CHAPTER THIRTEEN Cities and Urban Life in the Western Provinces of the Roman Empire, 30 BCE –250 CE Jonathan Edmondson 1 Introduction In the opening book of Vergil’s Aeneid the Trojan prince Aeneas, fleeing the ruins of his native city, arrives on the shores of North Africa to find another group of fugitives, Phoenicians from Tyre, establishing a new settlement on the site that will become Carthage. On a reconnaissance mission he and his companion Achates catch their first sight of the new city and its leader, Dido. They now started to climb the hill which loomed large over the city and looked down over the citadel opposite. Aeneas was amazed at the massive structures, where once there had been simply huts; he was amazed at the gates, the din of activity and the paved streets. The Tyrians were hurrying about busily, some tracing a line for the walls and manhandling stones up the slopes as they strained to build their citadel, others choosing the best site for a building and marking its outline by ploughing a furrow. They were establishing their laws and selecting their magistrates and respected senate. At one spot some were excavating the harbor, and at another a group of men were laying out an area for the deep foundations of a theater. They were also extracting from quarries mighty pillars to stand tall and handsome on the stage which was still to be built.... In the center of the city there was a grove of trees that provided a wealth of shade.... Here Dido the Sidonian was in the process of building a huge temple for Juno; already the offerings dedicated there made it opulent and the goddess’s powerful presence could be felt. Its threshold was made of bronze, raised high upon steps; bronze-plated were its beams, bronze were its doors that hung on creaking hinges.... Then alongside the folding doors that led to the goddess’s inner sanctum Dido took her seat beneath the temple’s dome upon her raised-up throne, surrounded by armed guards. She was already giving her people new laws and statutes and deciding by her own balanced judgment, or by lot, a fair division of the toil required of them. (Vergil, Aen. 1. 419–29, 441, 446–9, 505–9) Potter / Companion to the Roman Empire 0631226443-4-013 Revise Proof page 250 4.1.2006 7:22pm