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Caesar in Gaul: New perspectives on the archaeology of mass violence

Caesar in Gaul: New perspectives on the archaeology of mass violence

By  Nico Roymans and Manuel Fernández-Götz

TRAC 2014: Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, edited by Tom Brindle, Martyn Allen, Emma Durham and Alex Smith (Oxbow, 2014)

Vercingetorix Throws Down His Arms at the Feet of Julius Caesar", 1899, by Lionel Noel Royer

Introduction:  This paper aims to introduce a new research project on the Roman conquest of Northern Gaul. In these districts, especially in the ‘Germanic’ frontier zone, the conquest had dramatic negative effects; the emphasis was on destruction, mass enslavement, deportation and probably even genocide. This more negative aspect of the Roman conquest has been the subject of little serious research. Until recently, this was not possible because of the lack of independent archaeologicaldata for such research. However, the situation has changed substantially in the last two decades. Thanks to new archaeological, palaeo-botanical and numismatic evidence, it is now possible to develop a more accurate picture of the conquest and its social and cultural impact on indigenous societies, as well as of Caesar’s narrative itself. Adopting a theoretical-methodological focus,this paper aims to show how archaeology can contribute to the study of mass violence and disruption by using a combination of archaeological and historical information. Whereas the relatively new domain of battlefield archaeology will be addressed through the analysis of the fortification of Thuin and its environment, the alleged genocide of the Eburones by Caesar will be revised on the basis of settlement patterns and environmental data.

In the years 58–51 B.C. Gaul was conquered and added to the Roman state. For the first time in history tribal groups in North-western Europe were confronted with the violent expansion of an empire. Although it is generally accepted that Caesar’s war narrative is imbued with personal propaganda and the rhetoric of an imperial ideology, there is no doubt that the conquest had dramatic consequences forGallic societies. Illustrative is Appian’s claim (Gallic History) that Caesar killed one million Gauls and enslaved another million out of a total population of four million.



Until recently the Roman conquest by Caesar was only documented historically in the northern periphery of Gaul. In the Netherlands, Belgium and the German Lower Rhine area the Caesarian conquest was almost totally intangible in the archaeological record; direct archaeological evidence in the form of Roman army camps or battlefields was absent, this in contrast to the more central and southern areas of Gaul. One reason for this was the scarcity in the North of heavily defended oppida, which could have been used by Caesar as military targets or as winter camps for his army.

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