Roman settlement of northern Bruttium: 200 B.C.--A.D. 300

Abstract

<p>Long-held views regarding the presumed depopulation and economic stagnation of northern Bruttium (modern Calabria) during the Roman period of occupation must now be abandoned. Instead, the examination of evidence has demonstrated that the Republican and imperial period settlement was significant. It took the form of cities, smaller nucleated settlements and dispersed rural sites, and its existence depended on the exploitation of land as well as on local and regional trade. The first two chapters deal with the preliminaries where an historical outline and a selection of relevant contemporary literary sources are presented. Chapters three and four offer an in-depth commentary and functional interpretation of the archaeological remains from the urban and rural contexts. This is the first such detailed account that this material has received in one place. Chapters five and six seek to put all this material into a wider historical context, as well as to address some issues raised by the bibliography, and, where possible, to carry this discussion further.</p>