Editing Roman bridge (section)

== ''Opus pontis'' ==
[[File:Bridge Alcantara.JPG|thumb|The [[Alcántara Bridge]]]]
The costs of building and repairing bridges, known as ''opus pontis'' ("bridge work"), were the responsibility of multiple local municipalities. Their shared costs prove Roman bridges belonged to the region overall, and not to any one town (or two, if on a border). The [[Alcántara Bridge]] in [[Lusitania]], for example, was built at the expense of 12 local municipalities, whose names were added on an inscription.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Frothingham |first1=A.I. |date=1915 |title=The Roman Territorial Arch |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xX1JAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA172 |journal=American Journal of Archaeology |language=en |publisher=Macmillan Company |volume=14 |issue=19 |pages=159, 172}}</ref> Later, in the [[Roman Empire]], the local lords of the land had to pay tithes to the empire for ''opus pontis''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=James-Raoul |first1=Danièle |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5Pyh1YlfFCIC&pg=PA201 |title=Les ponts au Moyen Âge |last2=Thomasset |first2=Claude |date=2006 |publisher=Presses Paris Sorbonne |isbn=9782840503736 |page=201 |language=fr |access-date=15 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Gillespie |first1=Donald S. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2-McCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA27 |title=Le Beau Dieu |date=2015 |publisher=Holy Fire Publishing |isbn=9781603835084 |page=27 |language=en |access-date=15 July 2017}}</ref> The [[Anglo-Saxons]] continued this practice with ''bricg-geworc'', a literal translation of ''opus pontis''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bosworth |first1=Joseph |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oXlii1KgDngC&q=opus+pontis&pg=PA125 |title=An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary: Based on the Manuscript Collections of the Late Joseph Bosworth ... |date=1882 |publisher=Clarendon Press |page=125 |language=en |access-date=15 July 2017}}</ref>