Underwater on a Hunt For History of the Roman Empire

Maritime archeologist Justin Leidwanger maps the cargo of a Roman shipwreck at Marzamemi, Italy. Photo by S. Emma

By Tom Winterbottom

Stanford scholar Justin Leidwanger spends a lot of time underwater.

An assistant professor of classics, Leidwanger is a maritime archeologist. His research entails what it sounds like it would – exploring artifacts that lie beneath the sea.

A scholar with interests in the Roman and early Byzantine eras, Leidwanger has conducted thousands of dives – mostly to explore shipwrecks of the Eastern Mediterranean region. His students, too, don snorkels or scuba gear and work underwater.

Marine archeology, Leidwanger says, provides a privileged perspective on ancient history.

"There is a lot of theoretical work on the maritime economy of the Roman Empire, but I am interested in the close details of sea travel and how archeological finds can shed light on the history of consumption and connectivity around the Mediterranean," said Leidwanger.

The social networks established by sea travel, Leidwanger says, were the basis of commerce during the Roman Empire, and in the shipwrecks and harbors he is able to see evidence of "who was interacting with whom and how and when these objects were being transported and for what reason."

Leidwanger's aim is to bring together the theoretical models of ancient economics and socioeconomic connectivity with hard data from his underwater fieldwork.

"The Roman Empire was the most complex state structure at the time with a lot of movement of goods and people through the landscape," Leidwanger said. "I am interested in how these structures and social networks change over the life of the Roman Empire."

He is currently engaged in two projects, the Marzamemi Maritime Heritage Project in Sicily and the Burgaz Harbors Project in Turkey.

"Sicily was a nexus of communication and commerce between the eastern and western Roman Mediterranean. In the shipwrecks there, we are finding evidence of the changing patterns of commerce when the capital moved from Rome to Constantinople in the 4thcentury A.D.," Leidwanger notes.

In Turkey, archeologists are currently excavating four shallow-water harbors to get a picture of what the harbor structures were like. In the 4th century B.C., during the late Classical period, Burgaz became a regional and international economic center for the export of agricultural goods.

"We are finding evidence of how these integral structures changed over time," Leidwanger says.

Uncovering history in the mare nostrum

The location of Leidwanger's current research is key to uncovering archeological data about the importance of the Mediterranean Sea for the Romans.

"The Mediterranean Sea has been described as an 'inverted continent,' a zone of human culture and relationships centered on the sea rather than land, a product of geography that led me to focus on the maritime," Leidwanger said.

To undertake his research, Leidwanger maps and excavates marine sites to understand what was being transported and when.

At sites in Sicily or Turkey, where he travels each summer with Stanford students, Leidwanger excavates harbors and shipwrecks that often contain well-preserved artifacts that he can analyze in the lab.

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Underwater on a Hunt For History of the Roman Empire

Uncovering history in the mare nostrum

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