Given all that, one is tempted to ask: was there any 'amber road' at all?
****GK: You mean in the sense of an actual "road"? I thought it was pretty well understood that there wasn't and that by "amber road" scholars meant transport primarily via rivers...****
It's an old law of transporatation that high-value, low volume goods (noble metal, gems, intellectual products, eg software) are the least susceptible to high transportation cost, so one could wonder instead whether the 'amber road' was used for transporting thing other than amber at all, and whether we instead should be looking at rivers as supply routes for the exchanges we know have taken place? (odd evidence: once the Gotthard tunnel opened, Italy stopped producing great composers)
*****GK: For the "amber road" after ca. 60 CE, cf. Pliny NH, 37. 42-45:
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Certum est gigni in insulis septentrionalis oceani et ab Germanis appellari glaesum, itaque et ab nostris ob id unam insularum Glaesiariam appellatam, Germanico Caesare res ibi gerente classibus, Austeraviam a barbaris dictam. nascitur autem defluente medulla pinei generis arboribus, ut cummis in cerasis, resina in pinis erumpit umoris abundantia. densatur rigore vel tempore ac mari, cum ipsum intumescens aestus rapuit ex insulis, certa in litora expellitur, ita volubile, ut pendere videatur atque non sidere in vado. |
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arboris sucum esse etiam prisci nostri credidere, ob id sucinum appellantes. pinei autem generis arboris esse indicio est pineus in adtritu odor et quod accensum taedae modo ac nidore flagrat. adfertur a Germanis in Pannoniam maxime provinciam, et inde Veneti primum, quos Enetos Graeci vocaverunt, famam rei fecere proximique Pannoniae et agentes circa mare Hadriaticum. |
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Pado vero adnexa fabula est evidente causa, hodieque Transpadanorum agrestibus feminis monilium vice sucina gestantibus, maxime decoris gratia, sed et medicinae; creditur quippe tonsillis resistere et facium vitiis, varie genere aquarum iuxta Alpis infestante guttura hominum. |
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DC M p. fere a Carnunto Pannoniae abesse litus id Germaniae, ex quo invehitur, percognitum nuper, vivitque eques R. ad id comparandum missus ab Iuliano curante gladiatorium munus Neronis principis. qui et commercia ea et litora peragravit, tanta copia invecta, ut retia coercendis feris podium protegentia sucinis nodarentur, harena vero et libitina totusque unius diei apparatus in variatione pompae singulorum dierum esset e sucino.
****GK: So since Nero Carnuntum was the port of transit for the amber traffic from the north to Roma.**** |
For the 'amber road' an alternative river route would include rivers like
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Bug
*****GK: especially in the earlier period, before Roman ascendancy, when there were other important Hellenistic centers eager to acquire amber. Cf. generally:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amber_Road ****
(any connection between Piengitai and Pivdennyi from *pUl-den- "noon", I assume, BTW?)
****GK: How about trying a Dacian reconstruction via -getai ? *****