Rome Beyond The Frontiers

[Northern Neil]

I'm not sure this is the right place for this subject - but as it discusses stuff outside the empire, maybe so. A while ago I bought a greatl little book by the '40's archaeologist Mortimer Wheeler, called 'Rome Beyond The frontiers.' In it, he discusses Roman trading installations and docks in Iran and India, similar things way North of the Danube and again similar sites along the East coast of Africa. Whilst not built perhaps at the behest of the state, many of them were built by traders from within the Empire who were, by definition, Romans and acting as agents for the Empire. Apart from that little book, with its tantalising descriptions of a few odd sites, is there anything available on this subject which is more modern and comprehensive?

[Lacertus]

Interesting really though....

As far as is known there is a long chain how merchandises were delivered to Rome from other countries like India or East coast of Africa. But Romans didn't go on travels themself. Oh, yes Rome's market was flooded by exotic goods but they outbided from merchants from the Middle East or Egypt. They outtbrided the goods from other merchants in theirs turn.

[DanM]

Actually that is not completely true. While the Roman merchants probably did not travel to China or India with great frequency, there is evidence that some did reside in cities of Arabia and eastern Africa. I believe the Etheopian church traces its foundation to a Roman of Syrian descent who was a personal aide to the king of Etheopia. Also I remember reading accounts of how the slave of a Roman merchant was installed as King in one of the Kingdoms of Southern Arabia as well.

[Onasander]

In India, St. Thomas established a branch of the Syrian Orthodox Church that thrives still to this day. He was one of the 70 lesser apostles that followed Jesus, so we're looking at prolonged Roman/Byzantine contact in India.

 

(What made Marco Polo so special?)

[Lacertus]

O'k I found it (about St. Thomas )

here

 

but there are interesting words about merchant who came to Ierusalim from India in search of carpenters. Certainly there were connections between Rome and other far countries but they weren't so closed.

IMHO of course

[Onasander]

Yemen was the crossroads of the ancient world, I'm sure if you were from a distant, non-hostile country without tradegoods, you could get pass the warlords with little difficulty.... but imagine how utterly pointless this would be, this was not the age of tourism.

 

http://www.indianchristianity.org/orthodox/thomas.html

 

Trade Relationships

 

 

Extensive trade relations existed between Malabar and the Mediterranean countries even before the Christian era. The numerous golden coins of the Roman Empire which have been found all over the south, as well as many recent discoveries, offer abundant proof that Roman trade centers existed along the southern coasts of India. While King Solomon was ruling over the Israelites (B.C. 970-930), his warships brought back to his country valuable merchandise supposed to be from Muziris (Cranganore), a defunct international port of Malabar. While discussing the dealings of the Phoenicians with Muziris, the Roman historian Pliny (A.D. 23-79) complained that every year they were sending large sum of money to India for silk, pearls, gems and spices. He also remarked that the Malabar ships were visiting the Persian Gulf, Aden, the Red Sea and Egypt. Pliny, Ptolemy (A.D. 100-160) and the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea give much detailed information about the trading centers of Malabar. Diplomatic relations between India and Roman Empire existed even before the Christian era. There were Jewish colonies in Malabar in the first century.

 

 

http://www.indianchristianity.org/orthodox/faith25.html

West Asian (Syrian) Settlements

From ancient times, there were trade relations between Southern India and the central part of West Asia. As a result of this, the Churches, which existed in those regions especially, the Persian Church got an opportunity to know about the Christian community in India. When the Christians were persecuted in the Persian kingdom, many of them migrated to the southern coast of India where they received a warm and hearty welcome.

The most important of these arrivals took place in the times of Sapor II (345) when under the leadership of knanya Thoma, a group of Persian Christians came to India. Tradition records that this community consisted of 400 people who belonged to 72 families and a group of priests headed by a bishop. The Christian community here very happily welcomed these people and the Hindu King of this region gave them inscribed copper-plated documents granting them special privileges. Today's Thekhan Kuttukar' in Kerala claim that they are their progenies.

 

By about 520 AD Kosmas visited South India. He has clearly stated in his book "Universal Christian Topography", about the Church he had seen in Malabar and also about a place called 'Kalyan' where there was a bishop who was ordained in Persia

 

But the 'Catholicos' of Selusia continued to have relation with the Indian church and the preaching of the Gospel was done in all the eastern countries including china.

 

I'm going to email a couple of metropolitians I know and find out more about Roman/Byzantine sites that they know of in their territories.

[Onasander]

The most important find was the rim and handle of a classic Italian wine amphora, which came from Naples and belonged to the late first century B.C. The amphora, which was used to transport wine and olive oil, had been identified from a number of Roman sites in India, including Arikamedu and Alagankulam in Tamil Nadu.

 

http://www.hindu.com/lf/2004/03/28/stories...32800080200.htm

[Viggen]

what is fascinating to me is that the romans never? explored the west coast of africa. If you look at the roman empire map the border (in todays Marocco) just stoppes a couple of hundred miles to the south.

 

Did they just not bother going further south? Did they dont care? Where they scared for the unknown? It is not like there was an ocean in between, just land (i doubt the sahara was right to the coast or was it?)

 

does anyone know what the furthest southern (roman) find in western africa was? (if any)

cheers

viggen

[Neos Dionysos]

what is fascinating to me is that the romans never? explored the west coast of africa. If you look at the roman empire map the border (in todays Marocco) just stoppes a couple of hundred miles to the south.

 

Did they just not bother going further south? Did they dont care? Where they scared for the unknown? It is not like there was an ocean in between, just land (i doubt the sahara was right to the coast or was it?)

 

does anyone know what the furthest southern (roman) find in western africa was? (if any)

cheers

viggen

 

I can't tell you of the southern most Roman settlement or town, but I would say the reason for the lack of further expansion was the Atlas Mountains, and the Romans felt that going any further south was not in thier best interests. Perhaps there wasn't anything good in trade coming from the lands over the mountains and so there was no indication that there was really anything worthwhile there.

[Andrew Dalby]

what is fascinating to me is that the romans never? explored the west coast of africa. If you look at the roman empire map the border (in todays Marocco) just stoppes a couple of hundred miles to the south.

 

Did they just not bother going further south? Did they dont care? Where they scared for the unknown? It is not like there was an ocean in between, just land (i doubt the sahara was right to the coast or was it?)

 

does anyone know what the furthest southern (roman) find in western africa was? (if any)

cheers

viggen

 

I can't tell you of the southern most Roman settlement or town, but I would say the reason for the lack of further expansion was the Atlas Mountains, and the Romans felt that going any further south was not in thier best interests. Perhaps there wasn't anything good in trade coming from the lands over the mountains and so there was no indication that there was really anything worthwhile there.

 

Another classic book is Cary and Warmington /The ancient explorers/. So far as I remember there was at least one Roman expedition across the Sahara (to the middle Niger I suppose), and definitely one up the Nile well into Sudan. The Ptolemies maintained a settlement far south on the Red Sea coast called Ptolemais Theron 'of the wild beasts' because, surprise, they imported wild beasts from there.

 

It depends what you mean by 'Romans' but if you mean 'people of the Empire' they certainly travelled the Indian Ocean for trade -- hence that fascinating book the 'Periplus of the Erythraean Sea' (find the translation by Lionel Casson, publ. Princeton) which is a merchant's manual of the Indian Ocean coasts and ports. In Greek (nice easy Greek). Very few went beyond the southern point of India, however. At least one party in the mid 2nd century AD arrived somewhere around Canton, travelled north to the Chinese capital, and claimed to be an embassy from the Roman emperor.

[Virgil61]

...

Another classic book is Cary and Warmington /The ancient explorers/. So far as I remember there was at least one Roman expedition across the Sahara (to the middle Niger I suppose), and definitely one up the Nile well into Sudan. The Ptolemies maintained a settlement far south on the Red Sea coast called Ptolemais Theron 'of the wild beasts' because, surprise, they imported wild beasts from there.

 

It depends what you mean by 'Romans' but if you mean 'people of the Empire' they certainly travelled the Indian Ocean for trade -- hence that fascinating book the 'Periplus of the Erythraean Sea' (find the translation by Lionel Casson, publ. Princeton) which is a merchant's manual of the Indian Ocean coasts and ports. In Greek (nice easy Greek). Very few went beyond the southern point of India, however. At least one party in the mid 2nd century AD arrived somewhere around Canton, travelled north to the Chinese capital, and claimed to be an embassy from the Roman emperor.

 

Didn't one of the Pliny's claim Polybius sailed the coast of Africa?

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

Yes Pliny the Elder did. He records that the Greek historian Polybius sailed down along the west coast of Africa in ships lent to him by his friend Scipio Aemilianus during or during the 3rd Punic War around 146 B.C. He may have seen the 'Theon Ochema', the Chariot of the Gods, a mountain. Yet it is still in doubt because modern day scientists haven't been able to travel the same path yet.

[Andrew Dalby]

Yes Pliny the Elder did. He records that the Greek historian Polybius sailed down along the west coast of Africa in ships lent to him by his friend Scipio Aemilianus during or during the 3rd Punic War around 146 B.C. He may have seen the 'Theon Ochema', the Chariot of the Gods, a mountain. Yet it is still in doubt because modern day scientists haven't been able to travel the same path yet.

 

There are records of three other long distance explorations of the African coast in ancient times.

 

1. The one by a Phoenician party under the Persians, recorded by Herodotos. The report is that they got all the way round Africa in three years, stopping twice for a sufficient period to plant and harvest grain.

 

2. The 'Navigation of Hanno' the Carthaginian, mentioned by Polybius, the report of which survives as a separate Greek text. Hanno, according to his own claim, got well down the west coast, possibly to the region of Sierra Leone. I wonder if this is what you are referring to, Fl. Val. C.? Because I never heard of Polybius himself going on such a wild voyage, he wasn't that kind of fellow. I could quite believe that Pliny copied the information from Polybius in a confusing way ...

 

3. The speculative trading voyage of Eudoxus, who set off from Cadiz with a cargo including dancing girls (for which Cadiz was famous) and apparently aimed to make a profit and avoid paying taxes by taking them direct to India. According to the /Periplus/, incidentally, there was a good market for European girls in India.

Eudoxus's voyage is mentioned by Strabo: it isn't clear, I think, whether they all reached India, and made Eudoxus's fortune, or not.

[Virgil61]

...

2. The 'Navigation of Hanno' the Carthaginian, mentioned by Polybius, the report of which survives as a separate Greek text. Hanno, according to his own claim, got well down the west coast, possibly to the region of Sierra Leone. I wonder if this is what you are referring to, Fl. Val. C.? Because I never heard of Polybius himself going on such a wild voyage, he wasn't that kind of fellow. I could quite believe that Pliny copied the information from Polybius in a confusing way ...

 

From Pliny the Elder's Natural History writing in Chapter 1 on "The Two Mauritanias":

 

While Scipio

[Germanicus]

At least one party in the mid 2nd century AD arrived somewhere around Canton, travelled north to the Chinese capital, and claimed to be an embassy from the Roman emperor.

 

So that's where it came from, I've heard this before in reference to an embassy from M Aurelius, but had trouble finding evidence. Where did you find this reference ?