New work on the Roman economy has described a world dominated by long distance trade,  industrial  output,  urbanization  and slavery. Largely left out  of  these  narratives  is the role of some 80% of the population –rural small-holders,  tenants,   wagelaborers  and other  non-elites who  lived in the countryside. This paper takes up the problem of measuring their  relative prosperity,  using new  data from project   located   in   central   Italy,   and   the interpretive tools of development economics.  While  offering  amore  optimistic assessment  of  peasant  “capabilities,”  the paper  will  also  underline  the  contingencies inherent   in   most   archaeological   data   for economic   activity   and   question   to   what degree  we  can  speak  of  a  unified  Roman rural economy.

Kim Bowes

Associate Professor, University of Pennsylvania

Kim Bowes is an associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania and an archaeologist, specializing in the archaeology of late antique religions, domestic architecture, and Roman economics. She received her doctorate from Princeton University, held a post-doctoral fellowship at Yale University and assistant professorships at Fordham University and Cornell University. Author of four books and numerous articles, she has just completed major field project on Roman poverty in Tuscany, sponsored by the National Science Foundation. Kim was the 22nd director of the American Academy in Rome.