What is wrong with Roman agriculture?

[Alcsentre Calanice]

So, it is a common wisdom that medieval agriculture and medieval agricultural technology were much more advanced than ancient Roman agriculture.

Because I'm not a specialist of the matter, I asked you weather and how the medieval agriculture was superior to the ancient one? Had they better crops, better agricultural machines? Was it the manpower?

Thank you in advance for your replies!

 

[Cuchulainn]

Better ploughs & the invention of the horse collar enabled farming of heavier, but more fertile, soils in Northern/Central Europe.

The adaption of the 3 field rotation system allowing different crops to be grown on the same field on alternate years with a fallow-grazing year allowing soil fertility to recover.

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

Better ploughs & the invention of the horse collar enabled farming of heavier, but more fertile, soils in Northern/Central Europe.

The adaption of the 3 field rotation system allowing different crops to be grown on the same field on alternate years with a fallow-grazing year allowing soil fertility to recover.

It is very hard for the Romans to develop such a system? Or is the field rotation simply based on the observation of nature and thus understandble for everyone?

 

[Cuchulainn]

Oh & lots of social changes that i'm too much of an amateur historian to start on, suffice to say that even a serf who knew where he stood in the world order would take more care of the land than a slave who worked a large plantation type farm owned by a rich aristocrat.
Even in late Western Roman Empire land ownership tended to be concentrated in the hands of few & what small farmers that existed were subjected to exhortbitant taxation & conscription.
Many of the German mercenaries imported by the late empire were needed to put down recurring peasant revolts.

 

[Cuchulainn]

It is very hard for the Romans to develop such a system? Or is the field rotation simply based on the observation of nature and thus understandble for everyone?

From what i understand, in the middle Roman Republic/Empire period, slaves were so cheap & Egypt/Tunisia produced so much surpluses that there was no need to innovate, plus the riches involved in the circus's & games pulled in the resources & best minds that otherwise would have gone to technological advances in all areas. In the late period the church did the same.
Someone with a deeper knowledge might expand or dispute my answer & to be honest you need someone with more knowledge of this period than me to answer your question.

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

Oh & lots of social changes that i'm too much of an amateur historian to start on, suffice to say that even a serf who knew where he stood in the world order would take more care of the land than a slave who worked a large plantation type farm owned by a rich aristocrat.
Even in late Western Roman Empire land ownership tended to be concentrated in the hands of few & what small farmers that existed were subjected to exhortbitant taxation & conscription.
Many of the German mercenaries imported by the late empire were needed to put down recurring peasant revolts.

From what i understand, in the middle Roman Republic/Empire period, slaves were so cheap & Egypt/Tunisia produced so much surpluses that there was no need to innovate, plus the riches involved in the circus's & games pulled in the resources & best minds that otherwise would have gone to technological advances in all areas. In the late period the church did the same.
Someone with a deeper knowledge might expand or dispute my answer & to be honest you need someone with more knowledge of this period than me to answer your question.

You should remind that slavery lost it's dominant position in Roman economy in the early Principate, after the finishing of the important conquests of the Roman repulic. Slavery was replaced by serfdom (or something really close to it) during the 3rd century.

What do you mean with circus and games?

 

[TRH]

You should remind that slavery lost it's dominant position in Roman economy in the early Principate, after the finishing of the important conquests of the Roman repulic. Slavery was replaced by serfdom (or something really close to it) during the 3rd century.

What do you mean with circus and games?

I'm no expert on these matters either, but I understand that as games became larger and more elaborate over time, the logistical challenges in managing them became more complex, and they were so prestigious that they'd be big boosts for the careers of aediles who managed everything. So with intelligent bureaucratic minds going and doing that, it stands to reason that there'd be fewer people available to think up crop rotation instead.

 

[Agricola]

You should remind that slavery lost it's dominant position in Roman economy in the early Principate, after the finishing of the important conquests of the Roman repulic. Slavery was replaced by serfdom (or something really close to it) during the 3rd century.

Exactly! Actually serfdom started to replace slavery already in the 1st century AD. On the other hand, the praefectus urbi started to develop new laws in order to protect slaves. Latest in the 4th century slaves had more rights than free tenants. The roman system of serfdom was adopted by the germans and others and became the prime medieval system.

So I doubt slavery has anything to do with the quiestion, why the romans did not invent 3-field-rotation. Because slavery played no major role in the roman agriculture after the 1st century AD.

 

[Agricola]

I'm no expert on these matters either, but I understand that as games became larger and more elaborate over time, the logistical challenges in managing them became more complex, and they were so prestigious that they'd be big boosts for the careers of aediles who managed everything. So with intelligent bureaucratic minds going and doing that, it stands to reason that there'd be fewer people available to think up crop rotation instead.

Sorry, but Aediles managed nothing in the roman empire aka principate. It was even no mandatory step in the cursus honorum anymore.

Looking to the roman buerocracy, managing games was just a very minor part in terms of manpower used for administrative task.

 

[Cuchulainn]

http://www.roman-empire.net/society/soc-games.html

This omits some of the more gorey details of the later games & the often sexual sadism involved, a quick search on Google or Bing will turn up some interesting results.

The late empire did indeed abolish slavery, but what were all the freed slaves to do, penniless & without a home, many went straight back to work for their former masters as indentured labourers, possibly the origin of serfdom. A bit like what happened to the freed slaves in the USA after the civil war only without the promise of the North or West to flee to.

 

[Cuchulainn]

In any case, from a head start both in agriculture and technology in general, the Roman state stopped developing new technology from the good base that it had, why is a question that has many theories as answer, sometimes the conversation to state Christianity is blamed, i tend to agree but very possibly that's my personal prejudice

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

http://www.roman-empire.net/society/soc-games.html

This omits some of the more gorey details of the later games & the often sexual sadism involved, a quick search on Google or Bing will turn up some interesting results.

What has sexual sadism to do with technological progress? Also, not everything on the internet is true!

In the late period the church did the same.

sometimes the conversation to state Christianity is blamed, i tend to agree but very possibly that's my personal prejudice

I don't see how the church prevented technological progress. They may have destroyed pagan literature, but these were predominantly religious books without a scientific aspiration. Blaming the church for everything became popular during the reformation and especially in the 19th century.

From what i understand, in the middle Roman Republic/Empire period, slaves were so cheap & Egypt/Tunisia produced so much surpluses that there was no need to innovate,

look here:

Exactly! Actually serfdom started to replace slavery already in the 1st century AD. On the other hand, the praefectus urbi started to develop new laws in order to protect slaves. Latest in the 4th century slaves had more rights than free tenants. The roman system of serfdom was adopted by the germans and others and became the prime medieval system.

Though, the serfs provided cheap labor too, so they might be an additional reason for technological stagnation.

So I doubt slavery has anything to do with the quiestion, why the romans did not invent 3-field-rotation. Because slavery played no major role in the roman agriculture after the 1st century AD.

Also, instead of blaming slavery, one should bother care about craftsmen and artisans with little handicraft enterprises. They often transmitted traditional techniques without bothering with new, better, more efficient technology.
Craftsmen often use techniques antiquated techniques because of tradition and habit without thinking of how to improve them. Centralization of production in manufactories and competition between this manufactories and craftsmen is essential to break the power of customs and allow industrial techniques to develop and spread.

plus the riches involved in the circus's & games pulled in the resources & best minds that otherwise would have gone to technological advances in all areas.

That might be a question of mentality - the Romans never fully adopted this capitalist mindset of investment and reinvestment. The riches often prefered to waste their money for some luxuries than to use it to improve their estates. Anyway, the Roman Empire lacked of an efficient sytem of bank and stock exchanges to provide larger amounts of capital to entrepreneurs with projects.

Au contraire, the Roman Empire annually lost 100 million sesterces in its trade with the east! Funds were leaving the Empire for China, India and Arabia; the Parthians and later the Sassanids, the Roman archenemies, benefited from the Roman trade to those eastern country by levying tariffs on trade goods.

Looking to the roman buerocracy, managing games was just a very minor part in terms of manpower used for administrative task.

That might be a key in improving the Roman agriculture - actually using some bureaucrats for scientific research. The French historian of technology Maurice Dumas remarked that "it seems that in the strong and complex Roman administration, there was not one institution coordinating and promoting scientific research." The Romans perfect some tools, some agricultural or architectural techniques, but made no major progress in science or technology.

The Roman emperors funded schools and professors - Hadrian founded the Athenaeum in Rome, the schools of Athens and Alexandria were financed by the Roman government. Though, teaching in these universities was either too theoretical (like mathematics and astrology in Alexandria) or too unworldly (like e. g. literature, philosophy etc.). The only valuable disciplines were medicine and geography, based on empiric facts and improved through experience.

In any case, from a head start both in agriculture and technology in general, the Roman state stopped developing new technology from the good base that it had, why is a question that has many theories as answer,

I tend to think of a synergy of different factors that prevented the improvement of technology in the Roman Empire:
- Cheap manpower, first slaves, then the coloni (ancient serfs)
- Little enterprises instead of centralized, well-organized and innovative "factories"
- The mindset, ignoring the necessity of technological progress and reinvestisment
- The lack of an effectiv banking system providing capital
- The lack of stock exchanges and joint-stock companies (even if embryos of shareholder companies existed in maritime trade) providing capital
- The lack of funds within the Empire due to the oriental trade
- The lack of a "department of research" encouraging scientific progress and spread of agricultural techniques
- The lack of public education in natural sciences (like the Alexandrian Museion in hellenistic times)
- The lack of technological competition between kingdoms (due to the Roman conquest of the hellenistic Empires)

A list of possible invention can be found here.

Now, my question is: How to change the Roman mindset to get the emperors to establish a public entity charged with scientific research?

 

[DominusNovus]

It really does boil down to:

- Heavy plows (and related technologies, like better horse collars , which you don't need if you're not plowimg heavy soil.
- The three field system, which needs heavier plows to turn over more of the soil. If you're dropping from 50% fallow to 33% fallow, you can't just be turning over the top-most layer of the soil. You'll deplete your soil quickly.

The rest of this thread really takes on the semblence of some very stereotypical views of Hollywood Rome.

 

[Tonifranz]

Actually, from what I read, even though the second century BC witnessed the rise of latifundia and the decline of small landowners in Italy, small farms in Italy actually expanded during the 1st century B.C.

The reforms of the Gracchi actually did give lands to landless peasants, even though the Gracchi themselves were killed.

But more importantly...

Marius settled his landless veterans of plots of lands in Italy.

Sulla settled his landless veterans in plots of lands in Italy.

Pompey settled his veterans in Italy too.

So did Caesar. And Antony. And Augustus.

And you must remember that Augustus settled about 30 legions after Actium.

Where did the lands came from to give to these landless soldiers?

From the Ager Publicus.

But also from the confiscated estates of those who lost and those who supported the losing side. Or because their lands were just outright confiscated like the estate of Horace for the settling of demobilized soldiers after the Perusian War.

After taking Egypt, Augustus simply used Egypt's wealth to buy lot's of estates in Italy and settled tens of thousands of veterans of invidual plots of land.

So yeah, a kind of land reform happened in the first century, in that the estates of the losing sides were given to landless men, aka soldiers who served in the armies. And it didn't even require being soldiers of the winning side. Octavian even settled the soldiers of Antony's armies after Actium.

 

[ennobee]

So, it is a common wisdom that medieval agriculture and medieval agricultural technology were much more advanced than ancient Roman agriculture.

Because I'm not a specialist of the matter, I asked you weather and how the medieval agriculture was superior to the ancient one? Had they better crops, better agricultural machines? Was it the manpower?

Thank you in advance for your replies!

I think methods just got better over time. When talking about the medieval 'Agricultural miracle' we are just talking about a span of 100 years between 1100 and 1200 where a few technological advances (like horse-drawn plow) gave people the means not only to get a better yield from their lands but also to cultivate more lands with the same number of people. This at a time where there still was enough unused land around even on your own territory. (woods, bogs wild meadows etc). Still, this occurred at less 500 years after the chaos of the end of the Western Roman Empire, at least 200 years after science and technology had recovered back to Roman levels. If the Roman empire would have lasted 300 years longer, it would certainly have made the same discoveries.

However, the idea that medieval agriculture was more advanced in all aspects is something like a simplification too. On a local level the new techniques of the middle ages promised more yield for less manpower, but mostly made more manpower available to cultivate new fields. That was on a local level, and true for Western Europe only. If you had a bad year, all your fields would be ruined, no matter how many and how good their average yields.

The Romans on the other hand excelled in logistics. They imported a good deal of their food from far away, even from different regions so they had a steady source even if one part of the empire would suffer a bad harvest. They were masters of administration so they could plan ahead how many crops were desired and what manpower would be needed and their transport network still is awe-inspiring. So in general: 1200's France had the better food growing techniques but classical Rome the far better food supply

 

[PhilippeO]

I'm not sure there are anything wrong with Roman agriculture.

Did Italy, Southern France, Greece, and Spain change any of their agricultural practice because of Medieval agriculture ?

Heavy plow and four-field rotation is Northern European practice, did they actually improve anything on Medditerranean soil ? can they applied on wheat and olive agriculture ? It seems they designed for Barley-Rye field with large population of cattle, they might not work in olive and wheat southern model. Did Roman actually need horse collar ?, Roman horses are smaller and not that active in farming, it look like horse collar is useful after development of heavy draft horse breed in Middle Ages.

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

I'm not sure there are anything wrong with Roman agriculture.

France had roughly 12 million inhabitants in 400 AD, and 20 millions in 1350 AD, so I'm pretty shure that there was an improvement between Roman and medieval times in agricultural matters, since the country could nourish twice as much persons.

 

[Kerney]

I'm not sure there are anything wrong with Roman agriculture.

Did Italy, Southern France, Greece, and Spain change any of their agricultural practice because of Medieval agriculture ?

Heavy plow and four-field rotation is Northern European practice, did they actually improve anything on Medditerranean soil ? can they applied on wheat and olive agriculture ? It seems they designed for Barley-Rye field with large population of cattle, they might not work in olive and wheat southern model. Did Roman actually need horse collar ?, Roman horses are smaller and not that active in farming, it look like horse collar is useful after development of heavy draft horse breed in Middle Ages.

Not an expert, but could it have something to do with population declines in Gaul and Britian where cooling climate made northern agriculture more practical than the past.

 

[Agricola]

The late empire did indeed abolish slavery, but what were all the freed slaves to do, penniless & without a home, many went straight back to work for their former masters as indentured labourers, possibly the origin of serfdom.

No. Undoubtedly, the roman and later mid-age system of serfdom developed from the roman tenure of land system. And this already was available in the republic. Because of accumulation of debt, the tenants became more and more dependent on the landowners. Finally in the late empire this dependency was codified by law.

Furthermore I don't know of an abolishment of slavery in the late empire. Slavery simply diminished way before the late empire, because it was no longer competitive, e.g. the dacian gold mines of the 2nd century were most probably operated by tenants, not slaves. Slavery did also not scale as good as tenancy. So for the real super rich, who saw in a piece of land no agriculture, but just an investment with interest, slavery was not attractive.

So neither slavery nor serfdom is a reason that the romans did not invent better agricultural technology and processes. Because both (the roman way of) serfdom and slavery existed in the mid-ages too.

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

So neither slavery nor serfdom is a reason that the romans did not invent better agricultural technology and processes. Because both (the roman way of) serfdom and slavery existed in the mid-ages too.

So what is, in your opinion, the reason for the stagnation of Roman agricultural technology (and technology in general, see also watermills)?

So yeah, a kind of land reform happened in the first century, in that the estates of the losing sides were given to landless men, aka soldiers who served in the armies.

And little farms are much more inefficient than large estates, since the latter have not only more manpower available, but dispose also about much more capital to implement new technology and processes, like for example the heavy plow, the wheeled plow etc.

I'm of the opinion that little undertakings, both in industry and agriculture, are a certain obstacle to the spread of technical progress. Most of minor businessmen, craftsmen and farmers are very careful and aspire to secure their own economic position by perfecting existing techniques instead of revolutionizing their profession with new methods.

In the late antiquity (like in the Middle Ages), the collegia (guilds) were another impediment to innovation, since professions were hereditary without real competion and with no need of advance in production methods - for a newcomer with better ideas, it was thus very hard to gain a foothold in the trade, even if he had the knowledge to improve the art.