The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power

Although ancient Romans developed the technology for smooth, straight concrete roads, they are not responsible for the modern practice of street naming. Certain street names—like Vicus Frumentarius, Grain Street—bear the mark of intentional design, but Mask shows that existing documents use landmarks, rather than street names, to aid navigation.

However, whereas modern English has only a few synonyms for “road” or “street,” the ancient Romans had a wide variety of terms: “angiportum,” for example, referred to the road backing into the rear entrance of a home, while “gradus” described a street leading to stairs. The variety of terms used to describe these different types of streets indicates the importance of streets as a public space in ancient Rome. Mask notes that public streets were often used as restaurants, meeting areas, or even bathrooms.

The question of how ancient Romans navigated these crowded streets leads Mask to the research of Kevin Lynch, an urban planning professor working in the 1950s. Lynch’s research into what makes cities pleasurable led to the development of the idea of an “imageable” city. In Lynch’s theory, an imageable city is one that appears “well formed, distinct, remarkable: it would invite the eye and the ear to greater attention and participation” (61).