The foremost heritage the Roman world left the Middle Ages and its heirs no longer seems to be an eternal, unaltered road network. Rather, our great inheritance is – as this chapter shows – first, the principle of distributing building and maintenance costs proportionally among abutting dwellers and, second, the pay-as-you-use method. These two canons substantiate the new myth of Romans ways of infrastructure supporting. After the fall of the Roman Empire, infrastructure once again took on strategic importance during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, because of centralization government policy and growth of trade. Where economic prospects were good or where a common service had to be managed, private or community-wide initiative proved essential. In the Late Middle Ages earmarked taxes and public debt were set out to catch for road, bridge, and canal building needs, providing financial tools destined to greatly modernize the support of infrastructure.

Infrastructure Financing in Medieval Europe: On and beyond ‘Roman Ways’ / G. De Luca - In: Infrastructure Finance in Europe. Insights into the History of Water, Transport, and Telecommunications / [a cura di] Y. Cassis, G. De Luca, M. Florio. - Prima edizione. - New York : Oxford University Press, 2016. - ISBN 9780198713418. - pp. 39-60

Infrastructure Financing in Medieval Europe: On and beyond ‘Roman Ways’

G. De Luca
Primo
2016

Abstract

The foremost heritage the Roman world left the Middle Ages and its heirs no longer seems to be an eternal, unaltered road network. Rather, our great inheritance is – as this chapter shows – first, the principle of distributing building and maintenance costs proportionally among abutting dwellers and, second, the pay-as-you-use method. These two canons substantiate the new myth of Romans ways of infrastructure supporting. After the fall of the Roman Empire, infrastructure once again took on strategic importance during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, because of centralization government policy and growth of trade. Where economic prospects were good or where a common service had to be managed, private or community-wide initiative proved essential. In the Late Middle Ages earmarked taxes and public debt were set out to catch for road, bridge, and canal building needs, providing financial tools destined to greatly modernize the support of infrastructure.
Infrastructure, finance; Roman Age; Middle Ages; responsibility of the abutting dwellers; pay-as-you-use method; earmarked taxes; tax state; euergetism
Settore SECS-P/12 - Storia Economica
2016
Book Part (author)
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/2434/356076
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