Panel 2.2 – The impact of rivers on ancient economies

Organisation/Vorsitz:

• Christof Berns (Universität Bochum)
• Sabine Huy (Universität Bochum)

Vortragende:

• Sabine Huy (Ruhr-Universität Bochum)
  The Economy of the Don River Communities. Driven by the River or by Land Routes?
• Helmut Brückner (Universität zu Köln)
  Life cycles of islands and harbours. The case study of the Maiandros river and the city of Miletos
• Silvia Paltineri (Università degli Studi di Padova) und Mirella T. A. Robino (Università degli Studi di Pavia) / Federica Wiel-Marin (Ruhr-Universität Bochum)
  Flüsse als Wirtschaftsfaktor. Der Handel zwischen Etruskern, Griechen und Venetern im 6. und 5. Jh. v. Chr.
• Varvara Papadopoulou (University of Ioannina)
  River Arachthos: Shaping the economic landscape of Ambracia, a Corinthian colony in the Ionian coast
• Christoph Rummel (Freie Universität Berlin)
  Taming Nature. Riverine Connectivity in the Middle Danube Region
• Paul Pasieka (Freie Universität Berlin)
  Südetrurien und seine Flüsse. Beobachtungen zur wirtschaftlichen und infrastrukturellen Erschließung in der römischen Kaiserzeit
• Alessandro Sebastiani (University at Buffalo, SUNY)
  The river Ombrone Valley: connecting economies during the Roman period
• Anca Dan (CNRS, Ecole Normale Supérieure)
  Milesian Landscape Transfer: the salted fish, from Egypt to the Black Sea

Landscapes shaped by rivers provide characteristics and specific conditions, which have a great impact on the economic life of people living in fluvial contexts. Archaeologists so far concentrated on rivers as routes of transportation. Primarily, rivers have been considered as a frame for studies on the distribution of commodities. But especially geo-archaeological research has led to a better understanding of the complex effects of rivers on social communities. Significant geomorphic changes of river-landscapes have been proven at many sites. The different conditions of a river – i. e. seasonal (flooding, low water, icing, etc.) as well as on long-term effects (changing river courses, sedimentation etc.) but also altering possibilities of exploitation – force people to live in close relationship with the watercourse. Simultaneously the river provides specific chances for economic activities. It is the aim of the panel to investigate rivers as dynamic factors that structure ancient communities and have an impact on their economic systems. We hope to specifically look at the various functions of rivers as natural resources, the connective links and at the implications resulting from environmental changes. We seek contributions on single rivers as case studies or wider, systematic approaches addressing one or more of the following themes and questions: To what extend are rivers exploited for the supply of fresh water or foodstuff? Are there indications of infrastructural provisions such as harbours or dams? Does the use of rivers as transportation route result in shared patterns of consumption between the communities living along a river course? What types of risks and opportunities result directly from natural and/or anthropogenic changes of river landscapes, both in short- and long-term perspective?

1. Sabine Huy und Barbora Weissova (Ruhr-Universität Bochum)

The Economy of the Don River Communities. Driven by the River or by Land Routes?
The present paper examines economic connections along the River Don (in the western part of the Russian Federation) between the late 7th and the early 3rd century BC. The analysed time span revealed several clusters of settlements and burial fields, unevenly distributed along the entire main river course and its tributaries. An interconnection of these micro-regions is anticipated based on Greek imports encountered in each of them.
Trade between the micro-regions has been hitherto always interpreted as an outcome of the river route, the most obvious and easiest mean of transport. However, the spatial analysis of the distribution of settlements and burials shows a distinctive pattern, suggesting overland routes as substantially shorter ones. This fact alongside with characteristic topographic features (including a terrain model and the water regime of the rivers), challenged the original interpretation of the trade as being conducted exclusively via rivers. Hence, this in turn leads to the question of whether the main trade was driven by a combination of land- and waterways?
We search for an answer through two independent methodological approaches. One examines the archaeological evidence (including the distribution of sites and their spectra of findings), the other one analyses the cheapest routes between the micro-regions, applying a GIS based anisotropic least cost path analysis. The final results are interpreted with respect to the outcomes of both methodological approaches.

2. Helmut Brückner (Universität zu Köln)

Life cycles of islands and harbours. The case study of the Maiandros river and the city of Miletos
During the past millennia, the formerly flourishing harbour city of Miletos and its environs have experienced major palaeo-geographical and palaeo-ecological changes, caused by the post-glacial sea-level rise, tectonic activities, the delta progradation of the Maiandros (Maeander, Büyük Menderes), and the continuous human impact since Late Chalcolithic times. Based on historical accounts, archaeological criteria, and geoarchaeological research it is possible to reconstruct the spatio-temporal evolution of the landscape. Analyses of sediment cores collected around the Temple of Athena revealed that sea level reached its highest stand there during the Early Bronze Age. A similar pattern is evident around the later Sanctuary of Apollo Delphinius, where cultural debris from the Late Chalcolithic period is covered by shallow marine sediments. The environmental changes with high erosion and accumulation rates contributed to the rapid transformation of the Milesian archipelago with five islands to the Milesian Peninsula, which started during the 2nd millennium BC by the evolution of tombolos and was later supported by intentional infill. Siltation caused by the progradation of the Maeander delta since Roman Imperial times largely silted-up the harbours of the city, subsequently integrating the Milesian peninsula into the floodplain. Today, Miletos is situated some 8 km inland.

3. Silvia Paltineri (Università degli Studi di Padova) / Mirella T. A. Robino (Università degli Studi di Pavia) / Federica Wiel-Marin (Ruhr-Universität Bochum)

Flüsse als Wirtschaftsfaktor. Der Handel zwischen Etruskern, Griechen und Venetern im 6. und 5. Jh. v. Chr.
La comunicazione - che sarà tenuta in tedesco o in inglese - esamina le relazioni commerciali fra Etruschi, Greci e Veneti tra VI e V secolo a.C.: l’area settentrionale del Delta del Po e il suo entroterra erano attraversati da una fitta rete fluviale, individuata grazie a ricerche geoarcheologiche. I fiumi, prolungamento delle rotte adriatiche verso l’interno, avevano un regime costante ed erano navigabili in entrambe le direzioni: il Po di Adria passava lungo la frontiera fra Etruschi e Veneti, ma altri rami fluviali, più a nord, univano le loro acque a quelle dell'Adige, che lambiva Este, capoluogo del Veneto preromano. Gli insediamenti sorgono lungo la maglia fluviale, in posizione rilevata, su dossi o alture collinari prospicienti i fiumi e prediligono, data la natura del suolo, un’edilizia leggera.
La distribuzione degli indicatori commerciali conferma che i traffici avvenivano lungo la rete idrografica: nei siti del Polesine (es. Adria, San Cassiano, Balone), a forte presenza etrusca e con connotazione agraria, le anfore greche da trasporto marcano l’arrivo del vino. La ceramica attica seguiva il corso del Po (es. Forcello) e dell’Adige, una delle porte verso l’Europa centrale, spingendosi, insieme alla ceramica etrusco-padana, nei centri veneti e oltre. Il fenomeno di ritorno di questi scambi è l’arrivo nel Delta, lungo l’idrovia Adige-Tartaro, di un pregiato materiale lapideo, la trachite dei Colli Euganei, impiegata a San Cassiano nelle fondazioni degli edifici.

4. Varvara Papadopoulou (University of Ioannina) / Vassilios Kapopoulos (University of Athens) / Nektarios-Petros Yioutsos (University of Ioannina)

River Arachthos: Shaping the economic landscape of Ambracia, a Corinthian colony in the Ionian coast
Ambracia, a colony of Corinth, was founded in the late 7th century B.C. and prospered at the exact same location, where the modern city of Arta extends today. The choice of its location was dictated by the important strategic and trading advantages it had to offer. Built in the vicinity of the navigable river Arachthos and at a short distance from its harbors in the Ambracian Gulf, it was situated at a nodal point in relation to the land routes and waterways, leading both into the Epirote hinterland and Illyria further to the north, as well as to the Adriatic sea to the west. During the 6th century B.C. Ambracia must have played an important role in the circulation of fine Corinthian products in central Epirus and Illyria as it is evident through recent archaeological data.
In the past few decades there have been many excavations in the wider Arta/Ambracia area, revealing its excellent town planning, its complete drainage system, the appearance of its public and private edifices, the layout of its cemeteries.
This paper will present the river Arachtos and its role as a major trade route shaping the economy and cultural identity of the region, as well as finds that were discovered among the city’s ruins that show the Corinthian background of the colony, the trading routes to the Greek Mainland and the Western Mediterranean and its role as an important trading hub.

5. Christoph Rummel (Freie Universität Berlin)

Taming Nature. Riverine Connectivity in the Middle Danube Region
Until the completion of major Roman infrastructure works in the late 1st century AD, the middle Danube in what is now known as the Iron Gates or Djerdap, was not navigable from West to East (or vice versa). This is largely reflected in cultural and material culture distributions that are frequently divided into Eastern and Western Balkan groups. Various types of archaeological evidence reflect the extent to which the changes to the Danube river in the Djerdap/Iron Gates during the late 1st century AD directly affected the economy and society of the entire middle Danube Region. This paper identifies how the Danube as a key lifeline of Europe - as we see it today - did not come into being as such until the Roman period, and how its role as a transport route shaped the entire northern part of the Balkan peninsula for centuries.

6. Paul Pasieka (Freie Universität Berlin)

Südetrurien und seine Flüsse. Beobachtungen zur wirtschaftlichen und infrastrukturellen Erschließung in der römischen Kaiserzeit
Südetrurien gehört zu den wirtschaftsarchäologisch am besten untersuchten Regionen des Römischen Reiches. Nur selten wurden jedoch die Untersuchungen einzelner Siedlungskammern oder Mikroregionen vergleichend miteinander in einer Langzeitperspektive in Bezug gesetzt, um zu einem besseren Verständnis des Wechselspiels von Wirtschaft und naturräumlichen Grundlagen in diesem Gebiet zu gelangen. Der vorgeschlagene Beitrag will dazu beitragen, diese Lücke zu schließen. Aus wirtschaftsgeographischer Sicht zerfällt Südetrurien in zwei Großbereiche, die v.a. durch ihre unterschiedlichen fluvialen Systeme charakterisiert sind: Ein Küstenabschnitt mit einer Reihe kleinerer und mittlerer Flüsse wie Bruna, Ombrone, Marta oder Osa, die alle zum Meer entwässern und ein ausgedehntes, östliches Hinterland mit dem Tiber und seinem System weitverzweigter Zubringer, der vor dem Meer erst die Metropole Rom durchfließt. Diese beiden Flusssysteme werden hier als unterschiedliche Wirtschafts- und Kommunikationsräume aufgefasst, deren ökonomische und infrastrukturelle Entwicklung vergleichend vom 1. Jh. v. bis zum 3. Jh. n. Chr. betrachtet werden. Im Mittelpunkt steht die infrastrukturelle Erschließung – u. a. Häfen, Anlegestellen, Lagerhäusern – aus archäologischer Perspektive und die Frage, wie die Verkehrswege und ökonomischen Mikroregionen durch diese Erschließung zu größeren wirtschaftlichen Kommunikationsräumen zusammengeschlossen und ökonomische Hierarchieebenen miteinander verbunden werden.

7. Alessandro Sebastiani (University at Buffalo, SUNY)

The river Ombrone Valley: connecting economies during the Roman period
The aim of this paper is to describe the multi-scalar economical connections that happened along the river Ombrone valley (south Tuscany, Italy) during the Roman period.
As the Roman Mediterranean was a large globalized market area, ruled and connected through a series of human infrastructures that facilitated the exchange of goods and the mobility of people, this paper wants to analyze this elaborate network of economic hubs, such as cabotage ports and harbors, manufacturing district, villas, vici, farms and public facilities in the specific area of south Etruria. Drawing from the results of two different research projects (the Alberese Archaeological Project and the Impero Project), the paper will analyze the tight relationship between Roman economy and riverine connectivity, detailing the subsequent distribution of economic land-markers and infrastructures in terms of mobility of goods and people along the flow of the river, with the latter playing a crucial role in the understanding of the agency of interconnected landscapes, providing the trait d'union between the micro-scale level of economical distribution (south Etruria) and the macro-global market (the Mediterranean).

8. Anca Dan (CNRS, Ecole Normale Supérieure)

Milesian Landscape Transfer: the salted fish, from Egypt to the Black Sea
The concept of “landscape transfer” answers new trends in the study of “transported landscape” (the biota accompanying human populations in their migrations, cf. Anderson 1952) and “cultural transfers” (the passage of a cultural object from a context to another, giving place to new meanings, cf. Espagne-Werner 1988). It aims at emphasizing the anthropic modification of a landscape, by the habits of a new population.
Because of ”landscape transfers”, Greek – and especially Milesian – colonization had a significant impact on the Internal Sea, which still needs to be studied. From Antiquity until today, the Black Sea has the exceptional reputation of a sea very rich in fishes; however, before the 7th century BC, we have almost no traces of indigenous “eaters of fish” on its shores. The logical conclusion is that the Ionians (maybe more than the Megarians) became quickly aware of this potential and also that they brought with them the technology necessary for taking advantage of this resource as tarichos. Egypt (with Naucratis) could have been the place from where they learned and exported fish-salting and drying technology to the north.
The paper offers a brief description of the sea and river-mouth fishing before and after the Milesian colonization and stresses the environmental impact of the exploitation of salt marshes and salting basins at Black Sea river mouths.