The Western Roman Atlantic Façade: A Study of the Economy and Trade in the Mar Exterior from the Republic to the Principate

This book has attempted to collect evidence of the lively trade in the Atlantic from the 1st century BC up to 1st century AD, when the Romans decided to conquer the territories of the Atlantic littoral. The papers here cover the commercial phenomena detected from the Strait of Gibraltar up to the Galician coasts of the NW Iberian Peninsula, which was probably determined by the military campaigns in the NW during the Augustan campaigns against Cantabrii and Astures, and later the NW exploitation of the rich mines there. However, our feeling is that the phenomena was not limited to the Iberian Peninsula but affected the whole Mar Exterior (Atlantic), from the coast of Armorica, Brittany, Normandy, Belgium and Germania Inferior. Despite obvious differences between all these territories, there were some common traits in material culture, information, traders and logistics which cannot be explained in a fragmentary way. The present volume attempts to fill a gap from the western side of the Atlantic, but we are aware that some questions raised here can be only answered from other territories of the Mar Exterior.