Ann Olga Koloski-Ostrow

Water was a crucial element in Greco‐Roman urbanism, due to the quantity and nature of precipitation in the Mediterranean: the emergence and growth of cities was intricately linked to the degree they were able to draw upon available water sources, and to dispose of or store excess rainfall. This chapter reviews the development of urban water infrastructure between the classical Greek period and the Roman imperial period through the lens of six Mediterranean cities, including Athens, Corinth, Syracuse and Pergamon for the Greek and Hellenistic period, and Rome, Pompeii and Herculaneum for the Roman period. It highlights the combined importance of several technologies of water collection and storage, including wells, cisterns and aqueducts, and sketches the ways in which water was distributed over the city and made accessible to the population. Innovations like the inverted siphon played a crucial role in expanding urban water networks, whereas the emergence of lead pipes facilitated the consumption of water in the private realm.

[...]Jonas Bjornebye (ch. 18) compares two types of mithraea in Rome and the patterns of movement related to them, and considers how adherents to the cult might have negotiated topography and space in Late Roman Antiquity. Broad coverage is attractive (movement as an expression of power, ritual practices, metaphors in writing, communication between different status groups, economic stability, and even violent outbreaks), but the all-inclusiveness of the volume also damages its coherency.