Intensification, Roman Imperialism,
and the North African Pre-desert Agricultural Community:
In Defense of a "Bottom-Up" Perspective

Joseph Lemak (Elmira College)

The agricultural success of the North African pre-desert during the Roman period has been well attested by the ancient writers and the archeological record.  The relatively impressive abundance of this arid region did not come from the natural fertility of the landscape, but though a multitude of investments in small-scale, local hydraulic systems which trapped and directed the sporadic, unreliable rainfall.  In the recent past, it was assumed that the Roman imperial central administration and bureaucracy stimulated the dramatic rise in levels of production and intensification through provincial taxation, slavery, business practices, prolonged peace, and technical developments.  Within this framework, however, the native North African peasant farmer was not given credit as an agent who could affect levels of production and intensification.  Modern French and Italian colonial administrators did not believe that small farming groups organized at the community level were capable of constructing and maintaining intensive and highly productive agricultural systems, and, consequently, failed to reach the levels of production of their Roman predecessors, even after implementing large investments in landesque capital works and introducing a number of "superior" modern technologies. 

Questions of cause have taken precedence in nearly all deliberations concerning the intensification of agricultural production.  Anthropologists, ethnographers, and archaeologists have recently vested much time and scholarship in understanding the relationship between agricultural intensification and political centralization.  As a result, many scholars have soundly criticized the assumption that centralized state political organization was a necessary condition for large-scale intensive agriculture.  Furthermore, historical and ethnographic case studies have revealed that when centralized states meddle with traditional peasant farming, agricultural efficiency is often lost.  To what extent did the central Roman administration interfere with North African peasant farming?  Was it possible for the North African peasant farmer to produce such impressive levels of production without a centralized, bureaucratized administration structuring their everyday farming practices?  These questions are the foci of this paper.