. Discovery. Science. DISCOVERY 291 every conqueror must hold it, by means of the great military road skirting the northern slopes of the mountains. The headquarters of the Roman military force in the province, the third Augustan Legion, had been fixed by Augustus at Theveste (now Tebessa), at the eastern end of the Aures range. Trajan moved the legion westward, probably to the neighbourhood of Mascula (the modern Khenchela), and while it was there perhaps a detachment from it was stationed on the site of Timgad in order to guard the Foum- Ksantina gap. In . ioo a colony was founded at low
. Discovery. Science. DISCOVERY 291 every conqueror must hold it, by means of the great military road skirting the northern slopes of the mountains. The headquarters of the Roman military force in the province, the third Augustan Legion, had been fixed by Augustus at Theveste (now Tebessa), at the eastern end of the Aures range. Trajan moved the legion westward, probably to the neighbourhood of Mascula (the modern Khenchela), and while it was there perhaps a detachment from it was stationed on the site of Timgad in order to guard the Foum- Ksantina gap. In . ioo a colony was founded at lowed, the town would have been divided into four more or less equal squares by the cruciform intersection of the two main streets, which correspond to the two main roads that always intersect a Roman camp. But here the street which runs from north to south (the Kardo maximus) is not continued, as it should be, in a straight line after meeting the Forum in the centre of the town, but is diverted to the west. The street from east to west (the Decumanus maximus) runs nearly straight and was the most important in the town because it was a section of the great road. MERIDIAN STKElil" .^T TIMOAO. iBy the courUsy of the Clarendon Press^ Oxford.) Timgad. It was the usual civil settlement which was essential to a permanent Roman camp. It was not a garrison town, though built so as to be easily defended, but was the commercial centre and recruiting-ground for the neighbouring camp and the nursery of Roman civilisation in the surrounding region. By 123 the camp of the legion was thirteen miles west- ward of Timgad, at Lambjesis. Like all Roman military colonies, Timgad is built like a Roman camp. In its original form it is almost a true square occupying about thirty acres. Thi; gates in the centre of the northern, western and eastern sides still survive. If the normal plan had been fol- from Lambjesis to Theveste. The main stream of traffic passed through it, and many of th
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