Western Civilization - History Of European Society

(Marvins-Underground-K-12) #1

94 Chapter 5


had long been famous. Linens, drugs, perfumes, pre-
cious stones, and such delicacies as dried fruit and pick-
led fish came from various sources within the empire.
Other luxuries came from far away. The Silk Road
across central Asia connected Syria with China. More
than a hundred ships sailed annually from the Red Sea
ports to India for cargoes of spice, and Africa continued
as it had for centuries to provide the Mediterranean
world with gold, ivory, palm oil, and those hardy
perennials, frankincense and rhinoceros horn.
Almost without exception, these were low-volume,
high-profit trades that entailed a substantial element of
risk. They made a few people, mostly equestrians or
freedmen who eventually merged with the equestrian
class, enormously rich, but the prosperity they gener-
ated was not widely shared. Aristocrats, too, sometimes
invested in such ventures or speculated on the com-


modities market. They usually did so through agents
because the old prejudice against trade died hard.
Overall, the economy of the empire remained agrarian,
and mercantile activities were restricted to a few.
In the first century A.D. a million people may have
lived in the city of Rome, a nearly incredible total given
the limits of ancient technology and systems of distrib-
ution. As in any community, their lives were con-
strained by an elaborate social structure. While most
were desperately poor, few would have chosen to live
anywhere else. Rome was, to the Romans, the center of
the world.
About one-third of the city’s land area was occu-
pied by the palaces of the rich, the most spectacular of
which were clustered on the Palatine Hill. Some of
these structures, with their courtyards, galleries, baths,
and gardens, covered several acres and employed hun-

CAE
SARE
A-ROME

(^20) DAYS
ALE
XAN
DRIA-P
UTEOLI (^15) – 2
(^0) DA
YS
GADES-OSTI
A 9 DAYS B
YZ
AN
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(^10) -
(^12)
DA
YS
OST
IA



  • C


AT

HA

GE

3 –

5 D

AY

S

Po R.

Black Sea

Red
Sea

Atlantic
Ocean

North
Sea

Baltic
Sea

Me
dit
err
ane
an
Sea

Danu
be R.

Sava
R.

RhineR
.

iN
le
R.

Rh

on

e

R.

LoireR.

Dniep
erR

Tagus R.

TigrisR
.

Euphr
ates
R.

Pyrenees
Mts.

Alp

sM

ts.

Caesarea

Palmyra Dura-Europus
Tyrus Seleucia

Rome

Arretium
OstiaPuteoli

Gades

Corduba
Carthago Nova

Tarraco

Narbo

Lugdunum Carnuntum Apulum

Brundislum

Aquileia

Salonae

Londinium

Colonia Agrippina
Augusta Treverorum

Arelate
Massilia

Alexandria

Sardinia

Corsica

Sicily

Crete Cyprus

Ancona

Balearics

Carthage

Cyrente

Corinth

Athens

Syracuse

Rhegium

Pergamum
Ephesus

Nicomedia

Sinope
Byzantium Trapesus

Antiochia

Tarsus

Jerusalem
Gaza

Coptos

0 200 400 Miles

0 200 400 600 Kilometers

Gold
Lead
Grain
Olive Oil
Wine
Slaves

Pottery
Timber
Textiles
Trade Route
Roman Empire
A.D. 200

MAP 5.2
Trade Routes and Products in the Roman Empire, c. 200
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