Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

population; settlement; demographic decline? 321
of Roman Britain supported the same order of population as it did in the
later Middle Ages.
In other provinces, estimates of population are rarer; but, wherever
intensive field-survey has been carried out, extensive and dense rural settlement
patterns, similar to those discovered in Britain, have always been
found in at least part of the Roman period. However, recent work has
revealed striking differences between the various regions of the empire
when it comes to the precise period of the greatest spread of Roman settlement.
In the northern and western provinces, the clearest evidence for large
rural populations comes from before the beginning of our period in 425:
in Italy apparently under the early empire; in Gaul and Spain perhaps in the
late first and second century; in Britain and Africa possibly in the fourth.
By contrast, in both modern Greece and the near east, which are the only
two east Mediterranean regions where a large number of field-surveys have
been carried out, it is within our period, in the fifth and sixth century, that
the highest number of sites and the greatest geographical spread of settlement
are recorded. 11
Indeed, in the late antique near east, some areas were densely settled
which are very marginal for conventional agricultural exploitation and
which for the most part have never subsequently been as intensively used
again – in particular, the limestone uplands of northern Syria and the basalt
region of the Hauran around ancient Bostra, both rocky landscapes in
which the areas of arable soil are severely restricted (see Fig. 5) and, even
more striking, the wadis of the Negev in southern Israel, where the surrounding
landscape is bare rock, and where the rainfall is both very seasonal
and very low. 12 In Egypt, evidence from the papyri of an increasing
number of water-lifting devices from the fourth century onwards suggests
a similar late antique spread of agriculture into less readily cultivable areas,
and a similar rise in population. 13
In the east, therefore, it seems certain that the fifth and sixth centuries
were the period of both the greatest spread of settlement in Roman times
and of the highest population density and overall numbers. Furthermore,
in these regions population levels were almost certainly unmatched until
very recent times (perhaps not until this century).
The spread and intensification of settlement in the eastern provinces,
and the growth of the population until at least a.d. 500, seem clear and are
not disputed. What is much more open to both doubt and dispute is what
11 General surveys of the evidence, with further bibliography: Greene (1986) 98–141; Lewit (1991)
27–36. Greece: Alcock (1993) 33–92 (though focused on the earlier Roman period). Near east: Dauphin
(1980).
12 Northern Syria and Negev: useful review article of recent literature in Foss (1995). Hauran:
Dentzer (1985) and Sartre (1985). 13 Bagnall, Egypt 17–18.
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