ABSTRACT
The Lombard territory supplied building materials since the Roman Republican times (1st century BCE), but if the stones remained almost unchanged, the quarry methods and the transportations between the quarries and the urban yards greatly improved, as well as the working techniques to transform a rough block to an architectural element of regular shape or to a polished slab or to a perfectly carved ornament. The tools always show the same shape along the centuries; the sole variation was the metallic alloy used to make punch, chisel, toothed chisel, bull-nose chisel, gouge, etc.
The methods used in Lombardy to quarry, transport and work the stones were investigated according to the reports of ancient authors.
