A dictionary of Greek and Roman . ller than the hand couldjust grasp; above the statumen was the rudus, a massof broken stones cemented with lime, (what masonscall rubble-work,) rammed down hard and nineinches thick ; above the rudus came the nucleus,composed of fragments of bricks and pottery, the pieces being smaller than in the rudus, cementedwith lime and six inches thick. Uppermost wasthe pavimentum, large polygonal blocks of thehardest stone (silex), usually, at least in the vicinityof Rome, basaltic lava, irregular in form but fittedand jointed with the greatest nicety (ap
A dictionary of Greek and Roman . ller than the hand couldjust grasp; above the statumen was the rudus, a massof broken stones cemented with lime, (what masonscall rubble-work,) rammed down hard and nineinches thick ; above the rudus came the nucleus,composed of fragments of bricks and pottery, the pieces being smaller than in the rudus, cementedwith lime and six inches thick. Uppermost wasthe pavimentum, large polygonal blocks of thehardest stone (silex), usually, at least in the vicinityof Rome, basaltic lava, irregular in form but fittedand jointed with the greatest nicety (apta jungiturarte silex, Tibull. i. 7. 60) so as to present a per-fectly even surface, as free from gaps or irregu-larities as if the whole had been one solid mass,and presenting much the same external appearanceas the most carefully built polygonal walls of theold Pelasgian towns. The general aspect will beunderstood from the cut given below of a portionof the street at the entrance of Pompeii. (Mazois,Les Ruines dc Pompei, vol. i. pi. xxxvii.). The centre of the way was a little elevated soas to permit the water to run off easily, and hencethe terms agger viae (Isidor. xv. 16. § 7 ; xix. 16 ; compare Virg. Aen. v. 273) ;and summum dorsum (Stat. I. c), although bothmay be applied to the whole surface of the pavi-mentum. Occasionally, at least in cities, rectan-gular slabs of softer stone were employed insteadof the irregular polygons of silex, as we perceiveto have been the case in the forum of Trajan,which was paved with travertino, and in part ofthe great forum under the column of Phocas, andhence the distinction between the phrases siliccsternere and saxo quadrato sternere. (Liv. x. 23,xli. 27.) It must be observed, that while on theone hand recourse was had to piling, when a solidfoundation could not otherwise be obtained, so, onthe other hand, when the road was carried overrock, the statumen and the rudus were dispensedwith altogether, and the nucleus was
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