The Roman Empire - A History of Chaos

The old republican calendar listed about 90 days of public holiday throughout the year, but by the reign of claudius, that number had grown at least a hundred and 50. Retail shops were open in the commercial spaces that existed on the ground floor ofalmost every tenement building in the city. Adding to the chaos was the fact that these crowded streets had been laid out haphazardly and without an ounce of foresight. Some roads crossed themselves, others were far too narrow for the arterial traffic they now bore, while others led to nowhere at all. The dark shame of the obsessively type romans.