Mansio

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the Roman Empire, a mansio (from the Latin word mansus the perfect passive participle of manere "to remain" or "to stay") was an official stopping place on a Roman road, or via, maintained by the central government for the use of officials and those on official business whilst travelling.

Contents

[edit] Background

Ox-powered carts could travel about 8 miles per day, pedestrians a little more, and so each mansio was about 15 to 18 miles from the next one. There the official traveller found a complete villa dedicated to his refreshment. Passports were required for identification. Often cities, forts and the villas of provincial officials sustained them or sprang up around them.

The great roads, which were constructed first by the kings of Persia and afterwards by the Romans, were provided, at intervals corresponding to the length of a day's journey, with establishments of the same kind as the khans or caravanseras which are still found in the East. There were 111 such stations on the road from Sardes to Susa (Herodotus, The Histories, V.52, 53, VI.118), their average distance from one another being something less than 20 English miles (32 km). The khan, erected at the station for the accommodation of travellers, is called by Herodotus κατάλυσις and καταγωγῆ. To stop for the night was καταλύειν (Xen. Anab. I.8; Aelianus, V.H. I.32). As the ancient roads made by the kings of Persia are still followed to a considerable extent (Heeren, Ideen, vol. I pt.ii pp193‑203, 713‑720), so also there is reason to believe that the modern khan, which is a square building, enclosing a large open court, surrounded by balconies with a series of doors entering into plain unfurnished apartments, and having a fountain in the center of the court, has been copied by uninterrupted custom from the Persic καταλύσις, and that, whether on occasion of the arrival of armies or of caravans, they have always served to afford a shelter during the night both to man and animal.[1]

The Latin term mansio is derived from manere, signifying to pass the night at a place in travelling. On the great Roman roads the mansiones were at the same distance from one another as on those of the Persian empire. They were originally called castra, being probably mere places of encampment formed by making earthen entrenchments. In process of time they included, not only barracks and magazines of provisions (horrea) for the troops, but commodious buildings adapted for the reception of travellers of all ranks, and even of the emperor himself, if he should have occasion to visit them. At those stations the cisiarii kept gigs for hire and for conveying government dispatches (Cisium; Essedum). The mansio was under the superintendence of an officer called mansionarius.[1]

Besides the post-stations at the end of each day's journey, there were on the Roman military ways others at convenient intervals, which were used merely to change horses or to take refreshment, and which were called mutationes (ἀλλαγαὶ). There were four or five mutationes to one mansio. The Itinerarium a Burdigala Hierusalem usque, which is a road-book drawn up about the time of Constantine, mentions in order the mansiones from Bordeaux to Jerusalem with the intervening mutationes, and other more considerable places, which are called either civitates, vici, or castella. The number of leagues (leugae) or of miles between one place and another is also set down.[1]

The word is likely to be the source of the English word 'mansion', though their uses are entirely different.

[edit] Examples

[edit] Britannia

[edit] Other

[edit] Other types of way stations

Non-official travellers needed refreshment too, and at the same locations along the road.

[edit] Cauponae

A private system of cauponae were placed near the mansiones. They performed the same functions but were somewhat disreputable, as they were frequented by thieves and prostitutes. Graffiti decorate the walls of the few whose ruins have been found.

[edit] Tabernae

Genteel travellers needed something better than cauponae. In the early days of the viae, when little unofficial existed, houses placed near the road were required by law to offer hospitality on demand. Frequented houses no doubt became the first tabernae (Latin word taberna ('shed' or 'hut', from tabula 'board'), which were hostels, rather than the "taverns" we know today. A 'tabernaculum' or small taberna was a portable place of worship for the Hebrews, thus producing the word tabernacle.

As Rome grew, so did its tabernae, becoming more luxurious and acquiring good or bad reputations as the case may be. One of the best hotels was the Tabernae Caediciae at Sinuessa on the Via Appia. It had a large storage room containing barrels of wine, cheese and ham. Many cities of today grew up around a taberna complex, such as Rheinzabern in the Rhineland, and Saverne in Alsace.

[edit] Mutationes

A third system of way stations serviced vehicles and animals: the mutationes ("changing stations"). They were located every 12-18 miles. In these complexes, the driver could purchase the services of wheelrights, cartwrights, and equarii medici, or veterinarians. Using these stations in chariot relays, the emperor Tiberius hastened 500 miles in 24 hours to join his brother, Drusus Germanicus, who was dying of gangrene as a result of a fall from a horse.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

Look up Mansio in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
  • Mansio from A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, John Murray, London, 1875.

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities by William Smith (1870).