Alcántara Bridge

Alcántara Bridge (also called Puente Trajan at Alcantara) is a Roman stone arch bridge. It was built over the Tagus River, Alcántara, Spain between 104 and 106 AD. The Roman emperor Trajan ordered this bridge built in 98 AD. The Alcántara Bridge was built at the expense of 12 local municipalities in Lusitania. The names were added on an inscription on the archway over the central pier. The original length of this bridge was 190 metres (620 ft). It is now 181.7 metres (596 ft) long The clear spans of the six arches from the right to the left riverside are 13.6 metres (45 ft), 23.4 metres (77 ft), 28.8 metres (94 ft), 27.4 metres (90 ft), 21.9 metres (72 ft) and 13.8 metres (45 ft) The Alcántara Bridge was one of 100 finalists for the 12 Treasures of Spain in 2007. References General references David J. Brown, Bridges (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993), p. 25 Manuel Durán Fuentes, La Construcción de Puentes Romanos en Hispania (Santiago de Compostela: Xunta de Galicia, 2004), pp. 194–200 Vittorio Galliazzo, I ponti romani, Catalogo generale Vol. 2 (Treviso: Edizioni Canova, 1994), pp. 353–358 (No. 754) Bernhard Graf, Bridges that Changed the World (Munich: Prestel, 2002), pp. 20–21 Colin O’Connor, Roman Bridges (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 109–111 (SP21) Other websites Alcantara Bridge at Structurae Video of the bridge on YouTube Video of Alcántara on YouTube