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REVIEW BY ANDREW SELKIRK
The Roman province of Africa was famed as being the ‘breadbasket’ of the ancient city, for Africa produced the huge quantities of grain needed to feed the plebs of Rome. But why was this region so fecund? Was it due to Roman efficiency or was Africa already well on the way to ‘civilisation’?
In Between Sahara and Sea: Africa in the Roman Empire, David Mattingly argues that our view of Africa has been tainted by colonial perspectives. He therefore tries to take a non-colonial view of Africa in the Roman Empire, and to study these areas from the perspectives of the indigenous population rather than the invaders, which also tends to mean from the point of view of the archaeologist rather than the classicist.
North Africa can be considered under several regions. On the Mediterranean coast, the Phoenicians had long settled, but they mixed with the locals and were called Libyphoenicians. Throughout the Roman period, inscriptions in the Libyphoenician languages rival in number those in Latin.
The best known of the Libyan peoples are the Numidians, who occupied the very fertile area of modern Tunisia and Algeria – neighbours to Carthage. The Numidians appear in classical literature as allies and occasional enemies of Rome, and one of their towns, Dougga, has been well explored. A fine mausoleum that some have associated with their great king Massinissa, who ruled from the late 3rd to mid- 2nd century BC, has been restored.
A recent surprise discovery has been made in the mid-size town of Althiburos: deep excavations have revealed houses with stone footings, with evidence for grain cultivation, viticulture, and even ironworking going back to the 10th century BC, a date as early as any site in the Mediterranean. Similar evidence has also been found at Rirha, a town of the Mauri (‘Moors’) in modern Morocco near Volubilis. The origins of what David calls the North African Iron Age (NAIA) go back much further than expected.
The spread of settled occupation into the fringes of the Sahara Desert is another story worth examining. Here, the most spectacular discoveries are those made by David himself in exploring the Garamantes, who established a remarkable civilisation in Libya. Located 1,000km inland, this civilisation was based on exploiting underground water systems, and using the water extracted to produce cultivated farms. Excavations at Jarma, the biggest of their towns, have shown how the Garamantes borrowed techniques from the Egyptians to utilise the underground water sources (see CWA 9 and CWA 53).
Between the Garamantes and the fertile hinterland of the Libyphoenicians were the Gaetuli, who are often written off as being purely nomadic, but here, too, there were settlements around the oases, as well as hilltop fortifications, and a large number of cemeteries with round barrows where the bodies were covered with red ochre. The cemeteries have been investigated to some extent, though the settlements are little known.
David Mattingly has produced a masterpiece, opening up a new view of North Africa. His main concern here is producing an account of Africa purged from the colonial viewpoint – an approach that he has already demonstrated in his book on Roman Britain, An Imperial Possession. To a large degree, he succeeds.
This volume began life as a series of lectures given to the University of Michigan and the American Academy in Rome. It has now been published by the former in full colour and with numerous maps, themselves the product of superb scholarship. It must be said that the book itself is something of a monster: 700 pages long, on heavy paper, which makes it very hard going for this elderly reviewer. But for younger eyes and thicker muscles (it weighs 2kg) this is a magnificent publication that will enable us to see this major Roman province through new non-colonial eyes.
Between Sahara and Sea: Africa in the Roman Empire
David J Mattingly
University of Michigan Press, £38.95
ISBN 978-0472133451
