The Urban Economy during the Early Dominate: Pottery evidence from the Palatine Hill 9781841710044, 9781407351100

Table of contents :
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Table of Contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
Acknowledgements
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER 1: THE URBAN ECONOMY DURING THE EARLY DOMINATE
CHAPTER 2: THE A (105) POTTERY DEPOSIT
CHAPTER 3: SYNTHESIS: THE URBAN ECONOMY IN LIGHT OF THE A (105) POTTERY DATA
CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSIONS
APPENDIX 1: STATE INVOLVEMENT IN THE URBAN WINE SUPPLY DURING THE SECOND HALF OF THE 4TH C.
APPENDIX 2: FABRIC CLASSIFICATION
APPENDIX 3: TECHNIQUES FOR MEASURING THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF POTTERY
ABBREVIATIONS
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX OF ANCIENT TEXTS CITED
INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Citation preview

BAR  S784  1999   PEÑA   THE URBAN ECONOMY DURING THE EARLY DOMINATE

The Urban Economy during the Early Dominate Pottery evidence from the Palatine Hill

J. Theodore Peña

BAR International Series 784 9 781841 710044

B A R

1999

The Urban Economy during the Early Dominate Pottery evidence from the Palatine Hill

J. Theodore Pefia

BAR International Series 784 1999

Published in 2016 by BAR Publishing, Oxford BAR International Series 784 The Urban Economy during the Early Dominate

© JT Pena and the Publisher 1999 The author's moral rights under the 1988 UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act are hereby expressly asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be copied, reproduced, stored, sold, distributed, scanned, saved in any form of digital format or transmitted in any form digitally, without the written permission of the Publisher.

ISBN 9781841710044 paperback ISBN 9781407351100 e-format DOI https://doi.org/10.30861/9781841710044 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library BAR Publishing is the trading name of British Archaeological Reports (Oxford) Ltd. British Archaeological Reports was first incorporated in 1974 to publish the BAR Series, International and British. In 1992 Hadrian Books Ltd became part of the BAR group. This volume was originally published by Archaeopress in conjunction with British Archaeological Reports (Oxford) Ltd/ Hadrian Books Ltd, the Series principal publisher, in 1999. This present volume is published by BAR Publishing, 2016.

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Table of Contents

page

List of Figures

v

List of Tables Acknowledgements

Vlll

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Urban Economy during the Early Dominate 3 3 10

Introduction 1.1 General Aspects of the Economy 1.2 The Supply and Consumption of Wine 1.3 The Supply and Consumption of Olive Oil 1.4. The Supply and Consumption of Fish Products 1.5 The Supply and Consumption of Pottery Chapter I Endnotes

20 28 29 38

Chapter 2: The A (105) Pottery Deposit 57 57

Introduction 2.1 Context A (I 05): Characteristics, Dating, and Deposition 2.2 Study Methods 2.3 Catalogue Format 2.4 Amphoras 2.4.1 Wine Amphoras and Probable Wine Amphoras 2.4.2 Oil Amphoras 2.4.3 Oil/Fish Products Amphoras 2.4.4 Fish Products Amphoras 2.4.5 Amphoras of Unknown Content 2.4.6 Sherd Disks 2.5 Tablewares and Utilitarian Wares 2.6 Cookwares Chapter 2 Endnotes

60 70 71 71 86

87 93

96 98 100 122 138

Chapter 3: Synthesis: The Urban Economy in Light of the A (105) Pottery Data Introduction 3. I Aspects of Quantification 3.2 The Consumption of Amphora-Borne Foodstuffs and Pottery 3.2. l Introductory Considerations 3.2.2 Amphora-Borne Foodstuffs 3.2.3 Pottery 3.2.4 General Synthesis Chapter 3 Endnotes

iii

151 151 153

153 154

158 165 166

Chapter 4: Conclusions

page

169

Appendix 1: The Provision of State Wine to the City of Rome during the second half of the 4th c.

173

Appendix 2: Fabric Classification

183

Appendix 3: Techniques for Measuring the Economic Value of Pottery

191

Abbreviations

205

Bibliography

206

Index of Ancient Texts Cited

221

Index of Subjects

225

iv

List of Figures

The figure on the cover is a line rendering of a relief on an altar from Rome dating to either A.D. 284 or the A.D. 340s that depicts a river-boat being towed upstream from Ostia/Portus to Rome with what appears to be a cargo ofBaetican olive oil amphoras (see Section 1.3).

Fig. 1: Map of the Roman empire during the Early Dominate showing the dioceses and the cities mentioned in the text.

page

4

Fig. 2:

Map of portions of the dioceses ofltalia and Africa during the Early Dominate showing the provinces, towns, and rivers mentioned in the text.

5

Fig. 3:

Plan of Rome showing the locales and structures, and clay outcrops mentioned in the text.

7

Fig. 4:

Map of Rome and environs showing pottery production sites and hypothetical boundaries of pottery supply zones.

32

Fig. 5:

Harris Matrix of the stratigraphic sequence in the Northeast Room.

57

Fig. 6:

Map of the central Mediterranean showing the location of major igneous/metamorphic massifs and volcanic provinces/complexes.

61

Fig. 7:

Class 2: Mid-Imperial Campanian Amphora.

72

Fig. 8:

Class 3: Keay 52 Amphora.

73

Fig. 9:

Class 4: Middle Roman 1 Amphora.

75

Fig. 10: Class 5: Palatine East Amphora 1.

77

Fig. 11: Class 6: Ostia 1.455/456 Amphora.

79

Fig. 12: Class 7: Palatine East Amphora 2.

80

Fig. 13: Class 8: Palatine East Amphora 3.

81

Fig. 14: Class Class Class Class

83

9: Cretan 1 Amphora; 10: Late Roman 4 Amphora similis; 11: Sarac;:haneType 2 Amphora; 12: Late Roman 3 Amphora.

Fig. 15: Class 13: Kapitan 2 Amphora; Class 14: Kapitan 1 Amphora.

85

Fig. 16: Class 17: Keay 9/11 Amphora.

87

Fig. 17: Class 18: Keay 3A/B Amphora; Class 19: Keay 258 Amphora.

89

Fig. 18: Classes 20-23: Keay 4-5, 5bis, 6, and 7 Amphoras.

90

V

Fig. 19: Class 24: Short-Necked Central Tunisian Amphora; Central Tunisian amphora handle.

page

92

Fig. 20: Class 25: Almagro 51 C Amphora.

94

Fig. 21: Class 26: Almagro 50 Amphora.

95

Fig. 22: Class 27: Keay 1 Amphora.

97

Fig. 23: Class 28: Short-Necked Tripolitanian Amphora; miscellaneous unclassified amphoras.

98

Fig. 24: Class 29: Fineware 1 (open forms).

101

Fig. 25: Class 29: Fineware 1 ( closed forms, bases).

103

Fig. 26: Class 30: Color-Coat Fineware 1 (open forms).

106

Fig. 27: Class 30: Color-Coat Fineware 1 (closed forms, bases).

109

Fig. 28: Class 31: Color-Coat Fineware 2; Class 32: Color-Coat Volcanic Ware; Class 33: Volcanic Utilitarian Ware.

110

Fig. 29: Class Class Class Class Class

113

34: Streaky Thin-Walled Ware; 35: Quartz Ware; 36: Central Tiber Red-Slip Ware; 37: Red-Painted Fineware 3; 38: Heavy-Glazed Ware.

Fig. 30: Class 39: African Sigillata A; Class 40: African Sigillata D.

117

Fig. 31: Class 41: African Sigillata C.

119

Fig. 32: Classes 42-44: Tunisian Utilitarian Ware 1, 2, and 3.

121

Fig. 33: Class 45: West-Central Italian Cookware I (open forms).

125

Fig. 34: Class 45: West-Central Italian Cookware 1 (closed forms, lids, bases).

127

Fig. 35: Class 46: West-Central Italian Cookware 2.

130

Fig. 36: Class 47: Quartzite Cookware.

132

Fig. 37: Class 48: North Tunisian Cookware.

l .).) ",.,

Fig. 38: Class 49: Central Tunisian Cookware.

136

vi

List of Tables

Table 1: Ceramic lamps.

page

58

Table 2: Pottery by functional groups.

63

Table 3: Amphoras: sherd weight, sherd count, and rim count data.

63

Table 4: Amphoras: number vessel rims and estimated number of vessels data.

64

Table 5: Tablewares and utilitarian wares: sherd weight, sherd count, and rim count data.

65

Table 6: Tablewares and utilitarian wares: number vessel rims and estimated number vessels data.

66

Table 7: Cookwares: sherd weight, sherd count, and rim count data.

68

Table 8: Cookwares: number vessel rims and estimated number vessels data.

68

Table 9: Sherd disks: counts and diameters by class.

99

Table 10: Concordance of vessels in A (105) subjected to NAA.

160

Table 11: Comparative capacity data for three Africano 2 and two Keay 25 amphoras.

193

Table 12: Amphora capacity data.

194

Table 13: Amphora capacity data summarized by class.

197

Table 14: Amphoras: estimated economic value data.

198

Table 15: Tablewares, utilitarian wares, and cookwares: estimated economic value data.

201

vii

Acknowledgements

This work was realized with the assistance of numerous individuals and institutions to whom I would like to express my gratitude. First and foremost, I would like to thank Eric Hostetter, director of the Palatine East excavations, who invited me to join the project as ceramics specialist and has been a constant source of support and encouragement in my efforts to find order in the site's overwhelmingly massive pottery assemblage. The Palatine East excavation has received generous financial support from the Alexander and Helena Abraham Foundation, the Kress Foundation, the Packard Foundation, the American Academy in Rome, The University of Illinois, and Rutgers University. My colleague Bradley Ault was of assistance in clarifying various aspects of excavation operations in Sector A of the Palatine East site. My study of the materials that are the subject of this monograph was assisted by Eric De Sena (tablewares), Janne Ikaheimo (cookwares), and Victor Martinez (amphoras), who did much of the basic classificatory work and provided me with numerous ideas and bibliographical references. Tana Allen and Theodore Buttrey graciously shared with me their

analysis of the lamps and coins from the context that is the subject of this study. James McCaw undertook the bulk of the work involved in the measuring of the capacities of the various amphora classes represented, while Brent Drone, Laura Jaracz, Lynne Sprincze, and Arlene Vespa prepared the drawings of the context pottery. Sheldon Landsberger of the Department of Nuclear Engineering and Sarah Wisseman of A.T.A.M., both of the University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign, carried out the bulk of the work connected with the neutron activation analysis of the context materials. Paul Roberts graciously examined the materials that are the subject of this study, offering several helpful observations. I owe a particular debt of gratitude to Clementina Panella, who has been an unfailing source of support, guidance, and information in my work with the Palatine East assemblage. Myles Mccallum offered several helpful bibliographical references. Finally, various versions of the text were read and commented on by Stephen Dyson, Lisa Fentress, and Tim Potter, and all versions by Elizabeth S. Pefia.

viii

INTRODUCTION

This monograph presents an in-depth analysis of a deposit of pottery recovered on the Palatine Hill that is composed primarily of materials used and discarded during the period ca. A.O. 290-315. This span of time corresponds to the early years of the new imperial system formalized through the set of administrative, fiscal, and military reforms introduced by Diocletian. It also presumably marked the beginning of the transition from the forms of economic organization characteristic of the early and middle empire to those representative of the late empire. There are exceedingly few studies in print concerned with groups of pottery dating to this period - here referred to for the sake of convenience as the Early Dominate - and the presentation of the materials that are the focus of this monograph thus represents an important addition to our evidence regarding the nature of this transition, particularly as expressed in the supply of foodstuffs and craft goods to the historic center of the empire.

I . The study begins with a detailed discussion of the urban economy during the period of the context's deposition, employing this as a background against which to interpret the materials. This section, which is based primarily on a close reading of the textual evidence, provides an unusually rich context for the evaluation of the deposit, permitting the ceramic evidence to be linked to specific economic institutions to an extent that is not generally possible in Roman pottery studies. 2. The primary classification of the materials was carried out on the basis of fabric rather than form or surface finish. This approach allows for the more effective grouping of the materials by provenience. 3. The various fabrics represented have been arranged in a hierarchical scheme based on their salient compositional characteristics. This approach highlights the relationships between different fabrics and pottery classes at the materials level, while facilitating the use of the fabric classification as an identification key.

The deposit of pottery that is the subject of this study was recovered in the course of the joint Soprintendenza Archeologica di Roma/American Academy in Rome excavations on the northeast slope of the Palatine Hill. This project (henceforth referred to as the Palatine East excavations) was carried out in a series of six annual campaigns between 1989 and 1994 under the direction of E. Hostetter, with the author serving as chief ceramics specialist. The study presented here is a pilot project undertaken for the purpose of developing a set of procedures for the analysis and publication of the site pottery assemblage. The set of materials selected for this purpose was the ca. 512 kilograms of pottery recovered in context (i.e., stratigraphic unit) A (I 05). This group of materials was chosen for two reasons. First, it was evident at the time of its excavation that context A (105) contained materials used and discarded primarily during the historically important, yet archaeologically little-known period of the Early Dominate. Second, it was evident from the unusually large number of complete or nearly complete vessels recovered in A (I 05) that the materials in this context had been subjected to substantially less post-depositional disturbance than those in the several other large, late imperial deposits that had been excavated elsewhere on the site. The potential significance of the deposit thus appeared sufficiently great to justify its separate publication, while the condition of the materials suggested that it would be possible to experiment with certain analytical techniques that might prove difficult to apply to groups of highly fragmentary and/or relatively incomplete vessels.

4. The definition of forms and form variants has been carried out on the basis of both vessel morphology and the forming/ finishing operations involved in vessel manufacture. This approach yields a form classification more closely related to the production process, hence one more likely to express variability deriving from archaeologically significant factors, such as differences in manufacturing technique from one workshop to the next, diachronic change in forming technique, etc. 5. The materials in the deposit have been quantified using a wide array of standard measures, including sherd counts, sherd weights, and minimum vessel counts. This yields quantitative data that offer a high degree of intercomparability with data sets derived for other pottery groups, while also generating information that can be used to evaluate some of the empirical characteristics of these measures. 6. The materials in the deposit have been quantified using two measures developed specifically for this study that are designed to characterize the economic value of archaeological pottery. The first of these, which is applied to the amphora component of the deposit, draws on figures for the mean capacity of the various amphora classes represented in order to derive an estimate for the amount of content that they held. The second, which is applied to the tablewares, utilitarian wares, and cookwares, characterizes the value of vessels in terms of the amount of raw materials and labor involved in their manufacture. These approaches permit the generation

This study should prove to be both of general interest to students of the Roman economy and of methodological interest to specialists in the study of Roman pottery. The aspects that may prove to be of methodological interest include the following: 1

INTRODUCTION

of quantitative assemblage data more closely related to considerations of economic significance than do standard pottery quantification measures.

Linked to this chapter are Appendix 2, which presents the fabric classification, and Appendix 3, which discusses the two techniques referred to above for measuring the economic value of the assemblage pottery. Chapter 3 then presents the interpretation of the A (105) materials, considering their implications for our understanding of the urban economy during the Early Dominate and for certain aspects of the methods employed for their quantification. Chapter 4, which concludes the study, presents a brief summary of its principal results.

Chapter I presents discussions of various aspects of the urban economy during the period of the Early Dominate that are relevant to the interpretation of the A ( I 05) material. Appendix I, which is linked to this chapter, discusses state involvement in the urban wine supply during the second half of the 4th c. Chapter 2 consists of a detailed description of the A (I 05) materials.

2

CHAPTER 1: THE URBAN ECONOMY DURING THE EARLY DOMINATE

Introduction This chapter presents a selective overview of the economy of the city of Rome during the period of the formation of the A (105) pottery deposit (ca. A.D. 290-312/15). Since the aim is to formulate a background that can be employed for the interpretation of the pottery data, the discussion focuses on those aspects of economic activity most directly related to the ceramic record.

on the figures available for somewhat earlier and later periods of the city's history. Most recently, Morley has estimated that at the time of Augustus the city's population came to ca. 850,000-1,000,000 individuals. 4 Efforts by both Barnish and Hodges and Whitehouse to evaluate the general scale of they city's population during the late empire concluded that the number of inhabitants underwent substantial contraction from 1st c. levels only during the late 4th or 5th c. 5 For the Early Dominate, it would seem advisable to lower the Augustan figures somewhat in order to allow for the possibility that the population underwent significant decline in connection with the crisis of the 3rd c. In light of this assumption, a range of ca. 700,000-900,000 individuals would seem a plausible estimate.

The chapter is divided into five sections. The first examines various aspects of the urban economy in general during the period in question. The second, third, and fourth discuss the supply and consumption of the three principal foodstuffs regularly distributed to Rome in ceramic containers, namely wine, olive oil, and fish products. The fifth, in turn, discusses the supply and consumption of pottery as a craft good in its own right. It must be acknowledged at the outset that in each case the effort to reconstruct a coherent picture is severely constrained by the paucity of both textual and material evidence pertaining specifically to the period of the Early Dominate.

Transport: During the period that is the focus of this study Rome stood at the center of a highly developed transport system that connected it with its greater regional economic catchment area in west-central Italy and with the wider empire. 6 The main elements of this system were the constellation of paved, all-weather routes that radiated outward from the city,7 and the Tiber River. Goods moved overland were transported by porter, pack mule, and wagon at speeds probably on the order of 4-6 km per hour. 8 The Tiber provided connections with areas lying outside the region through the port facilities at Ostia and Portus. Goods brought to Ostia/Portus by naves onerariae (merchant ships) were transferred to naves caudicariae (river-boats out-fitted for towing), which were then dragged up a tow path that ran along the bank of the river, the ca. 35 km trip to Rome normally requiring three days. 9 The trip back, drifting with the current, presumably required the better part of a day. While there was presumably some degree of seasonal variation in the availability and price of goods brought to Rome by sea due to the restrictions on sailing during the period from October to March, 10 fluctuations of this kind may have been smoothed out to some extent by the stockpiling of non-perishable goods in warehouses against the slack supply season. 11 Upstream of Rome, the remains of port facilities indicate that practical commercial navigation extended into the interior of the peninsula as far as the confluence of the Tiber with the Pallia (the modem Fiume Paglia), near Orvieto, and, on the lower course of the Nar (the modem Fiume Nera), the most important tributary of the Tiber, as far as Namia (modem Nami). 12 While we possess no information regarding the speeds that could be managed by boats headed downstream to Rome in antiquity, in early modem times river-boats propelled by a

1.1 General Aspects of the Economy While it would be desirable to begin with a comprehensive discussion of economic life in the urbs during the Early Dominate, such an undertaking lies beyond the scope of the present study. 1 Instead, a topical approach will be employed, touching on a limited number or points relevant to the interpretation of the A (105) pottery.

Administration: Under the new administrative arrangement introduced under Diocletian the city of Rome constituted (together with Ostia/Portus) an autonomous district within the diocese ofltalia. 2 This district, bordered on the south and east by the province of Campania and on the east and north by the province of Tuscia et Umbria, was under the charge of the praefectus urbi, an official of senatorial rank, whose administration was known as the officium urbanum. The diocese of Italia was administered by an official known as the vicarius /taliae. 3 It lay within the prefecture of Italia et Africa, which was administered by an official known as the praefectus praetorio Italiae et Africae. Population: We possess no information regarding the size of the population of Rome during the Early Dominate, and the best that can be done is to develop an intelligent estimate based

3

THE URBAN ECONOMY Fig. I:

Map of the Roman Empire during the Early Dominate showing the dioceses and the cities mentioned in the text.

l Mediolanum ' , p • I .,. '", •✓

VIE

.· ·.

HISPANIAE

.

.

..

0

500

1000 km

1-----------------1---1

combination of oars and sail took three days to complete the ca. 135 km trip from Orte (Roman Horta), situated a short distance above the Nera confluence. 13 We may imagine that roughly similar speeds were attained in Roman times, with the trip from the Pallia confluence to Rome likely requiring one additional day. We know from Martial (4.64.11-24) that riverboats were towed back upstream, and remains of the tow path have been uncovered in the vicinity of the Pons Milvius. 14 The work must have been arduous, with the speeds achieved comparable to those attained in the towing of river-boats from Ostia/Portus to Rome (i.e., ca. 12 km per day). While the high quality of the road system that connected Rome with its hinterland and the large volume of traffic that no doubt made use of this network probably combined to make overland transport relatively inexpensive in the Rome region, it seems unlikely that most goods could have borne the added cost of land transport over any appreciable distance, 15 and for this reason it is probably safe to assume that the bulk of the nonlocal items available on the Rome market reached the city by means of the Tiber.

Political Integration: There is no reason to assume that the tetrarchic system for the division of rule instituted under Diocletian in AD 293 hindered the economic integration of the empire prior to A.D. 308. Beginning in that year, however, the political, and eventually military confrontation between Maxentius and Constantine likely resulted in significant interruptions to both free-market trade and the transfer of state goods between the parts of the empire that these two rulers had under their control. For Maxentius, this consisted of the prefecture of Italia and Africa, plus perhaps the diocese of Hispania, while for Constantine this consisted of the prefecture of Galliae, less perhaps the diocese of Hispania. 16 Of particular significance as far as the city of Rome is concerned was the revolt of Domitius Alexander, an uprising centered in the diocese of Africa that lasted from A.D. 308 to A.D. 309 or 310. 17 Domitius, the vicarius Africae, rebelled against the authority ofMaxentius, perhaps with some collusion on the part of Constantine, and sought to establish an independent kingdom in the territories under his jurisdiction. While many details of this episode re main unclear, Domitius appears to

4

CHAPTER I Fig. 2:

Map of portions of the dioceses ofltalia and Africa during the Early Dominate, showing the provinces, towns, and rivers mentioned in the text.

I

.

•

Ravenna ..

Caesena 'FLAMlN1A '\.

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\',~cENUM TUSCIA ET UMBRIA

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ZEUGITANA

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5

THE URBAN ECONOMY

have gained control over a large part of Maxentius' realm, including the provinces of Tripolitania, Byzacena, Zeugitana, Numidia, Sardinia, and perhaps also the Mauritanias. Among other things, this uprising led to an interruption of shipping between Africa and Italia that lasted for a period of at least one, and perhaps as many as three consecutive years. According to the Chronographus anni CCC LIii! (148) (henceforth Chron. 354) this resulted in a food crisis at Rome, which compelled Maxentius to levy new taxes, presumably to finance the acquisition of supplies of grain and olive oil to replace those which were normally imported from Africa and Sardinia. This period of political and economic division in the western part of the empire came to a close with Constantine's elimination of Maxentius in October, A.D. 312.

State Employment and Expenditures: Another important aspect of the urban economy at this and other times in the city's history would have been the elevated level of buying power that resulted from the transfer to state functionaries, soldiers, and other categories of free laborers in the direct or indirect employ of the state of large amounts of wealth in the form of wages and other payments. To some extent, the overall scale of these inputs of wealth into the urban economy would have been determined by the presence at Rome of an imperial court, and we should probably imagine that the establishment of Mediolanum (modern Milan) as a seat of imperial rule in A.D. 286, as well as the establishment there of the seats of both the praefectus praetorio ltaliae et Africae and the vicarius Jtaliae at roughly this same time, served to reduce their scale in some significant measure. This effect was presumably reversed in part by the re-establishment at Rome of an imperial court in A.D. 306 under Maxentius.

State Food Subsidies: Various forms of state expenditure would have produced a variety of effects, both direct and indirect, on the price and availability of goods on the Rome market. Most important in this regard were probably the several state initiatives for the free disbursal and/or sale at a subsidized price of food staples. By the second half of the 4th c., when we can gain a reasonably coherent view of these initiatives, they involved four different species fiscales (stateowned items), namely grain (from the 3rd c. onward distributed in the form of bread), olive oil, pork, and wine. 18 These were raised under the canon urbis Romae, a grouping of four special taxes (the canon frumentarius, canon olei, canon suarius, and canon vinarius) earmarked for the support of the urbs that were apparently subsumed under the annona (i.e., the land tax assessed in terms of kind). 19 Responsibility for the supply and distribution of the first two of these foodstuffs fell to the office of the praefectus annonae, while the supply and distribution of the latter two were undertaken by the office of the praefectus urbi. Figuring prominently in the storage and disbursal of these foodstuffs during the 4th c. were the Horrea Galbana, a large state-owned warehouse complex located in the Emporium, the city's major port district, 20 and a cluster of facilities in the eastern Campus Martius that included the Templum Solis, the Forum Suarium, and the Castra Urbana.

One of the most important areas of state expenditure would have been that of construction. Following a 35 year period during which there was a dearth of state building activity, the years from the accession of Aurelian to the fall of Maxentius (A.D. 270-312) were marked by a striking upswing in the number of major construction projects. 22 Among the more important projects undertaken during this period were the construction of the Aurelian Walls, the Templum Solis, the Baths of Diocletian, the Villa of Maxentius complex, the Basilica Nova, and a significant portion of the Baths of Constantine, and the rebuilding of the structures on the west side of the Forum damaged in the Fire of Carinus and of the Temple of Venus and Roma. One measure of the extent to which this activity represented a significant departure from the level of construction activity of the preceding decades is the fact that it occasioned a large-scale reactivation of the urban brick industry, which had fallen into decline during the first half of the 3rd c.23 While it might be argued that this activity would have had a negligible impact on the overall standard of living in a city of 700,000-900,000 inhabitants, particularly given the fact that a significant portion of the relevant labor force may have consisted of slaves, these projects must have resulted in the transfer of substantial amounts of wealth to a sizable number of households for periods of several years at a time through direct employment, spill-over in trades connected with the construction industry, and trickle-down effects experienced in other sectors of the economy. 24

These initiatives would have served not only to regularize the supply of the four classes of foodstuffs concerned, but would also have worked to hold down the prices that could be charged for these same items on the urban market, lowering the cost of living and enabling consumers to devote a larger portion of their income to expenditures in other areas. 21 Evaluating the specific impact of these initiatives on the urban economy at any particular point in the city's history is complicated by the fact that we possess only scattered and frequently ambiguous information regarding the amount of foodstuff allotted to each recipient, the number of qualified recipients, and the basis for distribution, that is, whether this involved free disbursals, sale at an officially mandated price, or some combination of the two. The task is particularly difficult when we turn to the Early Dominate, since we possess almost no reliable information regarding the nature of these initiatives during this period. It seems reasonably clear, however, that during this period both state bread and state oil were made available to a substantial portion of the city's populace on a regular basis. Whether or not initiatives for the regular distribution of wine and pork were also in place is less certain.

Taxation: The price of all promercalia (goods destined for sale) brought into the city would have been affected by one and, in some cases, two distinct customs taxes. The first of these, the octavae, or the city customs tax, was levied on all such goods brought within the urban customs boundary.25 While there is no definitive evidence in this regard, it seems a reasonable assumption that during the period in question this boundary corresponded with the circuit of the Aurelian Walls, constructed ca. A.O. 271-81. 26 As its name indicates, the octavae was equal to one eighth of the value (12.5 percent) of the goods being imported. 27 Promercalia originating outside the diocesan customs circumscription would also have been subject to the portorium, or harbor tax, which the state levied on both imports and exports. 28 The bulk of the goods that made their way to Rome from outside the diocese of Italia 6

CHAPTER I Fig. 3:

Plan of the city of Rome, showing the locales, structures, and clay outcrops mentioned in the text. (after Carta geologica d'Italia fogli 149, 150)

Templum Solis

■ AurelianWall Superior?] Mo ....a.."!.·.Jk

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'@ PALATINEEAST EXCS.

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,...""'

D ..

manufacture of tablewares, storage vessels, and architectural ceramics, out-crops along the middle and lower slopes of the hill and over the entire area of the Monte della Creta, a hill situated immediately to its west. 294 This is the only commercially exploitable clay source within the urban intramural and extramural zones, and from early modem times through the early decades of this century the Valle de! Inferno, the valley defined by the western slope of the Gianicolo and the Monte de Ila Creta, was the main locus for the manufacture of architectural ceramics at Rome. 295 It should thus be no surprise if this area developed as the locus ofa potters' quarter in antiquity.

jug) (1.18.2; 12.48.14.), while Juvenal, writing at some point during the first decade of the 2nd c., refers to Vaticano fragiles de monte patellae (fragile plates/platters/pans from the Vaticanus Mons) (6.344). 296 These passages indicate that around the tum of the 2nd c. there was in the popular view a connection between the place known as the Vaticanus Mons and pottery production. At this time the toponym Vaticanus Mons might have been used to refer either to the Janiculum generally, or, more narrowly, to just its northwestern slope, where it drops to the area now known as the Vatican. 297 In light of this evidence, it seems plausible to infer that by the imperial period a concentration of pottery workshops had grown up on the Janiculum, perhaps concentrated on its western slope. This area would have been particularly well suited for pottery production, as it lay well away from the city's major residential neighborhoods.

This inference is supported by both textual and archaeological evidence. Martial, writing at some point during the last two decades of the !st c., twice refers to a cadus Vaticanus (Vatican

32

CHAPTER I The scant archaeological evidence for pottery production at Rome supports the inference that the Janiculum had emerged as the main locus of pottery production in the city by the time of the Empire. Excavations carried out in 1965 on the eastern slope of the hill in an area off Via XXX Aprile (apparently outside the circuit of the Aurelian Walls) in connection with the construction of a power line uncovered a series of cuttings into the layer of Pliocene marine clay that had been partially infilled with sand and pottery production debris. 298 The excavators interpreted these features as clay pits that had been backfilled with spoil from the overlying formation of quartz sand together with waste from one or more pottery workshops likely located somewhere in the immediate vicinity. Among the production debris were wasters of various vessels in a fine fabric consonant with the locally available marine clay, including juglets, thin-walled ware beakers, chalices, and mold-made lamps bearing the stamps Oppi and COR.299 The lamps are products of the workshop of Caius Oppius Restitutus, which appears to have been active over the period ca. A.D. 90-140. 300 The beaker, juglet, and chalice forms attested also appear to date to the second half of the 1st c. or perhaps somewhat later. Remains of a second set of features related to pottery production were uncovered in 1888 a short distance away along the Via Dandolo (then Viale Glorioso), apparently in an area adjacent to the Sanctuary of the Syriac Divinities (again outside the circuit of the Aurelian Walls), where Lanciani reported observing a dump of workshop debris containing thousands of "vasellini misteriosi" (mysterious little pots) between two banchine (platforms?) of potter's clay. 301 The vessels in question appear to have consisted of both unguentaria and so-called vasetti ovoidi e piriformi, again apparently in a fabric consonant with the locally available marine clay. 302 These two sets of features represent the only evidence for imperial-period pottery production facilities that has been uncovered to date anywhere within either the urban intramural or the urban extramural zones. 303 It seems possible, however, that the extensive clay extraction that has gone on in the Valle de! Inferno in modem times has obliterated remains of pottery production facilities that existed in this area.

The evidence for pottery production in the suburban supply zone is little better than that for the two urban zones. From the geologic point of view, we would expect that pottery producers in this zone were concentrated in the area around Monte Mario, a block of marine clay similar to the Janiculum, and/or along the Tiber floodplain, where there are occasional deposits of commercially exploitable clays suitable for the manufacture of ceramics. This expectation is to some extent born out by the known facilities for the production of architectural ceramics, which tend to be located along the Tiber Valley and in an area of sedimentary outcrops to the northwest of the city. 306 We known from literary sources that during the 4th c. there was a cluster of these facilities along the Via Salaria, ca. 2-3 km beyond the Porta Salaria, known as the Civitas Figlina. 307 Turning to the archaeological evidence for this zone, excavations carried out at La Celsa, at km 12.7 of the Via Flaminia, have uncovered the remains of a pottery workshop apparently associated with a villa that was active during the period ca. A.D. 20-100 and possibly some decades into the 2nd c. 308 From the materials recovered there it is evident that this establishment manufactured a wide range of products, including Italian Sigillata, slipped and unslipped fine-bodied tablewares and utilitarian forms, including thin-walled forms (Fineware and Color-Coat Fineware in the terminology employed in Section 2.5), and cookware in a volcanic fabric (West-Central Italian Cookware 1 in the terminology employed in Section 2.6). While the physical extent of this establishment and the scale of its output both remain unknown, the fact that a dump of wasters was recovered along the Via Flaminia at a spot ca. 100 m to the north of the kilns suggests that both may have been appreciable. Italian Sigillata and fine-bodied tableware vessels recovered in contexts dating to the second half of the 1st c. at the Palatine East excavations exactly match vessels recovered at this workshop in fabric, form, and forming technique, and it appears all but certain that these materials are products of this workshop. The study of the Palatine East assemblage has not progressed sufficiently to establish whether or not cookwares from this workshop are also present in the site assemblage.

Potters located on the Janiculum presumably used the marine clay available there to manufacture fine-bodied tablewares and utilitarian vessels (Fineware and Color-Coat Fineware, in the terminology employed in Section 2.5) and, by adding volcanic sand temper to this clay, coarse-bodied utilitarian forms (Volcanic Utilitarian Ware in the terminology employed in Section 2.5). They may also have utilized sandy clays at the juncture between the marine clay and the overlying quartz sand to produce cookwares (West-Central Italian Cookware 2 in the terminology employed in Section 2.6), although this seems less certain.

Two pottery production sites have also been identified within the area here demarcated as the suburban supply zone in the vicinity of the Via Cassia. The first of these, identified on the basis of surface remains, lies beside the paved road that connected the Via Cornelia with the Via Cassia, at a locale known as Tenuta de! Forno, ca. 1.8 km southwest of the road station at Ad Nonas (modem La Storta).309 This establishment, associated with a villa, appears to have been active at some point during the 3rd-5th c., producing tablewares and storage vessels, both in a medium-grained quartz fabric, as well as architectural ceramics. The second of these establishments, also identified on the basis of surface remains, lies beside the road that connected Veii with the Via Cassia, ca. 1 km east of Ad Nonas, in a locale known as Casale del Pino. 310 This workshop, associated with a modest villa, appears to have been active during the 1st c., manufacturing fine-bodied tableware (Fineware), volcanic cookware (West-Central Italian Cookware 1), and architectural ceramics. The study of the Palatine East pottery has not progressed sufficiently to establish whether or not products of either of these two establishments are present

While difficulties in obtaining clay, the high cost of workshop space, and the fire hazard posed by urban pottery workshops may have discouraged potters from locating inside the circuit of the Aurelian Walls, we cannot exclude that some significant amount of pottery manufacture went on in this area. 304 Ostia, which, though appreciably smaller than Rome, provides us with what is probably our best analogue for the urbs insofar as the use of space is concerned, has produced evidence for at least one pottery workshop within the area of its walls, the socalled Caseggiato delle Fornaci (2.6.7), located immediately to the east of the Piazzale delle Corporazioni. 305

33

THE URBAN ECONOMY in the site assemblage.

by transporting them overland on the Via Flaminia or Via Amerina/Via Cassia, but also by access to raw materials that would have permitted the manufacture of functionally superior cookwares.

With regard to the extra-urban Italian supply zone, we may conjecture that here we are for the most part dealing with nucleated pottery industries that were able to manufacture products that could compete on the urban market due to their outstanding aesthetic or functional attractiveness, extremely low production costs, and/or extremely low transport costs. During the early and middle imperial periods these included both high quality tablewares, such as Italian Sigillata, and high performance cook-wares, such as Internal Red-Slip Cookware (Pompeian Red Ware). Whether or not such industries continued to operate in Italia as late as the Early Dominate is uncertain.

The consideration of appropriate ethnographic analogues may also provide us with insight into the methods that may have been employed for the distribution of the products of such nucleated industries. In the early 20th c., the extra-local distribution of Vasanello cookwares was carried out by itinerant retailers from the town known as carrettieri ("wagoneers").316These men placed orders with workshops for specific numbers of vessels, receiving these at a wholesale price. They would then load their wares on wagons for extended marketing trips. While in most cases these lasted for six or seven days, in some instances the carrettieri would undertake substantially longer forays, renting storage space in a distant town and remaining on the road for as long as one month. The nucleated cookware industry that operated at Pabillonis, in Sardinia, during the 19th and 20th centuries employed a broadly similar set of arrangements for the marketing of its products. 317 In this case, men who worked full-time as itinerant retailers would rent a cart from a local peasant, load it with between 100 and 120 sets of the standard service of four cooking vessels, and then drive along a determined route, stopping at several towns along the way to cache groups of pots with acquaintances. Upon reaching the end of the route these men would arrange for the wagon to be returned to Pabillonis, and then retrace their path by foot, retrieving the pots that they had cached along the way and peddling these to consumers living in and around these settlements. These marketing trips frequently lasted a month or longer. That similar approaches were employed for the marketing of pottery in Italy during the early imperial period is suggested by the fact that a calendar listing market meeting days in several towns in Campania and at Rome was found scratched into the wall of a commercial establishment at Pompeii that may have been a pottery shop. 318

As an example of such industries in west-central Italy, we may consider the nucleated pottery industry that appears to have operated in the northern ager Faliscus during the early to middle imperial period. Surface survey and excavation in this area have led to the identification of four workshops in the territory between Orte and Vasanello. One of these, situated at a locale known as Cesurli, was specialized in the production of Italian Sigillata, and appears to have been active ca. 30 B.C.A.D.15.311 Whether or not this establishment was associated with a villa is unclear. Two other workshops, one at a locale known as Poggio Pelato, the other at a locale known as Poggio Confine/Poggio de! Capitano, appear to have been involved in the specialized production of cookwares (West-Central Italian Cookware I) for an undetermined period of time during the 1st-3rd c.312Both establishments are associated with what may be either a villa or hamlet. The fourth workshop, at a locale known as San Marco, also appears to have been involved in the production of cookware during the early or middle imperial period. 313While the study of the Palatine East assemblage has not progressed sufficiently to establish whether or not any products of these establishments are present, the stamp evidence suggests that the Italian Sigillata workshop at Cesurli distributed its output principally to the urban market. 314 We can gain insight into the factors that may have underlain the emergence of such nucleated industries by considering appropriate ethnographic analogues. With regard to the nucleated industry that developed in the northern ager Faliscus, it is interesting to note that Vasanello was the locus of a nucleated cookware industry from at least the 15th c. through the immediate post-war period, with its products distributed throughout much of west-central Italy, including Rome. 315 The basis for this industry appears to have been a specific clay source at a locale known as Le Terraie, situated on the outskirts of the town, just ca. 200 m from the Romanperiod pottery workshop at Poggio Pelato. This source yielded a clay with a naturally-occurring volcanic component that permitted Vasanello potters to manufacture cookwares with superior performance characteristics. That this same source was also exploited during the Roman period for the manufacture of cookwares seems all but certain, given the presence of the workshop at Poggio Pelato. During the Roman period a nucleated pottery industry in the Orte/Vasanello area would thus have been favored not only by the possibility of distributing its products to the urban market at low cost by placing them aboard Rome-bound river-boats at Horta, and/or

With regard to the extra-Italian supply zone, we may posit that, as with the extra-urban Italian supply zone, we are again for the most part dealing with nucleated pottery industries that were able to manufacture products that could compete on the urban market due to their outstanding aesthetic or functional attractiveness, extremely low production costs, exceptionally low transport costs, or some combination of these. The regions in this supply zone of greatest significance during the Early Dominate lay in north and central Tunisia, roughly the provinces of Zeugitana and Byzacena. The workshops in these areas provided a wide variety of products to the urbs, including red-slipped tablewares and lamps (African Sigillata A, C, and D in the terminology employed in Section 2.5), white-surfaced utilitarian wares (Tunisian Utilitarian Ware 1, 2, and 3 in the terminology employed in Section 2.5), and cookwares (North Tunisian Cookware and Central Tunisian Cookware in the terminology employed in Section 2.6). The archaeological evidence points to the existence of two distinct modes for the manufacture of these wares. In the first, workshops located in the environs of major ports produced cookwares and possibly utilitarian wares together with 34

CHAPTER I amphoras. In central Tunisia, this mode of manufacture is attested for the Sullecthum (modem Salak.ta) area for the 2nd4th c., 319and for the Leptiminus (modem Lamta) area for the late 1st-2nd c. and possibly later.320In north Tunisia, a similar mode of manufacture may have existed in the Carthage area, with North Tunisian Cookware and, perhaps less likely, African Sigillata A and D produced by workshops also engaged in the manufacture of amphoras. 321

Djerbi and Henchir el Biar, manufactured African Sigillata D and North Tunisian Cookware beginning at some point during the first third of the 4th c. In central Tunisia, several sites for the production of African Sigillata C, in some cases along with cook-wares and utilitarian wares, are known in the area between Sbeitla and Kairouan. 324 This second mode of production also would have been founded to some extent on economies connected with oleoculture, which probably represented a highly significant, if not, indeed, the dominant form of agricultural activity in these areas. Of particular importance in this regard may have been the pronounced seasonal variation in the amount of labor required for the cultivation of olives and the pressing of oil, with a disproportionately large share of the overall annual requirement concentrated in the period running from the olive harvest through to the end of pressing, roughly OctoberJanuary.325In light of this fact, it seems likely that there would have been a significant amount of surplus labor available in these areas during the period February-September. This includes the portion of the year best suited for the manufacture of pottery, and it is not implausible to suggest that pottery producers took advantage of the situation by employing agricultural laborers at extremely low wage levels to carry out some of the more labor intensive, low-skill tasks associated with their operations, such as the digging, hydrating and mixing of clay, the collection and preparation of fuel, and the transport of finished pots to centers on the coast for sale or export. 326Also perhaps significant in this regard is the fact that pottery workshops in these areas could have fueled their kilns with the waste products of oil production, including the clippings from olive trees and grignons, the pulp that remains at the end of the pressing process. 327 Finally, it seems likely that these workshops could have taken advantage of the transport network created and maintained for the conveying of oil and grain down to the coast for export, moving their finished products to regional market centers and ports of embarkation at relatively modest cost. As with the cookwares and utilitarian wares produced by the urban/suburban workshops considered above, once arrived at the coast, the products of these establishments could have been exported to Italy at little expense as secondary cargo on merchantmen involved in the transport of oil, fish products, and grain for the provisioning of the urbs.

This approach to the production of cookwares was probably based in substantial measure on economies stemming from the export of oil and fish products. As noted in Section 1.3, African oil was probably transported to the coast in skin containers, where it was transferred to amphoras for export. At the same time, we know from literary sources that there were cetariae situated in the environs of at least one of these ports, Leptiminus. 322 There must then have been a considerable demand for oil and fish products amphoras in the environs of these ports. At least some of the workshops that supplied these containers appear to have engaged in diversified production, manufacturing not only amphoras, but also cookwares and utilitarian wares for both local consumption and export. This approach would have offered these establishments greater flexibility with regard to the calendar of their production activities and the marketing of their output. With regard to production calendar, the manufacture of amphoras may have been problematic during the winter months, when colder, wetter weather would have rendered the drying of large, closed vessels difficult. By varying their range of products to include cookwares and utilitarian wares, these establishments would have enhanced their ability to sustain a reasonably steady level of activity on a year-round basis. With regard to the marketing of their output, the sale of amphoras may well have involved the provision of large batches of containers to single buyers, with the consignment of these concentrated in certain times of the year. By producing cookwares and utilitarian wares both for export and for the local market, these establishments would have been able to attain a more regular flow of income from a variety of different sources. It should also be noted that by limiting their efforts at diversification to the production of cookwares and utilitarian wares, and eschewing the manufacture ofred-slipped tablewares with stamped decoration and mold-made lamps, these workshops could have achieved these advantages without appreciably expanding the range of production facilities and manufacturing techniques required for their operations. The cookwares and utilitarian wares produced by these workshops could have been distributed to the Rome market at extremely low cost by being placed directly aboard merchantmen involved in the transport of African oil, fish products, and grain to Ostia/Portus for the supply of the urban populace.

Mackensen has assayed a detailed interpretation of the cluster of workshops near Thuburbo Maius (henceforth referred to as the El Mahrine workshop complex), arguing that all four of these establishments were likely located within the bounds of a single large estate perhaps covering ca. 1,700-2,000 ha, and that they represent an initiative on the part of the possessor fundi (estate owner), who may well have been a decurio at either of the neighboring municipalities of Furnos Minus or Thuburbo Minus, to enter into pottery production on what was, in effect, an industrial scale. 328 Likening the situation to that attested in three papyri of mid-third c. date from Oxyrhynchus that record the lease of an amphora workshop on a rural estate (P. Oxy. L 3595-3997), 329he posits that these establishments were operated by potters who leased the premises complete with all of the necessary equipment and raw materials, agreeing to provide the estate owner with a set number of vessels as rent.

The second of the two modes of production attested for these wares consisted of the manufacture of red-slipped tablewares (including lamps) or both red-slipped tablewares and cookwares at rural workshops located in the interior. The most conspicuous example of this mode of production consists of a cluster of four workshops located in an area to the south of Thuburbo Minus (modern Tebourba), ca. 45-50 km to the southwest of Carthage. 321These establishments, including two at El Mahrine (El Mahrine I and II), and one each at Bordj el

35

THE URBAN ECONOMY The potters would have been free to market any vessels produced beyond this figure. Given the scale of operations and the high level of standardization in the output of these establishments, Mackensen believes that the distribution of the products of the El Mahrine workshop complex must also have been coordinated in some fashion.

Alternatively, those responsible for retailing and wholesaling pottery at Rome may have specialized in the sale of some other type of good or foodstuff, such as wine or oil, dealing in pottery only as a sideline. Thus, one of the two terracotta reliefs from the Isola Sacra necropolis discussed in Section 1.3 depicts what appear to be empty pitchers hanging inside a shop that served for the retailing of water and/or wine. 339 A customer is shown holding a similar container, and it may well be that these vessels found their way to consumers as packaging for these beverages.

The organization of the system that conveyed the output of these workshops to Italy remains unknown. 330 Neither the epigraphic nor the literary record provides any evidence for the existence in the Western Mediterranean of specialized pottery merchants, akin to the negotiatores cretarii (earthenware merchants) attested in the northern provinces of the empire during the later 2nd and early 3rd centuries.331 The shipwreck evidence suggests that African pottery was exported in lots of modest size that represented only a small portion of the ship's cargo, the balance of which presumably would have been made up of more bulky and/or valuable items, such as grain, oil and fish products. 332 In light of these observations, it seems possible that ship's masters and/or navicularii purchased modest-sized consignments of African pottery at the ports of embarkation, transported these to Italy along with their other cargo, and, upon their arrival at Ostia/Portus, sold these to wholesalers. IfMackensen is correct in his interpretation of the El Mahrine workshop complex, it may well be that the owner of the large estate on which this was located was himself a navicularius,333 and exported the vessels that he received as rent in his own ships. Alternatively, itinerant sellers may have purchased consignments of pottery at the ports of embarkation, accompanied these to Italy aboard merchantmen, and then either sold their wares to middlemen at Ostia/Portus or conveyed them up-river to Rome for direct sale to consumers. 334 While we have no clear evidence regarding the identities of the presumed middlemen at the Ostia/Portus end of the distribution network, we can once again point to general purpose traders, such as A. Herennuleius Cestus, the negotiator vinarius a Septem Caesaribus, idem mercator omnis generis mercium transmarinarum.

We possess only scant information regarding the price of pottery in the Roman world. 340 The most coherent group of price figures available is that included in the section of the £dictum de Pretiis concerned with ceramics. (15.88-101) This section, headed De fictilibus, contains five entries for pottery: Doleum Italicorum s(extariorum) mill[e ?J Vasumfictile Jtalicor(um) s(extariorum) duo[rum] Lucernasfictiles n(umero) de[cem} Lagoenam s(extariorum) vi{ginti quattuor?J Cetera vascula pro ratione [capacitatis distrahi debebunt?}

Xmille X duobus Xquattuor Xduodecim

Dolium with capacity of 1,000 (?) Italian sextarii 1,000 den. com. Earthenware vessel with capacity of2 Italian sextarii 2 den. com. Earthenware lamps, 10 in number 4 den. com. Jug with capacity of24 (?) Italian sextarii 12 den. com. Other vessels should be sold at a price commensurate with their capacity den. com. = denarii commmunes

By considering the array of items selected for inclusion in this section we can deduce the underlying logic of its compilers. The doleum (i.e., dolium) and lamps were presumably singled out for specific mention due their distinctive natures, the first being an extremely large and expensive item formed by the coiling technique, often, perhaps primarily, by workshops engaged in the manufacture of architectural ceramics, the second being an extremely small and inexpensive item formed by molding, in this case often by specialist establishments. The two-sextarius vessel is priced at the lowest figure employed in the £dictum de Pretiis, two denarii communes. Most of the wine amphoras in use at this time had capacities in the range of one quarter to three quarters ofan amphora/8-24 sextarii (see Appendix 3), and it seems possible that the 24-sextarius capacity lagoena (i.e., lagona) was intended to represent a generic wine container. 341 These observations, taken together with the final listing, which appears to direct that other vessels should be sold at a price commensurate with their capacity, suggest that the entry for the two-sextarius vessel was intended to establish a pricing standard for non-amphora pottery - i.e., one denarius communis per sextarius of capacity - while that for the 24-sextarius lagona was meant to establish a different pricing standard for amphoras - one denarius communis for every two sextarii of capacity. The adoption of a lower price standard for amphoras presumably reflected the lower labor and/or raw materials costs per unit capacity typically involved in their manufacture.

We possess no evidence regarding the methods employed for either the wholesaling or retailing of pottery at Rome. Other than C. Comissius Successus, the negotians Porto Vinario lagonaris referred to in Section 1.2 and a Leontia, who is termed ad Port(m) Tregemina(m) lagunara Gug seller at the Porta Tregemina) (CJL 6.9488), neither the epigraphic record nor the literary sources refers to any individual identified as a seller of pottery. 335 As already indicated, urban and suburban potters may have retailed their products directly to consumers, either on the workshop premises, at some other fixed location, or as peddlers.336 We may have evidence for this mode of retailing from a funerary inscription from Puteoli, which records a M. Modius M. I. Panfilus, who is styled ajigulus propolus (potter-seller).337 Fulltime retailers and wholesalers who sold pottery may have traded in a wide variety of goods. If so, they might have been referred to by generic occupational terms, such as negotiator, mercator, propola, or tabernarius. This suggestion receives some support from the artifact assemblages recovered at structures identified as pottery workshops, both elsewhere in Italy and in the northern provinces of the empire. 338 In most cases these establishments stocked one or more other types of goods besides pottery, including glassware, hardware, household items in stone, and even dry goods. These shops may also have sold items in organic materials not apt to be preserved in the archaeological record, such as wood, leather, basketry, and cloth.

By comparing these prices with those given in the £dictum de Pretiis for containers manufactured in other materials it is 36

CHAPTER I possible to gain some idea of the relative value of pottery. A scortia, presumably a leather container of some sort, with a capacity of one sextarius is priced at 20 denarii communes (10.15), for a price to capacity ratio equal to 20 times that of a pottery vessel of equivalent size. A first grade uter (wineskin) is priced at 120 denarii communes (10.13), while a first grade uter olearius (oilskin) is priced at 100 denarii communes ( 10.14). Since in neither case is the capacity of the container in question indicated, it is impossible to draw any direct price comparisons with pottery. A cask with a capacity of 50 sextarii is priced at 50 denarii communes (12.37), for a price to capacity ratio equal to that of small pottery vessels and twice that of the more functionally equivalent 24-sextarius lagona. Similar containers of various sizes are priced according to their capacities (12.38). While no entries appear for vessels in either stone or glass, raw Alexandrian glass and Judaean glass for the production of small vessels are priced respectively at 30 and 20 denarii communes per pound (16.3-4). 342 Since it was presumably possible to manufacture several small to mediumsized cups or bowls from a single pound of batch, we should not discount the possibility that inexpensively manufactured glass containers were priced at levels comparable to those of similarly-sized pottery containers. Objects in sheet bronze and bronze are priced according to their weight, at 60 and 50 denarii communes per pound (15.69-70), suggesting price to weight ratios considerably higher than those for glass and pottery ..

Basketry also appears to have been priced according to weight (33.20), although the relevant entry is problematic. The figures included in the Edictum de Pretiis can also be used to calculate the value of an amphora in relation to that of its content. Since the price to capacity ratio for a 24-sextarius lagona is one denarius communis for two sextarii, a container of this kind would have been worth one-sixteenth (6.25 percent) the value of its content if filled with low grade wine (priced at 8 denarii communes per sextarius), or 1/48 (2.1 percent) of the value of its content if filled with aged, first grade wine (priced at 24 denarii communes per sextarius). These figures can be compared with values pertaining to the price of wine and wine amphoras at Theadelphia, in Egypt, during the A.D. 250s. 343 In this instance, amphoras were wholesaled at prices equal to between 0.5 and 1.3 percent of the value of the wine that they were capable of holding. To summarize, these figures suggest that during the Early Dominate pottery was inexpensive in comparison with similarly-sized containers in leather, bronze, and also probably wood. Containers in glass, and also perhaps basketry, may have been comparably priced. Finally, since amphoras were worth only a small fraction of the value of their content, we may expect that many consumers chose to regard them as disposable packaging.

37

THE URBAN ECONOMY

CHAPTER 1 ENDNOTES

l. There is no general treatment of the urban economy during the period of the late empire. Loane (1938), now badly out of date, considers the evidence only through A.O. 200. For the social status of the urban labor force during the early and middle empire, see Treggiari (1980) and Josh el (1992). Morel (1987) presents a brief survey of the topography of craft production at Rome from the late republic through the middle empire, while Frayn (1993) 12-37 discusses marketing facilities in the urbs. For a useful survey of commercial structures at Ostia during the period A.O. 250-400, see Pavolini (1986) 246-52. 2. Chastagnol (1960) 27-28. 3. For a general overview of the administrative organization of Italy during the late empire, see Thomsen (1947) 196-260. For its administrative organization specifically during the Early Dominate, see Arce (1994). At some point during the course of the 4th c. Italia was divided into two sub-diocesan administrative districts known as the regiones suburbicariae and Italia annonaria. The former consisted of the peninsular and insular provinces, while the latter comprised the remaining provinces in the north. The exact date that this division took place is unclear. Chastagnol (1960) 30-42 notes that it is only after the definitive reinstitution of the office ofvicarius urbis Romae in A.O. 357 that we begin to find explicit references to the regiones suburbicariae in the sources. Giardina ( 1986) 9 accepts the creation of this office and the de facto division of Italia into two sub-diocesan administrative districts from the A.O. 320s. 4. Morley (1996) 33-39. 5. Hodges and Whitehouse (1983) 48-52; Bamish (1987) 160-64. 6. Gianfrotta ( 1989). 7. Quilici (1990). 8. Cicero, in Pro Rose. 7.19, records that a message was rushed from Rome to Ameria, a distance of 56 miles (83 km), by cisia, light, two-wheeled vehicles, in IO hours. This journey, which presumably followed first the Via Cassia and then the Via Amerina, was thus undertaken at an average speed of 8.3 km per hour. This is exceptional, however, and most overland transport in the Rome region must have moved at considerably lower speeds. 9. Le Gall (1953) 255-58. In early modem times the trip by river-boat from Ostia to Rome was normally accomplished in two days; see D'Onofrio (1970) 252, 255. 10. Rouge (1952); (1986). See CTh 14.22.1 (A.O. 364) for seasonal variation in the rates charged by the corpus of saccarii (stevedores) for the handling of cargo at Portus. 11. Brunt (1980) 93. 12. Quilici (1986) 206, 209; Morelli (1957). Seasonal navigation on the Tiber appears to have extended as far north as the area around Tifernum Tiberinum (modern Citta di Castello), in northwestern Umbria; see Pliny Ep. 5.6; Pliny HN 3.53. 13. Le Gall (1953) 18. For a five-day trip from Ponte Felice, the point where the Via Flaminia crosses the Tiber, to Rome (ca. 110 km) by amateur rafters drifting with the current, see Holland and Holland (1950). For various aspects of the supply of Rome by river-boat during the early modern period, see Fiore Cavaliere (1986); Nardi (1988); Scavizzi (1991 ). 14. Quilici ( 1986) 200. Prior to the introduction of steam-powered craft on the Tiber in the 1840s river-boats were towed upstream as far as Orte by gangs of men or water buffalo; see D'Onofrio ( 1970) 105 fig. 61, 252-57. 15. On overland transport in Roman Italy, see Laurence ( 1998). On the relative costs of road, river, and sea transport in the Roman world, see Duncan-Jones ( 1974) 366-69; Greene ( 1986) 39-40; Morley ( I 996) 63-68; Laurence ( 1998) 134-35. I 6. Cullhed ( I 994) 68-69.

38

CHAPTER I

17. For the revolt ofDomitius Alexander, see Barnes (1982) 14-15; Jaidi (1990) 33-34, 68 n. 106; Sirks (1991) 199; Cullhed (1994) 70-72. 18. For a general overview of these initiatives during the late empire, see Cracco Ruggini (1985) 232-36; Durliat (1990) 37-125. For grain/bread, see Tengstrom (1974); Meiggs (1980), esp. 198-209; Sirks (1991) 108-360; Virlouvet (1995). For pork, see Barnish (1987); Sirks (1991) 361-87; Belli Pasqua (1995) 268-71. For wine and olive oil, see Sections 1.2 and 1.3, respectively. While Chron. 354 148 states that salt was disbursed free under Aurelian, there is no other evidence for state involvement in the supply or distribution of this commodity at Rome during antiquity. 19. For the problem of the correct meanings of the terms canon and annona, see Cerati (1974) 26 n. 41, 27, 72-73 n. 47. 20. Richardson (1992) 192 s.v. Horrea Galbae; Virlouvet (1995) 100-08. That the Horrea Galbana continued in use until the end of the 4th c. is indicated by the fact that Not.Dig.Gee. 4.15 lists an official known as the curator Horreorum Galbaniorum as part of the officium urbanum. 21. The existence of these initiatives may, however, have driven down wage levels at Rome, partially offsetting any benefits that would have accrued to free laborers; see Brunt (1980) 96. 22. Coarelli (1986) 1-35; Steinby (1986) 139-46; Cullhed (1994) 45-67. 23. Stein by ( 1986) 110-11. 24. For a review of the arguments regarding the impact of state construction on employment and the standard ofliving in ancient Rome, see Brunt (1980). For an interesting attempt to model the labor inputs involved in construction at Ostia during the imperial period, see DeLaine (1996). 25. Palmer (1980); Jones (1964) 429-30, 825, 1,175 n. 47, 1,341 n. 4. 26. Palmer (1980) 217,223. 27. We have evidence for two distinct taxes subsumed under the octavae, termed the ansarium and theforicularium. Palmer ( 1980) 221-23 suggests that the former was charged on liquids packaged in containers with ansae (handles), i.e., amphoras, hence wine, olive oil, and presumably also fish products, while the latter may have been levied on livestock, which would have been counted as they were driven through a gate of some sort known as aforiculum. Alternatively, it seems possible that the term ansarium referred to ansae in the sense of meander loops (as in Italian), with this levy a tax charged on goods landed at the city's river ports. If correct, this interpretation points to a configuration of the city customs tax similar to that which prevailed at Rome during the early modem period. During the later 16th c., for example, the customs tax consisted of three distinct levies, the Ripa, charged on goods brought up the Tiber to the river-port at Ripa Grande, the terra, levied on goods brought into the city overland, and the grascia Ripetta, charged on goods (or foodstuffs only?) brought down the Tiber to the Porto di Ripetta; see Delumeau (1957) 127-28; Nardi (1988) 65-67. 28. De Laet (1949) 455-82; Jones (1964) 429-30, 825, 1,175 n. 47, 1,341 n. 4. While Chastagnol (1960) 337 states that after ca. A.D. 321 the urban customs tax and the harbor tax were probably combined into a single duty, this inference is not supported by the sources cited in evidence. 29. For the collection of the portorium at Ostia/Portus, see France and Hesnard (1995) 90-92. 30. De Laet (1949) 437-46; Palmer (1980) 219-20; Engelmann and Knibbe (1989) 48-49, 84-85. The extent to which city customs barriers can become the focus of popular resentment is illustrated by the case of the customs wall that surrounded Paris at the time of the French Revolution. One of the first actions of the mob in July, 1789 was to launch an all out attack this barrier, breaching it in several places and sacking 40 of the 52 customs stations; see Schama (1989) 236, 385-86. 31. For various forms ofvectigalia (taxes) at Rome during this period, see Chastagnol (1960) 336-39. 32. De Ligt ( 1993) 208. For a tax on sales in food markets during the later 1st c., see Palmer ( 1980) 218. A passage in the SHA Alex. 24.3, states that Alexander Severus (reign A.O. 222-35) imposed a vectigal on several classes of craftsmen, with the funds raised by this means earmarked for the operation of baths, but there is no evidence that this impost endured. There was probably a one percent tax levied on all goods sold at auction; see Thielmann (1961) 235-43; Andreau (1987) 596-97. As discussed below, however, auctiones no longer represented a significant form of market exchange by the Early Dominate. lfthere had been any general tax on craft production and/or sales during the 4th c. we should expect to have some evidence for the bureaucratic

39

THE URBAN ECONOMY

machinery that would have been required for its collection. The siliquaticum, a general sales tax introduced in the west in A.D. 444, for example, required the creation of a specialized body of tax collectors for each of various categories of goods and the designation of specific market days for each of these categories; see Jones (1964) 432, 435. 33. CTh 11.20.3 (A.D. 405) institutes a tax on buildings situated in towns, specifically mentioning horrea, ergasteria, and tabernae, but specifically excludes Rome. 34. Jones ( 1964) 464. That there may have been some formal distinction between retailers whose shops were located within the walls of a town and those whose shops lay outside the town in the Rome area is suggested by a temple dedication from Gabii dating to A.D. 168 that lists a contribution made by the tabernarii intra murum negotiantes (shop owners who do business within the wall) (CIL 14.2793=JLS 5449). 35. Chastagnol (1960) 27; Giardina (1986) 23-25. 36. Sirks ( 1991) passim. The date at which this title began to denote a munus has been the subject of considerable disagreement among scholars, with opinions ranging from the late 2nd to the late 3rd c. For a summary of the literature, see Sirks (1991) 128-42, which argues for an early date of ca. A.D. 200. 37. Sirks (1991) 125-26, 288-89. While a corpus naviculariorum is also attested for the Arelate-Ostia/Portus route in an inscription dated A.D. 198-203, this probably did not survive beyond the middle decades of the 3rd c. A corpus naviculariorum for the Alexandria-Constantinople route was probably organized ca. A.D. 332. 3 8. For the transport of military cargos, see Jones (1964) 828. The system employed for the transport of stone from state-owned quarries remains obscure; see Dodge (1991) 39-40. Fant (1993) 155 argues that much of this stone was transported first to Rome, whence it was distributed to other parts of the empire. 39. Sirks ( 1991) 154-55; 203. See Herz (1988) 225-34 for an interesting effort to model the costs of transporting state grain on the Alexandria-Constantinople route. 40. That state-owned and private cargos were sometimes mixed, presumably on outbound voyages, is indicated by CTh 13.8.1 (A.D. 395), which forbids this practice for navicularii operating in the eastern empire. It is unclear whether navicularii would normally have undertaken a direct voyage from their home port to their destination and then back again, or visited other ports en route. Duncan-Jones ( 1990) 16-17 reviews the papyrological evidence for sailing times on the Italy-Alexandria run, concluding that indi-rect voyages were probably common. Note that CTh 13.5.33 (A.D. 409) does not forbid eastern navicularii from visiting ports lying off their route, contra Tengstrom (1974) 43-44, followed by Tomber (1993) 147, but rather prohibits them from visiting such ports for the purpose of trading in the state-owned cargo in their charge. Abusive transactions of this kind may have involved the sale of the four percent wastage margin normally granted to navicularii. 41. The earliest constitutions in the Codex Theodosianus that make explicit reference to the exemption of navicularii from the various vectigalia are CTh 13.5.23 (A.D. 393), which grants this immunity to navicularii in the eastern empire, and CTh 13.5.24 (A.O. 395), which either institutes or confirms this same privilege for those operating in the west. For the latter group it is possible that this exemption is alluded to as early as CTh 13.5.16.2 (A.D. 380). De Laet (1949) 480 believed that immunity from customs taxes was already implicit in CTh 13.5.5. (A.D. 326) (and also presumably in CTh 13.5.17 [A.D. 386]), a position apparently accepted by Jones (1964) 1,341 n. 4. Relevant to the question, for eastern navicularii at least, may be the fact that CTh 13.5.23 was followed after little more than a year by CTh 13.8.1, which forbade navicularii from mixing private and state-owned cargos. Since CTh 13.8.1 would have appeared in time to establish policy for the sailing season immediately subsequent to the one for which CTh 13.5.23 had first been in effect, it is not implausible to infer that there was some connection between these two laws, with the second perhaps aimed at correcting abuses that had emerged immediately upon the issuing of the first. These abuses most likely consisted of the overloading of outbound ships with private cargos by navicularii intent on deriving maximum advantage from their newly acquired immunity. CTh 13.8.1 would have been designed to guarantee that these shippers limited their private trading to return voyages and voyages undertaken during the second year of the two-year grace period that navicularii were granted for the discharging of their official obligations in connection with the delivery of state-owned cargos. 42. For the considerations involved, see McGrail ( 1989) 356-57. Ships returning to their home ports from Ostia/Portus regularly employed sand as ballast; see Sirks (1991) 264-65; Parker ( I 992b) 90-9 I. For the argument that bricks produced in the Rome area were exported as saleable ballast, see Tomber ( I 987); Aubert (1994) 240-4 I. For the boast that Constantinople exported only earth, sand, and refuse, see Them. Or. 4.61 a. 43. While there are several passing references in the archaeological literature to the export of Italian goods and re-export of goods from elsewhere as return cargo on ships sailing from Ostia/Portus, this phenomenon has yet to be examined in a systematic fashion. 40

CHAPTER I

For general considerations, see Pavolini (1985) 204. For the export of terracotta lamps produced at Rome, see Maestripieri and Ceci (1990). For the import into Sicilia of various Italian products and Gallic wine as return cargo on Sicilian grain carriers, see Wilson (1990) 275. For the shipping ofltalian wines from Puteoli to Alexandria as return cargo on grain carriers, see Rathbone (1983) 87. For the shipping of construction materials and sarcophagi from Ostia/Portus to Sardinia as return cargo on grain carriers, see De Salvo (1989) 74 7. For the suggestion that African Sigillata was re-exported from Rome, see Fentress and Perkins (1988) 213 n. 27; Duncan-Jones (1990) 49. Mattingly (1988) 53 postulates that Dressel 20 amphoras found in the eastern Mediterranean represent the re-export from Rome of surplus Baetican olive oil. 44. Steinby (1986) 153-54. For brick production facilities in the lower Nera Valley and the central Tiber Valley during the early and middle empire, see Huotari (1974) 71-136; Helen (1975) 80-82; Monacchi (1986); Stanco (1994) 249; DeLaine (1995) 559. 45. A conspicuous exception is the millstone industry associated with an outcrop of leucitite ca. 2 km southwest of Orvieto, which distributed its products not only to many parts of Italia, but also exported them to Sicilia, Africa Proconsularis, and Tarraconensis during the I st-2nd centuries and perhaps later; see Peacock (1980); (1986); (1989). These were presumably placed aboard river craft at the nearby port facility at Pagliano, and brought down the Tiber to Rome for supply to the urban market and to Ostia for distribution beyond west-central Italy. This assumption is supported by the fact that the excavations carried out at Pagliano during the 1880s saw the recovery ofat least 16 such millstones; see Morelli (1957) 16, 17, 23. 46. Corbier (1986) 507-10; Burnett (1987) 112-14, 122-24; Harl (1996) 131-36. 47. Burnett (1987) 124-26; Harl (1996) 143-48. 48. Hendy (1985) 449-62; Burnett (1987) 126-31; Harl (1996) 148-57. 49. Barnish (1985) 8-9; Bogaert (1968) 31-33. 50. Thielmann (1961 ); Andreau (1987) passim. 51. Andreau (1987) 111-16, 139-67. 52. For the considerable body of evidence regarding the role of auctiones in the wholesaling of wine, see Section 1.2. The evidence for livestock is less substantial. That the Forum Boarium (Cattle Market) served as the venue for livestock auctions is suggested by the fact that the Arch ofSeptimius Severus (dedicated there late A.D. 203 or 204) was, as indicated in its dedicatory inscription (CIL 6.1035=/LS 426), constructed through a joint effort on the part of the argentarii and negotiantes boarii huius loci qui invehent (cattle traders associated with this facility who will import [animals through this gate?]). That the Forum Suarium (Pig Market), a facility which lay in the eastern Campus Martius in the environs of the Templum Solis (LTUR 2 347-47 s.v. Forum Suarium) also served as a venue for livestock auctions is indicated by the fact that a dedication of late 2nd or early 3rd c. date from the Esquiline (CIL 6.3728=31046) was erected by the actores de Faro Suario; see Andreau (1987) 130, 686. Sheep and goats being brought onto the urban wholesale market may perhaps have been sold at auction at the Campus Pecuarius (Sheep Field), a facility the precise location of which remains unknown; see LTUR 1 225 s.v. Campus Pecuarius. 53. Howgego (1992) 15. For doubts regarding the extent to which this form of exchange significantly expanded circulation velocity and market volume, see de Ligt (1991) 496. 54. Andreau (1987) 4 7 and passim states that auctions disappeared at some point during the period A.D. 260-300. The latest datable reference to a praeco, argentarius, coactor or coactor argentarius in a role that suggests some association with auctions is apparently a dedication of A.O. 251 to Q. Herennius Etruscus Messius Decius set up by the argentarii, exceptores, and negotiantes vini supernat(es) et Arimin(enses) (CIL 6.1101=/LS 519). For this inscription, see Section 1.2. For the suggestion that this pattern may be a reflection of epigraphic practices rather than of changes in the banking system, see de Ligt (1991) 493-94. For the activities of bankers known as argentarii during the late empire, see Bamish (1985). While some references to auctiones do occur in the Digest, these are few and do not derive from contemporary sources, and thus should not be taken as evidence that this form of exchange con-tinued into the Late Empire; see Barnish (1985) 23. 55. The probable effects of the demise of auctions on the urban market can be analyzed in terms of Fisher's equation. This formulation, rendered mv = pq, specifies that the amount of money in circulation (m) times its circulation velocity (v) equals the price of goods (p) times the quantity of goods in circulation (q); see Burnett (1987) I 05-06. 56. That the structures in place for providing the city with meat were already proving inadequate at the beginning of the 3rd c. is indicated by the fact that at that time the state offered certain immunities to qui in Faro Suario negotiantur, si duabus partibus bona-rum annonam iuvent (those who trade in the Forum Suarium, provided that they support the annona with two thirds of their 41

THE URBAN ECONOMY

stock); see Ulp ..fr.Vat. 236; Paul.fr. Vat. 237. For the possibility that the state undertook similar initiatives to promote the import of wine from the province of Asia as early as the 1st c., see Section 1.2. 57. Duncan-Jones (1974) 345-47; Harl (1996) 275-76. 58. For the relationship between social mobility and consumption in the context of 1st c. Pompeii, see Wallace-Hadrill (1994) 14374. The peculiar part played by London in the emergence ofa consumer society in 18th c. England can help us to envisage the role that Rome might have played in determining patterns of consumption across the Roman Empire; see MacKendrick et al. (1983) 21-23. 59. Hopkins (1978) 73-74. 60. Treggiari (1980) 56, 61-64. 61. Hopkins (1978) 73. 62. Burnett (1987) 111. 63. Harl (1996) 152; 280-81. 64. Burnett (1987) 111. 65. Giacchero (1974) 111-13. 66. For the date of the £dictum de Pretiis, see Giacchero (1974) 4; Corcoran (1996) 206. 67. For brief comments, see MacMullen (1976) 117; Harl (1996) 281-82. 68. Burnett (1987) 118-19. 69. Jones (1964) 28-29; MacMullen (1976) 118; Burnett (1987) 119. 70. Bagnall (1985) 17-18. 71. For these two amphora classes, both standard during the Early Dominate, and the calculations used to derive these figures, see Sections 1.2 and 1.3, respectively. 72. On the scale of payments for which thefollis would have served, see Hendy (1985) 339. The Codex Theodosianus provides some evidence regarding the use of the fol/is at Rome in the decades following the period that is the focus of this study. CTh 11.36.2 (A.D. 315) specifies fines to be paid to the praefectus urbi in terms of folles, while CTh 14.24.1 (A.O. 328) indicates the price to be paid to the office of the praefectus annonae for the purchase of mensae oleariae (oil counters) in terms offolles. For mensae oleariae, see Section 1.3. 73. Frayn (1993) 123-25. 74. For the compilation, publication, and area of enforcement of the £dictum de Pretiis, see Lauffer (1971) 1; Corcoran (1996) 215-25, 229-32. That it was intended to be valid for the west as well as the east is indicated not only by the fact that it was issued in the names of all four tetrarchs and is said in the preamble (lines 116-118) to apply to the whole of the empire, but also by the fact that the section concerned with freight rates (Section 35) includes tariffs for numerous point to point voyages for which both termini lie in the west. 75. For the length of enforcement of the £dictum de Preti is, see Corcoran (1996) 332-33. 76. Frezouls ( 1977) 255-56; Bravo Castaneda ( 1980) 261-76. 77. For the Pettorano fragment, see Giacchero ( 1974) 82; Corcoran ( 1996) 230. The place where the copy of the £dictum de Pretiis to which this fragment belongs was set up remains unknown, although Rome, Ostia, and Puteoli seem plausible possibilities. 78. For this form of non-market, "internal supply," see Whittaker ( I 985) 58-68, where it is estimated that as much as I 0-40 percent of the city's population might have been fed in this way. 79. For wine in Roman Italy, see Purcell (1985); Tchernia (1986); Murray and Tercu~an eds. (I 995) 239-327. 42

CHAPTER I

80. For wine consumption practices in the context of the convivium (dinner party) and the essential continuity in these between the early empire and the middle/late empire, see Dunbabin (1993), especially 136-41. 81. Ostia provides our best evidence regarding the various public venues for wine consumption that likely existed at Rome; see Hermansen (1981) 125-203. Three passages in Ammianus Marcellinus (14.6.25, 28.4.4, 28.4.29) refer to the ready consumption of wine in tabernae vinariae at Rome during the second half of the 4th c., suggesting substantial continuity in this form of retailing and consumption from the early to the late empire. 82. Note, however, that data from early modem Europe show pronounced shifts over time in levels of wine consumption among some urban populations; see Purcell (1985) 15. In the case of Rome, for example, the amount of wine available per capita fluctuated from 2.8 hl (hectoliters) in 1708-09 to 2.0 hl in 1790; see Revel (1979) 46. While analogous swings may have occurred in ancient Rome, we have no basis for evaluating the likelihood of this possibility. 83. Tchemia (1986) 21-27. 84. Frier (1983) 257 translates a figure for annual wine consumption at Rome derived by Frank into terms that can be more readily visualized by calculating the number of times that the amount in question would fill the Pantheon. Since this structure has a volume of ca. 700,000 hi., the range of figures suggested here would have sufficed to fill it roughly 1.1-1.8 times. 85. For the loss of stored wine due to souring and the breakage of storage vessels, see Dig. 18.6.1. For the loss of state tax wine at Rome due to souring, see CTh 11.2.3. 86. For the different kinds of containers employed for the transport and storage of wine, see Dig. 33.6.3.1. For cupae, see White (1975) 141-43; Desbat (1997); Panella and Tchemia (1994) 159-60; Tchemia (1986) 285-92; Martin-Kilcher (1987) 485-86; Amouretti (1993) 575-78; Baratta (1994). For cullei, see White (1975) 139-41. 87. For a wall painting from a shop in Pompeii (6.10.1) depicting the filling of amphoras directly from a large, wagon-mounted culleus, see Jashemski (1967) 196 fig. 4; (1979) 219,224 fig. 326. For a wall painting from the Catacomb of Santa Agnese in Rome depicting a wagon-mounted cupa, see Tchemia (1986) fig. 5.1. In early modem times casks were the preferred method for the conveyance to Rome of the wines produced both in the central Tiber Valley and in the Colli Albani. 88. For the return of empty wine amphoras to landowners consigning tax wine at Rome, possibly for return to their estates in westcentral Italy for refilling, see the discussion of CIL 6.1785, in Appendix 1. At Pompeii it appears to have been regular practice to employ empty wine amphoras for the bottling of both wine and fish products; see, for example, Jashemski (1967) 194; Curtis (1979) 13-14; de Vos and de Vos (1982) 95; Quattrocchi (1992) 52, 60; Berry (1997a) 109, 110 fig. 4, 115-16 fig. 8. Thetalrnudic sources repeatedly address issues of purification in connection with the re-use of foreign (hence non-kosher) wine amphoras, suggesting that this was a common practice in the province of Palestina during the middle and late empire; see Zevulun and Olenik (1979) 29. 89. Tchemia (1986) 285-92. For reservations regarding the importance of casks in long-distance wine transport, see Parker (1990) 330; Panella (1992) 200. 90. For discussions of this evidence, see Carandini and Panella (1981); Tchemia (1986) 197-299, 321-49; Panella (1989); Panella (1992); Panella and Tchemia (1994). 91. The so-called "Carrot Amphora"(= Peacock and Williams [1986] 109-10, Class 12), largely overlooked in the literature regarding the urban wine supply, probably served as the container for the well-known wine originating in the region ofLaodicea. This amphora class occurs in small, though consistent amounts in contexts at the Palatine East dating to the second half of the 1st c. and the first half of the 2nd c. For Laodicean wine, see Rathbone (1983) 85-86. 92. For the most recent discussions of these facilities, see Palmer (1980); Bertinetti ( 1985) 160. 93. For the date of this inscription, see Andreau ( 1987) 291. 94. For this assumption, see Palmer ( 1980) 224. It cannot be excluded, however, that the Portus Vinarius Superior lay somewhere in the ager Faliscus rather than at Rome. If so, it would probably have been located somewhere in the vicinity of the Porto Goliano, the port facility situated at the point where the Fosso Treia empties into the Tiber that served Civita Castellana during medieval and early modern times. 95. Palmer ( 1980) 224, 233 App. VI, Andreau ( 1987) 116, and Coarelli ( I 996) 106 all assume that these inscriptions refer to a sepa-rate facility of this name at Rome. 43

THE URBAN ECONOMY

96. The alternative interpretation, that these facilities functioned as customs enclosures of some sort, as might be inferred on the basis of Dig. 50.16.59 (Ulpian), which states portus apellatus est conclusus locus quo importantur merces et inde exportantur (a portus is an enclosed area into which goods are imported and subsequently exported), seems impossible to reconcile with the evidence re-garding their function. We know of several other facilities at Rome termed portus, including a Portus Cor(neli) and a Portus Licini, both of which served as tegularia, that is, facilities for the bulking and storage of architectural ceramics. For these, see Richardson (1992) 320 s.v. Portus Cor(neli); s.v. Portus Licini. For a facility termed the Portus Olearius Vici Victoriae, which presumably func-tioned in connection with the supply ofolive oil, see Section 1.3. 97. Palmer (1980) 232 App. IV. la follows Marini in suggesting that the occupation of the dedicant in CJL 6.712 should be restored as negotias vinarius a Se[ptem Caes(aribus). It should be noted, however, that the editors of the CJL dismissed this conjecture on the grounds of insufficient space. 98. Palmer (1980) 224; (1981) 368-69. See also Richardson (1992) 63 s.v. Caesares. 99. LTUR J 257 s.v. Cella Saeniana. A facility known as the Cella Civiciana also lay in the Portuense district, although probably inside the urban customs boundary; see LTUR 1 256 s.v. Cella Civiciana. There is no evidence that this facility served for the storage of wine. 100. For the Porto di Ripa Grande, see D'Onofrio (1970) 238-47. Both Flambard (1987) 203-04 and Coarelli (1996) 197 associate the Portus Vinarius with the late imperial wine reception facility at a place known as Ciconiae, which was probably located on the left bank of the Tiber in the Tor di Nona district of the Campus Martius. As discussed in Appendix 1, however, this facility was pro-bably situated where it was so as to provide convenient access to the warehouses that served for the storage of state wine at or near the Templum Solis, and need have had no connection with the Portus Vinarius. If, as suggested here, Rome possessed one port that served for the handling of wine being brought up the Tiber from Ostia/Portus and a second such facility that served for the handling of wine brought down the river from the interior of the peninsula, it seems extremely unlikely that the former would have been situated as far upstream as Tor di Nona. 101. Richardson (1992) 80 s.v. Cellae Vinariae Nova et Arruntiana; LTUR 1 259 s.v. Cellae Vinariae Nova et Arruntiana. 102. For a view of the Porto Leonino, which lay adjacent to Santo Spirito in Sassia, see D'Onofrio (1970) 119 fig. 70. 103. Nardi (1988) 25-30, 63-105 passim. 104. For the career of this individual, see Meiggs (1960) 275. 105. Meiggs (1960) 288. For an earlier effort to show that this facility was located immediately adjacent to the northeast side of the hexagonal harbor at Portus, see Fasciato (I 94 7). 106. Hermansen (1981) 85. 107. Coarelli ( 1996). 108. For these two inscriptions, see Bloch (1939) 37 figs. 6-7. 109. For the argument that the quadriga of this inscription was a monument at Portus topped by a statue group consisting of a chariot drawn by four elephants, see Fasciato ( 1947) 69-72. An unpublished inscription from Ostia (inventory no. 6080) may indicate that the Forum Vinarium also contained some element with a feminine name (e.g., porticus) that was ampliata (enlarged) at some point; see Licordari (1974) 317 n. 15. 11O.Note that the transcription of this text in /LS omits the phrase referring to the mensuras. 111. For the second of these two inscriptions, see Licordari (1974). 112. Bloch (1939) 38. 113. For the second of these two inscriptions, see Licordari (1974) 317. Some of the members of this corpus also appear to have set up AE 1939.66, a dedication to Marcus Aurelius dated A.O. 162; see Bloch (I 939) 38 Fig. 8, where the name of the dedicatory group is restored colleg]ium vinariorum in[portatorum. 114. For alternate interpretations of the evidence pertaining to these two groups, see Sirks (1991) 399-40 I; Licordari (1974) 318. 44

CHAPTER I

115. For the interpretation of this grouping of titles, see Andreau (1987) 120-22. 116. For this inscription, see Panciera (1980) 244-45. 117. That this individual was a regionally-based wine wholesaler is suggested by the fact that a bronze stamp probably employed either for the stamping of bricks or for the sealing of plaster amphora stoppers found in the Tiber in the Ripa Grande area bears the name of her daughter, Cloelia Mascellina; see Tagliettti (1994) 162-63, 172-75. For a possible parallel case of an individual involved in the importing ofBaetican olive oil and the wholesaling of wine, in this instance at Lugdunum (modem Lyon), see CIL 6.29722 =/LS 7490, an epitaph from Rome belonging to a certain Cn. Sentius Regulianus, who was eques Romanus, diffusor olearius ex Baetica, curator eiusdem corporis, negot(ians) vinarius Lugdun(ensis) in Canabis consistens, curator et patronus eiusdem corporis, nauta Araricus (member of the equestrian order, olive oil diffusor from Baetica, curator of the corpus of the same, wine trader ofLugdunum established at the Canabae, curator and patronus of the corpus of the same, sailor on the Arar). For this inscription, see Panciera (1980) 241-43. 118. Note also in this regard that there are at least eight known wrecks of late 1st c. B.C./lst c. A.D. merchantmen outfitted with rows of dolia anchored amidships, apparently for the transport of wine; see Tchemia (1986) 138-40; Aubert (1994) 260-61. 119. Nicolet (1991); (1994). 120. Nicolet (1994). 121. Nicolet (1991) 480. 122. For the amphora evidence from Rome, see Panella (1992) and Section 2.4.1. 123. Lang (1955). 124. Haggis (1996) 200 fig. 20,201 fig. 21, 204-06. 125. Chaniotis (1988) 79. 126. Chaniotis ( 1988) 75-78; Marangou-Lerat (1995) 159-60. See also Section 2.4.1. 127. Tchemia (1986) 298. 128. For a discussion of this inscription, see Andreau (1987) 126-28. While the name of this group might be expanded negotiantes vini supernat(is) et Arimin(ensis), this makes no difference to the interpretation. 129. Sirks (1991) 96-97 maintains, mistakenly, in the author's view, that the corpus naviculariorum maris Hadriatici mentioned in this inscription consisted of shippers based in Cyrenaica and Tripolitania, and that it was involved in the transport to Ostia/Portus of grain and olive oil from this region. Further evidence for the close association between Adriatic shipping interests and the wine supply is the fact that Cn. Sentius Felix, the distinguished citizen of Ostia, who, as already noted, had strong connections to the Ostia/Portus wine trade, was also gratis adlect(o) inter navicular(ios) maris Hadriatici (granted honorary election to the [corpus] of navicularii of the Adriatic Sea). (C/L 14.409) 130. For a similar association of socially prominent individuals with the wine trade at Lugdunum, see Martin-Kilcher (1994a) 538-39. 131. Licordari (1974) 315-16. 132. While the vinarii mentioned in this inscription might have been simple wine retailers, the joint nature of this office suggests that it likely refers to negotiantes vinarii. 133. Docimus might conceivably have been a Mauritanian merchant active in the importing of both fish sauce and wine from his province, much as the unnamed dedicant of AE 1973.71 may have imported both oil and wine from hers. 134. For horrea at Ostia equipped with dolia set into the ground, presumably for the storage of wine and/or oil, see Paroli (1996) 256.

45

THE URBAN ECONOMY

135. For the emergence of central Italy as an important supplier of wine to the urbs during the I st c., see Tchernia (1986) 253-55; LaPadula (1997) 147-54. 136. For a uniquely detailed picture of the complex set of transactions involved in the production, bulking, and marketing of wine in mid-3rd c. Theadelphia, see Rathbone (1991) 193-95, 278-306. 137. One expression of the importance of Rome's immediate hinterland to the urban wine supply is the large number of wine presses that have been discovered in the environs of the city; see Rea (1985). 138. For a summary of the various modalities for the sale of wine as indicated by the literary sources, see Frier (1983) 276 n. 76. 139. See Jashemski (1979) 221-26 for a house at 1.9.6-7 with an annexed wine shop, which, in addition to wine, sold fish products. See also Martin-Kilcher (1994a) 539-40 Fig. 255 for a grave relief from Augsburg depicting the sale of wine at such a shop, and White (1975) 116-17 for descriptions of two reliefs depicting a similar scene, one from Til-Chatel, and the other from Ji.ingenrath. At Rome, the proprietors of these shops may have been the vinarii, whom SHA Alex. 33.2 states Severus Alexander organized into a corpus. That these were not negotiantes vinarii is suggested both by the fact that these traders had long since been organized into a corpus, and by the identities of the several other occupations for which, according to this passage, corpora were also constituted at that time, including shoemakers, greengrocers, and omnes artes. 140. Perhaps involved in this phase of the distribution process was a certain Acinius Faustus, who is styled praebitor vi[norum; -narius] (wine supplier) ( CIL 6.36815). 141. Richardson (1992) 324 s.v. Quattuor Scari. 142. There is, to the author's knowledge, no clear evidence for the existence of specialized wine storage facilities within the urban customs boundary. Palmer (1980) 233 App VII-VIII lists several cellae that were situated inside the customs boundary or for which the locations remain unknown, terming these "wine magazines." That cellae served exclusively for the storage of wine seems un-likely, however, since had this been the case the term eel/a vinaria would have been redundant. Rodriguez-Almeida ( 1984a) 73 characterizes cellae as a specific type of small-scale, special-purpose storage facility constructed at Rome during the 2nd and earlier 3rd c. Negotiantes vinarii and other wholesalers may perhaps have made use of the horrea publica, which SHA Alex. 39.3 states Severus Alexander arranged to have built in all districts of the city for the storage of goods by those who did not have privatae custodiae. See also Dig. 33.9.4.2 for Sabinus, a 2nd c. jurist, on mercatores who in a single eel/a mix containers of olive oil and wine intended for personal consumption with containers of olive oil and wine intended for sale. 143. Whether or not negotiantes vinarii would have conveyed wine to the premises of the buyer is unclear. The legal sources indicate that for the sale of wine the passage of possession could be accomplished by the seller consigning to the buyer the keys to the eel/a vinaria where the wine was stored, or by the buyer simply posting a guard there; see Dig. 41.2.1.21; 41.2.51; Cod. Just. 4.48.2. l. 144. Domitian's famous vine edict appears to have been an irregular, one-time intervention; see Tchernia (1986) 221-33. On the probable exclusion of wine from the set of goods whose prices were governed under the annona macelli, see Frayn (1993) 124. The organization of the vinarii into a corpus by Alexander Severus may reflect some interest in regulating the retail end of the urban wine supply. On this initiative, seen. 139. 145. Frier (1983) 291, 293-94. 146. That the disruption of the export trade to Italy may have led to a decline of wine production in this province can perhaps be inferred from the enigmatic notice in SHA Prob. 18.8 that Probus (reign A.D. 276-82) authorized the inhabitants of Gaul, Spain, and Britain to cultivate vineyards and produce wine. 147. Ricci (I 994) 724 n. I I. For the existence of a corpus negotiatorum at Rome in A.D. 384-85, see Symm. Rel. 14. l. 148. Vinegar was frequently employed for the extinguishing of fires (e.g., Dig. 33.9.3 .4), and the implication of the statement attributed to Phosphorius is that he would rather have treated his wine as vinegar than bring it onto the market at a ruinously low price. The fact that the domus in question was located in the Transtiberim district may point to some continuing association of this part of the city with the wholesaling of wine. For the literature on this incident, see Giardina ( I 986) 21 n. 146. For a dedication to Constans erected by Symmachus Phosphorius in the Transtiberim district ca. A.D. 340-50, see Section 1.3. I 49. For commentaries on this section of the £dictum de Preti is, see Lauffer ( I 97 I) 2 I 7-19; Mommsen and Bli.immer (1958) 6771.

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CHAPTER I

150. The sections of the Edictum de Pretiis concerned with linen cloth and garments and with freight rates (Sections 26 and 35, respectively) exhibit a similar structure, with groups ofrelated entries introduced by the word item. 151. For these wines, see Tchernia (1986) 259-60, 278-79, 326-36, 342-46, 348-49, and passim. Picenum is presumably a new desig-nation for Hadrianum; see Tchernia (1986) 301. Saitum is a variant for Setinum, the wine from Setia in Latium. Aminneum, or, as it was more commonly termed, aminaeum, was a wine made from a particular variety of grape rather than a wine from a specific geographic region. Aminaeum wines were produced in several different parts ofltaly, including the Bay of Naples, Etruria, Calabria, and Sicily. There were also productions of aminaeum in Hispania, Syria, and Bithynia; see RE 1.2 coll. 1035-37. 152. For the various forms of cooked must and their uses in Roman cooking, see Flower and Rosenbaum (1958) 24-26. 153. For these, seeApic. 1.1.-3. 154. For this section of the Edictum de Pretiis, see Section 1.3. 155. For these two amphora classes, see Section 2.4.1. 156. Perhaps worth noting in this regard is the fact that the ratio of the maximum prices given in this document for the most expensive and the least expensive wines, 30/8, or 3.75, is close to that of 4 attested for Pompeii; see Duncan-Jones (1974) 46 n. 3. For additional evidence regarding the price of wine at Rome during the imperial period, see Duncan-Jones (1974) 364-65. 157. Corcoran (1996) 221-23 regards the tariff list in the Edictum de Preti is, including the section regarding wines, as a reflection of market conditions at Antioch. 158. Additional evidence for wine production in Lucania et Bruttii during the late empire is provided by CTh 14.4.4 (A.D. 367) and Cassiod. Var. 12.2 (A.D. 533-35). For these sources, see Appendix 1. 159. Tchernia (1986) 100. 160. Symm. Rel. 14.1 refers to the imposition of a levy of horses against the corpus negotiatorum at Rome in A.D. 384-85, perhaps evidence that these traders were involved in substantial measure in the transport of goods overland to Rome by wagon. 161. A comprehensive study of state involvement in the urban wine supply during the late empire remains to be written. The most ambitious attempt to date, Chastagnol (1950), contains errors on several important points. Similarly flawed is Rouge (1957). For useful discussions of some of the relevant evidence, see Sirks (1991) 391-94; Herz (1988) 193-95, 296-302; Kohns (1961) 114-18, 146-49. 162. See CTh 14.4.2 (A.D. 324 or 326) for the pork supply system, and CTh 14.24.1 (A.D. 328) for the olive oil supply system. For the second of these two laws, see Section 1.3. 163. For this document, see Deleage (1975/1945) 221-23. See Champlin (1980) for the argument that this list preserves a portion of a register of properties belonging to a single individual rather than those for an entire municipality. 164. For a summary of Aurelian's initiatives concerned with the urban food supply, see Homo (1904) 176-83. 165. SHA Aur. 35.2: Nam idem Aurelianus et porcinam carnem populo Romano distribuit, quae hodie dividitur (The same Aurelian also distributed to the Roman people the pork which is given out even today). SHA Aur. 48.1 is sometimes cited in support of the existence of pork distributions under Aurelian, although it apparently refers to distributions of olive oil, bread, and pork made in the author's day rather than during the reign of Aurelian. Against the evidence of SHA Aur. 48.1 and 35.2 that distributions of wine and pork were made under Aurelian is the failure of these to be mentioned in Chron. 354 148, which states panem, oleum et sat populo iussit dari gratuite (he [i.e., Aurelian] commanded that bread, olive oil, and salt be given to the people gratis). 166. The several scholars who have considered this passage have all accepted that it has some historical basis; see Homo (1904) 179-80; Fisher (1929) 132-33; Chastagnol (1950) 167; Hartke (1972) 278-83; Manacorda (1976-77) 560-61; Palmer (1980) 220; Sirks (1991) 391-92; Virlouvet (1995) 52 n. 8. As newly planted vineyards require several years before they reach maturity, the wine supply initiative that SHA Aur. 48.1 attributes to Aurelian could not have begun to provide wine for distribution at Rome until some years after the end of his reign. 167. For oil in the ancient world, see Mattingly (1988) 34; Amouretti ( 1986); Amouretti et al. (1993).

47

THE URBAN ECONOMY

168. For this amphora class, see Section 2.4. The figure presented here for number of containers (and for all similar calculations throughout this work), which involves the conversion of liters of oil to Roman pounds of oil, is based on the following two assumptions: I) the Roman pound was equal to 327 g.

2) the density of Roman olive oil was equal to 0.91.

The capacity of an amphora that held 100 Roman pounds ofoil would thus be equal to 35.9 I. ([100 x 0.327]/0.91). For the density of oil, see Viedebantt (1912) 432, where it is stated that this varies from 0.91 to 0.93 as a function of several factors (e.g., quality of oil, temperature, etc.). In a trial carried out to confirm these values the author determined that at room temperature 1.5 I of commercially distributed Bertoli olive oil from Italy weighs 1.37 kg, for a density of0.913. 169. While there is no direct evidence for the transport of oil in cu/lei in west-central Italy, the lack of any other suitable container suggests that this was probably the type ofreceptacle employed. For the period in question, the £dictum de Pretiis (10.14) lists an uter olearius (oil skin), while ostraca relating to the mobilization of state oil in the provinces of Zeugitana and Byzacena in A.O. 373 indicate that cu/lei were employed for the transport of oil to Carthage for export; see Pefia (1998a) 184-92. 170. For this inscription, see Panciera (1980) 238-41. 171. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 107-274; Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994). 172. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 109, 118. 173. Le Roux (1986) 252-58. 174. For this inscription, see Pavis D'Escurac (1976) 191. 175. BlazquezMartinezetal.

(1994) 18-35, 130-46.

176. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 113-16; Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 23-24, 137-42; Remesal Rodriguez (1994) 103-110. 177. Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 22-24; see also Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 147-60. For these three amphora classes, see Section 2.4.1. There are, in addition, trace amounts of the Keay 1 Amphora; see Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 161; Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 127-28. 178. Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 137-42. 179. Manacorda (1976-77) 591 n. 223; Mattingly (1988) 55. 180. For the relative efficiencies of the Dressel 20 Amphora and the Keay 9/11 Amphora, see Peacock and Williams (1986) 52 Table 1. 181. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 116-19. 182. Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 36-37; Rodriguez-Almeida (1989a) 26-30; Rodriguez-Almeida (1993) 100-03; Liou and Tchemia (1994); Aubert (1994) 265-67. Two additional titulus components, known as epsilon and theta, sometimes appear on these amphoras. For the second of these, see below. 183. For an anomalous titulus on a Dressel 20 amphora bearing a consular date of A.O. 71, see Rodriguez-Almeida (1980) 279-80. 184. Martin-Kilcher (1987) 152-53, 155 abb. 86. 185. Rodriguez-Almeida (I 993) 103. 186. Remesal Rodriguez ( 1986) 22. 187. Rodriguez-Almeida (1980) 279-80. The earliest tituli are from the Porte Vendres B shipwreck, dating to the A.O. 40s, indicating state involvement of this sort in the supply of oil to military units from at least this time.

48

CHAPTER I

188. Rodriguez-Almeida (1993) 99 n. 16 suggests that bottling operations were conducted by the imperial fisc, perhaps working on behalf of the office of the praefectus annonae. Remesal Rodriguez (1986) 22, in contrast, surmises that the delta titulus component may have been a fiscal control connected with the levying of the portorium. For criticisms of the latter view, see Le Roux (1986) 250 n. 13; Liou and Tchemia (1994) 151 n. 10. Mattingly (1988) 44 suggests that local municipal authorities may have conducted bottling operations during the 1st c., with responsibility for this then shifting to the office of the praefectus annonae. Keay (1988) 101 is non-committal, simply stating that "the filling, sealing and exporting of oil amphorae were ... carefully monitored by imperial authorities in Baetica." 189. Worth noting in this connection is the fact that a legal source dating to the second half of the 2nd c. (Dig. 13.7.43.1 [Scaevola]) refers in the hypothetical to the requisition for the annona of cu/lei by a centurio missus ex officio annonae (centurion sent from the office of the annona). While containers of this kind might in theory have been used for the transport of either oil or wine, there is no evidence that the office of the praefectus annonae was ever responsible for the mobilization of the latter species, and this passage would thus appear to indicate that during the period in question this branch of the imperial administration was involved in the col-Iection of oil at or near its point of production. 190. Remesal Rodriguez (1986) 74-76; Blazquez (1992) 175-77, 186; Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 142-43, 146. 191. For the assumption that this oil was raised by the office of the praefectus annonae under an unspecified initiative, see Le Roux (1986) 263-64. Blazquez (1992) 176 posits a mixed approach to the mobilization of Baetican oil, involving taxation, gifts, and purchase. 192. Manacorda (1977) 319-20. See also Remesal Rodriguez (1996). 193. Le Roux (1986) 258-63; Rodriguez-Almeida (1989b); Liou and Tchemia (1994) 134-37. 194. Taglietti (1994) 179-85; Granino Cecere (1994a) 710-19. 195. Liou and Tchemia (1994) 136-37 assume that these individuals operated entirely within a free-market context. 196. Kehoe (1988) 69-70, 139-40. 197. Kehoe (1988) 42-43. 198. Kehoe (1988) 12-20, 163-77. 199. rsted (1992) 827-29. 200. For the extraordinary distribution of oil during a period of food crisis under Antoninus Pius, see SHA Ant. 8.11. 20 I. For the Porticus Pallantiana, see Richardson (1992) 318 s.v. Porticus Pallantiana. 202. For some of the problems in defining the meaning of olearius, see Panciera (1980) 235-38. 203. Floriani Squarciapino (1956-58) 192-93 no. 9, tav. V.l; 193-94, tav. V.2. 204. For distributions of state oil at Rome, see Pavis D'Escurac (1976) 188; Manacorda (1976-77) 556-58; Carandini and Panella (1981) 498-99; Herz (1988) 157; Sirks (1991) 389; Pefia (1998a) 154-56. 205. SHA Alex. 22.2 also refers to the institution of oil distributions under Septimius Severus. 206. Pavis D'Escurac ( 1976) 198. 207. Tengstrom (1974) 84-85. 208. Manacorda ( 1976-77) 559-60 identifies this as a reference to Claudius tonsor, mentioned in SHA Elag. 12.1. 209. For these documents, see Jones (1964) 629 n. 44, 1,261-62. For the inference that P. Beatty Panop. 2.245-249 implies a monthly oil ration of one-eleventh sextarius per day for soldiers stationed in Egypt during the period A.O. 298-300, see DuncanJones (I 990) I 09-10. 49

THE URBAN ECONOMY

210. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 119 suggests that this passage may be hyperbole. 211. For the inscriptions that indicate the existence of this initiative, see Strubbe (1987) 65-66 nos. 46-50; (1989) 105, 109. Strubbe assumes that the grain fund referred to in these texts was intended for the crnffivia (sitonia), a municipal initiative involving the purchase of grain for the support of a city's populace, a practice that was widespread among the cities of Asia Minor during the imperial period. That this was not the case, however, is suggested by the fact that evidence for this specific grain fund is limited to these two cities. 212. Mattingly (1994) 155 suggests that this voluntary donation may have been made in response to Severus' awarding of the ius !talicum to Leptis Magna. 213. Manacorda (1976-77) 580-82. 214. For discussions of this inscription, see Manacorda (1976-77) 543-55, 581-82; di Vita Evrard (1985) 145-46. 215. For the identification of the regio Tripolitana as an administrative district of the patrimonium, see di Vita Evrard (1985) 15256. 216. Mattingly (1994) 55 suggests that its creation may have been linked with the introduction of free distributions of state oil at Rome. 217. Rodriguez-Almeida (1980) 282-87; (1989a) 35-37; Blazquez (1992) 184; Blazquez Martinez et al. (1994) 38; Remesal Rodriguez ( 1996). 218. For the translation of this designation, see Remesal Rodriguez (1986) 105-06. 219. Mayet (1986) 300-03. Tchemia and Liou (1994) 147-48 argue that these three facilities may have passed from imperial to private ownership rather than the other way around. 220. For the view that these changes were related to land confiscations in Baetica, see Manacorda (1976- 77) 579-82, 592-96; Reme-sal Rodriguez (1996). For arguments against this inference, see Rodriguez-Almeida (1980) 282-84; Liou and Tchemia (1994) 148. 221. Rickman (1980) 192, 195-97; Virlouvet (1995) 131-56. 222. Rodriguez-Almeida (1989a) 30. 223. The argument in Le Roux (1986) 261-62 that the corpus of diffusores olearii ex Baetica mentioned in an inscription from Rome was an organization of workers responsible for the transvasing of Baetican oil from Dressel 20 amphoras to containers of some other sort following its arrival at Rome is unconvincing. These men more likely carried out their activities in Baetica; see Pefia (1998a) 167-68. 224. Rodriguez-Almeida (1989a) 112, no. 119. 225. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 165. That the introduction of the Dressel 23 Amphora was directly related to the discontinuation of the system for the mobilization and export ofBaetican oil seems unlikely, as the Cabrera 3 shipwreck shows that the Dressel 20 Amphora and the Dressel 23 Amphora were being used concurrently for the transport of Baetican oil to Italy in A.D. 257 or shortly thereafter; see Bost et al. (1992) 118-27. 226. While Remesal Rodriguez ( 1982) 68 suggests that the large-scale discard of oil amphoras may have continued elsewhere in the Emporium, noting that large accumulations of containers were carted away from the areas known as "Piccolo Testaccio" and "II Cavone" during the course of the 19th c., the suggestion that these represented some sort of successor dump to Monte Testaccio is unconvincing. 227. For the chronology of the lmperium Galliarum, see Lafaurie (1975). 228. Shipping from Hispania might also have been subject to significant disruptions for some or all of the period A.O. 260-66 due to the occupation of considerable portions of its Mediterranean coast by Frankish and Alaman invaders. For the argument that the interruption of the supply of Baetican oi I to Rome was a direct result of this development, see Chic Garcia (1983) 181-82. 229. For the interpretation of this law, see Barnish ( 1987) 162-63. 50

CHAPTER I

230. While the term canon is used in SHA Sev. 23.3 in reference to the urban grain and oil supplies in the year A.D. 211, this may well be a late 4th c. anachronism; see Herz (1988) 157. 231. See also CTh 12.6.9 (A.D. 368), which refers to customary procedures for the collection of more than one species annonaria in Africa. Also worth noting in this regard is a law of A.D. 386 (CTh 12.11.2), which commanded the vicarius urbis to enforce the previously decreed cancellation of all debits registered in the kalendarii (account books) maintained in connection with the area olearia (oil chest), an account that presumably served for the deposit of commutation payments and/or oil raised under the canon olei, and/or the deposit of coin raised through the sale of state oil. 232. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 166-67. For the date of this structure, see Humphrey (1986) 601. 233. Rodriguez-Almeida (1984a) 167. For the date of this structure, see Coarelli (1981) 175. 234. Worth noting in this regard is that the church of Saint Jerome in Cologne, a construction dating to of the middle years of the 4th c., employs more than 1,200 Dressel 23 amphoras as lightening elements in its vaulting; see Remesal Rodriguez (1983) 129. 235. Candida (1973); Friggeri (1985). For a line drawing of this relief, see the front cover of this volume. 236. PLRE 863-64 Symmachus 3. 237. For the best published photograph of this relief, see Candida (1973) 172 tav. II. For other reproductions, see Meiggs {1960) Plate XXVb; Le Gall (1953) planche XXXl.2. 238. Candida (1973) 115-16. Friggeri {1985) 237-38 remains non-committal. 239. Sirks (1991) 126,242. Metal bullion may also have been transported from Hispania to Italia as state cargo during this period, although operations would appear to have ceased at most of the important metal mines in Hispania by this time; see Howgego (1992) 7. 240. Remesal Rodriguez (1982) 68-69; (1983) 115. 241. Whitehouse et al. (1982) 75, 80; Carignani et al. (1986) 38-41; Martin (1989) 476-78; Carignani and Pacetti (1989a); (1989b); Hostetter et al. (1994) 159. 242. For the argument that Egypt had ceased to be a major source of state grain for the supply of Rome prior to the revolt of Domitius Alexander in A.D. 308, see Sirks (1991) 199-200. Sardinia apparently remained a significant source of supply into the 5th C. 243. Pavis d'Escurac (1976) 142-44. 244. For a detailed analysis of these documents, see Pefia (1998a). 245. For this corpus, see Sirks (1991) 146-92. 246. Pefia (1998a) 206-07. 247. Durliat (1990)73-74. 248. Jones (1974) 331-32 calculates the value of the follis in A.O. 324 at 2.5 aurei or 3 solidi, equal to one twenty-fourth of a pound of gold. He then relates these figures to the price for rnensae oleariae as indicated in CTh 14.24.l (p. 335), suggesting that the figure of3 solidi to thefollis seems reasonable in this instance. The price for one of these facilities would thus be equal to twenty twenty-fourths, or five-sixths of a pound of gold. 249. Burnett (1987) 120, for example, notes (without citing any source) that only 30 percent of all possessores held sufficient land to produce a yield large enough to equal the value of a single gold coin (presumably a solidus, equal to l /72 of a pound of gold). 250. Rickman ( 1980) 208. 251. Palmer ( 1980) 220-21; 232 Appendix IV.

51

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252. Rickman (1980) 204-06; Sirks (1991) 322-54. 253. Barnes (1982) 14-15. 254. This may have been rendered difficult by the fact that Domitius Alexander controlled Sardinia for at least part of the duration of his revolt, since this would have given him command of the Bocche di Bonifacio, the strait between Sardinia and Corsica through which most Hispania-Portus shipping likely passed. 255. For fish sauces and salted fish products in the ancient world, see Curtis (1991 a); (1991 b); Ponsich (1988) 24-1 OI. 256. For Rome, see Panella (1992) passim. For Ostia, see Carandini and Panella (1981) 492-501; Panella (1991) 290-92. For the fish products industry in Baetica, see Ponsich (I 988) 169-219. For the fish products industry in Lusitania, see Edmondson (1987) 100-205; Ponsich (1988) 220-28; Etienne and Mayet (1992-93). While the fish products industry in Africa Proconsularis has been the subject of little investigation, see now the works cited in Mattingly and Hitchner (1995) 200 n. 343. 257. For the marketing of Italian fish products during the 1st c., see Aubert (1994) 267-69. 258. The establishment at 1.12.8, which served for the fermenting and bottling offish sauce, appears to contain no facilities for its retailing; see Curtis (1979) 8-9. 259. The author has observed a considerable number of Lusitanian and Baetican fish products amphoras among unpublished deposits of 1st to 4th c. date from Falerii Novi. 260. For the literary evidence for the price of fish products, see Curtis (1991a) 170-75. 261. Some of the most informative evidence regarding the range of different materials employed for the manufacture of specific vessel forms during the middle and late imperial period comes from the talmudic literature. For a discussion of this evidence in relation to artifacts from archaeological excavations in Israel, see Zevulun and Olenik (1979). 262. While broken and worn out pots were also recycled, this probably was not done with anything approaching the thoroughness observed with objects in metal and glass. 263. With the publication of detailed house inventories from Pompeii this situation is beginning to change somewhat, at least insofar as containers manufactured in non-organic materials are concerned; see, for example, Berry (1997a) 105-18; (1997b) 18795; Allison (1997) 126-35. 264. Several amphoras at Pompeii bear dated tituli picti showing that they were several decades old at the time of the eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79; see Laurence (1994) 5-7. Similarly, dated tituli picti on some of the amphoras from the Castra Pretoria deposit in Rome show that they too were several decades old at the time of their interment; see Paterson (1982) 146-48. To judge from ethnographic case studies, the average use-life of ceramic vessels employed for functions other than storage must have been consi-derably shorter than this, perhaps ranging from no more than a few months for some cookware forms to several years for high-quality tablewares. For ethnographic and ethnoarchaeological studies of pottery use-life, see Rice (1987) 293-99; Kramer (1985) 89-92; Neupert and Longacre (1994); Shott (1996). 265. For general patterns in pottery consumption in agrarian societies, see Smith (1987) 310-14. 266. Peacock(l982). 267. Aubert (1994) 205-06. 268. Aubert (1994) 244-76. 269. For the significance of pottery production in the Roman economy, see Evans ( 1981) 519-29; Morel (1983); Pucci ( 1983) 10912; Tomber(l993) 142-45. 270. For this evidence, see below. 271. To the author's knowledge, there are no reliable data from the Roman world regarding the percentage of a particular work force engaged in the pottery trade. Remondon (1962/1913) 334, without noting the source of his information, states that papyrological evidence indicates that in Roman Egypt the manufacture of pottery and glass employed ca. 0.2 percent of a typical

52

CHAPTER I

village work force. Hopkins (1978) 71-72 reports that of the 328 male funerary epitaphs from Korykos that indicate the occupation of the deceased, ca. 10 percent relate to the pottery trade. This figure seems impossibly high, and cannot represent the true percentage of the town's work force involved in this sector of the economy. 272. While there are no data available regarding ancient Rome, a tax levied against the various professional corporations active at Rome in 1600 provides some interesting evidence for the early modern period. In this instance, the corporation of potters and pottery sellers was assessed an obligation of 19 scudi, with the combined total for all 52 corporations listed coming to 2,782 scudi; see Delumeau (1957) 375-78. Since the size of the assessment made against each corporation presumably reflected some estimate of its share of overall economic (retail?) activity, these figures may be taken as a rough indicator of the relative importance of the vari-ous sectors of the economy represented by each of the groupings of tradesmen included in the levy. The figure for the corporation of potters and pottery sellers, equal to 0.7 percent of the total, falls in the same general range (17-19.5 scudi) as the obligations assessed against the poultry sellers, candle makers and candle sellers, saddlers, and gold workers. 273. A striking example of the ease with which even some of the more complex technical aspects of pottery manufacture might be transferred from one production center to another in the Roman world is provided by Berges' study of the lamps from Montans, an important center for the manufacture of Gallic Sigillata that also produced lamps as a sideline. All 908 of the specimens examined by her were produced by the technique of surmoulage, that is, the making of molds by taking a cast from an existing piece, using originals produced in workshops located either in Italy or in Africa; see Berges (1989) 27-30, 55-56. 274. We possess no evidence regarding the cost of potting clay in the Roman world. Talmudic sources do, however, indicate the way in which it was sold, at least in the province of Palestina. These refer to the selling of"potter's eggs," presumably egg-shaped lumps of prepared clay; see Adan-Bayewitz (1993) 24-26; Vitto (1987) 51. 275. For the mimicking of vessels in metal, see Vickers et al. (I 986); Fulford (I 986). 276. To date, there has been no comprehensive study of the social status of potters in the Roman world. For useful discussions, however, see Delplace (1978); Vitto (1987); Mackensen (1993) 469-86. 277. For efforts to analyze the effects of distance on the marketing of pottery, see Fulford and Hodder (1974); Hodder (1974); Harris (1980) 134-35; Gillam and Greene (1981) 9-24. 278. The method employed for levying the octavae on goods such as pottery is not known. Customs records of 1453 from Tuscania indicate that pottery being brought into the town for sale was taxed by the salma (animal load); see Barbone (1978) 12729. 279. There is no evidence that there was any sort of potter's tax at Rome. For the existence of a potter's tax at the village of Karanis, in Egypt during the 2nd c., see Shelton (1977) 100; Geremek (1969) 91-92. 280. Peacock (1982) 99-100. For passages in the talmudic literature indicating that potter's kilns were banned from Jerusalem on account of the smoke that they generated, see Vitto (1987) 59. 281. For the suburbium, see Champlin (1985); Coarelli (1986) 35-58; Quilici (1991). 282. For land prices in the suburbium, see Champlin (1985) 102-04. 283. Dumps of discarded pottery found in several harbors in the western empire have been interpreted as cargo broken in transit that was jettisoned upon arrival in port so as to avoid paying the portorium; see Rhodes (1989) 48-49, 50-51. 284. Quilici (1991) 104. 285. For the effects of the construction of the Aurelian Walls on the geography of the urbs, see Quilici (1991) 98. 286. For the archaeological and textual evidence for ceramic production in the Roma area, see Petracca and Vigna (1985); Morel (1987) 129-31. 287. The epigraphic record for Rome contains attestations of occupations concerned with the manufacture of vessels in various other materials, including vitrarius (glass-maker), argentarius vasculariuslvascularius (maker of metal vessels), cullearius (maker of skin containers), and capsarius (box-maker); see Treggiari (1980) 61-64; Joshel (1992) 176-82; Granino Cecere (1994b). 288. Waltzing ( 1968/1900) 24. Ephesus is the only major city of the empire for which we possess evidence for the existence of a professional organization of potters; see Merkelbach and Nolle ( 1980) 250 no. 2402. 53

THE URBAN ECONOMY

289. For the low visibility of potters in the epigraphic record, see Del place (1978) 56. 290. Delumeau (1957) 370-75, tables I-III. 291. Revel (1979) 37. 292. Pavolini (1994). 293. In republican times there may have been a potters' quarter on the Oppian, as indicated by the toponym Figlinae and the presence in this area of the remains of a republican pottery workshop; see Petracca and Vigna (1985) 131; LTUR 2 252-53 s.v. Figlinae. 294. Carta geologica d'Italia,foglio 149, formation Pl2;foglio 150, formation p2. 295. Scavizzi (1983) 31-32, 72 tav. 2. 296. For the meanings of patella, see Hilgers (1969) 239-41. 297. Richardson (1992) 405 s.v. Vaticanus Mons. 298. There are only a few brief allusions to these remains in the literature, including Mocchegiani Carpano (1977); Pavolini (1980) 1,01213 n. 44; Mocchegiani Carpano (1982) 27; Petracca and Vigna (1985) 134; Maestripieri and Ceci (1990) 119. 299. Mocchegiani Carpano (1982) 27, 32 fig. 4.A-E, 33 fig. 5.g, 5.h, 5.1.; Maestripieri and Ceci (1990); Olcese (1994) 241-43. 300. Maestripieri and Ceci (1990). 301. Gauckler (1909) 265. 302. For the second of these vessel forms, see Section 2.5, Form 29.13, identified as a probable bottle stopper. Examples of vessels recovered in this dump would appear to be depicted in Mocchegiani Carpano (1982) 31 fig. 3, 33 fig. 5.F, 5.I. 303. Mocchegiani Carpano ( 1982) 27, without indicating the source of his information, states that finds made elsewhere along the eastern slope of the Gianicolo demonstrate the presence of pottery production in this area over a period of time extending from the republic to beyond the 5th c. 304. Sternini ( 1989) publishes what she identifies as production debris from a glass workshop active somewhere in the Lungotevere Testaccio area during the 5th c. For doubts about the identification of this material as production debris, see Whitehouse (1991). 305. Pavolini (1983) 61. Excavation underneath the mosaics of the Piazzale delle Corporazioni produced possible wasters of Italian Sigillata; see Carta et al. ( 1978) 231, 234-36. The proximity of this finds pot to the Caseggiato de lie Fornaci raises the possibility that there was a concentration of pottery production in this part of the town. For the recovery of Italian Sigillata wasters at the site of the Republican Temple (2.9.4), located at the intersection of the Decumanus and the Via