EARTHQUAKES

With the incorporation of the Mediterranean areas into the Roman Empire, Rome was increasingly confronted with the problem of earthquakes. These are reported for Italy during the time of the republic as well, in 217 and 91 bc, with Pliny even telling of simultaneous coastal inundations (nat. 2.199–200). For the imperial era we have more detailed reports about numerous further earthquakes at various places. After Emperor Augustus had already provided assistance to cities in Asia Minor for reconstruction in 25 bc (Strab. 12.8.18; Suet. Tib. 8), in ad 17 the ‘twelve-city earthquake’ in Asia Minor gave cause for Emperor Tiberius to provide state relief as well: Sardes received 10 million sesterces and five years’ tax exemption, and similar provisions also applied to the other cities (Tac. ann. 2.47). An earthquake shook Campania in ad 62, which later made imperial aid from Vespasian necessary, and caused damage in Pompeii that is visible to this day (Sen. nat. 6.1.13ff.). Seventeen years later came the devastating eruption of Mount Vesuvius.

Earthquakes shook the eastern Mediterranean particularly frequently: in ad 115 Antioch was struck by an earthquake from which Emperor Trajan was just able to escape, and during which several miraculous rescues were attested (Dio 68.24–5). In the middle of the second century ad the earth shook in Lycia, Caria, Kos and Rhodes, leading Emperor Antoninus Pius to provide help for the reconstruction of the cities there (Paus. 8.43.4; Hist. Aug. Antonin. 9). In ad 358 an earthquake in Nicomedia was accompanied by whirlwinds and lightning, so that many houses collapsed, fire broke out and many deaths were lamented, since no help from outside came (Amm. Marc. 17.7.1–8). And in ad 365 an earthquake and tsunami struck the Mediterranean area, devastating Mothone in the Peloponnese and especially Alexandria (Amm. Marc. 26.10.15–19).

In view of the environmental problems of our own time, we are increasingly addressing the question of the historical roots and conditions of ecological crises. This leads us back far beyond the environmental history of the past fifty years, and addresses long-term developments of human history since the earliest times. It also includes a large number of scientific disciplines: prehistory, history, geography, geology, anthropology, medicine, biology, ethnology and others. Clearly, environmental historical work relying on a single discipline would be inadequate or too one-sided; it would need to be completed by results from other fields of study, and, ideally, meshed with them.

Ancient history as a discipline draws primarily on the literary sources, from Greece of the archaic era through to late antiquity. It thus addresses primarily ancient perceptions, descriptions and interpretations, which risks a one-dimensional perspective. For a more adequate reconstruction of ancient environmental conditions, this volume will attempt to at least begin to include research from other disciplines, even if no comprehensive interdisciplinary approach can as yet be realised.

The Romans saw themselves as a peasant people, and were proud of their rural origins. Agricultural literature, which flourished from the second century bc to the first century ad, and which propagated ties to the soil, was at the same time aimed at increasing production and profit. Agriculture was not only the basis of livelihood, but also of wealth, which was primarily manifested in landholding (Plin. epist. 3.19, 6.19).

Economic interests were also a factor in the expansion of the Roman Empire, which began to take over the entire Mediterranean region after the middle of the third century bc. Rome profited from the taxes of the provinces, and took over their landscapes, first by land surveying and parcelling, then also by intensified construction. North Africa supplied olives and cereals; Spain, wine and oil; Sicily and Egypt, cereals – the latter probably yielding two harvests a year. Under Augustus, 20 million modii – approximately 150,000 tons – of cereals were delivered to Rome each year (Aur. Vict. epit. Caes. 1.6). Despite these imports, however, scarcities were never impossible in the capital, so that Italic agriculture continued to be of great importance, despite a number of setbacks.

Animals – cattle, goats, pigs, deer, sheep, poultry, birds, fish – were a part of the food supply in antiquity, but also provided other raw materials such as wool, leather and fur. Horses, mules, oxen, elephants and camels also served as means of transport and conveyance, particularly in war. Animals were thus the companions, servants and guardians of people, and at the same time a means of entertainment and prestige in spectacles and at the hunt. Finally, they were used as sacrificial offerings to the gods, whose will was divined by observation of birds – the Roman auspices – or by the reading of entrails.

Animal husbandry was the foundation of rural subsistence. In early Greece, the stock of animals was initially a greater determinant of wealth than landholding. Cattle were of the greatest economic importance, both as draught animals and as suppliers of meat and leather. Sheep, which were also held in large numbers, provided milk and wool. Together with cereals, the meat of sheep, goats and pigs formed the foundation of the diet. Dogs served as protectors and companions, particularly on the hunt; the close relationship between them and their masters is often shown expressively on grave steles.

Agriculture formed the basis of the ancient economy, and initially served the purpose of self-sufficiency. Even the prosperous were, in their own view, not merchants or shopkeepers, but farmers and landowners. The ancient polis was, as Max Weber described it, a ‘warriors’ guild’, its citizen hence a soldier who equipped and provided for himself; the city did not embody a centre of production and commerce, but rather served ‘consumer interests’. For the citizens, agriculture represented the primary economic sector, so that no contradiction arose between town and countryside.

Ancient agriculture demonstrated great continuity: there was neither any revolutionary technological innovation in agriculture nor any mechanisation, only some improvements in the tools and the methods of cultivation. No large-scale enterprises came into being in the area of the skilled crafts, and mass production hardly emerged at all. In terms of forms of property and means of production, there were major differences in agriculture depending on location – ‘from the highly developed Egyptian channel and irrigation system to simple pasturing and hunting economies’.

Ancient Greece encompassed the southern part of the Balkan peninsula and the Peloponnese, as well as the numerous islands of the Aegean Sea and the more remote islands of Crete and Cyprus. Moreover, Greek cities were founded along the adjacent coast of Asia Minor, in modern Turkey, during the early part of the first millennium bc. Finally, during the colonisation period starting in the second half of the eighth century bc, Greek settlements sprang up all round the Mediterranean and to some extent even on the Black Sea. This far-flung urban construction constituted the most important transformation of the landscape in the ancient world, and the one with the most lasting consequences.

Both geographical and political factors were decisive in the emergence of this Greek world. The landscape of Greece itself, with its small-scale structures, has only a few broad coastal strips and fertile plains, but many promontories and offshore islands.

In the Near East and Egypt the most important gardens were located in the surroundings of the ruling dynasties, with the palace and the sacred site forming a unit. The so-called Hanging Gardens of Babylon of Semiramis, an Assyrian queen who lived around 800 bc, were later included among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. These gardens have not been identified, but probably formed a terrace structure over dome-shaped substructures, such as those built under Nebuchadnezzar II during the first half of the sixth century bc. Moreover, Near Eastern rulers kept artificial animal-parks surrounded by walls, the so-called paradeisoi. They served for the royal hunts, which made the king, together with the god, the lord over nature, and which also recalled the Garden of Eden. Hellenistic rulers and Roman aristocrats would later be happy to continue with this tradition.

In the city states (poleis) which developed in Greece during the early part of the first millennium bc, the municipal centres left space for religious ceremonies and public meetings, but the residential areas had very little green space. Sacred gardens or public sacred groves were mainly located outside the actual housing areas. According to traditional belief, sacred beings dwelt in such places – be they gods, nymphs or heroes. A sacred grove (alsos) was generally a place in open natural surroundings with a cluster of trees, a brook, a field or a grotto. It was marked by a ritual figure and mostly enclosed by a wall, so that the designated plot was called a temenos. However, unlike the Near Eastern royal gardens, it remained accessible to all. Its fundamental features were its communal religious aspect and its untamed natural character, located at the transition to civilisation. Sacred groves were thus protected against uncontrolled intervention (Thuc. 3.70.4; Callim. hymn. 6.24–60). In Athens the sacred olive trees dedicated to Athena were generally protected from being felled or dug up (Lys. 7).