An Interactive Map Shows Just How Many Roads Actually Lead to Rome

Zoomable version here.

...he went away, and passing through what was called the house of Tiberius, went down into the forum, to where a gilded column stood, at which all the roads that intersect Italy terminate.

~ Plutarch, Life of Galba (XXIV.4)

All roads lead to Rome.

To illustrate, designers Benedikt Groß and Philipp Schmitt worked with digital geographer Raphael Reimann to select 486,713 starting points on a 26,503,452 km² grid of Europe. The image above is from their interactive map Roads to Rome - zoom in for detail.

Via Open Culture, where they also point out:

In a nod to map lovers outside of Europe, the mobility-obsessed team came up with another map, this one geared to stateside users.

Do you know which of the United States’ nine Romes you are closest to?

Now you do, from 312,719 distinct starting points.