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One incentive for wealthy Romans to finance construction of aqueducts was, of course, glory. One's name would go up on the wall somewhere, and down in history, too.

However, there was more to aqueducts than just delivering water to cities for drinking, washing, cooking, and lavatory needs. For instance, hydraulic mining was all the rage in some places. One would run a spur from the existing aqueduct to indulge in a bit of ruina mortium, or hushing, to use water to bare up a gold or nickel vein.

Perhaps a prospector looking for funds might approach me, offering a contract and promising a sizable cut. Or I could hire someone to do some research to see if there were any areas that had growth potential, and the one obstacle was the lack of water.

Or, perhaps, the governor, or the Emperor himself, might send his agents to me, and I would promise, for a fee, to provide engineers, foremen, and slaves for an aqueduct project?

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In other words: were there wealthy people in the Empire not personally involved in aqueduct construction who could invest in it on the chance they might turn a profit?

Ricky
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    As it stands this is very vague, you're asking about the plausibility of a supposition (in a large empire over a span of many centuries) and it reads more like a world-building question than a history one. – Steve Bird Dec 07 '15 at 07:46
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    I think people are being quite mean here. It is a very interesting question. Does anyone know how major engineering projects were financed in ancient Rome? That it is what the question is about, and fascinating it would be to know the answer. – WS2 Dec 07 '15 at 08:56
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    I believe the picture is of the Pont du Gard in the South of France. My children as teenagers walked across the top structure. There are no barriers at the side (although it is very wide), and I could not have coped with the sense of vertigo! – WS2 Dec 07 '15 at 09:00
  • @WS2: Yeah, it's gotta be. It's the most famous one because of the views and stuff. ... Lots of stuff was financed by the government, because that's what governments are supposed to do, in fact. However, there had to be incentives for both public and private investment in various places at different times, including kickbacks. – Ricky Dec 07 '15 at 09:07
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    @WS2 Same as everywhere, the (typically, local) government paid for it. Usually (esp for mundane works) through taxation (e.g. road tolls) but also significantly using spoils of war, such as the Coliseum from the sack of Jerusalem. Rich "citizens", especially the Emperor, would also finance works from his own wealth for public support. – Semaphore Dec 07 '15 at 09:17
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    @WS2, I wasn't being mean, I was simply stating that as it stands the question is too vague. The Roman Empire spanned a large area and existed for several centuries and I very much doubt that the same rules for investment in public works applied everywhere for the whole existence of the empire. The other problem is determining if the investment "turned a profit", I would guess that much of the "profit" for supporting public works is intangible - investment earns favor which is returned in better business opporunities later on - difficult to prove one way or the other. – Steve Bird Dec 07 '15 at 09:32
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    I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it belongs on world building – Golden Cuy Dec 07 '15 at 10:01
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    I think it's a valid question. After all, if someone still thinks it's too broad, we may confine to well-known 11 aqueducts of Rome only. Is there any info on "private investments" in these projects? – Matt Dec 07 '15 at 10:48
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    Perfectly good question. Let me paraphrase all other comments: I don't know the answer. – Ne Mo Dec 07 '15 at 11:31
  • I find "Make money by investing" to be rather vague. Building an aqueduct that brings water to your fields would make you money, even if the aqueduct by itself did not bring any profit. Maybe you mean to ask if you could build a private aqueduct and charge users for the water? Otherwise, any farmer channeling water to grow some crops would be "making money" by "investing" (at least workforce) in an "aqueduct" (a channel to transport water) – SJuan76 Dec 07 '15 at 11:52
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    @SJuan76: You might want to read the question, not just the title. – Ricky Dec 07 '15 at 12:01
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    Then what you are proposing is mostly a construction company looking for contract. It did not work that way. Your model is that of capitalist enterprise which is anachronistic by a thousand years or more. If I (rich Roman or the Government) wanted something done, I would just hire an engineer and supply slave labour for it; materials would be local too. I would not pay for a company to provide me workers while I have thousands of slaves sitting that I can overwork into exhaustion for free, and only into exceptional cases(cif engineer) I would need to import free labour. – SJuan76 Dec 07 '15 at 12:21
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    @SJuan76: You judge hastily, I think. Slaves may have worked for free, but they weren't free to the owner: they had to be fed, clothed, and treated when sick. When a slave died in a construction accident, it was, among other things, a loss of small fortune. Moreover, the sheer scale of aqueduct building was prohibitive: no one man could undertake a project of that magnitude by himself. He needed partners, and the authorities' nod. And where there are authorities, there are kickbacks. – Ricky Dec 07 '15 at 12:28
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    Downvoting is not mean, unless you intend to say that anyone who has an opinion different from yours is intrinsically evil. – MCW Dec 07 '15 at 12:46
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    @MarkC.Wallace: I nearly always have an opinion that differs from those of others - a little or a lot. I wouldn't dream of downvoting anyone because I don't agree with them. The activity is not evil, it's merely disgusting. – Ricky Dec 07 '15 at 13:01
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    Downvoting is disgusting? What an interesting world you live in. – MCW Dec 07 '15 at 13:02
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    I have to agree with @MarkC.Wallace here. Downvoting is a core design of the Stackexchange sites. I do not like downvoting either, but if you detest it to the point of finding it disgusting, then a site designed around the concept of upvoting and downvoting might not be the best place for you. – Semaphore Dec 07 '15 at 13:07
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    I think there is an anachronism in the question, but it is subtle; Rome was perhaps the first place in the western world with an commercial economy where investment in the modern sense might have made sense. That said, the primary motivation for capital expenditures seems to have been social recognition rather than financial profit. Before I could answer the question, I'd have to research and write a lengthy essay on what "investment" mean to a Roman elite. – MCW Dec 07 '15 at 13:54
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    Downvoting just because you don't like the questioner/answerer is counterproductive. It's flowery, overlong and has a picture because of reasons, but the question at the core of it is straightforward - were there investors in public infrastructure who hope to turn a profit in ancient Rome? This is answerable and history-related. – RI Swamp Yankee Dec 07 '15 at 15:28
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    While I usually agree with @RISwampYankee, in this case I cannot. Downvoting is a privilege; anyone can downvote for any reason. Downvotes are not "mean" and they do not require justification. I refuse to submit my downvotes to anyone else's approval. I think this discussion has gone on too long, so I invite anyone else to have the final word. – MCW Dec 07 '15 at 16:16
  • Naturally, I can't find the source right now, but I've read that, as others said, the aqueducts were public works and not necessarily for profit. However, there was an office with the power to sell a limited number of permits for taps into Rome's water system each year. Apparently the original intent was those permits expired each year, but they were treated as permanent, with the result that every year more and more homes drew on them and reduced the amount of water available for fire fighting. – Rob Crawford May 14 '19 at 17:32

3 Answers3

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According to A Companion to the Archaeology of the Roman Republic, and a citation of antiquities scholar Ph. Leveau in particular, Roman aqueducts were mostly publicly funded, and although some may have had private funding, it was not for-profit.

Aqueducts were very costly to construct. So why and how did the Romans do it? Under the Empire, aqueducts were usually built and financed by the emperor, often to serve one of the monster bath complexes, themselves a product of imperial beneficence. Under the Republic these criteria did not exist and the decision to build an aqueduct rested with the Senate, apparently spurred on either by the personal initiative of an individual senator or by the ready availability of abundant funding; maintenance was under the care of censors or aediles. As an authority on financing, Ph. Leveau, has put it:

Aqueducts, being public works serving the public, did not attract private investment, and private citizens, contributing to their construction, did not in principle look for any profit in return. It has therefore been pointed out, and rightly, that the utility of an aqueduct did not lie in the field of economics, for while it promoted the health (salubritas) and quality of life (amoenitas) in the city, it did nothing for its commercial development. (Leveau, 2001: 86)

If you were a well-to-do ancient Roman funding the construction of an aqueduct, it would probably be called philanthropy.

congusbongus
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    Just a comment, but I believe the senatorial classes were forbidden from engaging in "trade" - their wealth (at least theoretically) came from landholdings. Of course, there were wealthy non-senatorial Romans. – TheHonRose Dec 07 '15 at 16:09
  • @TheHonRose: To be fair, they weren't forbidden to do anything, and not all trades were equal, either. Owning a ludus (i.e. a gladiator school) was frowned upon, and the owner wouldn't dare show his face in polite society, or if he did, he'd be shunned, but there was no law against it. – Ricky Dec 08 '15 at 02:11
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    @Ricky "In the later Republican period, Roman Senators and their offspring became an unofficial elite within the equestrian order. As senators' ability to engage in commerce was strictly limited by law, the bulk of non-agricultural activities were in the hands of non-senatorial equites. As well as holding large landed estates, equites came to dominate mining, shipping and manufacturing industry. In particular, tax farming companies (publicani) were almost all in the hands of equites." Wikipedia: Equites – TheHonRose Dec 08 '15 at 03:13
  • @TheHonRose: That's pretty good, actually. There's plenty of room for maneuver right there. Thank you. My next question will have to be about financial transactions (IOU's, receipts, the physical aspect of transferring large sums of money, etc. – Ricky Dec 08 '15 at 03:26
  • @Ricky Just reread the title of your question, and found myself wondering - how ancient an ancient Roman would you be? – TheHonRose Dec 08 '15 at 03:31
  • @TheHonRose: I'm not sure what you mean. How advanced in years (i.e. would I be senile? or too young to invest money?); or which epoch would I call home? – Ricky Dec 08 '15 at 03:42
  • @Ricky However you like - it was a joke! – TheHonRose Dec 08 '15 at 13:56
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Yes, but this was a rare exception rather than a rule. The Roman aqueduct-bridge of Pont d'Ael (which not only allowed water to cross, but also people) was funded privately by Caius Avillius Caimus. He charged a toll for everyone who wanted to cross the bridge (so admittedly the profit did not come from the aqueduct bit, at least as far as I know).

I visited the site some three year ago while it was in the middle of the reconstruction work and the archaeologist supervising the work was kind enough to show us around; she actually claimed that this was the only privately funded aqueduct known.

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There is additional sources, although I can't recall at the moment, about rich romans paying for their homes to be connected to the system so that they have running water in their homes. I believe aqueducts were generally public works (Defense and sanitation projects) local delivery to rich peoples homes could be a private endeavor as wealthy romans did pay a connection charge.

Stuart Allan
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