The Arapsu Bridge is a
Roman bridge
The ancient Romans were the first civilization to build large, permanent bridges. Early Roman bridges used techniques introduced by Etruscan immigrants, but the Romans improved those skills, developing and enhancing methods such as arches and ke ...
in
Antalya
Antalya () is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, fifth-most populous city in Turkey as well as the capital of Antalya Province. Located on Anatolia's southwest coast bordered by the Taurus Mountains, Antalya is the largest Turkish cit ...
,
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
. The well-preserved footbridge lies in the Arapsuyu district, 5–6 km west to the city center, at the foot of an ancient mound which is associated with the
Greek colony
Greek colonization was an organised colonial expansion by the Archaic Greeks into the Mediterranean Sea and Black Sea in the period of the 8th–6th centuries BC.
This colonization differed from the migrations of the Greek Dark Ages in that i ...
of
Olbia
Olbia (, ; sc, Terranoa; sdn, Tarranoa) is a city and commune of 60,346 inhabitants (May 2018) in the Italian insular province of Sassari in northeastern Sardinia, Italy, in the historical region of Gallura. Called ''Olbia'' in the Roman age, ...
.
Partly submerged by a modern
weir
A weir or low head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the river level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...
about 100 m downstream, the exact form of its
masonry arch is difficult to determine. According to
George Bean, the slightly
pointed arch
A pointed arch, ogival arch, or Gothic arch is an arch with a pointed crown, whose two curving sides meet at a relatively sharp angle at the top of the arch. This architectural element was particularly important in Gothic architecture. The earlie ...
indicates a
post-ancient construction date.
Colin O'Connor, however, classifies the bridge as a
Roman segmental arch bridge
The ancient Romans were the first civilization to build large, permanent bridges. Early Roman bridges used techniques introduced by Etruscan immigrants, but the Romans improved those skills, developing and enhancing methods such as arches and k ...
, examples of which have survived in the neighbouring
province
A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''Roman province, provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire ...
Lycia
Lycia (Lycian language, Lycian: 𐊗𐊕𐊐𐊎𐊆𐊖 ''Trm̃mis''; el, Λυκία, ; tr, Likya) was a state or nationality that flourished in Anatolia from 15–14th centuries BC (as Lukka) to 546 BC. It bordered the Mediterranean ...
(such as the
Limyra Bridge
The Bridge near Limyra (in tr, Kırkgöz Kemeri, "Bridge of the Forty Arches") is a late Roman bridge in Lycia, in modern south-west Turkey, and one of the oldest Circular segment, segmented arch bridges in the world. Located near the ancient c ...
).
See also
*
List of Roman bridges
This is a list of Roman bridges. The Romans were the world's first major bridge builders. The following list constitutes an attempt to list all known surviving remains of Roman bridges.
A Roman bridge in the sense of this article includes an ...
*
Ancient Roman architecture
Ancient Roman architecture adopted the external language of classical Greek architecture for the purposes of the ancient Romans, but was different from Greek buildings, becoming a new architectural style. The two styles are often considered one ...
*
Ancient Roman engineering
The ancient Romans were famous for their advanced engineering accomplishments. Technology for bringing running water into cities was developed in the east, but transformed by the Romans into a technology inconceivable in Greece. The architecture ...
References
Sources
*
*
External links
{{Roman bridges, state=collapsed
Roman bridges in Turkey
Deck arch bridges
Stone bridges in Turkey
Pamphylia
Buildings and structures in Antalya Province
Arch bridges in Turkey
Pedestrian bridges in Turkey