Ancient Roman Mining and Quarrying Techniques
Read this article about Roman mining to learn how ancient Romans solved its technical problems. They even had mechanical devices for removing modest amounts of water from mineshafts.
Modes of Transportation
Figure 17: Quarries used in construction of the Baths of Caracalla
In addition to selecting the right materials for the job and handling them correctly, they had to be sourced as closely and conveniently as possible to minimize construction delays. Many Roman quarries have been found near near rivers so that materials could be shipped along them. For example, the figure below shows possible sources of building materials used in the Baths of Caracalla, all located near a river. Vessels could be rowed by slaves, which was much easier than land transportation.
Land Transportation
Figure 18: 60 pairs of oxen bring Mussolini's monolith to be carved into his obelisk
Figure 19: Finished obelisk
Romans used carts and animals to travel on land. For lighter loads, caravans of donkeys and mules were used to distribute weight. Smaller donkeys could carry about 55 kg balanced on either side while larger mules could carry double that. For even heavier loads, oxen were yoked together in increasing number depending on the size of the load. It took about 12 pairs of oxen to pull a 10 ton load.
One disadvantage to using many oxen was maintenance, if one animal 'broke down' the entire operation had to stop. As the number of oxen increases, the probability of breakdown is higher and more frequent. Overall, use of the waterways clearly beats the strength of any animal. This advantage is observed in the construction of Mussolini's 560 ton obelisk where it took only 60 pairs of oxen to transport it. On land, more than ten times that amount would have been required.
River and Sea Transportation
Rivers allowed Romans to move goods with relatively low cost (although still pricier than sea travel) and without risk. The challenge rivers sometimes presented was their shallow depth. In the case of the Aniene River, flatter vessels had to be constructed so ships didn't scratch the bottom of the surface and capsize. In more extreme cases it was necessary to wait until the rainier seasons of Winter or Spring to use certain rivers so that the water level was high enough.
Transporting vessels upstream was an issue, although still cheaper than land travel. One economical way to get around this was to make temporary rafts only meant to go downstream and burn them as fuel or use them as timber after unloading them. If this was not possible, slaves or oxen were used to tug vessels back to the material source to be reloaded.