CFP: The Environmental Contexts of Riverine Frontiers in the Roman World (original) (raw)
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RAC 2020 Call for Papers and Session summaries (1)
The RAC 2020 Executive Committee is pleased to announce the Call for Individual Papers for the Fourteenth Roman Archaeology Conference in Split, which will run from Thursday 16th to Saturday 18th April 2020, with excursions on Wednesday 15th and Sunday 19th April. The Conference will address a range of important topics and themes relating to the archaeology of the Roman world. We are inviting proposals for Papers that will present new discoveries or ideas in the field of Roman archaeology through 40 themed conference sessions.
T. Ivleva, J. de Bruin and M. Driessen (eds.), Embracing the provinces. Society and material culture of the Roman frontier regions. Essays in honour of Dr Carol van Driel-Murray, 2018
The subject of this contribution is a probable military site tucked away in a river bend in the Rhine delta, west of the Roman fort at De Meern – a site that has recently come to life again largely owing to Carol van Driel-Murray’s input and inspiration. Not only did her expertise of Roman military leatherwork provide high-resolution dating evidence, it also managed to revive the motley crew that populated and worked this micro-installation between c. AD 180–230. Perhaps most importantly, Carol’s out-of-the-box and precociously “post-colonial” way of looking at the Roman army has been crucial in helping us interpret the seemingly hybrid find assemblage of a site that sheds unexpected light on the functioning of the Lower Rhine limes in the Severan period.
A History of the Congress of Roman Frontier Studies 1949-2022
A History of the Congress of Roman Frontier Studies 1949-2022, 2022
This volume celebrates the twenty-fifth Congress of Roman Frontier Studies. It presents the history of the congress accompanied by photographs and reminiscences from participants, a story populated by many of the well-known archaeologists of the last 75 years and, indeed, earlier as the genesis of the Congress lies in the inter-War years. In 1949, in the aftermath of a devastating war, Eric Birley organised the First Congress of Roman Frontier Studies. His aim was not only to pursue the study of Roman frontiers but also to take a step towards restoring harmony in international relations within this field of research. The pattern was set early on: the exchange of information, networking and friendship. These three elements remain at the core of the approach of those organising and attending the Congress. They are reinforced by the pattern of the meetings, usually held every three years. The programme includes not only lectures but also visits to the local Roman military sites led by appropriate specialists. Over the 73 years since the First Congress, membership has grown enormously with more lecture theatres and more coaches being required every meeting. This publication marks the twenty-fifth Congress at Nijmegen in the Netherlands, a city well known to Roman frontier archaeologists and early medieval scholars alike. It aims to help newer members understand the body they have joined; for those who have been attending for longer, it will be a reminder of friendships made and strengthened; for all, the book hopes to be a spur to continuing investigations and research into Rome’s greatest monument, its frontiers; for the moment of publication, it will be a celebration of the twenty-fifth Congress of Roman Frontier Studies.
(2023) The Environmental Context of Riverine trade in the Roman World
Sessions 4–5, Single Contributions, Heidelberg: Propylaeum, 2023 (Archaeology and Economy in the Ancient World – Proceedings of the 19th International Congress of Classical Archaeology, Cologne/Bonn 2018, Vol. 54)., 2023
Riverine transportation was highly dependent on environmental conditions in the pre-modern world, and understanding these conditions is an important step in understanding how rivers fitted into an Empire-wide network during the Roman era.1 Contemporary Roman written sources are mainly silent about these issues, and they are difficult (but not impossible) to understand through archaeological evidence alone. Recent advances in palaeo-environmental and palaeo-climatic reconstruction have an enormous amount of information to contribute,2 and can be added to comparative historical analysis of material observed in a Roman context.3 This multidisciplinary approach is the only way to fully appreciate the environmental realities of river-borne trade and transportation in antiquity, and has much to offer the economic historian. We must also recognize that modern rivers and modern shipping do not provide useful analogies to the ancient reality, influenced as they are by centuries of engineering projects and technological advancements. These issues are broadly applicable across the rivers of the Roman world, but are investigated here through the case study of the Rhine River and the provinces of Roman Germany. Roman river ships, especially the barges that were used to move large cargoes of bulk products, relied on basic technologies of sail and oar to move with the flow of a river downstream. Examples of these ships from sites such as De Meern, Zwammerdam, and Woerden in the Netherlands or Mainz in Germany show that they could be up to 40 m long and 4.3 m wide with a 100-ton capacity.4 Upstream movement was more complicated and often required the ship to be hauled against the current by men or animals on shore. Scenes of this activity in the Roman world can be found on the Igel Column near Trier, Germany, on the Avignon Relief from southern France, or on the statue of the god Tiber in the Louvre. We also find descriptions by authors such as Ausonius (Mosella 39-42), Cassiodorus (Variae 12, 24) and Wandalbert von Prüm (29, 2) that demonstrate that human labor from shore was a critical part of upstream travel in the Roman, late antique, and early medieval periods. Comparative evidence also shows that riverine transportation was limited to certain seasons because it was so dependent on riverine conditions. Seasonal risks, including ice in winter, floods in spring and autumn, and drought in summer dictated when and where a ship could travel and with how much cargo. The largest Roman ships traveling the greatest distance were the most vulnerable, and comparative evidence from the 19 th century demonstrates that the period from July to September was the most active for shipping bulk products on the Rhine.5 Outside of this period, problems can be encountered: Tacitus (Hist. 4, 26-27) records a ship running aground as a result of drought in AD 69, and Ammianus Marcellinus (14, 10, 2-3) records that floods prevented the