Argument

Roman frontiers have been studied with emphasis on multiple intercultural dimensions. Scholarship mainly focused on the political situation (e.g. the emerging of Roman domination and administration in the provinces), the economy (e.g. trade and traffic between Romans and Barbarians), military issues (e.g. the role of the army as a peacekeeper and as a bearer of cultures) and religious aspects (e.g. the mutual impact of religious habits), etc. Our project will broaden the perspective on Roman riverine frontiers. Rivers comprise two – prima facie – irreconcilable functions. While on the one hand they can constitute natural frontiers between the Roman Empire and the Barbaricum, on the other hand they facilitate the sharing of goods and, further, stimulate cultural interaction at the border of the Empire. So far scholarship has been mainly concerned with the defensive function of riverine frontiers. To deepen our understanding of riverine areas on the border of the Roman Empire, one has to take into account the aforementioned dichotomous character of rivers. The proposed research project, focusing on the provinces Dacia and Moesia inferior, will investigate how rivers enhance or hamper connectivity on frontiers and thus shape riverine areas as multifunctional spaces with different functions.

In order to get meaningful results the projects relies on a comparative approach. The two chosen provinces, Dacia and Moesia inferior, share a common core of features that still allows further research. Both are situated at the northern periphery of the Roman Empire, both in south-eastern Europe, and are fortified by the Limes. In geostrategic terms, they are defined by a large river (the Danube) with several tributaries. As border provinces, they are also considerably characterized by military forces and infrastructure. In addition to that, militarization also had a great impact on economy and society. The military presence led to the development of economic exchange with the local population and produced a certain level of security, necessary for regional trade. So far the evidence for trade and commerce is much better attested and explored in other frontier provinces of the Roman Empire (e. g. German provinces) than in Dacia and Moesia inferior. The same can be stated for the incorporation of the local population in Roman auxiliary units, the granting of citizenship to individuals and their integration into the Roman bureaucracy. Hitherto, mutual effects between the local population and the presence of Roman people, military and infrastructure is less documented for the two provinces. The aim of our project is to create a model of military, economic, cultural and religious interaction of local and Roman identities along the Lower Danube border. The project therefore will follow several steps to enhance our understanding of riverine settings in border regions of the Roman Empire. These riverine border regions are characterized by a significant presence of Roman military, extensive economic activity and religious interchange.

The state of research for the western provinces is rich in examples treating various aspects of inter-culturalism. The traditional way of research focuses on the positivist or quasi-positivist analysis of written sources (both literary and epigraphic) in the general context of Romanization or at least in one or more of its levels. In this respect, we note the works of MacMullen (2003, 215–231), Pilhofer (2006), Watson (2007), Alvar Ezquerra (2008). Modern research approaches do not only entail interdisciplinary investigations, but propose an analysis based on differentiation and nuances regarding each aspect of Romanization, and sometimes on new patterns of this phenomenon. In this sense, we mention only a few works that make use of both the archaeological and epigraphic approaches: Millett (1990); Woolf, (1998); Hingley (2003, 2005); Alföldy (2005, 25–56); Häussler (ed.), (2008); Mattingly (2010); Rubel (ed) (2013). The role of the army as a colonization, Romanization and acculturation vector has been addressed in numerous books and articles (M.A. Speidel, 2014a, 319–344; 2014b, 625–640). The economic exchanges between the barbarian and the Roman world along the frontier, and their impact on the cultural transformation of the provinces represented the topic of other works and debates. Another important aspect concerning the local societies’ modeling in the Roman frontier provinces is the transport of religion and daily customs. The role of rivers as interculturation model was partially treated by Campbell, but only a few pages were consecrated to Danube. We mention only a few of the relevant works written on this topic. For the German provinces, these problems have been treated in several seminal books and articles: H. J. Schalles (ed.) (2001); K. Matijevic (2012, 99–124). Dacia and Moesia inferior, as frontier-province scenes of intercultural action, have been less studied in this regard. Nevertheless, we can mention the recent work by D. Boteva (2012, 33–52). Still, the author only touches the issues sequentially and without putting them in a global picture.

The role of rivers as facilitators of cultural adaptation and innovation came as a project idea after long discussions on a partnership between the universities of Iaşi and Cluj-Napoca and The Institute of Archaeology of Bucharest, based on the large expertise of Prof. Lucreţiu Bîrliba (Iaşi), Prof. Ioan Piso (Cluj-Napoca) and Dr Florian Matei-Popescu (Bucharest) and their teams: they have carried out important studies on religious transport, on the dynamics of colonization and on the merchants’ activities in the Lower Danube provinces, as well as on the army’s control in these regions. Prof. Bîrliba and his team have reconstructed the dynamics of colonization in the civilian and military milieu of Moesia inferior, in order to observe the waves of migrants and their origin. Prof. Ioan Piso is an international well-known epigraphist and historian, with publications both in Roman religion and Roman army . Dr Florian Matei-Popescu had remarkable results in the research of the Roman army, especially in Dacia and Moesia Inferior.

Objectives

O1. The setting of the connection between the Roman military presence and provincial society, culture and economy. We will deal with questions about how and why the local population interacted with the Roman army and to which degree individuals have been integrated into military forces. Then, we will address how the military presence affected the economy of the border regions. At this moment, studies in this field have been conducted both for Dacia and for Moesia inferior, but comparable scholarship is still required for the Lower Danube region. The military presence has undoubtedly galvanized and diversified the mercantile exchanges and has created new products and specialized tradesmen. In German provinces, for example, a local trade elite emerged. The project will investigate if similar effects can be seen in the Lower Danube provinces. One of our main interests will be the reconstruction of trade routes and the kind of goods that served the needs of the local population;

O2. The analysis of the interaction between the administrative centre and the periphery. We will evaluate the degree to which political action in the provinces could be enforced by a centralized administration. Consequently, we will examine the geopolitical factors that influenced the location of troops and their strength;

O3. The analysis of the transfer of religion in Dacia and Moesia Inferior. Exchange not only happened in the field of economy, but also in the sphere of religion. Accordingly, we will analyze the transfer of religion in border regions in Dacia and Moesia inferior. The connective effects of rivers and the presence of military troops amplified not only the mobility of people, but also of gods and cult practices. How strong was the impact of Roman official cults in these provinces? Is there a correlation between trade and religious interchange? Taking again the example of the German provinces, we can assume that trade had a role in the creation of a Gallo/Germano-Roman religion with prominent goddesses like the Matronae and the seafarer and merchant goddess Nehalennia from Schelde. W. Spickermann has already studied this phenomenon for the German provinces. How can we apply his methods in the case of Dacia and Moesia inferior? Can we connect in the same way the military presence and merchants’ mobility for the Lower Danube space?

O4. The analysis of archaeological evidence from the riverine limes. The approach will be a synthesis of the material findings (both Roman and “barbarian”) at the limes. The innovative aspect, in the case of these two provinces, will consist in establishing how cultural interaction could be determined and which was, from this point of view, the result of this interculturation. Does it match with the result of the analysis of written source? Another innovative aspect is, beyond the corrections of former analyses, the setting up of a proper database of Roman findings on both sides of the Danube, using the modern investigation tools of the Arheoinvest platform (www.erris.gov.ro/arheoinvest);

O5. The analysis of the river-Roman colonization interaction. Not only the river influenced the frontier’s settlement, but also the river change its status after the Roman occupation: it becomes frontier between the Empire and Barbaricum (in the western part of Moesia Inferior) and inner frontier between provinces of the Roman Empire: Dacia-Pannonia, Dacia-Moesia Superior, Dacia-Moesia Inferior;

O6. The synthesis of results and their incorporation into the larger context of scholarship on the Roman provinces. How and to which extent could rivers hamper or augment the amount and the way riverine society interacted? In which ways can these interactions be categorized? How do these interactions in riverine areas differ from interactions in other regions?

O7. Considering these questions, the project aims to establish new categories and models for riverine societies in antiquity.

Methodology

The approach will include, as already stated, several methods that were applied only partially or, at least in the case of Moesia inferior, not at all:

(1) the prosopographic analysis (trying to establish not only the origin family and region, but also the historical circumstances of the individuals’ mobility). In this respect, Prof. Birliba and some project members from Iaşi have completed an investigation of this kind for the families of Troesmis, the crux of which was that the veterans who formed the municipal elite were recruited during Trajan’s Parthian War or during the Bar-Kochba revolt from the age of Hadrian; a similar type of analysis revealed that the soldiers recruited in Pontus et Bithynia during the Bar-Kochba revolt came to Moesia inferior with their families (see the works of Lucrețiu Mihailescu-Bîrliba). The same model was proposed for the elite in Dacia by Ioan Piso (Fasti provinciae Daciae I. Die senatorischen Amtsträger, 1993; Fasti provinciae Daciae II. Die ritterlichen Amtsträger, 2013). The project aims not only to deepen and to extend this kind of analysis, but to apply it on a much larger scale in both provinces, especially in the case of Dacia;

(2) the epigraphic investigation, in order to analyze the link between the transfer of religion, the merchants’ specialization and the main markets of these two provinces. The team’s expertise  as epigraphists and specialists in religious history and military history will help the Romanian scholars to substantiate another essential aspect of the project: setting the groundwork of the research on religious transport in the case of Moesia inferior and (partially) of Dacia, as well for developing the research direction regarding the merchants’ activity in this province;

(3) The investigation of litterary sources regarding the ancient authors’ opinion on the rivers’ role as frontier in the Roman empire;

(4) the investigation of archaeological finds at the riverine limes. It will be analyzed the material from towns and villages, also from the Barbaricum beyond the limes, but most important will be the result of comparing the type of materials, in order to establish the way of interculturation;

(5) Also, the global method used for our analysis is novel, because it combines several methods, already applied in various fields, in an interdisciplinary approach. In this way, our project has an exploratory character, because is trying to propose a model of riverine societies during the Early Roman Empire and of rivers as vectors of cultural and economic adaptation and innovation.