Roman roads in Libya
The cities of Roman Tripolitania, Leptis Magna, Oea and Sabratha, grew rich on the trans-Saharan trade, and the roads inland ran to the desert oases that made it possible. Leptis Magna was the birthplace of the emperor Septimius Severus, who rebuilt it on a scale the province could not sustain and which is why so much of it survives.
What to see
Leptis Magna is the most complete Roman city in the Mediterranean and the reason to care about Libya's roads. Septimius Severus, born there in AD 145, rebuilt his home town on an imperial scale it never needed: a forum, a basilica, a four-way arch and a harbour that silted up almost as soon as it was finished. Sabratha keeps a three-storey theatre facade rebuilt in the 1930s.
- Mapped segments
- 181
- Surveyed length
- 12,200 km
Measured from the Itiner-e survey. Segments by certainty of line: conjectured 98, hypothetical 77, certain 6. A conjectured line is one inferred from evidence either side of it, not a road whose existence is doubted.
What kind of roads
- Secondary Road 134 segments
- Main Road 47 segments