Conclusions about Archaeology
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Transport

• Key to defining physical limits of trade. Artistic sources and prices useful but incomplete and geographically limited.
• Archaeology helps understand shear range of trade – how? Study of shipwrecks and their cargoes, recognition of enormous range of ships, boats and vehicles.
• Roman transport equal to demands placed upon it – not excelled until canal and railway building.
• Archaeological study of results of transport – distributions of marble, wine or pottery – demand existence transport system – scale and size of Roman transport limited by demand not technology.

Coinage

• Coinage – Numismatic approach – lead to support view Roman economy involved comprehensive monetisation – nature, quantity and distribution of Roman coins more compatible with evidence for monetisation derived from Roman literature.
• Extent and diversity Roman trade in everyday items and luxuries – adds circumstantial weight to concept of interactions facilitated by cash payments.
• Augustan system of denominations very intricate – but not backed, as evidence suggests, with methods of accounting, credit or banking.

Agriculture

• Rich Roman literature in agriculture – archaeology just begun to supplement this evidence. Columella and Pliny – illustrate butchery trade in towns, and range of crops grown in the countryside.

Settlement in the Roman Empire

• Need clear perception of form and extent of the Roman expire. Highlight heavy but dispersed scatter of rural sites – reduce notional importance of the town. How could such a rural and dispersed population live without complex transport and systems of exchange.

Metal, Stone and Pottery

• Consistent feature of mining, quarrying and pottery making consistent feature of technology – not revolutionary.
• Prices of metal low enough for most farmers to use metal tools, marble in abundance. Technology for extracting and manufacturing such produce clearly adequate enough to meet high level of demand and priced low enough to be afforded by a wide range of the population. Effective transport nd coinage syste help to sustain trade state and army.

Conclusions

• Level of economic activity revealed by archaeology makes “Minimalist” approach of historians such as Finley untenable – economy does not show sign of evolution, but simply intensification of everything that existed in Greek and Roman republican times.
• Importance of archaeological evidence rises as number of relevant documents falls

Other Notes in this Category

1. Archaeology of the Roman Economy
2. Conclusions about Archaeology
3. Environmental Archaeology
4. Models of the Roman Economy
5. Rackham - Marshes, Fens, Rivers, and the sea
6. Studying the Landscape

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