Regional Urban Systems in the Roman World, 150 BCE - 250 CE

Luuk de Ligt is Professor of Ancient History at Leiden University. He has published widely on economic history, social history, legal history and urban history. His monograph Peasants, Citizens and Soldiers (Cambridge University Press, 2012) has been greeted as a path-breaking contribution to the demographic history of Roman Italy. Between 2013 and 2018 he held a major research grant from the European Research Council (2013-2018) for the project An Empire of 2,000 Cities.John Bintliff is Emeritus Professor of Classical and Mediterranean Archaeology at Leiden University and Emeritus Professor at the University of Edinburgh. Since 1978 he has been co-directing (with Cambridge University) the Boeotia Project. In 2012 he published The Complete Archaeology of Greece: From Hunter‐Gatherers to the 20th Century AD (Wiley-Blackwell). Between 2013 and 2018 he co-directed the ERC-funded project An Empire of 2,000 Cities.List of contributors: Florian Baret, Damjan Donev Eseninova, Matthew S. Hobson, Michalis Karambinis, Frank Kolb Haselweg, Dragana Mladenović, Oliva Rodríguez Gutiérrez, Frida Pellegrino, Paul Scheding, David L. Stone, Manuel Fernández-Götz, Frédéric Trément, F. Vermeulen, Rinse Willet.

• AcknowledgementsList of Figures and TablesAbbreviationsNotes on Contributors1 IntroductionLuuk de Ligt and John Bintliff2 A World of 200 Oppida: Pre-Roman Urbanism in Temperate EuropeManuel Fernández-Götz3 The Size Distribution of Self-governing Cities in the North-Western Provinces: Trends and AnomaliesFrida Pellegrino4 The Roman ‘Small Towns’ in the Massif Central (civitates of the Arverni, Vellavii, Gabali, Ruteni, Cadurci and Lemovices): Methodology and Main ResultsFlorian Baret5 Towns, Roads and Development Dynamics in the Territory of the Arverni in Roman Times (Auvergne, France)Frédéric Trément, Florian Baret, Marion Dacko, Jérôme Trescarte, Maxime Calbris, Lise Augustin and Guy Massounie6 Urbanisation of the Iberian Peninsula during the Roman Period: Choices, Impositions and ‘Resignation’ of the NewcomersOliva Rodríguez Gutiérrez7 The Urban Landscape of Roman Central Adriatic ItalyFrank Vermeulen8 The Impact of Roman Rule on the Urban System of SicilyLuuk de Ligt9 Roman Towns and the Settlement Hierarchy of Ancient North Africa: A Bird’s-Eye ViewMatthew Hobson10 A Diachronic and Regional Approach to North African UrbanismDavid Stone11 Micro-regional Urbanism: An Ancient Urban Landscape in Roman North AfricaPaul Scheding12 Urbanisation and Population Density: The Case of the ‘Small Municipia’ in the Balkan and Danube ProvincesDamjan Donev13 Between the River and the Fort: Applying Critical Regionalism to Roman Towns in the Pannonian BasinDragana Mladenovic14 Urban Networks in Early Roman Macedonia and Aegean ThraceMichalis Karambinis15 Regional Perspectives on Urbanism and Settlement Patterns in Roman Asia MinorRinse Willet16 From Mountain to Coastal Plain: Settings of Settlements and Stages of Urbanisation in Ancient LyciaFrank KolbIndex

"The relevance of these contributions to the study of regional urban systems across the Roman world is demonstrated not only by the authors’ discussions, but also by the wealth of analytic data, tables, catalogues and appendices supplementing many of these texts. Undoubtedly, the volume provides new information that will be of use to anyone working on the urbanism, economic and socio-political history of the Roman Empire, striking a good balance between archaeological and ancient historical standpoints." - Niccolò Mugnai, University of Oxford, in: Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 2021.01.29''This volume successfully champions the ‘regional perspective’ as a fruitful way to analyse the process of urbanisation in the Roman period. The adoption of multiple scales allows the publication to account for the diversity of urban developments, while paying due attention to both pan-imperial and region-specific factors. The publication makes it evident that a number of important insights would have been missed if urbanisation studies remained limited to research on single cities. The larger scale and the systemic context provided by the volume allow for more complex observations about economic integration and about the nature of contacts between individual cities. The volume’s key conclusions about provincial urbanisation and the data it assembles will pave the way for further work on cities in the Roman world.'' - Pawel Borowski, in: The Classical Review 70.2 (2020)