When man began to till the soil and do other kinds of work he left the cave that had been his home and built a house. These houses soon gathered together to form villages which dotted the countryside, and then the problem arose: how were the villages to keep in touch with each other? By this time man had learned to trade goods for other articles to needed and these goods had to be carried to the places where the exchange was done. Man found that he had to prepare special tracks to travel along. The tracks had to be smooth so that the goods would not be damaged by too much bumping and jogging.

With the invention of the wheel man began to travel much faster. The roads had to be improved for wheels could become bogged down in mud or loose soil.

At this point man realized that earth which had been pressed down flat was not enough and paved road was necessary. The ancient Greeks were already building such roads. These roads had long sunken tracks in them which acted rather like a railway track to take the wheels of vehicles such as carts and chariots. But the true inventors and builders of the modern road were the ancient Romans.

The Romans solved the basic problems of road engineering by using techniques which still hold good today. They learned much from the Etruscans, but they introduced many modifications and improvements.

The Romans cambered or curved the surface of their roads to allow rain water to drain away. They built a solid foundation by constructing an agger, or embankment, of packed earth or rocks. The top surface of the road rested on the agger and consisted of flat paving stones or gravel. Roman roads were usually about 5 meters wide but some were up to 10 meters. The roads were straight and were used to connect all the main centers of the Roman Empire.