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Recensione di Carlos Cáceres-Puerto, University of Edinburgh Numero di parole: 1942 parole Pubblicato on line il 2020-06-25 Histara les comptes rendus (ISSN 2100-0700). Link: http://histara.sorbonne.fr/cr.php?cr=3204 Link per ordinare il libro
Pliny the Younger once wrote, in a letter to Iulius Naso, that he might not have a full granary due to a season of particularly bad weather, but he could offer a desk full of writings instead (Letters, 4.6.2.). Resources, their extraction, storage and consumption, affect almost every aspect of life in a society. It is also present in a wide variety of evidence, if one is able to seek the right clues. From the trade routes established to Rome from Egypt, to correspondence among acquaintances, grain was a key element in Roman economy. Although it is often neglected to pursue the research of more fulfilling artefacts, like Samian ware, or amphorae trade, for instance.
Traditionally agricultural studies have not been taken into consideration in the main archaeological currents of research, excepting the paradigm of the villa. The author intends to include a wider variety of rural settlements in this accepted archetype. Although different aspects of rural production have been broadly analysed, as different pottery studies demonstrate, a wider research on storage facilities was a missing piece within the scheme of Roman archaeology. This volume comprises a compendium of the most significant examples of horrea in the Roman West, complementing it with an exhaustive analysis of various aspects that are fundamental for the understanding of an agricultural economy in the Roman Empire, with a special interest in the cereal-based economical model.
The book is majorly based on the author’s PhD thesis, named “Horrea, granaria et siri. Estructuras de almacenamiento de grano en el occidente del Imperio Romano”, defended in 2005 at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. This volume also compiles nearly a decade of intensive research and work. The project focuses on the archaeology of production, but also reviews the main literary sources that are a key component for a better understanding of the topic, both classic works and modern-day research.
Storage is the link between production and retail, it allows us to understand the basic concepts of a society’s economy with very minimal archaeological features that are not always easy to interpret. Besides, as for the economy, each region has its own autochthonous characteristics, shaping the buildings in various manners, according to particular needs. Within this volume, the author presents a wide variety of models of raised granaries, not merely adhering to agricultural facilities, but as an amalgamation of living spaces with dedicated production areas. They are arranged in different setups considering the ethos and features of each area. The author tries to eliminate the concept of ‘villa’ as a conception of uniqueness in examples of rural production centres. It also raises the idea of granaries associated to different buildings, not necessarily in rural contexts.
This volume places itself as the keystone in the research of the rural settlements of the Roman West, complementing a certain number of research projects developed during the past years, or currently ongoing. The Portus in the Roman Mediterranean Project, directed by S. Keay (University of Southampton, British School at Rome, British Academy, Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Roma), studied the harbour of Ostia with a special interest in imports and exports. It was not especially focused on grain or granaries, but wheat-based imports represented a vast percentage of the daily transactions of the Roman port. Dr. Tyler Franconi developed a similar project at his time at the University of Oxford, with the Oxford Roman Economy Project. He studied the characteristics of the Roman economy in the borders, using the limes of the Rhine as a case study. He focused on the relationship of landscape change and rural economies, amongst different variables, a quantitative analysis of amphorae in the Province of Germania. It can be compared to the project developed by Dr. Remesal Rodríguez, Dr. Blázquez Martínez and Dr. Revilla Calvo (CEIPAC, University of Barcelona) in Monte Testaccio (Rome). They studied the typology and morphology of the imports of olive oil from the Province of Baetica through sherds of amphorae from the site. If these research projects are not entirely linked to raised granaries, they demonstrate the increasing interest for quantitative studies and the analysis of large amounts of data in the study of various aspects of the rural economy of the Roman Empire. However, the most recent publication in the field of rural economies is The Socio-Economics of Roman Storage. Agriculture, Trade and Family, by Astrid van Oyen [Cambridge University Press 2020].
The book is structured in four parts, plus a fifth part as the catalogue of raised granaries analysed in the volume. Part One (“Introducción”) outlines the aims and objectives of the volume, as well as the methodology employed. The author provides different historiographical trends in the study of rural economies in the Roman Empire, and the status of the issue regarding this structure. The main purpose of this section is to define the structure of the book, which is divided into several parts. Apart from the geographical location, it also focuses on the architectural features, means of preservation of the grain which are thoroughly explained in later sections. The research was conducted on raised granaries distributed in the Roman West (Hispania, Gallia, Britannia and Germania), excluding Italy, analysed according to their archaeological remains and data provided by Roman land surveyors. There were obvious difficulties, such as the cataloguing of each building as they did not follow clear patterns or were difficult to distinguish amongst the archaeological ensemble.
Part Two (“Sistemas de almacenamiento de grano: tipología y estructuras asociadas”) dissects the facilities used to store grain according to their architecture. The major aim was to organize a system to catalogue the different horrea according to their particular features associated to the geographical location. Javier Salido proposes a combination of all the typologies associated to granaries over the past decades. Rickman (Roman granaries and storage buildings [Cambridge 1971]) established a division of military and civilian storage facilities, which was further differentiated by Morris (Agricultural buildings in Roman Britain [Oxford 1979]) depending on the construction material: wood or stone, but only referring to military facilities. The main typology preceding this volume was established by Sigaut (A method for identifying grain storage techniques and its application for European Agricultural history [1988]), based on the environmental characteristics under which the grain was preserved. However, there is a lack of update in typologies for horrea since the 1990s, due to the lack of large-scale research on the matter. The author intends to provide a distinct approach, as different research projects have tried to alter the typology system with a database methodology featuring horrea according to the length of the storage, either short-term, long-term, markets or granaries, rather than architectural variations. The different building techniques are merely circumstantial, as they depend on the geographical location and problems to overcome, whereas the objective of the structure remains unchangeable.
Part Two also discusses the possible facilities associated with storage units, as in a religious context, or forming part of a more complex pre-industrial system of food processing, like beer-making facilities, for instance.
Part Three (“Análisis arqueoarquitectónico de los graneros sobreelevados”), refers to the extensive research undertaken by the author on horrea, especially regarding their architecture, construction materials, and archaeobotanical remains. Regarding the latter, the importance of this field needs to be increased, the same way sample collection should be encouraged through archaeological excavation, although the cost of the analysis often complicates this process.
This section especially emphasizes the historical process for a better understanding of the construction phases, in addition to the stages of decay and further abandonment. In the majority of cases, horrea collapsed by natural causes after a time of abandonment and decay; although the action of fire was also accounted for in domestic accidents. Present in this volume, are different examples of abandonment or destruction by the action of fire in Britannia; Langston, St. Albans and Lullingstone being the most significative cases. There are further examples of this phenomenon in Germania, Gallia and Hispania. The difficulties in determining refurbishing works undertaken within the facilities in raised granaries is a common phenomenon shared with a vast number of archaeological remains. However, as a building designed with a specific purpose, it is plausible to conceive restorations or improvement works, which are not always patent in the archaeological trace. Javier Salido also analyses the reality, often unaccounted for, of dismantled horrea used for different purposes, most likely for the creation of domestic or religious spaces. Nevertheless, this is a phenomenon occurring after the 4th century AD, although there are some specific earlier examples, like the horreum of Eccles, which was restructured between AD 65-120.
The conclusion of this volume is included in Part Four (“Reflexión final: los graneros y su aportación al estudio de la economía romana”). This study of the raised granaries in rural areas of the Roman West, has taken into consideration the existence of various types of storage facilities, whereas the images we obtain from archaeological research and literary sources are, often, incomplete. By only using the latter, the picture we would see differs enormously from the real perspective, as the construction techniques and storage vessels within the horrea would have been neglected. Other means of preservation have been studied, using perishable materials, like sacks, or baskets, which are not usually found during the excavation process, and the evidence is minimal.
The distribution of the evidence analyses is not even, as the vast majority of horrea are present in Gallia and Germania (73%), whereas Britannia only accounts for 19%, and Hispania, 7% of the cases. The distribution of the cases in typologies, as was referred to in Part Two: villae, secondary gathering of horrea, and other types of settlements, intended to study the economical patterns of different scenarios. There are further subdivisions, separating secondary gathering if those depended on a bigger settlement, or a city, for instance, in order to study different variables. One of the main questions formulated in this volume is the destination of the storage grain, whether it was for domestic consumption, local retail or exportation. By the end of this book, Purcell’s statement: We should see ‘villae’ as so many great warehouses dotting the landscape (‘The Roman villa and the landscape of production’ [London 1995: 169]), remains a partial answer for a bigger problem.
The final part of this volume, Part Five (“Catálogo analítico”), comprises a very detailed corpus of the raised granaries analysed in this volume. They are the main documented structures for grain storage purposes, present in Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and The United Kingdom. The division has been established according to the limits of the Roman provinces of Hispania, Britannia, Gallia and Germania, with the aforementioned typologies: villae, secondary gathering, and other means of rural occupation.
In sum, this volume is an excellent piece of research on rural economies in the western part of the Roman Empire. The Roman studies were lacking thorough research regarding raised granaries in a bigger picture, rather than focusing on particular areas. The catalogue presented by Javier Salido is composed of a large database of archaeological evidence in the rural world, which is subject to change and improvement, as archaeological science and research advances, but it is a key reference book for those interested in economic studies from past societies.
N.B. : Carlos Cáceres-Puerto prépare actuellement une thèse de doctorat intitulée "Becoming Roman: the case of Colonia Augusta Emerita in comparative perspective" sous la direction de Manuel Fernández-Götz (University of Edinburgh).
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Editori: Lorenz E. Baumer, Université de Genève ; Jan Blanc, Université de Genève ; Christian Heck, Université Lille III ; François Queyrel, École pratique des Hautes Études, Paris |
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