Porticus Aemilia

warehouse, Italy

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July 2, 2026

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The Porticus Aemilia was a large warehouse in ancient Rome, constructed around 193 BC. It was built on the banks of the Tiber River and measured 300,000 square feet. This structure exemplifies a new building technology of the time: concrete construction. This technique, using a mixture of crushed stone, lime, and sand, offered advantages in availability, flexibility, and reusability of molds over traditional cut-stone methods. The Porticus Aemilia featured repetitive arches and vaults, characteristic of later Roman architecture. This innovation was crucial for meeting the needs of Rome's growing population, including improving the construction of aqueducts for the city's water supply.1

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ancient Rome
Demographic and economic developments
The Porticus Aemilia (193), a warehouse of 300,000 square feet on the banks of the Tiber, illustrates how the new needs were met with a major new building technology, concrete construction. Around 200 bc in central Italy it was discovered that a wet mixture of crushed…
Read More
The Porticus Aemilia (193), a warehouse of 300,000 square feet on the banks of the Tiber, illustrates how the new needs were met with a major new building technology, concrete construction. Around 200 bc in central Italy it was discovered that a wet mixture of crushed…
Read More