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The Roman Empire: Economy, Society and Culture 2nd edition by Garnsey, Peter, Saller, Richard (2015) Paperback
During the first, stable period of the Principate (roughly from 27 BC to AD 235), when the empire reached its maximum extent, Roman society and culture were radically transformed. But how was the vast territory of the empire controlled? Did the demands of central government stimulate economic growth, or endanger survival? What forces of cohesion operated to balance the social and economic inequalities and high mortality rates? Why did Roman governments freeze the official religion while allowing the diffusion of alien, especially oriental, cults? Are we to see in their attitude to Christianity a policy of toleration--or simply confusion and a failure of nerve?
These are some of the many questions posed in this book, which offers the first overall account of the society, economy and culture of the Roman empire. Addressed to non-specialist readers no less than to scholars, it breaks with the traditional historian's preoccupation with narrative and politics. As an integrated study of the life and outlook of the ordinary inhabitants of the Roman world, it deepens our understanding of the underlying factors in this important formative period of world history.
These are some of the many questions posed in this book, which offers the first overall account of the society, economy and culture of the Roman empire. Addressed to non-specialist readers no less than to scholars, it breaks with the traditional historian's preoccupation with narrative and politics. As an integrated study of the life and outlook of the ordinary inhabitants of the Roman world, it deepens our understanding of the underlying factors in this important formative period of world history.
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First published January 1, 1987
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About the author
Peter Garnsey
24 books9 followersProfessor Peter Garnsey is Emeritus Professor of the History of Classical Antiquity and a Fellow of Jesus College. His research interests include: history of Political Theory and Intellectual history; social and economic history; food, famine and nutrition; and physical anthropology.
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March 26, 2019A difficulty in studying the Roman empire is that there are topics that we can discuss in detail and things that we can never know about for sure because the evidence is simply not there. The early essays in this book point this out and so inevitably the humble reader is going to judge all of them by that standard.
Perhaps it has nothing to do with the quality of evidence that does survive - literature, buildings, archaeology - perhaps it is simply something in our natures that draws us to want to make sweeping conclusions about things that really we know next to nothing at all - the economy, or social issues. All the same these issues have been and will be exciting people who do know better, but whose enthusiasm we can enjoy, although if wise, not take seriously.
The book is a collection of essays and I had the curious sensation at times that the essays had been written in response to a particular opinion but I just didn't know what, anyway, be that as it may, I am not one to resist the temptation of reading a book about ancient Rome.
A Mediterranean empire was the first essay, a little unexcitingly it made the point that from a Mediterranean perspective this was about exploitation of the narrow, fertile, coastal literals around the Mediterranean and eventually control asserted over the mountainous hinterland which retained a reputation for warlike, hard fighting, inhabitants . The Roman empire was about bringing down the wild men from the hills and settling them in nice cities with aqueducts and baths. If you were a Tacitus you could then scoff at the barbarians' acquiescence in their own enslavement. Otherwise your perspective was liable to be more positive.
Government without bureaucracy, I felt missed the point, my impression increasingly is that the government of the Roman empire was through a court, as in a monarch and their courtiers. The word bureaucracy - which as Weber argued represents the highest form of government organisation is just completely misleading in describing Rome where literally having access to the Emperor's ear was what counted (and by extension getting access to the persons who had access to the Imperial ear was how you got what you wanted). So not enough Norbert Elias here for me . In a wider sense Government through bureaucracy is largely, or in most places, a modern phenomenon. Which brings me back to the issue of feeling that these essays stood in response to something, in this case I don't know if that was a belief on the part of the authors that in popular conception Rome was a bureaucratic empire, or if someone has specifically made such a claim.
An underdeveloped economy well now this was the essay that occupied the statistical high ground pointing out that by combining the city of Edessa returns for the collatio lustralis with those for the land tax for Heracleopolis & Oxyrhynchos in Egypt a century later you really don't have a sufficient empirical base to determine the relative significance of agriculture in relation to trade in the Roman empire. Aside from this I did wonder about the use of the term 'underdeveloped', since that assumes the existence of a 'developed' economy. If we argue that 21st century Japan or even the 18th century Netherlands were developed economies then saying that the Roman empire was underdeveloped economically is a tautology, since everything that we might want to include in our kit of the typical model developed economy either was missing in the ancient world or left no evidence of its presence. I felt the need here for the authors to make use of or even invent a language for discussing an economy which was obviously overwhelmingly agricultural with a lot of production at a subsistence level, yet which nevertheless had the industrial, shipping, and legal capabilities to allow for the supply of the million odd population of Rome with grain, olive oil, and wine.
The land in which the authors find themselves admitting to the resilience of peasant farming , although most of the discussion has to be about the estates of the elites, because in passing that is what our sources discuss and that reminds me of something I had best leave in spoiler tags.
Supplying the Roman empire this was an interesting discussion of the supply of Rome and the Imperial army within the confines mentioned above - ie so far the information that would be useful are mostly missing. For instance the authors only had one example of villages established to feed garrisons on the Danube frontier. If you take their view, for example, that farms in Southern Britain provided the food to feed soldiers in Northern Britain, then considerable transport costs follow as an inescapable consequence. I think this was the essay that mentioned that Roman ships were constructed exterior first rather than from the skeleton outwards which strikes me as incredible.
The social hierarchy, an interesting point is raised here and repeated in the following essay about the extremely low reproduction rate of the Roman aristocracy. What it turns out is meant by this is that evidence of appointment to the position of consul shows that only 1 in every 4 consuls had a son who became consul, and this is an example of how the authors get raised on their own petard of statistical accuracy since the position of consul was hardly typical and we might well wonder if the men who became consuls were typical of the aristocracy as a whole, particularly as they got to be very close to the Imperial ear, a powerful, but also a risky place to be. Aside from this the authors mention that most of the labour on farms in Egypt, North Africa and Gaul was free - but that we know very little about the legal and particularly social links that bound them.
Family and household was an essay that put me in mind of The uses of Greek Mythology when the authors mentioned the exempla paterfamilias decapitating the son who had demonstrated insufficient courage on the battlefield, these are the kinds of myth we find in Livy along with the Roman wives who valued their chastity more than their lives unlike those in Ovid who were of the opposite persuasion & the happier for it . The authors argue that based on average life expectancy that it would have been unusual for a paterfamilias to have lived long enough to have exercised paternal authority over his adult grandsons however much he may have wanted to, and that as far as we can tell from funerary monuments that friends were far more important than relatives in making the necessary post-mortem arrangements suggesting that adult children or surviving parents tended to be rather unusual. Daughters were often very important to Patriarchs, possibly as a by-product of executing cowardly sons, their children might end up viewed as principal heirs and legally although the Romans were distinctly Patriarchal by ancient Italian standards when Roman law was re-energised in the medieval period marriage law was one area that was changed to legally subject the wife to the husband's authority, apparently this wasn't the case in Ancient Rome.
Social relations largely treats the role played by patronage in providing social support and structure, the Emperor as patron sitting at the centre of a web of patrons, and in the example cited of Trajan refusing permission for a town to establish a fire brigade, consciously acting to prevent the creation of bodies that could function as alternatives to patronage in binding people together.
Religion, the authors dismiss the idea that the Romans were tolerant, suggesting that they were largely indifferent to other religions apart from a couple that particularly annoyed them. Some discussion of Egyptian and then Syrian gods joining the pantheon. Although critical of other theories they didn't though have any convincing insight of their own as to the triumph of Christianity. I was amused by Strabo's disgust at the Celtic habit of killing a man and then nailing his head above their door for religious reasons - this coming from a culture that was completely at ease with crucifying people along the roadside or watching them kill each other in an arena for entertainment.
Culture they discuss the bad Roman poetry of north Africa, but not in any detail in case you are fearful. Rather than a single Roman culture spreading over the empire they envisage a series of hybrids developing in different regions. They raise the phenomena of the golden and silver ages of Latin literature with the curious absence of surviving Latin letters for a century or so, but have no explanation for it.
I felt this was an okay discussion of issues around the Roman empire, but it did come across as reading only part of an argument. I'm sympathetic to not making claims beyond what the evidence allows for, but then again they fall foul of this themselves, and when there is economic evidence for example in the archaeology of the huge scale of Roman pottery production in some places - this isn't something that they draw upon. Certainly though this collection of essays would sit nicely alongside reading a general introduction to the Roman empire, but in particular it's handling of Hellenism and the influence of the eastern Mediterranean upon Rome makes the copy of Rome in the East sitting on my shelf all the more attractive. This is a problem for me.
Perhaps it has nothing to do with the quality of evidence that does survive - literature, buildings, archaeology - perhaps it is simply something in our natures that draws us to want to make sweeping conclusions about things that really we know next to nothing at all - the economy, or social issues. All the same these issues have been and will be exciting people who do know better, but whose enthusiasm we can enjoy, although if wise, not take seriously.
The book is a collection of essays and I had the curious sensation at times that the essays had been written in response to a particular opinion but I just didn't know what, anyway, be that as it may, I am not one to resist the temptation of reading a book about ancient Rome.
A Mediterranean empire was the first essay, a little unexcitingly it made the point that from a Mediterranean perspective this was about exploitation of the narrow, fertile, coastal literals around the Mediterranean and eventually control asserted over the mountainous hinterland which retained a reputation for warlike, hard fighting, inhabitants . The Roman empire was about bringing down the wild men from the hills and settling them in nice cities with aqueducts and baths. If you were a Tacitus you could then scoff at the barbarians' acquiescence in their own enslavement. Otherwise your perspective was liable to be more positive.
Government without bureaucracy, I felt missed the point, my impression increasingly is that the government of the Roman empire was through a court, as in a monarch and their courtiers. The word bureaucracy - which as Weber argued represents the highest form of government organisation is just completely misleading in describing Rome where literally having access to the Emperor's ear was what counted (and by extension getting access to the persons who had access to the Imperial ear was how you got what you wanted). So not enough Norbert Elias here for me . In a wider sense Government through bureaucracy is largely, or in most places, a modern phenomenon. Which brings me back to the issue of feeling that these essays stood in response to something, in this case I don't know if that was a belief on the part of the authors that in popular conception Rome was a bureaucratic empire, or if someone has specifically made such a claim.
An underdeveloped economy well now this was the essay that occupied the statistical high ground pointing out that by combining the city of Edessa returns for the collatio lustralis with those for the land tax for Heracleopolis & Oxyrhynchos in Egypt a century later you really don't have a sufficient empirical base to determine the relative significance of agriculture in relation to trade in the Roman empire. Aside from this I did wonder about the use of the term 'underdeveloped', since that assumes the existence of a 'developed' economy. If we argue that 21st century Japan or even the 18th century Netherlands were developed economies then saying that the Roman empire was underdeveloped economically is a tautology, since everything that we might want to include in our kit of the typical model developed economy either was missing in the ancient world or left no evidence of its presence. I felt the need here for the authors to make use of or even invent a language for discussing an economy which was obviously overwhelmingly agricultural with a lot of production at a subsistence level, yet which nevertheless had the industrial, shipping, and legal capabilities to allow for the supply of the million odd population of Rome with grain, olive oil, and wine.
The land in which the authors find themselves admitting to the resilience of peasant farming , although most of the discussion has to be about the estates of the elites, because in passing that is what our sources discuss and that reminds me of something I had best leave in spoiler tags.
Supplying the Roman empire this was an interesting discussion of the supply of Rome and the Imperial army within the confines mentioned above - ie so far the information that would be useful are mostly missing. For instance the authors only had one example of villages established to feed garrisons on the Danube frontier. If you take their view, for example, that farms in Southern Britain provided the food to feed soldiers in Northern Britain, then considerable transport costs follow as an inescapable consequence. I think this was the essay that mentioned that Roman ships were constructed exterior first rather than from the skeleton outwards which strikes me as incredible.
The social hierarchy, an interesting point is raised here and repeated in the following essay about the extremely low reproduction rate of the Roman aristocracy. What it turns out is meant by this is that evidence of appointment to the position of consul shows that only 1 in every 4 consuls had a son who became consul, and this is an example of how the authors get raised on their own petard of statistical accuracy since the position of consul was hardly typical and we might well wonder if the men who became consuls were typical of the aristocracy as a whole, particularly as they got to be very close to the Imperial ear, a powerful, but also a risky place to be. Aside from this the authors mention that most of the labour on farms in Egypt, North Africa and Gaul was free - but that we know very little about the legal and particularly social links that bound them.
Family and household was an essay that put me in mind of The uses of Greek Mythology when the authors mentioned the exempla paterfamilias decapitating the son who had demonstrated insufficient courage on the battlefield, these are the kinds of myth we find in Livy along with the Roman wives who valued their chastity more than their lives unlike those in Ovid who were of the opposite persuasion & the happier for it . The authors argue that based on average life expectancy that it would have been unusual for a paterfamilias to have lived long enough to have exercised paternal authority over his adult grandsons however much he may have wanted to, and that as far as we can tell from funerary monuments that friends were far more important than relatives in making the necessary post-mortem arrangements suggesting that adult children or surviving parents tended to be rather unusual. Daughters were often very important to Patriarchs, possibly as a by-product of executing cowardly sons, their children might end up viewed as principal heirs and legally although the Romans were distinctly Patriarchal by ancient Italian standards when Roman law was re-energised in the medieval period marriage law was one area that was changed to legally subject the wife to the husband's authority, apparently this wasn't the case in Ancient Rome.
Social relations largely treats the role played by patronage in providing social support and structure, the Emperor as patron sitting at the centre of a web of patrons, and in the example cited of Trajan refusing permission for a town to establish a fire brigade, consciously acting to prevent the creation of bodies that could function as alternatives to patronage in binding people together.
Religion, the authors dismiss the idea that the Romans were tolerant, suggesting that they were largely indifferent to other religions apart from a couple that particularly annoyed them. Some discussion of Egyptian and then Syrian gods joining the pantheon. Although critical of other theories they didn't though have any convincing insight of their own as to the triumph of Christianity. I was amused by Strabo's disgust at the Celtic habit of killing a man and then nailing his head above their door for religious reasons - this coming from a culture that was completely at ease with crucifying people along the roadside or watching them kill each other in an arena for entertainment.
Culture they discuss the bad Roman poetry of north Africa, but not in any detail in case you are fearful. Rather than a single Roman culture spreading over the empire they envisage a series of hybrids developing in different regions. They raise the phenomena of the golden and silver ages of Latin literature with the curious absence of surviving Latin letters for a century or so, but have no explanation for it.
I felt this was an okay discussion of issues around the Roman empire, but it did come across as reading only part of an argument. I'm sympathetic to not making claims beyond what the evidence allows for, but then again they fall foul of this themselves, and when there is economic evidence for example in the archaeology of the huge scale of Roman pottery production in some places - this isn't something that they draw upon. Certainly though this collection of essays would sit nicely alongside reading a general introduction to the Roman empire, but in particular it's handling of Hellenism and the influence of the eastern Mediterranean upon Rome makes the copy of Rome in the East sitting on my shelf all the more attractive. This is a problem for me.
October 8, 2017
Η έκδοση που έχω είναι του 1996.
November 22, 2017
Possibly the most boring history text on the Roman Empire I have ever read.
March 23, 2021
This book contains a series of essays covers many different aspects of Roman society and economics spanning the entire period of Roman hegemony. The number of essays covering the later history of the Roman Empire is greater, due to the greater availability of evidence to analyze. Through the lens of primarily economic data, this work offers a deeper understanding of the actual workings of the Roman history. Within this, the impact of Christianity on Roman administration is noted. The long and steady decline of Rome is charted as the Roman leadership responds, with varying degree of effectiveness, to the challenges of the geographic immensity and increasing demographic diversity.
The great value of the work is its comprehensive examination of the entirety of Roman history. The work assumes a broad understanding of the historical events and evolution of Roman society. The work is not a history of the Roman Empire as mush as an examination of how the Roman empire functioned. Economics center the discussion, but less in a descriptive day-to-day functioning of the average Roman city and household, but more in the factors that shaped society and how the Roman administration functioned. Consideration of Roman coinage and attempting to determine their relative value is a key consideration of Roman economic policy. The attempt to secure a stable currency along with the need to provide sufficient currency to ensure economic activity in a system dependent on hard currency is a struggle witnessed throughout the history of the Empire. Similar is the discussion of Roman society. There is less concern to describe how society functioned, and more on how society was driven by conditions. Slavery and its influence on the Roman economy and society, not only for historical reasons, but also the author's particular neo-Marxist worldview. Similarly, the relationship of Rome, Italy and the provinces is considered. The extractive policy, and the increasing consumerism of the Italian peninsula contrasted sharply with the productivity of the provinces. While Roman and its environs was the center to the Empire's wealth, its indolence and demographic decline ensured the shift in power away from Italy to the fringes of the Empire that define the late Roman Empire.
The great value of the work is its comprehensive examination of the entirety of Roman history. The work assumes a broad understanding of the historical events and evolution of Roman society. The work is not a history of the Roman Empire as mush as an examination of how the Roman empire functioned. Economics center the discussion, but less in a descriptive day-to-day functioning of the average Roman city and household, but more in the factors that shaped society and how the Roman administration functioned. Consideration of Roman coinage and attempting to determine their relative value is a key consideration of Roman economic policy. The attempt to secure a stable currency along with the need to provide sufficient currency to ensure economic activity in a system dependent on hard currency is a struggle witnessed throughout the history of the Empire. Similar is the discussion of Roman society. There is less concern to describe how society functioned, and more on how society was driven by conditions. Slavery and its influence on the Roman economy and society, not only for historical reasons, but also the author's particular neo-Marxist worldview. Similarly, the relationship of Rome, Italy and the provinces is considered. The extractive policy, and the increasing consumerism of the Italian peninsula contrasted sharply with the productivity of the provinces. While Roman and its environs was the center to the Empire's wealth, its indolence and demographic decline ensured the shift in power away from Italy to the fringes of the Empire that define the late Roman Empire.
October 22, 2022
An advanced academic insight into ancient Rome, a good read. That being said, the academia does have a tendency to leave the reader behind. I found it to be at times disorientating; as there are very few explanations into the context, people, places, religions, gods, cults, so on, are casually mentioned with no introduction.
If you are studying the subject, which I am, this does not get in the way. I am not reading it to enjoy every paragraph and to teach me about Rome. In my case, I'm looking for sound history, references, notation and bibliography. Considering it is only 230 pages long, it certainly has these. Each chapter has an addendum of further reading. Sometimes the addenda will be written by an entirely different consulting author.
A fantastic textbook, though not one to read for pleasure. Irrespective, this shall be a vital resource over the coming months!
If you are studying the subject, which I am, this does not get in the way. I am not reading it to enjoy every paragraph and to teach me about Rome. In my case, I'm looking for sound history, references, notation and bibliography. Considering it is only 230 pages long, it certainly has these. Each chapter has an addendum of further reading. Sometimes the addenda will be written by an entirely different consulting author.
A fantastic textbook, though not one to read for pleasure. Irrespective, this shall be a vital resource over the coming months!
August 31, 2021
This is great
September 18, 2016
This is a somewhat dense academic work that captures the currents of modern scholarship on the Roman Empire during the Principate. For the most part, the authors avoid jargon and write persuasively on the changing views on the nature of the Roman economy, the role of slavery in agriculture, why the official state religion remained static, and why Romanization does not accurately describe the process of cultural change in the West or East. The addenda with updates and discussion of the most recent work were stimulating. This book is not designed for the casual reader interested in the Empire. For that, I would suggest Greg Woolf's Rome: An Empire's Story.
December 31, 2019
Clear and accessible but not simplistic overview of the Roman Empire. It does not tend to glorify the Roman achievement, but it does have a certain amount of respect for what the Romans did and the legacy they left behind. It approaches Roman history not through their military exploits or the overwhelming amount of palace intrigue, but rather through looking at how Roman society worked and how the Empire was created and maintained, and what kind of society they had, which is a much better and more balanced approach, in my opinion. If you don't want to read the primary sources and are wary of the more popular histories of the Roman Empire (however scholarly they may be), this book is for you: the authors take the primary sources (in addition to other evidence, such as archaeological findings) and turn them into a vivid portrait of Rome's empire, while examining a range of scholarly debates with an unfailingly critical eye. If you want to know about ancient Rome but don't yet, this book is an excellent starting point. Highly recommended.
May 28, 2016
Este libro ha sido mucho mejor que el que leí de la Guerra de Corinto. El autor se expresa con claridad y precisión. Las notas a pie de página no son largas y apenas abundan (no como en el otro que era horroroso, lo siento César Fornis). En definitiva, da un repaso a la economía, la sociedad y la religión de la época imperial de Roma (no la monarquía ni la república, el principado).
La única razón por la que he tardado todo un maldito mes en leermelo es porque tenía que leerlo por obligación. Sin embargo lo recomiendo completamente para aquellas personas que quieran conocer la época imperial de Roma en casi todos sus ámbitos. Sin embargo habría hecho más hincapié en la cultura que básicamente se centra solo en la religión. He echado en falta una explicación y enseñanza de las festividades más características, así como las divinidades romanas y sus atributos.
La única razón por la que he tardado todo un maldito mes en leermelo es porque tenía que leerlo por obligación. Sin embargo lo recomiendo completamente para aquellas personas que quieran conocer la época imperial de Roma en casi todos sus ámbitos. Sin embargo habría hecho más hincapié en la cultura que básicamente se centra solo en la religión. He echado en falta una explicación y enseñanza de las festividades más características, así como las divinidades romanas y sus atributos.
February 5, 2017
After I had finished reading this book, I realised that while the book itself is brilliant, it's not suitable for someone who is new to Roman history. I believe that before reading this book, knowledge of the brief outline of Roman history is essential.
It's not a book you can read casually. It delves into the Roman society, the disestablishment and re-establishment of monarchy, the nature of Roman economy, the general indifference to most religions apart from a selective few, and the limited cultural inflow of Rome. It's a great book for a comprehensive study of the Roman society, and is more than just a book of historical facts.
It's not a book you can read casually. It delves into the Roman society, the disestablishment and re-establishment of monarchy, the nature of Roman economy, the general indifference to most religions apart from a selective few, and the limited cultural inflow of Rome. It's a great book for a comprehensive study of the Roman society, and is more than just a book of historical facts.
Currently reading
March 14, 2013The style of the book is for pedants with nothing appealing to general readers. Nonetheless, you will see the society more intimately and Rome will be more than a history book. You will see what the patron and client relationships were really like, how wealthier women were much more liberated than anything you could have imagined, and a whole array of topics. I really appreciated reading it
March 13, 2007
I read this and never went to class, since I figured my professor wrote the book.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews