Rome/Ostia avoiding pirates

[Onasander]

These early maritime raiders were at the same time the first true pirates, attacking anyone of any nationality, owing loyalty to no one, but also quite unique. Because of their roots in land raiding, they were known not only to attack ships and coastal towns but also to venture further inland. This caused even the earliest large cities to relocate anywhere from 2 to 10 miles away from shore.[8] Pirates tended not to go any farther inland due to difficulties escaping. Speed was one of the most important elements of piracy. This relocation gave a relatively effective cushion of safety to major cities such as Athens, Tiryns, Mycenae and others. It protected them from the sea’s dangers, although it also cut them off from it benefits. The sea was still the primary, and practically only, area of major commerce. This caused twin cities to be built, one inland city paired with a coastal port, such as Rome and Ostia, Athens and Piraeus, etc. To protect their connection they built “‘long walls’ like those that enclosed the thoroughfare between Athens and Piraeus.”[8] The maritime historian Henry Ormerod said, “If we remember that piracy was, for centuries, a normal feature of Mediterranean life, it will be realized how great has been the influence which it exercised on the life of the ancient world.”[9]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Mediterranean_piracy

 

I'm having difficulty with this wikipedia page focusing on bronze age piracy.

 

So the Romans then, after the collapse of the bronze age, in the face of the sea peoples and pirates.... intentionally built inland, with a port city, in the same pattern as Athens?

 

I know Romans had issues with pirates at a later stage, largely of their own doing in smashing Carthage and it's international networks.

 

I thought Rome started off (disregarding the Trojan story) as a inland power, between Etruscan and Greek Powers. The only sea people it ever had to deal with would of been migratory celts during the days before Rome was founded.

 

I just dislike this page in general. It's great to have opinions, express them on a forum.... but I can't find much in the way of facts here. Rome didn't develop in parallel like Athens. Rome grew in lurches, and was periphial to both the ocean world, and hellanism until arriving relatively late. Rome was land oriented in it's developments, and thus army oriented, not Navy in a embryonic form in the beginning centuries.

[Texian35]

Very interested in the development of the Port and its ultimate decline.  I know the port was used as the shipping port for the Empire.  Its major goods for many years were grain and  ??. 

I am interested, as well, in the attention pirates paid the area, especially in the Centuries after 300AD. 

Finally, where did the Port's permanent population go, and what did they do, after 400AD?  Can it be said they went towards Rome, or travelled further north?    

 

Texian35

[Onasander]

You know.... you bring up a good point.

 

I never read the trade agreement between Carthage and the Romans, I don't actually know what Rome exported of value in the early days.

 

Slaves. Yes, later on, but how many slaves in the beginning? I'm trying to imagine what a merchant in Carthage would want to trade to Romans with? Its a bootleg Greek, bootleg Etruscan town, with the real deal just north and south of it. Pottery? Lemons? A ritual urn or badly sculpted sculpture and fancy wicker worked baskets? A little wine?

 

If I recall, the Romans used untreated copper nuggets as currency. Not evidence of a great trader culture. I guess the port existed less in the beginning for international import and export than.... the need for a central port of capital trying to keep in contact with its farther estates, and to shelter its fishing vessels (nearly said fleet, but didn't want to involve that collectively organized implication).

 

At some point it made the switch.

 

I can't recall the name of the Roman Law, it "survived" into the middle ages, banning local lords who held a coastline from claiming the goods of shipwrecked ships as well as any survivors as slaves. I recall the catholic church getting upset the practice was still going on at times. Gives a insight as to how officials would of originally seen passing ships, personal and their goods as fair game, and how this mindset would have to be modified over time so as to encourage commerence, and regularly receive cargo. I can't imagine a international port of call sitting in the middle of such a backwards society.

[caldrail]

Ostia was attacked once in force by Cilician pirates, and as a result, the Romans sent a force that defeated them. The attack caused considerable panic at the time and many Roman ships had been burned. The port was left to decline after the 5th century and within four hundred years had been pretty well abandoned completely aside from materials appropriation.

 

As for the Cilician pirates being the "first true pirates", I hardly think so. The earliest mentions I've found of piracy in the Mediterranean go back to the 14th century BC.