The Via Egnatia is a historic Roman highway built in the 2nd century BCE that connected the Adriatic Sea to the Bosphorus. Designed and built by the Roman army more than 2000 years ago, the original Via Egnatia road ran from Durres in Albania all the way to Istanbul. The first part that was restored and described as a hiking route was from Durres to Thessaloniki.
The Via Egnatia exists because Roman soldiers needed a fast and safe route to travel between the key parts of their empire, and so built their roads avoiding wide open plains where they would be vulnerable to the enemy. In order to pull horse carts, the road could not be very steep, which leads to some amazingly runnable trails in the mountains. Further, a Roman soldier could march 25-30 miles a day, meaning that towns are naturally spaced this distance apart, making the trail perfect for running from town-to-town.
There is a Via Egnatia foundation who is committed to restoring the trail so people can hike it. Part 1 is described in their book, and was the fist part reopened for hikers. The foundation can be found here: https://viaegnatiafoundation.eu/the-trail/
