The system within the system

As everyone may know by now through other posts or general knowledge that the Romans build the aqueducts. At the high point of Rome's population the aqueducts were bring in around 150 million gallons per day. So the real question is where is that water go after it got to Rome. Some went into storage tanks, but the rest had to be taken care of. So the Romans built the first under ground sewer system. The system would take the water and deposit it in the river down stream of the city.  Then after, the first public bathrooms were built over the sewer system. Which was better than going in pots and taking to the sewer.

In the shadow of the aquaducts

It was a beautiful summer morning as we made our way out to the old roman aqueducts that brought water into Rome. It was amazing that they had the engineering and construction skills to build these giant structures with precise angles of  slope to control water flow. After all those years since its construction the structure was still standing. I was able to walk around and through the structure and as the day got warmer I was even able to put my head into the water flowing out of an adjacent and more modern aqueduct.

Pisa!

Pisa was supper awesome and very pretty. The walk from the train station to the meaning tower of Pisa was very pretty with all of the old buildings and streets. It was amazing to see the tower in person. It was awesome to see just how much the tower was leaning and then to be able to go inside! It was very difficult to climb the stairs because as you were going up you could feel the angle of the tilt in the stairs. Plus each stair was used so many times that there are now smoothed out dips in each step. This made it really hard to go down the stairs as well. It was really cool to see how as you walked up the stairs the place of the dip changes as well.

Aqueducts and mystery beige animals

During our visit to the aqueducts I was personally impressed by the precision of engineering of the waterways. To have them slope exactly enough to transfer water over such a long distance required a great deal of measurement. I didn't previously know that it was common to have two different duct systems run atop each other. This allowed for a much great total flow rate of water. Having the opportunity to feel the water that would have been transferred, it was surprising how cold the water could stay over such a long distance. 

Museum of the History of Medicine Basement

At the Museum of the History of Medicine, the exhibits stretched back to ancient medical practices until present day. Fortunately enough for our group we were given a guided tour of the basement exhibits. This includes full size rooms we could enter setup as historical places; an alchemist's laboratory, an apothecary, a physician's examination room etc. these rooms had mostly original artifacts, with a few reproductions scattered among them.

In the alchemists laboratory there were several original and real crocodiles, no more than about six feet in length. This is very fitting as the crocodile was the symbol of alchemy, similar to the snake being a symbol for medicine. Other artifacts included many specially shaped glass bottles, tools for handling the heated materials, and many of the materials used in alchemy reactions. These materials included a narwal's horn, and various animal tusks, as well as other odd materials. All in all this was a very interesting exhibit, and I learned that alchemy eventually fell away from the magical aspects associated with it and would be very important with the development of apothecaries and mixing elixirs and so forth, eventually leading to modern medicines.

Water Distribution, Ancient Roman Style

I had an awesome time visiting the aqueducts yesterday! It was impressive to see the size of the closed channels used to transport water to the city. Even more impressive for me was the understanding of hydraulics and treatment that the Romans had at the time which are still important today (as an Environmental Engineering student, this stuff was exciting). The channels couldn't be built with too steep of a slope otherwise the water would travel too fast and cause erosion. In addition, they used inverted siphons to lift water over ridges or buildings and sedimentation pits to remove large particles from their drinking/bath water. The men also knew that lead pipes could leach the chemical into the water over time which is why they typically aren't used today. We also learned that to compensate for the large amounts of water being brought into the city, a sewage system was designed to carry wastewater out of the city to the Tiber River.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

The Leaning Tower of Pisa was so cool! I've seen pictures, but it's pretty funny when you get there and it's actually leaning so much. I think it's so cool how they tried to fix it as they finished constructing it. You can see that it gets straighter towards the top. With over 200 stairs to the top it was a long trek, and your body could definitely feel the lean. At the top, there were seven bells. I never knew it was supposed to be a bell tower!