Trees in Ancient Rome : Growing an Empire in the Late Republic and Early Principate

Focusing on the transitional period of the late Republic to the early Principate, Trees in Ancient Rome offers a sustained examination of the deployment of trees in the ancient city, exploring not only the practicalities of their cultivation, but also their symbolic value. The Ruminal fig tree sheltered the she-wolf as she nursed Romulus and Remus and year’s later Rome was founded between two groves. As the city grew, neighbourhoods bore the names of groves and hills were known by the trees which grew atop them. From the 1st century BCE, triumphs included trees among their spoils and Rome’s green cityscape grew, as did the challenges of finding room for trees within the congested city. This volume begins with an examination of the role of trees as repositories of human memory, lasting for several generations. It goes on to untangle the import of trees, and their role in the triumphal procession, before closing with a discussion of how trees could be grown in Rome’s urban spaces. Drawing on a combination of literary, visual and archaeological sources, it reveals the rich variety of trees in evidence, and explores how they impacted, and were used to impact, life in the ancient city.

Andrew Fox is an Early Career Research Associate at the Institute of Classical Studies, and an Associate Lecturer at the University of Reading, UK. He received his PhD from the University of Nottingham, UK. His research focuses on the role of nature in the urban environment of ancient Rome, combining literature, art, and archaeology to understand the city as a whole.

Esther Eidinow is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Bristol, UK. She is a series editor for the Bloomsbury series Ancient Environments, co-editor of Cognitive Approaches to Ancient Religious Experience (2022) and author of Envy, Poison and Death: Women on Trial in Classical Athens (2016).

Katharina Lorenz is Professor of Classical Archaeology at the University of Giessen, Germany. She is a series editor for the Bloomsbury series Ancient Environments, and, among many other publications, is author of Bilder machen Räume (2008) and Mythogical Images and their Interpretation (2016).