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Sanitation in ancient Rome was a complex system similar in many ways to modern sanitation systems. During the Dark Ages, the technical knowledge of the Roman system was lost and has subsequently been investigated by modern-era historians and archeologists. ==Sewer systems== The latrines are the best-preserved feature at Housesteads Roman Fort on Hadrian's Wall. The soldiers sat on wooden boards with holes, which covered one big trench. Water ran in a big ditch at the soldiers' feet. A system of eleven Roman aqueducts provided the inhabitants of Rome with water of varying quality, the best being reserved for potable supplies. Poorer-quality water was used in public baths and in latrines, which were an early form of toilet. Latrine systems have been found in many places, such as Housesteads, a Roman fort on Hadrian's Wall, in Pompeii, Herculaneum, and elsewhere that flushed waste away with a stream of water. It is commonly believed the Romans used sea sponges on a stick & dipped in vinegar after defecation, but the practice is only attested to once. The Romans had a complex system of sewers covered by stones, much like modern sewers. Waste flushed from the latrines flowed through a central channel into the main sewage system and thence into a nearby river or stream. However, it was not uncommon for Romans to throw waste out of windows into the streets, at least according to Roman satirists. Despite this, Roman waste management is admired for its innovation. It is estimated that the first sewers of ancient Rome were built between 800 and 735 BC. Drainage systems evolved slowly, and began primarily as a means to drain marshes and storm runoff. The sewers were mainly for the removal of surface drainage and underground water.〔Farnsworth 1940, p. 942.〕 The sewage system as a whole did not really take off until the arrival of the Cloaca Maxima, an open channel that was later covered, and one of the best-known sanitation artifacts of the ancient world. Most sources believe it was built during the reign of the three Etruscan kings in the sixth century BC. This "greatest sewer" of Rome was originally built to drain the low-lying land around the Forum. It is not known how effective the sewers were, especially in removing excrement.〔Gowers 1995, p. 27.〕 From very early times the Romans, in imitation of the Etruscans, built underground channels to drain rainwater that might otherwise wash away precious top-soil, used ditches to drain swamps (such as the Pontine marshes), and dug subterranean channels to drain marshy areas. Over time, the Romans expanded the network of sewers that ran through the city and linked most of them, including some drains, to the Cloaca Maxima, which emptied into the Tiber River. In 33 BC, under the emperor Augustus, the Cloaca Maxima was enclosed, creating a large tunnel. The Cloaca Maxima, it is presumed, built in the fourth century BC and reconstructed under Augustus), still drains the Forum Romanum and surrounding hills. Strabo, a Greek author who lived from about 60 BC to AD 24, admired the ingenuity of the Romans in his ''Geographica'', writing: :''The sewers, covered with a vault of tightly fitted stones, have room in some places for hay wagons to drive through them. And the quantity of water brought into the city by aqueducts is so great that rivers, as it were, flow through the city and the sewers; almost every house has water tanks, and service pipes, and plentiful streams of water...In short, the ancient Romans gave little thought to the beauty of Rome because they were occupied with other, greater and more necessary matters''. A law was eventually passed to protect innocent bystanders from assault by wastes thrown into the street. The violator was forced to pay damages to whomever his waste hit, if that person sustained an injury. This law was enforced only in the daytime, it is presumed because one then lacked the excuse of darkness for injuring another by careless waste disposal. Around AD 100, direct connections of homes to sewers began, and the Romans completed most of the sewer system infrastructure. Sewers were laid throughout the city, serving public and some private latrines, and also served as dumping grounds for homes not directly connected to a sewer. It was mostly the wealthy whose homes were connected to the sewers, through outlets that ran under an extension of the latrine. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sanitation in ancient Rome」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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