A German explorer has discovered the longest ancient tunnel in the mountainous region of Jordan. Millions of tons of drinking water flowed through the stone pipe to the luxurious cities of the Roman-occupied Near East. However, the seemingly primitive structure is a real mystery.
When the Romans were not busy conquering new territories, they spent their energy on the construction of aqueducts. In them, the engineers of the empire used standard lead pipes with a pressure of 15 bar.
In the capital alone, there were thousands of drinking water sources, fountains and thermal baths. Wealthy senators freshened up in the pools on hot days, and built cool grottoes in their gardens. Ancient Rome had a record water consumption: more than 500 liters per person per day. For comparison, in modern Germany, about 125 liters are consumed.
In arid Palestine, which the Romans conquered, water was clearly not enough. But soon intelligent aqueduct designers solved this problem. In the former Roman province of Syria (today Jordan), they created a 106 km underground canal system. Scientists have recently begun to explore the tunnel, which locals call Qanat Firaun - "the channel of the pharaohs."
The builders, most likely, were legionnaires who removed more than 600 thousand cubic meters of stone from the soil, which corresponds to a quarter of the volume of the Cheops pyramid. Thanks to this construction, spring water was supplied to three large cities of the so-called decapolis - decapolis, an economic center, initially consisting of 10 communes. The final destination was the city of Gadara, in which about 50 thousand inhabitants lived.
In ancient times, the path to the highlands of the northern Jordan was blocked by a chain of mesas surrounded by steep gorges. One of the first obstacles was the Wadi al-Shalal gorge, 200 meters deep. With the level of technology of that time, no Roman engineer would have been able to overcome such a gap.
However, the builders dodged a little and drew the aqueduct along the mountain flank to the south. Since an elevated route in the impassable area was hardly possible, they moved the watercourse to the interior of the steep slope. Sometimes the desert valley was so cramped that bridges had to be built. And today in the gorge you can still see the plank stones of ancient structures.
On the other side of the abyss was an even more difficult terrain, a combination of hills and slopes. In the vicinity of Carthage, the Romans, in a similar topographical situation, drew a 19-kilometer waterway under massive stone walls and arches. In Jordan, the Romans pursued an even more ambitious goal. The rest of the way we decided to go completely underground. The bridges were no longer needed; in the thickness of the rock, the miners could hollow out the rock at the required height.
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Apparently, the ancient entrepreneurs suffered heavy losses. The compass was still unknown at that time - so how to navigate when laying a route in the mountain? How to ventilate the adits? After walking a few meters underground, the workers had to fight shortness of breath.
Modern researchers of the ancient tunnel faced a similar problem. As the magazine "Der Spiegel" writes, quoting the words of the project manager Matthias Döring: "Sometimes we had to stop working due to lack of oxygen." Considering the average tunnel height of 2.5 m and a width of 1.5 m, no more than 4 workers could be underground at the same time. In rock, they could cut no more than 10 cm per day. At this rate, they would not have made it to Gadara to this day.
It seems that Döring revealed the secret of the ancient masters: "Many facts indicate that first the engineers laid an overhead passage, and then they went 20 or 200 m deep into the rock." Fresh air was supplied through these holes, so that several hundred workers could work at the same time. When in 129 A. D. Emperor Hadrian visited the decapolis, work was in full swing.
The construction was completed after 120 years. But it is not very clear how it was carried out. For example, it is still unknown how vertical lots were lowered into mines cut obliquely. Either modern researchers have little idea of the achievements of ancient science and technology, or the ancient masters knew some secrets. One way or another, but the genius of Rome managed to turn this part of the Middle East into the Garden of Eden.