2. INDUSTRY AND TRADE
This diveristy of development in different parts of Italy, ranging from small farm to great ranch, finds a parallel in the industrial development. Farm-households in early days naturally tended to a ‘house-economy’ and self-sufficiency; as much food, clothing and equipment as possible would be home-produced. But as towns developed, their needs would be met by the growth of industry on a small scale: cobblers, smiths and others would use their special skills for the community and establish their small workroomshops employing one or two free or servile hands, but not seeking to provide for more than their own immediate neighbourhood. But as men became more wealthy and demanded more luxuries, they created a wider market that was satisfied by the increase of commerce and of specialized lines of industrial production. Division of labour increased and something like a factory system emerged for the production of certain goods on a large scale and for wide distribution.
Thus industry ranged from home-production through the artisan-shop to the specialized factory. The first, with such activities as spinning and weaving, needs no description. The work of the small shop-factory, which might represent more than half the output in the early empire, is illustrated from the remains at Pompeii. Residential blocks, built around a central courtyard, often had their street-frontages lined with small rooms which were self-contained, i.e. they did not connect with the main block but merely opened on the street. Here worked the small manufacturer: in the front he might have a counter to display his wares, and behind was his workshop with its bench, forge or furnace where he made his cutlery, shoes or leather-work. Such retail trade conducted on the spot would be supplemented by the peddling of hawkers and street-fairs.2
Specialization in larger factories, worked by slave labour and aiming at mass production for wider distribution or even export, increased, but really large-scale development was hampered by the cost of transport by land and by the ubiquity of slavery: not only did many wealthy men employ their own slaves on industrial work that otherwise might have fallen to the open market, but the supply of cheap labour did not encourage inventiveness in labour-saving devices that might have stimulated fresh developments. One of the most striking aspects of ‘big industry’ was the production of a red-glazed table ware, Arretine terra sigillata (the so-called Samian ware). This was manufactured at Arretium (Arezzo) and one or two other centres in Italy (especially Puteoli and perhaps in Rome) and gained such popularity that it was exported widely to nearly all parts of the Roman world except the southeast. The scale of production is illustrated by the fact that one mixing-basin at Arretium had a capacity of 10,000 gallons; the largest known single workshop employed 58 slaves. Since most of the decorated pieces are stamped with the maker’s name, much can be learned about the organization of the trade. The reason for the popularity of this particular ware is not of course that it was a patented trade-process (such methods were unknown) but perhaps because of its technical excellence; the process of red-glazing may have been a trade-secret and the necessary fine clay was localized. This particular trade not only provides the best example of a factory-system producing for an ‘international’ market, but its fate illustrates another tendency. Production at Arretium began about 30 B.C., but some fifty years later the ware was being manufactured in the provinces, especially in Gaul: in order to reduce cost of transport producers apparently found it profitable either to migrate or to establish branch-factories. So flourishing did the potteries in southern Gaul become that the Arretine factories declined and virtually ceased business in the Flavian period. This change illustrates how the extreme prosperity of Italy in the early years of the Empire was gradually overshadowed in some spheres by provincial competition.
Another specialized industry was the production of glassware, which received a great impetus from the invention in Sidon of the process of glass-blowing; previously glass-paste had been poured into a mould, and a new mould had been needed for each article. Skilled workers migrated from the East to Italy and suitable sand was found on the Volturnus river in Campania. Here factories were established and specialists produced fine translucent glassware, usually signed by the maker, for export. Metal industries developed on various lines. Much ironware continued to be made by the smith at the forge in his small shop, but there was also a concentration of the iron trade at Puteoli where pig-iron was shipped from Elba and manufactured in quantity. This did not involve the bringing together of specialized skills, since each man worked much as he could have done in his own shop (and it was not until the fourth century A.D. that the invention of valved bellows improved smelting to a point where cast iron could be made), but Puteoli could provide wood for the furnaces and was an excellent distributing centre. The production of copper and bronze utensils, however, led to a truer factory system, since more varied processes and artistic skills were brought together. This was centred at Capua, which had an old tradition of metalwork; large factories employed hundreds of men, and the products were exported as far north as Germany and Britain, while nearer home much of the fine metal furniture and objects d’art of Pompeii came from the Capuan factories. They also produced much of the splendid silver plate that has been found at Pompeii and neighbourhood (e.g. the treasure from Boscoreale). Jewellery and goldwork on the other hand continued to be made and sold in small shops.
Bricks, though used in North Italy, were not widely used in Rome before the time of Claudius apart from roof-tiles. Thereafter brickfaced concrete became more common and after its superiority to travertine as heat-resisting had been demonstrated during the fire in Nero’s reign, it was widely used in the rebuilding of Rome and thereafter. Brickyards helped to make the fortunes of Domitius Afer who came to Rome under Tiberius a poor man and died in 58; his descendants, using the opportunity created by the fire, almost gained control of the industry in the city, and few buildings did not contain bricks bearing the name of Afer. The business ultimately passed by inheritance to Marcus Aurelius and imperial possession, but the making of bricks had always been regarded more as part of agriculture than industry and was therefore regarded as a reasonably ‘respectable’ source of wealth.
The public and private water supply of Rome required the production of large quantities of standard lead pipes, but curiously this need did not result in the growth of factories. Two groups of imperial slaves were responsible for the aqueducts, one inherited by Augustus from Agrippa and the other created by Claudius; they had to make and lay the pipes. The water supply to private buildings and houses was provided by individuals who bought from the authorities the right to tap the public water-mains and who then laid down the pipes. The names of the makers that are stamped on these pipes indicate that they were made in small shops and not large factories. Thus here Roman conservatism preserved older methods at the expense of more efficient organization: the plumber and manufacturer were rolled into one.
During the Republic most clothing was produced at home and men wore homespun: the small shop system therefore was less needed in this industry. But the processing of such homespun woollen cloth (e.g. the elimination of the oil) was not easy and in the early Empire at latest the task was often transferred to skilled fullers. At Pompeii, for instance, there are remains of many fulleries which in addition to laundry and dyeing services helped to process cloth for individual use; a fullers’ hall on one side of the Forum suggests that they may also have bought the rough cloth and after treating it have displayed and sold it there. In some centres both in North and South Italy, however, there were some large slave-run factories for the production of finer clothing fabrics. Other materials were imported, as silk from the Far East and linen from the state factories of Egypt which Augustus inherited from the Ptolemies.
The Augustan peace naturally enabled the provinces also to improve their economic conditions. In general there is a distinction between the newer provinces of the West, which tended to supply the raw materials, and those of the East with their much older traditions of trade and industry. All produced wha
t they could for their own needs, but most also managed to provide a little more, both of natural products and manufactured articles, for export. The products of Egypt found a wide market; they included corn (sufficient it is said to feed the population of Rome for four months), papyrus (of which Egypt enjoyed a monopoly), glass, textiles, metalware, stones and jewels. Syria supplied wine, dried fruits, spices, drugs, glass and textiles (her dyeworks were famous); and she also benefited from her position astride some of the eastern caravan routes, and from the old Phoenician carrying trade. Asia Minor exported oil, wine, fruits, salted fish, wood, copper, precious stones and also textiles (including woollens from Miletus, goat-hair coats from Cilicia, silks from Cos, and carpets and rugs). Greece was rather poor but managed to send abroad some wine and oil and art bronzes. Sicily continued in its old role as an exporter of corn. The western provinces began to enter on a period of great prosperity. Gaul exported wine and oil from the south and corn from the north. It produced much crude metal but probably did not export much of it or of the objects manufactured from it. But it did export textiles, and, as has been seen, from about A.D. 20 began to develop its pottery industry, of which a centre was at La Graufesenque in the south; by the end of the century production was moving to the north (e.g. at Lezoux). Glass also was produced from the middle of the century at Lugdunum which had become a most prosperous trade centre. Spain, rich in minerals, was also very productive and exported gold, silver, copper, lead, tin, iron. It also sent overseas corn, oil and wine, and some specialities as pickled fish, garum-sauce and esparto-grass for rope-making. The discarded pottery-containers of the wine and oil were thrown on to a heap in Rome, which in the course of time became a great mound (the Monte Testaccio). The exports of Britain have already been mentioned (p. 252). Africa exported corn, oil, animals for the arena, citron wood and precious stones. The Danube lands despatched some agricultural produce and much iron (some of it manufactured) and gold. This trade passed through Aquileia in N. Italy, which became a great commercial city, balancing the harbour of Puteoli in the south.
3. TRADE BEYOND THE EMPIRE3
Such a cursory survey thus shows that, while the countryside would supply basic local needs, a considerable interchange of goods took place within each province and a brisk trade developed between various provinces; further, this interprovincial trade was not confined to luxuries. But trade also developed between the Empire and the peoples beyond the frontiers. It had in fact sometimes preceded the flag: thus for more than half a century before the Claudian conquest, there had been much interchange of goods between Britain and the Roman world. With ‘free’ Germany and the lands to the North trade steadily increased, though not all the objects found beyond the Rhine reached there through trade. Thus the famous silver dinner-service found at Hildersheim near Hanover may be loot taken from a Roman commander; much of the equipment of Varus’ legions must have passed into German hands (this may be the origin of a remarkable concentration of Augustan gold coins found between the Ems and Weser). Diplomatic gifts to native chiefs may explain the origin of other finds, such as that discovered at Hoby on the Danish island of Laaland: of approximately Augustan date, this hoard consisted of a fine table-service of silver and bronze; since one of the silver cups, which represents a scene from the story of Philoctetes, bears the name ‘Silius’ scratched on its base, it may once have been owned by C. Silius the legate of Upper Germany from A.D. 14 to 21. But the volume of regular trade with the North increased. Most of the goods in the first century A.D. came from Italy and passed by road to the Danube at Carnuntum. Thence in the early part of the century they moved on to Bohemia, where the Marcomanni were for a time both customers and also acted as middlemen for distribution further north, but after the death of Maroboduus their importance decreased. Under Nero a new trade-route was brought under Roman control, the so-called ‘amber route’ from Carnuntum to the eastern Baltic. This was due to the enterprise of a knight who pioneered the route and brought back a great quantity of amber. All this northern trade stimulated the prosperity of Aquileia, the nodal point through which it passed; and beside acting as middlemen, Aquileia itself manufactured amber for export. The operation of Roman warships in the North Sea (p. 250) will have helped to open up the sea routes to Jutland and Scandinavia, but most of the carrier trade probably remained in the hands of the Frisii of the Dutch coast, and few Roman goods reached Norway or Sweden before the third century.
A few trading stations on the coast of East Africa are known, from the mouth of the Red Sea to Zanzibar. From this region exports to the Roman world included ivory, rhinoceros-horn, tortoiseshell, palm-oil, cinnamon, frankincense and slaves. At the southern exit from the Red Sea Augustus seems to have broken the monopoly of the Arabs who had acted as middle-men for goods coming from the East (see p. 211). Till this time any trade with India involved a long coast-wise journey from Aden, along the shore of southern Arabia, and thence to the mouth of the Indus and the west coast of India. But a great discovery was made, probably under Augustus (less probably earlier), by a sea-captain named Hippalus who found that it was possible to establish a direct sea-route from Aden to India by making use of the regularity of the monsoons. The summer monsoon would take ships safely to the mouth of the Indus and the anti-trade winds of winter would take them back; by Nero’s time an even more southerly direct route was taken to Muziris in South India.4 This discovery revolutionized trade with India. The actual shipping was probably in the hands of Alexandrine and other Greeks, but Rome was the chief customer. Strabo records that 120 merchantmen would sail from the Red Sea harbour of Myos Hormos to India in a year, and the extent of the trade has recently been strikingly demonstrated by excavation at Podouke (modern Pondicherry) on the east coast of India, where quantities of Arretine ware manufactured in Italy between 30 B.C. and A.D. 45 have been found. To reach the east coast involved sailing round the treacherous southern tip at Cape Comorin, which was not attempted until near the end of the first century (this explains Rome’s comparative ignorance of Ceylon, Taprobane, at this earlier date). In consequence goods were landed on the west coast and were carried over the tip by land via Coimbatore: this trade route is marked by the survival of many hoards of first-century Roman coins. The main exports from India were pepper, spices, jewels and muslin. These luxury goods were paid for by Rome very largely in gold and silver coins (which the Indians would treat as bullion; they therefore preferred coins minted before A.D. 64 when Nero depreciated the metal content). This Indian trade is said to have resulted in an annual adverse balance for Rome of 60 million sesterces in Nero’s day, and the effect of draining away so much precious metal to the East became serious. That this commerce was desired by India as well as by Rome is shown by the Indian embassies that were sent to the West: two at least, possibly four, visited Augustus.
Northern India produced less of what Rome required, but it played an important role as middleman in forwarding to the West other luxury goods from farther Asia as silk from China, turquoise and lapis lazuli. The normal trade route, the so-called Silk Route, ran from China to Bactra in Afghanistan and thence across Iran to Syria.5 But in Iran lay a political barrier, the Parthians. Hence some goods were diverted when they reached Bactra and were sent on south-eastwards through Begram and Taxila (where most interesting finds have been made) to Barygaza (modern Broach) south of the Indus; here they could be picked up by the regular sea routes and brought to the West.
4. GENERAL ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
This healthy state of economic life was largely a spontaneous growth and the result of private enterprise. The State interfered as little as possible, and in Egypt, where Augustus inherited a highly centralized economic system, State ownership and monopolies were decreased. Certain internal customs barriers existed within the empire, but these indirect taxes (portoria) were imposed merely for purposes of revenue and not for ‘protection’ or to keep provincial goods out of Italian markets. The frontiers, at which a fixed percentage of the value of the goods that cross
ed was exacted, enclosed larger units than the individual provinces: thus the three Gauls formed a customs district that paid 2½ per cent, ‘Illyricum’ (i.e. all the Balkan provinces) paid 5 per cent, Spain paid 2 per cent. At certain points within these districts, at bridges or ferries, transit tolls were collected. There is little evidence to suggest that these taxes, the collection of which was let out to publicani, proved a serious burden to trade.6 Goods that came into the Empire from outside also paid duty: thus, for example, luxuries from the East were subject to a 25 per cent tax at Leuke Kome. Some individual cities also might impose local octrois and transit tolls to help their municipal revenues: thus there is later evidence for elaborate tariffs at the caravan city of Palmyra under Hadrian.
Though the emperors might avoid direct interference, they kept a watchful eye on some activities and gave indirect encouragement. In particular they were concerned about the corn-supply and the feeding of Rome, the supply of metals for the coinage, and all the needs of the army. Thus Claudius took measures to improve the harbour and warehouse facilities at Ostia and to encourage the corn merchants (see p. 248). The operation of mines during the Republic had been let to companies of publicans, but under the Empire the mines of precious metals and quarries came under imperial ownership or control: there must be no shortage of gold and silver for the currency, iron and lead for the army, stone and marble for roads and buildings. Another indirect stimulus to trade that came from the emperor was the provision of a sound currency which won the confidence of traders throughout the provinces. Yet another was the existence and upkeep of the great road system of the Empire: designed first mainly for military purposes, it also served the ends of peace. The arterial roads, the rivers, and the sea-routes, all carried a rising quantity of merchandise which was reasonably free from risk of attack by robber or pirate. In a world at peace there was an unceasing movement of goods from one end of the Empire to the other along a network of communications. Men could move freely, without passport and unhampered in the main by racial prejudice or colour bar. Though sea voyages were avoided in the winter, during most of the year travellers could normally rely on finding a passage from the great ports. But journeys, though reasonably safe, were slow by modern standards. On land the imperial post service covered some fifty miles a day, but ordinary commercial traffic would be slower. Ships, up to 1000 tons, might carry some 600 persons, but ordinary freighters were probably only about 200 tons or less. The journey from Ostia to Gades took over a week, to Alexandria nearly three weeks, and to Berytus about a month. If transport by land was dear, it was cheaper by sea, but there were still many risks and difficulties to be encountered at sea, as the story of St. Paul’s journey to Rome, recounted so vividly in Acts 28, illustrates. St. Paul’s adventures, as he travelled freely on his missionary journeys to the cities of Asia Minor, Macedonia and Greece, provide a classic example of the liberty of movement allowed to all citizens and non-citizens alike. The traders were men of all races and status: many, of whom a great number were of freedman origin, went forth from Italy to East and West, and even more orientals, Syrians and Alexandrians, found their way to the West. The class of negotiatores included importers and distributors of foreign goods (such as the Italian merchants in Gaul, mentioned by Diodorus, who in exchange for slaves distributed wine by river or land transport), together with travelling merchants, both salesmen and buyers, who went from town to town with their goods. In the same way independent shipowners ‘tramped’ their cargoes from port to port; partnerships might be formed, but these seem to have been generally limited and not to have worked with more than four or five ships. Foreign merchants might rent an office (statio), perhaps with warehouse facilities and dock space, in another country, as those of the Nabataean Arabs and of the Tyrians at Puteoli which are attested for a later period. At Ostia a large portico (Piazzale delle Corporazioni) behind the theatre was set aside as a chamber of commerce for foreign shippers. This represents an attempt by the government not to control trade, but merely to provide facilities for encouraging the corn-supply that was so vital to Rome’s needs; although the famous mosaics that adorn this building belong to a much later period, offices in the portico probably existed in the early Principate. Thus organization and distribution generally continued on a small scale, though a kind of co-operative society may have developed for the distribution of the mass output of terra sigillata by the Gallic factories at La Graufesenque, and the shippers may have acted as salesmen as well as mere distributors.
From the Gracchi to Nero: A History of Rome from 133 B.C. to A.D. 68 Page 44