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.
The Market for Stones
Tuff Mines Today
Rome's mines have served many purposes over the millenia; a source of building material, a place of refuge for Christians under persecution, a resting place for the dead, and currently a popular tourist attraction.
Figure 1: Quarried tuff stones
Beginning with Rome's former rulers, the Etruscans dug the first tuff mines to gather soft volcanic rock to build with. These excavations were later reused as a refuge for Christians in fear of being sentenced to horrible deaths by Emperor Nero.
In the summer of 64 A.D, a massive 6 day fire consumed nearly three quarters of Rome. Afterwards, the public blamed the emperor for setting the fire for his own amusement. Nero dodged this bullet by using Christians as a scapegoat and blaming them. This worked well because they already had a bad reputation in Rome for proclaiming the existence of a new king, which was taken as a threat to those in power.
Nero first rounded up a few Christians and used interrogation techniques to expose the identities of many more. Nero then put a large amount of Christians to death as a form of public amusement, sometimes lighting them on fire and using them as evening street lights. St. Cyprian, an early Christian writer wrote of Christians being worked to death in the mines as well. After the fire ended, a Twelve Tables law (Table 8, Law 1) was written requiring a 2.5 foot gap between buildings to minimize how quickly fires could spread.
Figure 2: Underground tuff mine with calcium carbonate deposits
Christians may have been confused with Jews and labeled rebellious and lazy as a result. These labels were a result of uprisings Judean Jews had against Roman provincial government and the fact that they did not work on the Sabbath; this may have added some fuel to the fire. In accordance with Rome's resourceful re-use of infrastructure, the catacombs found another use when the stench of decaying bodies became too much for Rome to handle. Another Twelve Tables law (Table 10, Law 3) was written which forbade the burial and cremation of bodies within city limits. Christians of that time practiced burial rather than cremation, so they began digging out body sized holes in the tunnel walls.
Today, the bodies have been removed from the excavated portions and curious tourists are invited in only with tour guides to avoid getting lost in the seemingly endless maze of tunnels. In a world without power tools or knowledge of the dangers of underground mining, Romans faced many unknown dangers and overcame them with trial and error. The disposable amount of slaves they had surely helped them accomplish this.