The Roman Agricultural Economy: Organization, Investment, and Production (Oxford Studies on the Roman Economy) - Hardcover

9780199665723: The Roman Agricultural Economy: Organization, Investment, and Production (Oxford Studies on the Roman Economy)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0199665729 ISBN 13: 9780199665723

Publisher: OUP Oxford, 2013

This volume is a collection of studies which presents new analyses of the nature and scale of Roman agriculture in the Mediterranean world from c. 100 BC to AD 350. It provides a clear understanding of the fundamental features of Roman agricultural production through studying the documentary and archaeological evidence for the modes of land exploitation and the organisation, development of, and investment in this sector of the Roman economy.

Moving substantially beyond the simple assumption that agriculture was the dominant sector of the ancient economy, the volume explores what was special and distinctive about it, especially with a view of its development and integration during a period of expansion and prosperity across the empire. The papers exemplify a range of possible approaches to studying and, within limits, quantifying aspects of Roman agricultural production, marshalling a large quantity of evidence, chiefly archaeological and papyrological, to address important questions of the organisation and performance of this sector in the Roman world.

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Review:

it has much to offer anyone with a serious interest in how the Roman Empire managed to survive and to feed a growing population for several centuries. I commend the book to such readers. (Rupert Jackson, Classics for All)

The Roman Agricultural Economy contains wide-ranging and high-quality scholarship that, on the one hand, reflects the focus of current investigations and, on the other, provides fruitful material for future research. This balance renders it a welcome addition to scholarship on the Roman economy, and a worthy successor in the OXREP series. (Taco Terpstra, The Classical Journal)

About the Author:

Alan Bowman is Principal of Brasenose College and Emeritus Camden Professor of Ancient History at Oxford University. His research interests focus on papyrology, the Vindolanda Writing-Tablets, and the social and economic history of Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt and the Roman Empire. Andrew Wilson is Professor of the Archaeology of the Roman Empire and Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and Chairman of the Society for Libyan Studies. He has directed excavations in Italy, Tunisia, and Libya, and is the author of numerous articles on ancient water supply, ancient technology, economy, and trade.

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