Ethnicity in the Roman Northwest 505prosper. To what extent this sea change was caused by an expulsion or impoverishment
of powerful anti-Roman Treveran families in the wake of the Batavian Revolt is a mat-
ter of some debate (see Wightman 1970: 50–1; Drinkwater 1978; 1983: 192–6; Krier
1981; Heinen 1985: 168–70; also Tacitus,Historiae5.19.4). What is clear is that, from
the Flavian period onward, Treveran cities such as Trier (Augusta Treverorum) devel-
oped large-scale public buildings (Heinen 1985; Kuhnen 2001), and the Treveri became
involved in long-distance trade, especially of wine and cloth. Together with the many
local villa estates (e.g., Fliessem-Otrang, Welschbillig, Nennig), trade formed the basis
for a kind of “middle class” who expressed their wealth and confidence in the elabo-
rate gravestones for which the region is now famous (Wightman 1970: 51; Drinkwater
1978: 837; Leveau 2007: 654). These monuments show, in no uncertain terms, the
worldly outlook in everyday life scenes of household members in the office or work-
shop, receiving gifts from tenant farmers, or, in their free time, banqueting, hunting, and
having their hair done (for a discussion of the various scenes with examples, see Rothe
2009: 24–7). Interestingly, it is in precisely this demographic group that the female Gallic
Ensemble developed.
A study of Gallic epigraphy by Lothar Wierschowski has shown that, in the time period
from the late first to the mid-third century, the Gauls, and the Treverans in particular,
displayed a high degree of short-term mobility in the form of business trips in other cities
(see Krier 1981). Belgic Gauls are generally overrepresented among the mobile individ-
uals in other parts of Gaul (Wierschowski 1995: 35, Table 1 and 36, Table 2), and just
as manynegotiatores,nautae,andartificesare named as coming from Belgica as from
all other Gallic provinces together (206–7). The Treveri seem to have had a particular
interest in the trading of wine and textiles (see, e.g., CIL 5, 5229, CIL 13, 2008; CIL
13, 2033; CIL 13, 542; AE 1982, 709). The vast majority of migrant-related inscriptions
in the Three Gauls mention trade organizations such as thevinariiandutricularii,and
the occupationsnegotiatores,nautae,andartifices(Wierschowski 1995: 209, 233–57,
277). Most importantly, this mobility was confined almost entirely to the northwest-
ern provinces, and theTres Galliaein particular (Wierschowski 1995: 35, Table 1 and
36, Table 2). For the inhabitants of the Three Gauls, by far the greater part of their
contact with other cultural groups was not with Italians but in fact with other Gauls.
As a result, Wierschowski has called the German and Gallic provinces a “regionale[r]
Verbund” (1995: 233). From the second century onward, Britain seems also to have
played an important role (e.g., a Treveran at Bath [RIB 140] and votive inscriptions at
the channel crossing at Colijnsplaat: AE 1973, 375; 1975, 653; 1985, 682). Against this
background, it is no longer surprising that, in the late first century, symbols of small-scale,
local identities such as Menimane’s Ensemble became obsolete. The geographical hori-
zon had widened; one felt increasingly part of a wider Gallic culture. The change to
a new female “Gallic Ensemble” may only be one of many manifestations of this shift
in identity, but it is one that is especially visible to us today. It should not be surpris-
ing that, while it was mainly men who traveled on business, it was the women’s dress
that changed, because unlike the latter, that of the men had never acted as a symbol
of local identity. It is clear that the change in cultural orientation was linked to inte-
gration into the Roman Empire and the economic developments that it engendered
through the establishment of cities, overriding economic structures, roads, transport
security, and so on. However, just as Italians did not dominate the economy of the Three