I visited that bridge once which is near Alcantara. You forgot to mention there is a small temple on one side of the bridge bearing an inscription which reads “Pontem perpetui mansurum in saecula” meaning “I have built a bridge that will stand forever”
Building something strong is not that difficult for human builders, just overbuild it. We have the technology to build structures that can last millennia, we just don't have a need nor a reason to. Modern Engineering is about the design requirements, timeline, budget.
@@sepg5084Another commenter said that there's a temple nearby that has an inscription that reads "I have built a bridge that will last forever." So you might be right, and this is also just an example of intentional overbuilding from their time.
There's a roman bridge where I live (Rimini aka Ariminum) that is even more ancient (from the period of Augustus and the Tiberius) and which even withstood a German bombing in ww2 without collapsing, and you can still the part which took the hit today
No, we don't We build sturdier, longer lasting and more efficient than ever before The things we build are just exposed to far greater stresses than anything the Romans could even think about We now casually build bridges that regularly carry loads 100 times greater than what the bridge in this video can hold, over longer spans, with lighter materials, and expect them to last at least a century The only thing that comes close to the weight of just one car back in those days was an elefant, and an elefant doesn't cross a bridge at 50-100 km/h
@@Soguweyou seem so expert about ancient carrages, my dear fellow. although you seem a bit misinformed about elephants. don't know whic type of car you are used to, but a normal african elephant weighs alike 2 of the normale european cars... moreover we were talking about sturdiness, nor capacity. the mere fact that something of 2000 ago could be just confronted to today's buildings, even losing, is astonishing
@@SoguweLondon Bridge collapsed in 1990 due to structural issues Golden Gate Bridge collapsed in 1906 due to an Earthquake Broughton Suspension Bridge collapsed in 1831 from MARCHING Ponte Das Barcas collapsed in 1809 from people running on it Yarmouth Suspension bridge 1845 from an improper weld The collapse mentioned above Most of these bridges were made of lighter, stronger materials and yet still couldn’t stand the test of time and yet a bridge made of stones has survived near 2000 years even after being partially destroyed multiple times There’s a reason there aren’t many bridges like this Roman one that can stand for that long cause at some point people stopped caring about quality over quantity
Im from Spain, and i live nearby of another roman bridge which is perfectly fine nowadays. Its not as big as this bridge, but it mustnt be understimated though.
@@alejandrop.s.3942 El puente romano de Bibey, (Galicia) aunque no es tan grande como este. Es un solo una década más reciente que el mencionado en el vídeo
@@Bronze_Age_Sea_Person Honestly everyone did this i some way. Either they keep using the roman stuff. Or you give it the hadrians wall treatment and tear it down and steal all the bricks to make your house
medieval types weren't dolts. Gothic cathedrals have much more sophisticated engineering than roman bridges from 1200 ad onwards. In fact they're were the pinnacle of engineering up till industrial era really
All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
Simple: Commodus dies like the rest of his brothers, and Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus accepts adoption. Granted, who knows how much longer the dynasty lasts.
@@aaronTGP_3756 it was because of Nerva that we got the best Emperor in the history of the Roman Empire, Trajan. And Nerva was also the one who started the tradition of adopting worthy successors. He isn't as meagre as you say, I feel.
@@jchea1764 An overstatement. Nerva was coerced into adopting Trajan by the Praetorian Guard. Trajan was the one nearly everyone wanted to be Emperor. And Nerva didn't have any family members to pick, anyway. The whole adoption thing was done because the Emperors had no sons. Then Marcus Aurelius had a son, Commodus.
To do this, Romans make great use of arches, which transfer tension loads into compressive ones. Stone is great in compression, but nowhere near as good in tension. Same with concrete.
It was recently discovered that Roman buildings actually repair themselves! In modern buildings you’ll often spot cracks and gaps in stonework over time but this isn’t common in Roman buildings unless there is catastrophic damage. It was found that limestone in the rock and concrete they used allowed for cracks to repair themselves over time, meaning the building can maintain its structural integrity for far longer. Whether it was accidental or intentional, it’s pretty amazing
It’s worth mentioning that emperor Trajan was born close to current day Seville (Itálica), not that far from Alcantara, so he probably knew the area fairly well.
They for the time had some ground breaking ideas that made life alot easier compared to other civilization's . Considering what they had to work with. This for water delivery they also had pretty good sewer systems also .
Santiponce, a village near Seville partially build over the old Roman town of Italica. Still uses the Roman sewage on some parts of the city. In the 30s, after heavy rains, the part that used a recently build modern sewage system got flooded. The part serviced by the roman one was alright.
@@ZettyLad using the aquafer. As a bridge to cross valleys instead of walking down into the valley the stone bridges they used to cross tanks on were part of the Roman water system in the past . Foot soldiers used them to cross before tanks were invented and if they were moving water the soldier walked in ankle high water wearing sandel's and dirty feet polluting the drinking water . ??? A couple of years before you were born .
The tank shown was a WWII German Panther, which was around 45 tons, if memory serves, and was considered a medium tank. I think most heavy tanks today are in the same neighborhood. Heavy tanks at the end of WWII were getting into the 70 ton range, which was totally impractical. No one in their right mind would build a tank that heavy today.
Napoleon crossed it to go to Toulon and Napoleon III renovated it as most of the stones were starting to be too fragile but still standing after 1800 years and now in great shape after 2000 years
Indeed. When you drive the ~25km from Nimes (the destination of the aqueduct) to Pont du Gard you realize haw insane the Roman engineering was. They built that only to have water. And Pont du Gard is only about the midpoint of the 50km long aqueduct.
Plot double twist: The driver of the Tank was, himself, a time traveller, who wanted to "Thank" the first time traveller for the bridge in a unique way. So, he travelled back in time to when armored carriages were being created and suggested, why not call them "Tanks"? ...Yours is better. 😌
Building something strong is not that difficult for human builders, just overbuild it. We have the technology to build structures that can last millennia, we just don't have a need nor a reason to. Modern Engineering is about the design requirements, timeline, budget.
Rome was in the buisness of building monuments to ensure their name lived on forever, modern engineers are in the buisness of not breaking the bank on extending life expectancy past that of their civilization. Roman concrete is also objectively inferior to modern concrete, (we have a ton of chemical additives that can have some drastic impacts of the properties of the resulting concrete) ours just doesn't last as long because: 1. We use rebar reinforcement which rusts and splits the concrete, they didn't. Rebar fixes the abysmal tensile strength of concrete. 2. Ours faces much more deleterious forces like road salt, car exhaust, acid rain, and they dynamic forces of very heavy cars and trucks. 3. They overbuilt everything, partially because they only had materials able to withstand compressive loads so they made everything heavy and used arches to convert tensile into conpressive forces. We also have the ability to protect metal from corrosion, 1 option is a martyr metal lile zinc that will corrode before the steel, and another is an active cathodic system that uses electrical current to prevent corrosion by essentially undoing the redox reaction the same way you charge a battery.
"Look at this original roman bridge (rebuilt numerous times)" is the same as "this is my grandfather's hammer that I am still using after some repairs: my dad replaced the handle and I replaced the head."
Not really, that depends on which parts of the bridge were destroyed, and how large those parts were. It could very well be that most of those bricks are still the original ones.
@@notforsaletoday1895 Precisely! But with the additional twist of someone marveling at the end about the ship building skills of Theseus' people which made de ship last this long!
Well, India has the oldest dam which is more than 2000 years old. Kallanai (also known as the Grand Anicut) is an ancient dam built by Karikala of Chola dynasty in 150 CE. It is built (in running water) across the Kaveri river flowing from Tiruchirapalli District to Thanjavur district, Tamil Nadu, India. And, the DAM is still in use today!😀
The ancients are not as stupid as some people thought. Christianity arrived in Europe and many ancient knowledge disappeared. The Christian clerics of the dark ages opposed the learning of ancient knowledge and science. Scientist were accused to practice witchcraft. Romans and Greeks believe that earth and other planets move around the sun but the clerics forced the people to believe the earth is flat and earth is the centre. The Spaniards destroyed thousands of books in the Americas. Two peaceful religions appeared in the middle east and wiped out 300 million people.
That's amazing considering Main street in the little town I grew up in was completely torn up & re-cemented twice in the last 15 years from falling apart & is due again
For those interested, there's a man called Isaac Moreno Gallo who has a RU-vid channel, where he debunks many supposed Roman buildings which are not really Roman, and the other way around. Not saying that the bridge of Alcántara is not Roman, I don't have a clue about that.
"en España cualquier cosa que sea de piedra o medianamente antiguo que nadie sepa su origen; automáticamente se hace romano" eso una vez dijo en un video.
@I I Dude, you don't know history, the reason the Roman Empire is the greatest of all is because is the beginning, the father and the creator of all the other ones that came after it.
@@shaoliten1 Certainly one of the greatest but not the only greatest. Also greatest in what sense. If for architecture then what wrong has the Egypt or India has done.
Um, this video is slightly misleading. The bridge is upkept and constantly assessed for damage through mandatory routine monitoring and maintentance by the Spanish government. This bridge is not magic, it like any other structure is damaged over time and must be repaired. They just happen to hold it in extremely high regard and therefore spend a large amount of resources maintaining it. Also, they use modern equipment that didn't exist when the bridge was first constructed in order to aid in its repair and upkeep such as Topographic Laser Scanners (to accurately measure the dimensions of the bridge in order to spot irregularities in the structure that may indicate a failure in it's integrity/other concerning issue that must be further assessed) and various Ground Penetrating Radars (used with different antennae to work at different depths and spatial resolutions in order to analyze structural elements of the bridge), and these tools are vital to the continued existence of the monument. It has very little to do with the original ingenuity of the building itself; rather, it has more to do with the countless hours of labor poured into a historic monolith because of national pride (also, they legally have to upkeep it.). You even state that the bridge has partially collapsed and been subsequently rebuilt several times since its inital construction, thus showing that it is not unique in its ability to sustain damage or remain standing, and also making it technically false to claim that ot has been standing continuously for 2000 years. I'm sorry if this comes across as mean-spirited; that is not my intention. I merely wish to explain that this bridge is not special or unique from a structural standpoint, nor are we building bridges worse than we were in the second century; this bridge just happens to be properly maintained and observed for damage and disrepair. If any other bridge was as well upkept as this one, it would last just as long and be able to support more weight (provided it was constructed with more resilient materials, namely; steel, concrete, and asphalt. You know, like any modern bridge.).
Your protracted rant is not worth the length, since the dubious content, and your argument is not very convincing. Yes, the bridge has been repaired and restored, but the foundations and the principles of its engineering have remained intact, which is remarkable considering its longevity. Modern steel, cantilevered and cable span bridges, which have not been standing that long, have needed to be restored and re-enforced. This is what was done with the Brooklyn Bridge, and other bridges in NYC. The Romans were superlative engineers, and the fact that even though, much of the masonry was removed and employed throughout the ages for building structures, the ruins and shells of what remains, continues to elicit awe and wonder. And rightly so. The durability of Roman roads, arenas, temples,(Pantheon), aqueducts, continues to be an impressive testimony of the incredible feats achieved by the Romans. Belittling and discrediting their accomplishments only reveals a form of brittle, shallow nonchalance, or worse, petty indifference.
I am from near Alcantara and visited the bridge multiple times. It must be stressed that the bridge was destroyed and restored only partially and it is still the only way to cross the Tagus at that point. It hasn't been until 2022 that a new bridge has been projected to hold 100 % of the traffic the Roman one has been holding for almost two millennia.
Meanwhile, much of what we build now lasts no more than a few decades. A lot of it isn’t even intended to last longer. The architecture equivalent of fast food.
@@patrickjustice7371 "Huh, you see I won the argument because I made you the soy wojack so I don't have to engage with your point or what you have to say. Checkmate leftie"
Honestly, I'd love to go back in time to tell a roman architect that their creation is still largely untouched ~2,000 years later just to see their reaction.
Predynastic egyptian engineering: pyramids Roman engineering: bridges, aquaducts Swedish engineering: Volvo Us now: look at our phones a little too hard and it breaks.
@@nelscarlson5052 those will definitely not be around in two frikking thousand years. Especially complete disasterfucks like the Burj Khalifa which is being worked on extensively throughout its entire existence just to keep the frikkin' thing upright.
Bro its a dome. Its very cool but we have built far better things later on. Yes modern cheap construction sucks ass. But its done for profit not for quality. If we buikd out of stone we can do it a lot better. Just as those who came after the romans had stonework far better.
Yes, the concept of ionic radius needs to be rediscovered again: magnesium ion is smaller than calcium ion and higher surface charge density. Nitrogen ion in gallium nitride is smaller than arsenic ion in gallium arsenide and higher surface charge density.
They didnt use roman concrete for bridges man wat. Concrete is good at compression but roman concrete was not particularly load bearing. It wouod collapse instabtly if used in skyscraoers of today. Too heavy. Brick and mortar was used here. As with most of their construction
I saw a Roman built coliseum in Arles, France in 2018 that had been standing since 82BC, and it looked as if it had been constructed just a few years ago.
There's another 2000 years old bridge in Adana, Turkey. This bridge is so strong that municipality allowed cars to traverse it but then they closed the bridge to traffic in 2007 which is a good idea tbh.
There WAS a Roman bridge used in the spaghetti western "Duck you sucker". They have a scene where the army is crossing the bridge and the protagonist detonates it to stop them.... They actually destroyed it for the film.
They figure they may have learned how Roman concrete works now, as it seems to be especially long lasting. According to another article I've seen, mixing the concrete with salt water like from the ocean can have a dramatic impact supposedly. It prevents some of the components of the cement from mixing properly, so it stays raw as the concrete cures. Over time, when cracks form, rain water seeps in and activates these raw components which seal the crack and cure all over again, boding to the old concrete. So, effectively, it heals itself over time.
Reinforcement bars are a recent strength augmentation to concrete structures. They work very well in a newer structure. But they cause much more harm, than good, once a tiny crack allows water get to the rebar. This is why modern structures will never last as long as the ancient ones made with natural cut stone or newer structures without the rebar.
Except they would be beyond jealous of buildings with more than 3 stories, bridges capable of holding 6-12 lanes of traffic, and pretty much everything else only possible with modern building materials that are actually able to withstand any tensile force at all. (To compensate for the fact base stone and concrete can't withstand tensile forces they removed them completely at great cost by having to overbuild everything, we instead just use a couple steel beams or put steel rods inside the concrete and accept that it will eventually break as oxygen leaks through the concrete itself to cause the steel to rust and expand (cracking the concrete)
Rebar can be great and also a curse. Modern concrete structures use rebar to strengthen them instead of the curvature of arches holding the weight you have metal that can fail if exposed to the elements.
Makes me ever prouder of my country. (And the fact that it was part of the Roman Empire, if I remember correctly, someone called Spain "the sword of Rome" or something like that.)
I showed this to a friend whose question was, "Why did they waste the effort on such over-engineered things?" It is simple. Romans, unlike modern politicians, understood that these over-engineered things meant that the expense of building them would never be repeated. In the end, the over-engineered structures are cheaper because they don't need to be replaced regularly. Even those that eventually fail last so long that the cost over time remains less than putting up less robust structures over and over again.
So it isn’t like the bridge has survived perfectly intact for 2 millennia. People have done their able best to keep the thing maintained. In itself, that’s pretty amazing, but it isn’t quite the same.
52 metric tons is a lot of load bearing capacity for an ancient bridge but no where near enough to bear the loads of modern tanks. Pretty much only scout tanks would be able to cross as even the lightest MBTs top out at close to 62 tons.
Doesn't surprise me at all. I grew up in a over 2000 year old city and the sewer in the city center is still from the times when Romans built the city - and it still works.
If you told me that it was rebuilt over the centuries using the same materials, like you did, I would tell you you’re wrong because we only just recently rediscovered what’s different about Roman concrete.
