Author Description

"The volume provides a prosopography of Roman businessmen involved in business in the western part of the Mediterranean and present in epigraphy, mainly in the shape of tituli picti, amphorae stoppers, and anchors, but also in monumental epigraphy. This limits the chronological range of this analysis to the final two centuries of the Roman Republic and the first three of the Imperial Age. The book is not designed to be read from front to cover, but as a starting point or point of reference for anyone working on the nature of Roman business. It provides data on commercial partnerships, professional specialisation, family firms, the structure of agency as well as the close relationship between production and distribution. It also reveals facts of anecdotic value such as the extreme misfortune of a shipper whose name is found inscribed on the anchors of three different wrecks. The volume is organised by the various types of merchants, such as negotiatores, negotiantes, mercatores, nautae, utriclarii, navicularii, naucleri, propolae, poletai, emporoi, kapeloi, vinarii, frumentarii and [diffusores] olearii. This is followed by chapters on the three main types of small epigraphic sources and an index of names."--Description de l'éditeur