I WAS FIRST DRAWN TO STREETS BY THE CHANCE TO STUDY THE dialectical relationship between society and the built environment. And – because streets consisted of both “empty” spaces between buildings as well as those structures’ façades, sidewalks, benches, and the like – a central goal of this book has been to set people and their physical environment in dialogue, to animate the buildings that we encounter on site and to watch people shape them, interact amidst them, and be impressed, frustrated, comforted, intimidated, or bruised by them. As a final example, I want to concentrate on one of the very few passages in Latin literature that offers a glimpse at wayfinding; that is, it depicts someone giving directions through city streets and therefore discussing what might stand out. Visiting this passage draws together threads from the preceding chapters and, in so doing, illustrates the new light this book sheds on familiar territory.

When theatergoers took their seats in the early Empire, they might have enjoyed a production of Terence's Adelphoe, a comedy penned in the middle of the second century bce about strategies of child-rearing. Much of what unfolded on stage would have seemed ridiculous – the oddball incidents and complications that were part and parcel of a complex plot. But other aspects of the play, even though it was a couple of centuries old, would have seemed more familiar because they closely paralleled the audience's daily life. One such episode occurs when a character named Demea searches for his brother, Micio. Micio's smooth-operating slave Syrus knows his master's whereabouts and gives Demea directions (Adel. 572–583):

SYR: You know the portico down that way by the market?

Dem: Of course I know it.

SYR: Go past it straight up the street. When you get to the top, there's a downhill slope in front of you; run down there. Then there's a small shrine on this side and not far away there's an alley.

DEM: Which one?

SYR: The one by the large fig tree.

DEM: I know it.

SYR: Proceed down this.

DEM: But there's no through way.

SYR: Of course not. Rats! You must think I'm bonkers! My mistake. Go back to the portico. In fact this is a much shorter route and there's less chance of losing your way. You know the house of that wealthy guy Cratinus?