply, repairing old systems and building new ones. The Augustan-era Aqua Virgo named, according to legend, for the young girl who directed thirsty soldiers to the springs that fed it has been used uninterrupted ever since its construction. During his reign, Caligula began building two aqueducts that were finished by Emperor Claudius, the Aqua Claudia and Aqua Anio Novus. Trajan built the Aqua Traiana, which is 37 miles long, in A.D. 109. (8) The last of Rome's aqueducts was the Aqua Alexandrina, nearly 14 miles long, built by Alexander Severus in A.D. 226. Some have calculated that, once completed, Rome's aqueducts delivered roughly 1.5 million cubic yards of water per day—about 200 gallons per person. Its water network supplied 11 grand scale baths, as well as the 900 or so public baths, and almost 1.400 monumental fountains and private swimming pools. A crucial later stage in the conveying of water was, of course, its disposal. Rome's Cloaca Maxima sewer, which flowed into the Tiber River, became the model for urban sanitation.