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Stek, Tesse

Stek, Tesse

Fellow

Early Roman Colonization and Economic Exploitation

Research Question

How did the Romans win their empire? This basic question has haunted generations of scholars. Often, the question has been answered in terms of military power and the promotion of civilization and urbanism. This project takes a fresh perspective, by proposing that Romans targeted and energized existing opportunities for economic exploitation.

Project Description

Roman colonization has traditionally been seen as the foundation of new Roman towns based on agricultural farming, thus bringing Roman civilization to the conquered lands. By rethinking the origin of and evidence for this view, this project argues instead that Roman colonies targeted regionally specific economic resources, ranging from sheepherding to fishing and piracy.

Selected Publications

T.D. Stek, R. Kalkers, R. v Otterloo, J. Sevink, An early Roman colonial landscape in the Apennine mountains: landscape archaeological research in the territory of Aesernia (Central-Southern Italy), Analysis Archaeologica, 1, 2015, 229-282.

T.D. Stek, Roman imperialism, globalization, and Romanization in Early Roman Italy. Research questions in archaeology and ancient history, Archaeological Dialogues 21, 1, 2014, 30-40.

T.D. Stek, The city-state model and Roman Republican Colonization: sacred landscape as a proxy for colonial socio-political organization, in T.D. Stek & J. Pelgrom (eds), Roman Republican Colonization. New Perspectives from Archaeology and Ancient History, Palombi, Rome 2014, 87-105.

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