Taming the Tiber: Roman Water Management in the Tiber Valley and its Impact on Riparian Communities
Data evento
29 April 2026
Flooding has formed one of Rome’s most persistent environmental challenges and during the Roman era the city was subject to frequent and devastating inundations. Throughout the Roman period, public institutions and private individuals undertook a variety of interventions along the Tiber and its tributaries in an attempt to control and manage the river. These ranged from small alterations to the river channel, to large-scale engineering projects that dramatically altered the landscape. While these interventions may have protected areas in their immediate vicinity, their piecemeal nature resulted in unintended consequences for riparian communities along the Tiber. Defending the riverbank in one area could transfer risk to another stretch of the watercourse, exacerbating hydrological risk. Although the effectiveness of Roman interventions along the Tiber are hard to quantify, the high frequency of floods recorded by literary sources suggests an adequate solution was never found.