The Archaeology of Roman Portugal aims to contribute to the wider debate on Roman imperialism and expansionism, by bringing to the fore a much-underrepresented area of the Roman empire, at least in English-language scholarship: its westernmost edge in modern day Portugal. Highlighting the perspective from Roman Portugal will contribute to our understanding of the Roman empire, because it presents both an extraordinary landscape in the sense of economic opportunities (ocean resources, marble and metal mining) and settlement history. The volume aims to present new data and insights from both archaeology and ancient history, and to discuss their significance for our understanding of Roman expansion and imperialism. A key goal of the volume is to discuss how the Portuguese panorama compares to other areas of the Iberian peninsula.
An explicit goal of the volume is to better integrate Portuguese scholarship in the academic debate on the Mediterranean Roman world, and to contextualize it firmly in the wider Iberian and Western Mediterranean context. Therefore, chapters are produced by internationally diverse scholars in archaeology and ancient history from Portugal, Spain, Germany, the UK, the US, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Italy. With a view to asses the potential of integrating best practices in archaeological approaches and methodology, different national and disciplinary research traditions and historical frameworks will be explicitly discussed.
