Ancient Romans in Arabia | Early European History And Religion

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ROMANS IN ARABIA

Roman gate at Petra

The establishment of a Roman presence in the Arabian Peninsula had its foundations in the expansion of the empire under Augustus (ruled 27 B.C.– A.D. 14.). After the conquest of Egypt by the Romans in 30 B.C., trade between Rome and India via Red Sea and Arabian Sea increased significantly. Frankincense and myrrh, two spices highly prized in antiquity as fragrances, could only be obtained from trees growing in southern Arabia, Ethiopia, and Somalia. Arab merchants brought these goods to Roman markets by means of camel caravans along the Frankincense Trail.

Gaius Aelius Gallus was the second governor of Roman Egypt, from 26 to 24 B.C. Augustus ordered him to undertake a military expedition to Arabia Felix in 26 BC, where he was to either conclude treaties making the Arabian people foederati (i.e., client states), or to subdue them if they resisted. According to Theodor Mommsen, Aelius Gallus sailed with 10,000 legionaries from Egypt and landed at Leuce Kome, a trading port of the Nabateans in the northwestern Arabian coast. Gallus besieged Ma'rib unsuccessfully for a week, before being forced to withdraw. The supporting Roman fleet had more success: they occupied and destroyed the port of Eudaemon (modern Aden), securing the Roman merchant route to India.

When the emperor Trajan started his military expansions toward the east Rabbel II Soter, one of Rome's client kings, died. This event prompted the annexation of the Nabataean Kingdom, although the manner and the formal reasons for the annexation are unclear. Some epigraphic evidence suggests a military operation, with forces from Syria and Egypt. What is clear, however, is that by 107, Roman legions were stationed in the area around Petra and Bostra, as is shown by a papyrus (and other evidence) found in Egypt. The Hedjaz region was integrated into the Roman province of Arabia in A.D. 106. The conquest of Arabia was not officially exulted until the completion of the Via Traiana Nova in 120s. This road extended down the center of the province from Bostra to Aqaba.

Bosra, Roman Capital of Arabia

Bosra (in far southern present-day Syria, near the Jordanian border) is an ancient city mentioned in 14th century B.C. Egyptian sources. An important Nabatean city, it became the prosperous provincial capital of the Roman province of Arabia Petraea following the break up of the Nabatean kingdom.

The Ancient City of Bosra was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980. According to UNESCO: “Bosra, once the capital of the Roman province of Arabia, was an important stopover on the ancient caravan route to Mecca. A magnificent 2nd-century Roman theatre, early Christian ruins and several mosques are found within its great walls. =

“The name of Bosra occurs in the precious Tell el-Amarna tablets in Egypt, which date from the 14th century B.C. and represent royal correspondence between the Pharaohs and the Phoenician and Amorite kings. It became the northern capital of the Nabataean kingdom. In the year of 106 A.D, a new era began for Bosra when it was incorporated into the Roman Empire. =

“Alexander Severus gave it the title Colonian Bostra and Philip the Arab minted currency especially for it. During Byzantine times, Bosra was a major frontier market where Arab caravans came to stock up and its bishops took part in the Council of Antioch. Bosra was the first Byzantine city which the Arabs entered in 634 in the phase of Islamic expansion. =

“Today, Bosra is a major archaeological site, containing ruins from Roman, Byzantine, and Muslim times. Further, Nabataean and Roman monuments, Christian churches, mosques and Madrasas are present within the city. =

frankincense

“Its main feature is the second century Roman Theatre, constructed probably under Trajan, which has been integrally preserved. It was fortified between 481 and 1251 AD. Al-Omari Mosque is one of the oldest surviving mosques in Islamic history, and the Madrasah Mabrak al-Naqua is one of the oldest and most celebrated of Islam. The Cathedral of Bosra is also a building of considerable importance in the annals of early Christian architecture. =

“Bosra survived about 2500 years inhabited and almost intact. The Nabataeans, Romans, Byzantines and Umayyad, all left traces in the city, which is an open museum associated with significant episodes in the history of ideas and beliefs. =

Bosra is important because: 1) The incorporation of the exceptionally intact 2nd century Roman theatre, complete with its upper gallery, into later fortifications to create a strong citadel guarding the road to Damascus represents a unique architectural achievement. The remains of the 6th century basilica of the martyrs Sergios, Bacchos and Leontios, the cathedral of Bosra, represent an extremely significant example of the centrally planned churches in terms of the evolution of early church architectural forms. The Mosque of Omar, restored in 1950, is one of the rare constructions of the 1st century of the Hegira preserved in Syria. The Madrasa Jâmi' Mabrak an-Nâqua is one of the oldest and most celebrated of Islam. 2) Of the city which once counted 80,000 inhabitants there remain today extensive ruins of Nabataean, Roman, Byzantine and Umayyad buildings. These ruins, including the major monuments mentioned under Criterion (i) above bear exceptional testimony to the past civilizations that created them. 3) In Islam, Bosra is associated with a significant episode in the life of the Prophet Mohammed, who is believed to have visited Bosra twice. At the end of his first visit, it is said that Monk Baheira indicated that Muhammad was to become a prophet. =

Strabo on Roman Incursions in Arabia

Strabo wrote in A.D. 22: “XVI.iv.22. The late expedition of the Romans against the Arabians, under the command of Aelius Gallus, has made us acquainted with many peculiarities of the country. Augustus Caesar despatched this general to explore the nature of these places and their inhabitants, as well as those of Ethiopia, for he observed that Troglodytica, which is contiguous to Egypt, bordered upon Ethiopia; and that the Arabian Gulf was extremely narrow where it separates the Arabians from the Troglodytae. It was his intention either to conciliate or subdue the Arabians. He was also influenced by the report which had prevailed from all time, that this people were very wealthy, and exchanged their aromatics and precious stones for silver and gold, but never expended with foreigners any part of what they received in exchange. He hoped to acquire either opulent friends, or to overcome opulent enemies. He was, moreover, encouraged to undertake this enterprise by the expectation of assistance from the Nabataeans, who promised to cooperate with him in everything. [Source: Strabo: Geography, Book XVI, Chap. iv, 1-4, 18-19, 21-26, c. A.D. 22, Strabo, The Geography of Strabo: Literally Translated, with Notes, trans. by H. C. Hamilton & W. Falconer (London: H. G. Bohn, 1854-1857), pp. 185-215]

“XVI.iv.23. Upon these inducements Gallus set out on the expedition. But he was deceived by Syllaeus, the king's minister of the Nabataeans, who had promised to be his guide on march, and to assist him in the execution of his design. Syllaeus was, however, treacherous throughout; for he neither guided them by a safe course by sea along the coast, nor by a safe road for the army as he promised, but exposed both fleet and the army to danger by directing them where there was no road, or the road was impracticable, where they were obliged to make long circuits, or to pass through tracts of country destitute of everything; he led the fleet along a rocky coast without harbors, or to places abounding with rocks concealed under water, or with shallows. In places of this description particularly, the flowing and ebbing of the tide did them the most harm.

Roman Empire in the East Under Trajan in AD 117

“The first mistake consisted in building long vessels of war at a time when there was no war, nor any likely to occur at sea. For the Arabians, being mostly engaged in traffic and commerce, are not a very warlike people even on land, much less so at sea. Gallus, notwithstanding, built not less than eighty biremes and triremes and galleys at Cleopatris [also called Arsinoë, and near Heroöpolis] near the old canal which leads from the Nile. When he discovered his mistake, he constructed a hundred and thirty vessels of burden, in which he embarked with about ten thousand infantry, collected from Egypt, consisting of Romans and allies, among whom were five hundred Jews and a thousand Nabataeans, under the command of Syllaeus. After enduring great hardships and distress, he arrived on the fifteenth day at Leuce-Come [modern Hanak], a large mart in the territory of the Nabataeans, with the loss of many of his vessels, some with all their crews, in consequence of the difficulty of the navigation, but by no opposition from an enemy. These misfortunes were occasioned by the perfidy of Syllaeus, who insisted that there was no road for an army by land to Leuce-Come, to which and from which place the camel traders travel with ease and in safety from Petra, and back to Petra, with so large a body of men and camels as to differ in no respect from an army. “XVI.iv.24. Another cause of the failure of the expedition was the fact of king Obodas not paying much attention to public affairs, and especially to those relative to war (as is the custom with all Arabian kings), but placed everything in the power of Syllaeus the minister. His whole conduct in command of the army was perfidious, and his object was, as I suppose, to examine as a spy the state of the country and to destroy, in concert with the Romans, certain cities and tribes; and when the Romans should be consumed by famine, fatigue, and disease, and by all the evils which he had treacherously contrived, to declare himself master of the whole country. Gallus, however, arrived at Leuce-Come, with the army laboring under stomacacce and scelotyrbe, diseases of the country, the former affecting the mouth, the other the legs, with a kind of paralysis, caused by the water and the plants (which the soldiers had used in their food). He was therefore compelled to pass the summer and the winter there, for the recovery of the sick.

Strabo on the Nabataeans

Strabo wrote in A.D. 22:“XVI.iv.21. The Nabataeans and Sabaeans, situated above Syria, are the first people who occupy Arabia Felix. They were frequently in the habit of overrunning this country before the Romans became masters of it, but at present both they and the Syrians are subject to the Romans. [Source: Strabo: Geography, Book XVI, Chap. iv, 1-4, 18-19, 21-26, c. A.D. 22, Strabo, The Geography of Strabo: Literally Translated, with Notes, trans. by H. C. Hamilton & W. Falconer (London: H. G. Bohn, 1854-1857), pp. 185-215]

“The capital of the Nabataeans is called Petra. It is situated on a spot which is surrounded and fortified by a smooth and level rock (petra), which externally is abrupt and precipitous, but within there are abundant springs of water both for domestic purposes and for watering gardens. Beyond the enclosure the country is for the most part a desert, particularly towards Judaea. Through this is the shortest road to Jericho, a journey of three or four days, and five days to the Phoinicon (or palm plantation). It is always governed by a king of the royal race. The king has a minister who is one of the Companions, and is called Brother. It has excellent laws for the administration of public affairs.

“Athenodorus, a philosopher, and my friend, who had been to Petra, used to relate with surprise that he found many Romans and also many other strangers residing there. He observed the strangers frequently engaged in litigation, both with one another and with the natives; but the natives had never any dispute amongst themselves, and lived together in perfect harmony.

“XVI.iv.26. The Nabataeans are prudent, and fond of accumulating property. The community fine a person who has diminished his substance, and confer honors on him who has increased it. They have few slaves, and are served for the most part by their relations, or by one another, or each person is his own servant; and this custom extends even to their kings. They eat their meals in companies consisting of thirteen persons. Each party is attended by two musicians. But the king gives many entertainments in great buildings. No one drinks more than eleven cupfuls, from separate cups, each of gold. The king courts popular favor so much, that he is not only his own servant, but sometimes he himself ministers to others. He frequently renders an account before the people, and sometimes an inquiry is made into his mode of life.

Roman Theatre at Bosra, the AD 2nd century

“The houses are sumptuous, and of stone. The cities are without walls, on account of the peace which prevails among them. A great part of the country is fertile, and produces everything except oil of olives; the oil of sesame is used instead. The sheep have white fleeces, their oxen are large; but the country produces no horses. Camels are the substitute for horses, and perform the labor. They wear no tunics, but have a girdle about their loins, and walk abroad in sandals. The dress of the kings is the same, but the color is purple.”

Strabo on the Land Frankincense

Strabo wrote in A.D. 22: “XVI.iv.25. The aromatic country, as I have before said, is divided into four parts. Of aromatics, the frankincense and myrrh are said to be the produce of trees, but cassia the growth of bushes; yet some writers say, that the greater part (of the cassia) is brought from India, and that the best frankincense is that from Persia. According to another partition of the country, the whole of Arabia Felix is divided into five kingdoms (or portions), one of which comprises the fighting men, who fight for all the rest; another contains the husbandmen, by whom the rest are supplied with food; another includes those who work at mechanical trades. One division comprises the myrrh region; another the frankincense region, although the same tracts produce cassia, cinnamon, and nard. Trades are not changed from one family to another, but each workman continues to exercise that of his father. The greater part of their wine is made from the palm. [Source: Strabo: Geography, Book XVI, Chap. iv, 1-4, 18-19, 21-26, c. A.D. 22, Strabo, The Geography of Strabo: Literally Translated, with Notes, trans. by H. C. Hamilton & W. Falconer (London: H. G. Bohn, 1854-1857), pp. 185-215]

“A man's brothers are held in more respect than his children. The descendants of the royal family succeed as kings, and are invested with other governments, according to primogeniture. Property is common among all the relations. The eldest is the chief. There is one wife among them all. He who enters the house before any of the rest, has intercourse with her having placed his staff at the door; for it is a necessary custom which every one is compelled to observe, to carry a staff. The woman, however, passes the night with the eldest. Hence the male children are all brothers. They have sexual intercourse also with their mothers. Adultery is punished with death, but an adulterer must belong to another family.

“A daughter of one of the kings was of extraordinary beauty, and had fifteen brothers, who were all in love with her, and were her unceasing and successive visitors; she, being at last weary of their importunity, is said to have employed the following device. She procured staves to be made similar to those of her brothers; when one left the house she placed before the door a staff similar to the first, and a little time afterwards another, and so on in succession, but making her calculation so that the person who intended to visit her might not have one similar to that at her door. On an occasion when the brothers were all of them together at the market-place, one left it, and came to the door of the house seeing the staff there, and conjecturing some one to be in his apartment, and having left all the other brothers at the marketplace, he suspected the person to be an adulterer; running therefore in haste to his father, he brought him with him to the house, but it was proved that he had falsely accused his sister.

“Merchandise is conveyed from Leuce-Come-to Petra, thence to Rhinocolura [modern Al-Arish] in Phoenicia, near Egypt, and thence to other nations. But at present the greater part is transported by the Nile to Alexandria. It is brought down from Arabia and India to Myus Hormus [modern Bãr Safajah],, it is then conveyed on camels to Coptus of the Thebaïs, situated on a canal of the Nile, and Alexandria.

“Some merchandise is altogether imported into the country, others are not altogether imports, especially as some articles are native products, as gold and silver, and many of the aromatics; but brass and iron, purple garments, styrax, saffron, and costus (or white cinnamon), pieces of sculpture, paintings, pieces of statues, are not to be procured in the country. They look upon the bodies of the dead as no better than dung, according to the words of Heracleitus, "dead bodies more fit to be cast out than dung;" wherefore they bury even their kings beside dung-heaps. They worship the sun, and construct the altar on the top of a house, pouring out libations and burning frankincense upon it every day.”

Roman mosaic from Bosra showing a camel train

Arab Nomad Language Found in Pompeii — and What That Means

Candida Moss wrote in the Daily Beast: In 1987 some clusters of mysterious graffiti found on the walls of Pompeii’s theater tunnel were published in an academic journal. These graffiti were written in an obscure form of Old Arabic otherwise completely unknown in the Western Mediterranean. For almost 35 years the inscriptions were a mystery: Who wrote them? And, frankly, what are they doing there? [Source: Candida Moss, Daily Beast, February 13, 2022]

The inscriptions — 11 in total — were found scratched onto the north wall of the passageway (known as the theater tunnel) that connects the ancient theater complex with the Via Stabiana, one of the main roads that led in and out of the city. Part of the reason for the neglect of these unique inscriptions is the mystery surrounding their origins. They are written in Safaitic, a south Semitic script that records a dialect of Old Arabic. Scholars have plenty of Safaitic inscriptions — over 34,000 were written between the first century B.C. and the fourth century A.D. — but they are found in arrah, the black desert that stretches from southern Syria, down through northeast Jordan, and into northern Saudi Arabia. The script was used by the nomads who populated the region and bred camels, sheep, and goats. Prior to the Pompeiian discovery Safaitic had never been seen in the Western Mediterranean much less the Italian Peninsula. Other than “volcanic stuff” (the black desert is so called because it is made of basalt) it’s difficult to see what Pompeii and the arrah have in common.

An article, published in early 2022 in the prestigious Journal of Roman Studies by St. Olaf College classics professor Kyle Helms, offers a brilliant solution of why the inscriptions showed up in Pompeii. Up until now the working hypothesis for their existence has been long-distance trade. The explanation has a ring of truth to it and is certainly credible. But it is as easy as it is logical: If you find something out of place in the ancient world it was surely brought there from somewhere else. But the “trade” explanation didn’t really give us much to go on especially, as Helms notes, when there is no evidence “for nomad involvement with trade in Puteoli [the port that served Pompeii] — or, in fact, with trade of any kind.”

It's clear that the graffiti were written by nomads from arrah, the real question then is, why were they in Pompeii? Helms argues that these nomads had been incorporated into the Roman military and had come to Italy with the Legio III Gallica — the Third Gallic Legion — during the civil war of 69 A.D.

The reason for the association is partly contextual. The Safaitic graffiti are not alone; they are tucked among the crush of inscriptions that adorn the theater wall. The inscriptions there are a diverse group: images of boats, animals, and gladiators jostle for position alongside bathroom stall-style boasts of group sex, prayers to Venus, and more banal assertions of presence. Of this last category two, written by Roman soldiers and located close to the Safaitic inscriptions, struck Helms as particularly suggestive. These pithy examples note that “The men of the Third were here” and send their regrets (“farewell, Rufa, since you suck well”) and best wishes (“farewell, prick) to the city’s inhabitants.

The men of the Third have for some time been thought to have been soldiers in another Third Legion of Rome. There was more than one Third Legion in the army but, according to the historian Tacitus, Legio III Gallica was stationed in Capua in the waning months of 69 and early days of 70 A.D.. As no other Third Legion is known to have been in the vicinity at the time, this was the probable window of opportunity for these veritable poets to leave their marks on the corridor wall.

This is crucial, writes Helms, because III Gallica arrived in Italy after spending almost a century in Syria, “the distant homeland of writers of Safaitic.” They were called to Italy when they marched in support of the future Emperor Vespasian, who successfully wrested power from his predecessor Vitellius. They spent some time billeted in Capua, at the expense of local aristocrats who had supported Vitellius rather than Vespasian. They were finally dispatched home in 70.

Helms identifies two ways in which nomads might have entered the Third Gallic Legion: first, during this period Roman legions were becoming more provincial and increasingly drew upon the local population. A legion with historic ties to Syria, therefore, would have been comprised of a large number of Syrian recruits. This much is clear from Tacitus himself who refers to the men of the Third observing Syrian religious customs. Alternatively, it’s possible that the Safaitic writers were auxiliaries. It was unusual to move auxiliary troops but periods of crisis — like the civil war in 69 — were the sorts of occasions when it might have happened.

Image Sources: Wikimedia Commons

Text Sources: Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Rome sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; Internet Ancient History Sourcebook: Late Antiquity sourcebooks.fordham.edu ; “Outlines of Roman History” by William C. Morey, Ph.D., D.C.L. New York, American Book Company (1901) ; “The Private Life of the Romans” by Harold Whetstone Johnston, Revised by Mary Johnston, Scott, Foresman and Company (1903, 1932); BBC Ancient Rome bbc.co.uk/history/ ; Project Gutenberg gutenberg.org ; Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Live Science, Discover magazine, Archaeology magazine, Reuters, Associated Press, The Guardian, AFP, The New Yorker, Wikipedia, Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopedia.com and various other books, websites and publications.

Last updated October 2024