Human Landscapes in Classical Antiquity: Environment and Culture

359 Pages·1996·2.69 MB·English

by  John Salmon

Leicester-Nottingham Studies in Ancient Society
Volume 6
HUMAN LANDSCAPES IN
CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY

HUMAN LANDSCAPES IN
CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY
Environment and Culture
Edited by
GRAHAM SHIPLEY and JOHN SALMON
London and New York
First published 1996
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003.
Routledge is an International Thomson Publishing company

Selection and editorial matter © 1996
Graham Shipley and John Salmon
Individual chapters © 1996 the contributors
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by
any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known
or hereafter invented, including photocopying and
recording, or in any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data
Human landscapes in classical antiquity: environment and culture/
edited by John Salmon and Graham Shipley.
p. cm—(Leicester-Nottingham studies in ancient society: v. 6)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-415-10755-5
1. Greece—Civilization. 2. Rome—Civilization 3. Ecology—
Greece—History. 4. Ecology—Rome—History. 5. Human
ecology—Greece—History. 6. Human ecology—Rome—History.
7. Landscape—Greece—History. 8. Landscape—Rome—History.
I. Salmon, J.B. II. Shipley, Graham. III. Series.
DE61.E25H85 1996
304.2′0938—dc20 95–35216
CIP
ISBN 0-203-42690-8 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-73514-5 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-415-10755-5 (Print Edition)
Contents
List of figures vii
Notes on contributors ix
Preface xi
List of abbreviations xiii
1 Ancient history and landscape histories 1
GRAHAM SHIPLEY
2 Ecology and pseudo-ecology: the example of
ancient Greece 16
OLIVER RACKHAM
3 Feeling the earth move: cultivation techniques on
steep slopes in classical antiquity 44
LIN FOXHALL
4 The uses of the uncultivated landscape in modern
Greece: a pointer to the value of the wilderness
in antiquity? 68
HAMISH FORBES
5 The countryside in classical Greek drama, and
isolated farms in dramatic landscapes 98
JIM ROY
6 Ancient hunting: from Homer to Polybios 119
ROBIN LANE FOX
7 Where was the ‘wilderness’ in Roman times? 154
CATHERINE DELANO SMITH
v
vi Contents
8 Rome and the management of water: environment,
culture and power 180
NICHOLAS PURCELL
9 First fruit? The olive in the Roman world 213
DAVID J.MATTINGLY
10 Barren fields? Landscapes and settlements in late
Roman and post-Roman Italy 254
NEIL CHRISTIE
11 Nature and views of her landscapes in Pliny
the Elder 284
MARY BEAGON
12 Cosmic sympathies: nature as the expression of
divine purpose 310
GILLIAN CLARK
Index 330
Figures
2.1 Ebenus cretica on a cliff 18
2.2 An apparently barren hillside 19
2.3 New wood of cypress and pine springing up on
former pasture 20
2.4 Burnt pinewood 21
2.5 Wood of holm-oak and arbutus 23
2.6 Badlands of the N. Peloponnese 31
2.7 Effects of a deluge on a bulldozed hillside 32
2.8 Origanum dictamnus (ancient diktamnon) 37
2.9 Wood-pasture of prickly oak 40
7.1 The botanical model of vegetation degradation 167
7.2 Land-use zonation around a settlement 169
7.3 The ecological impact of a twelve-year
charcoal-burning cycle in a valley 171
7.4 Where was the ‘wilderness’? 173
9.1 Extensive orchard of widely spaced olive trees 215
9.2 Dense olive grove 216
9.3 Modern limits of olive cultivation in the
Mediterranean world 217
9.4 Annual Tunisian olive oil output 1950–77 220
9.5 The olive harvest 221
9.6 Plot of an extensive Roman olive orchard 227
9.7 The standard form of lever press in use in Roman
Africa 230
9.8 Baskets of pulped olives under pressure below the
beam of a lever press 231
9.9 Manipulating the windlass to raise the
counterweight block off the ground 232
9.10 The stone uprights (arbores) of a Roman olive
press 233
vii
viii Figures
9.11 Detailed survey of the high steppe near Kasserine,
Tunisia 236
9.12 Olive oil production and Dressel 20 amphora
manufacture in the Guadalquivir valley, Spain 242–3
10.1 Map of Italy showing sites mentioned in the text 257
10.2 Comparative chart of open, low-lying sites and
hilltop or defended sites in the Ager Faliscus 262
10.3 Iulium Carnicum-Zuglio: view from the forum 269
10.4 Complaints about rain, floods, drought/heat, and
storms/cold in contemporary documentary sources 273
10.5 Burial 59 at Mola di Monte Gelato 276
Contributors
Mary Beagon is Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of
Manchester.
Neil Christie is Lecturer in Medieval Archaeology at the University
of Leicester.
Gillian Clark is Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of
Liverpool.
Catherine Delano Smith was formerly Reader in Historical
Geography at the University of Nottingham, and is now a
Research Fellow of the Institute of Historical Research, University
of London.
Hamish Forbes is Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of
Nottingham.
Lin Foxhall is Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of
Leicester.
Robin Lane Fox is Fellow and Tutor in Ancient History at
New College, Oxford, and a University Lecturer in Ancient
History.
David J.Mattingly is Reader in Roman Archaeology at the
University of Leicester.
Nicholas Purcell is Fellow and Tutor in Ancient History at St John’s
College, Oxford, and a University Lecturer in Ancient History.
Oliver Rackham is a Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.
ix