The date of the first commercial use of the square seems to lie in the Hadrianic period. A mosaic of the stuppatores restiones in statio 58 is most likely Trajanic-Hadrianic, although we cannot exclude that it is a replacement from the years 190-200 AD. The inscription NAVICVLARI AFRICANI from the east porticus is not later than Hadrian as suggested by the style of writing. It makes sense to link it to the substantial raising of the square in the Hadrianic period. We can imagine that the square gradually developed into an informal meeting place of skippers and traders, and that the east porticus was now (partly) reserved for people from Africa Proconsularis. it is only in the 190's that a clear situation emerges.
The evidence from Ostia and Portus indicates that the reigns of Commodus and Septimius Severus were characterized by intensified economic activity. On the square we see three pillars: regular transport of many commodities for Rome; storage and transport to Rome; preparations for emergency transport. I suggest that the offices were used as follows (including some educated guesses):
East porticus:
- In the south part: local and regional guilds. Related to: the building, maintenance and equipment of ships; transporting materials for construction work in the harbours, fuel for the lighthouse, and wood for ship building; storage and transport to Rome (grain measurers). Perhaps also builders, ship builders, and grain merchants.
- In the north part: skippers from North Africa (including members of the auxiliary fleet) and Sardinia.
- In between these skippers perhaps: representatives from the provinces of Africa Proconsularis and Sardinia.
North porticus:
- Skippers from Gaul and Egypt (and Spain?).
- Porters.
- Office of the auxiliary fleet and Imperial grain treasury.
West porticus:
- Operators of the tow boats on the Tiber.
- Overseers of the guilds.
- Provinces of Mauretania Caesariensis, Greece and western Turkey or Sicily, and Spain.
- Representatives of the Procurator Annonae.
- Weigh masters.
- Tax offices.
The clustering of local and regional guilds in one corner is understandable, rather surprising is the different location of the porters and the skippers of the tow boats on the Tiber. The clustering of skippers from North Africa again makes sense. The presence in between of skippers from Sardinia is reminiscent of the collaboration between the ship owners from these provinces, but still does not explain it. A central office has its own lay-out, a cluster of three rooms. The mosaics in the western portico are very different from those in the eastern. Wide inscriptions are mostly absent, and there is a tendency to depict single objects instead of complete scenes. There may have been marble inscriptions over the entrances, such as the one linked to iron mines (see the section "The name of the square" and the appendix below). The physical reality of the actual transport is less obvious. Higher ranking officials were present here, such as curators.
It is not always clear which guilds were present as members of the auxiliary fleet and which were not. Skippers that were not from North Africa obviously were not. In several North African offices nothing points to the auxiliary fleet (Hippo Diarrhytus et etcetera). Some of the North African harbours are not well-known, Gummi for example. It is difficult to draw conclusions from that: an important harbour is not necessarily a large city.[1]
A wide range of commodities is documented, not just the large-scale import of grain: olive oil, fish, fish products, marble, metal, and wild animals. We may assume that the goods were sold both to the Emperor (also for his personnel and slaves) and on the private market. However, the square is far too small for hosting representatives of all harbours from which goods were transported to Rome. One of the benefits of being a member of the auxiliary fleet was having a priviliged position.
We should remember that the navicularii were not employees of the Imperial government, but working on the basis of a contract and membership of a corpus. The cooperation was not self-evident. Subsequent laws (excusationes from munera) suggest that the corpora did not always have enough members, hence also the change from voluntary membership to membership as a munus. In the Severan period the five corpora naviculariorum marinorum Arelatensium, from Arles, during a conflict even threatened to withdraw from business with the government if their demands were not met. The matter was settled by Claudius Julianus, prefect of the Annona.[2] A role of the Imperial government on the square cannot be doubted.[3] It is evident from the Imperial rebuilding of the theatre and the inscriptions on the pedestals from the square. The Barracks of the Fire Brigade was around corner and large warehouses, presumably Imperial, nearby. I imagine the work on the square as primarily a system of control and a "lubricant". Discussions and meetings will have concerned the many small and large issues that must have occurred in the shipping business.[4]
A reflection of some of the work that was going on, discharge or release of ships, can be found in a papyrus: "Irenaeus to Apollinarius his dearest brother many greetings. I pray continually for your health, and I myself am well. I wish you to know that I reached land on the 6th of the month Epeiph and we unloaded our cargo on the 18th of the same month. I went up to Rome on the 25th of the same month and the place welcomed us as the god willed, and we are daily expecting our discharge, it so being that up till to-day nobody in the corn-fleet has been released. Many salutations to your wife and to Serenus and to all who love you, each by name. Goodbye. Mesore 9. (Addressed) To Apollinarius from his brother Irenaeus".[5]
The stationes are quite small, so presumably no more than a few men worked in each office. As to how many days per month the square was in business, all we can say is that the square must have been rather quiet in autumn and winter, during the mare clausum. Still, that would be a good period for maintenance and building, and of course the tow boats on the Tiber were active. In spring and summer there may have been a slight fluctuation in the activities. It is generally assumed that the Alexandrian grain fleet sailed to Portus as a convoy. The skippers from the various other cities may have been required to sail in convoys as well, to prevent a rather chaotic situation upon arrival in the harbour.
Some of the people involved with the square may have lived in the large apartments of block II,VI to the east of the square, including the House of the Painted Ceiling and the House of the Infant Hercules. These expensive apartments are on an unlikely, very busy spot: to the east of the square and the theatre, to the south of industrial establishments (the bakery House of the Ovens and two fulleries), to the south-west of the Barracks of the Fire Brigade, and to the west of the Baths of Neptune. They may have been constructed on this extremely busy location by the Imperial government for some of its own personnel, with the explicit intention of showing commitment of the government to the annona through a clear presence.
(1) Of course many harbours were active regionally only. Quoting David Stone on the harbours of North Africa: "All ancient sources together mentioned 137 harbors within North Africa [excluding Egypt], not including those with the 29 definite and 16 possible artificial structures discussed above. A further 126 harbors have been located by modern archaeological surveys but were not mentioned by ancient sources. These numbers indicate a total of 308 harbors along the North African coastline in antiquity. They confirm Houston's observation that the majority of harbors were unmodified (n=263) [i.e. had no artificial port structures], while the minority (n=45) may have had port structures." (Stone 2014, 579).
(2) CIL III, 14165; Sirks 1991, 198-202.
(3) It is beyond me how authors can speak of VIP rooms, meant only for eating and drinking. What could have possessed the skippers, traveling back and forth between their home port and Ostia, to finance theatrical performances and then ostentatiously show their wealth to the local population?
(4) On legal and administrative procedures in ports (scripta commercii) see Mataix Ferrándiz 2018.
(5) Loeb, Select Papyri, Letters, 113 (second century AD) (translation A.S. Hunt - C.C. Edgar). Epeiph 1 = June 25, Mesore 1 = July 25.
APPENDIX
If marble inscriptions were indeed placed over the entrances of stationes in the west porticus, then perhaps a fairly recent find may be added. It is a large marble slab (w. 2.40, h. 0.77), fragments of which were reused outside the city.
CORPVS
PISTORVM
LOCVS ADSIGNATVS A PAPIRIO DIONYSIO TVNC PRAEF(ecto) ANN(onae)
DECVRIONVMQVE C[onces or onsen]SVGuild
of the bakers.
The place was allocated by Papirius Dionysius, then Prefect of the Annona,
with the permission (or: with the general consent) of the city council.Marcus Aurelius Papirius Dionysius was Praefectus Annonae at the end of 189 and in 190 AD, and somehow involved with the food shortage at the end of the reign of Commodus. Lidia Paroli has suggested that the inscription belongs to the (unidentified) guild seat of the bakers (Paroli 1993, 159). But this does not explain the surprising leading role in Ostia of the prefect of the food supply in Rome. We should also note that the inscription does not necessarily refer to the bakers in the harbours, referred to as corpus pistorum (EDR072485 from 140 AD; EDR072618 from 249 AD), corpus pistorum coloniae Ostiensium et Portus Utriusque (EDR130129 from the reign of Marcus Aurelius), and corpus pistorum Ostiensium et Portuensium (EDR164848 from around 200 AD). We may be dealing with the guild in Rome. It is conceivable that the bakers of the Urbs were responsible for the flow control of the grain from the warehouses in the harbours to those in Rome, both the grain on the private market and the grain of the free distributions, which they must have processed. A law from 398 AD says: "Moreover, by a similar punishment those persons shall be constrained who have dared to vindicate for themselves, as though by private possession, any supplies from the State storehouses or the small storerooms which are established within the City of Rome and the Port and which are held under the control of the breadmakers (ex his horreis cellulisve, quae intra urbem Romam adque in portu constitutae pistorio iure retinentur)." (Codex Theodosianus 14.15.4; translation Clyde Pharr).
Cf. a marble statue base from 179 AD, reused in the facade of the theatre of Ostia, with the text Ded(icata) IIII Id(us) Maias [[Imp(eratore) Commodo II]] P(ublio) Martio Vero II. Locus acceptus ex auctoritate Flavi Pisonis, pr(aefecti) ann(onae), adsignante Valerio Fusco, proc(uratore) Augg. (EDR075449; AE 1973, 126; Seston 1971, 330-331).