Romans in the Sahara

The “Salt and Slave” Trade Route in the Roman Imperial Age

Abstract

Historical research of ancient Rome has been recognized for a long time that trade connections of the imperium Romanum were reaching far beyond the limes. Series of scholarly works have been dedicated to the so-called “Amber Route” (reaching the Baltic Sea), the “Silk Routes” (leading to China and the Far East), the “Spice Route” (connecting India and the Mediterranean), as well as the “Myrrh and Frankincense Route” (towards South Arabia). Meanwhile, very little research has been dedicated to the Trans-Saharan trade connections, even the mere existence of such routes having been strongly questioned by some scholars. The archaeological excavations carried out by European universities from the 1990s onwards have revealed that the Roman Empire’s trade contacts beyond the limes Africanus were just as active and important as towards the above-mentioned regions. Although the wholesale trade in gold and salt from the Niger region is as yet archaeologically unproven, by a fortuitous epigraph we are aware that even the Roman traders arrived south of the Tassili Mountains. However, the majority of African trade goods (ivory, slaves, salt, natron, cotton etc.) reached the Mediterranean port cities through the intermediary commercial activity of the Garamantians. Ever more signs indicate that there was a “Salt and Slave” trade route across the Sahara in the Roman imperial age. Unfortunately, around this route there is no successful metanarrative such as – for example – that around the “Silk Road”.