constructing an extensive system of drains and sewers that disposed of
city wastes, building a network of roads that eventually gave the Romans
access first to all parts of Italy and later to the entire Mediterranean
Basin. They also replaced the wooden bridges over the Tiber and other
rivers by stone bridges carried on stone piers and arches.

Early in their building activities the Romans learned to make a cement
so weather-resistant that many of their constructs are still usable two
thousand years after the Romans built them. These and similar building
operations made Rome one of the show places of the Graeco-Roman world.
They also provided for the Romans a level of stability and security far
beyond that of their neighbors in that part of the unstable Italian
peninsula.

At the time Rome was founded, presumably about 700 B.C., the Italian
peninsula was occupied by a large number of principalities, kingdoms and
tribal nomads, newly arrived from eastern Europe and Asia. The struggle
for pasturage and fertile soil, for dwelling sites and trading
opportunities, went on ceaselessly. Romans, like their neighbors and
competitors, were reaching out to provide themselves with food, building
materials, trade opportunities, strategic advantages. They expanded
peacefully if possible, using diplomacy up to a certain point and only
engaging in war as a last resort. But since the entire Italian peninsula
was occupied by more or less independent groups, each of which was
seeking a larger and safer place in the sun, the outcome was ceaseless
diplomatic maneuvering, using war as an instrument of policy in the
struggle for pelf and power. Four centuries of power struggle, in which
Romans played an increasingly prominent role, gave the Roman Republic
and its allies substantial control of the entire Italian peninsula.
Beginning as one among many small independent states in Italy, the