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Urban form, infrastructure and spatial organisation in the Roman Empire

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 June 2019

John W. Hanson*
Affiliation:
Department of Classics, University of Reading, Reading RG6 6BT, UK
Scott G. Ortman
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA
Luís M.A. Bettencourt
Affiliation:
Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation, University of Chicago, Chicago IL 60637, USA
Liam C. Mazur
Affiliation:
Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation, University of Chicago, Chicago IL 60637, USA
*
*Author for correspondence (Email: j.w.hanson@reading.ac.uk)
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Abstract

Although there has been considerable scholarly interest in the nature of ancient cities, it has been difficult to identify and explore quantitative patterns in their design and amenities. Here, the authors offer a model for the relationship between the population size and infrastructural area of settlements, before testing it against measures of urban form in the Roman Empire. They advocate a more consistent approach to the investigation of settlements that is capable of not only incorporating sites with divergent physical forms and historical trajectories into the same model, but also able to expose their similarities and differences.

Information

Type
Research
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 2019
Figure 0

Figure 1. The estimated populations of cities in the Roman Empire (symbols are proportional to estimated population) (after Hanson & Ortman 2017).

Figure 1

Figure 2. An illustrative example of the features measured for communal spaces, in this case Pompeii (adapted from Dobbins & Foss 2005: accompanying map).

Figure 2

Figure 3. An illustrative example of the features measured for street networks, in this case Neapolis (Naples) (adapted from Laurence et al.2011: fig. 5.1).

Figure 3

Figure 4. The case studies used in this article (figure by J. Hanson).

Figure 4

Table 1. The relationships between population and various measures of urban form in cities in the Roman Empire.

Figure 5

Figure 5. The relationship between population and communal area and the distribution of residuals from the fit-line; it is not possible to reject the null hypothesis that the residuals are normally distributed (Shapiro-Wilk P = 0.570) (figure by J. Hanson).

Figure 6

Figure 6. The relationship between population and street network area and the distribution of residuals from the fit-line; it is not possible to reject the null hypothesis that the residuals are normally distributed (Shapiro-Wilk P = 0.576) (figure by J. Hanson).

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