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    Make Concrete Roman Again!

    by Brian Gallagher Jul 28, 2017 4 minutes

    Pliny’s literary challenge, in composing his “Natural History” in 1st century A.D., was giving “novelty to what is old, and authority to what is new.” Modern engineering’s is to see that what is old has some authority, too.“Roman Capriccio: The Pantheon and Other Monuments,” by Giovanni Paolo Panini (1735)

    he Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder can be charmingly self-deprecating. He attempted, in the 1st century A.D., to curate all ancient knowledge in his , yet he its 37 volumes to his close friend’s son, Titus, the Emperor of Rome, as having “such inferior importance.” To Pliny, they did “not admit of the display of genius,” nor “of anything particularly pleasant in the narration, or agreeable to the reader.” But he reminded Titus of his

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