the romans and ancient travelers in general did not use maps. they may have existed as specialty items in some of the libraries, but they were hard to copy and were not in general use. on the roman road system, however, the traveller needed some idea of where he or she was going, how to get there, and how long it would take. the "itinerarium" filled this need. in origin it was simply a list of cities along a road: "at their most basic, "itineraria" involve the transposition of information given on milestones, which were an integral feature of the major roman roads, to a written script." it was only a short step from lists to a master list. to sort out the lists, the romans drew diagrams of parallel lines showing the branches of the roads. parts of these were copied and sold on the streets. the very best featured symbols for cities, way stations, water courses, and so on. the maps did not represent landforms but they served the purpose of a simple schematic diagram for the user.