Roman Impact on the Landscape Near Castellum Fectio, the Netherlands
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Veget Hist Archaeobot (2014) 23:277–298 DOI 10.1007/s00334-013-0424-0 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Roman impact on the landscape near castellum Fectio, The Netherlands Valerie van den Bos • Otto Brinkkemper • Ian D. Bull • Stefan Engels • Tom Hakbijl • Mans Schepers • Marieke van Dinter • Guido van Reenen • Bas van Geel Received: 27 June 2013 / Accepted: 6 December 2013 Ó Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013 Abstract Castellum Fectio was one of the largest forti- involved in large-scale deforestation, transforming semi- fications along the Limes, the northern border of the Roman open parkland to a landscape of meadows and agricultural Empire. The castellum, situated 5 km southeast of Utrecht, fields. Non-pollen palynomorphs, botanical macrofossils the Netherlands, was occupied from around the start of our and insect remains support this conclusion. The recorded Era to ca. A.D. 260. It was situated along a river bend of the mycoflora shows a shift from assemblages characterised by Rhine that was cut off from the main stream during the the tree pathogen Kretzschmaria deusta to assemblages occupation of the Roman fort. A 6 m long sediment dominated by spores of fungi associated with herbaceous sequence was recovered from the infill of the residual plants, concurrent with the decrease in arboreal pollen. The channel and pieces of Roman wall plaster, glume bases of presence of masticated bran fragments of cereals, clover Triticum spelta and radiocarbon dates indicate that the remains, eggs of intestinal parasites and entomological and sediments were deposited during the period of Roman geochemical data in the upper part of the sequence indi- occupation. The combined palaeoecological analyses— cates that these sediments largely consist of faeces that palynological, macrobotanical, entomological and geo- were dumped into the former channel. Surprisingly, seeds chemical—allow a detailed reconstruction of changing of salt tolerant species are encountered in the sediments of environmental conditions as a consequence of the Roman this inland site, which was situated outside the influence of occupation. The pollen record reveals a dramatic decrease the sea. Horses may have brought these seeds to Fectio in in arboreal pollen, suggesting that the Romans were their intestinal tracts after grazing in coastal meadows. Keywords Roman impact Á Palaeoecology Á Palynology Á Deforestation Á The Netherlands Communicated by A. E. Bjune. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00334-013-0424-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. V. van den Bos Á S. Engels Á G. van Reenen Á B. van Geel (&) T. Hakbijl Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, University Department of Terrestrial Zoology, Naturalis Biodiversity of Amsterdam, P.O. Box 94248, 1090 GE Amsterdam, Center, Darwinweg 2, 2333 CR Leiden, The Netherlands The Netherlands e-mail: [email protected] M. Schepers Groningen Institute of Archaeology, University of Groningen, O. Brinkkemper Poststraat 6, 9712 ER Groningen, The Netherlands Cultural Heritage Agency, P.O. Box 1600, 3800 BP Amersfoort, The Netherlands M. van Dinter Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan 2, I. D. Bull 3584 CS Utrecht, The Netherlands School of Chemistry, University of Bristol, Cantock’s Close, Clifton, Bristol BS8 1TS, UK 123 278 Veget Hist Archaeobot (2014) 23:277–298 Introduction Human impact on natural vegetation has been demonstrated in pollen diagrams since the 1940s (Behre 1981). The impact can be diverse, including deforestation, effects of grazing, crop cultivation and eutrophication. Kalis et al. (2008) pre- sented an overview of past vegetation developments in the upper part of the Rhine delta in the Netherlands and Germany on the basis of several pollen diagrams with newly calibrated 14C dates. The landscape of this area was dominated by forest up to the end of the Neolithic period. Tree pollen declined at the start of the Bronze Age, slowly at first, but later more drastically. Poaceae, Ericales, Rumex acetosella-type and Plantago lanceolata show a concurrent increase in abun- dance. This change signals the establishment of large open areas (meadows, arable land) and the presence of heathlands on poor sandy soils. This development continued into the Iron Age and in the Kleefse Beek record (Kalis et al. 2008) the abundance of arboreal pollen reached a minimum at around 500 B.C. In most pollen records, the occupation of the Romans cannot be distinguished from the general trend of deforestation during the Iron Age. The end of the Roman period and the onset of the Migration Period can usually be recognized in pollen diagrams from the Netherlands by an increase in arboreal pollen percentages. The region was probably predominantly forested again at around A.D. 500. Fectio (52°3031.6200N, 5°9037.4300E; Fig. 1) was one of the first three military bases built by the Romans in the Netherlands, along with castella at Meinerswijk and Velsen (Polak 2009). The fortifications were built at the start of the first century A.D. and were part of a linear frontier system situated along the Lower Rhine. They were probably intended to create a safe corridor for transport and as protection against Germanic invasions (Polak 2009; van Dinter 2013). This defence system became the Limes, which was the northwest frontier of the Roman Empire, at the end of the first century A.D. (Kooistra 1996; Polak 2009; van Dinter 2013). Fectio was initially built on the southern bank of the Roman Rhine and was probably occupied from Fig. 1 a Map of the Netherlands showing the location of castellum Fectio and other Roman castella. b Location of the coring site. shortly before or around the beginning of the Era until the Natural levee categories (e.g. moderately high) span 30–40 cm end of the third century A.D. (Polak and Wynia 1991; altitude each Zandstra and Polak 2012). The objective of the present study is to assess the impact of the Roman occupation on the vegetation around Fectio Materials and methods and in the Kromme Rijn area. We retrieved a 6 m long sediment record from an in-filled river channel situated Site description and previous research right next to the former castellum (Fig. 1). Based on the analysis of pollen, non-pollen palynomorphs (NPPs), The earliest camp on the location of castellum Fectio was botanical and entomological macrofossils, archaeological built on the outer bank of a large Rhine meander. The finds, moss remains and geochemical analyses we provide northern part of the camp defences disappeared after ero- a detailed reconstruction of the vegetation development sion by the river (Polak and Wynia 1991; Zandstra and and the history of human impact in the region during the Polak 2012). Subsequent building phases of the castellum Roman period. were located further to the south, probably following the 123 Veget Hist Archaeobot (2014) 23:277–298 279 retreat of the river bank. When the large meander was cut Table 1 Lithology of the Fectio core off from the main channel, the river channel adjacent to the Depth (cm) Sediment castellum became a nearly 100 m wide residual channel that started to silt up (van Dinter 2013). This process was 0–110 Reworked clays (discarded) apparently accelerated by the dumping of waste into the 110–185 Oxidized sandy clay residual channel. Pottery shards dated to the start of the 185–345 Organic-rich (‘peaty’) clays, several intercalations of minerogenic clay third century A.D. were found in the upper sediments of the residual channel (Polak and Wynia 1991). This led to 345–375 Clay the conclusion that the channel was completely filled up 375–535 Gyttja, some clay-rich intervals during the course of the Roman occupation, perhaps as 535–673 Silty clay, several sandy bands. Coarse detrital layers below 650 cm early as ca. A.D. 200. The discovery of a Roman ship in the residual channel in A.D. 1893, ca. 100 m northeast of our coring site, shows that the channel was still navigable in the early part of the first century A.D. (Polak 2006). Kooistra 2009). Some plough marks dated to before A.D. 200 All fortifications in the Rhine delta were initially con- were found to the west of castellum Fectio, indicating that structed out of timber and earth (van Dinter 2013) and large farmers were active near the site (Kooistra 1996). Horses quantities of wood were required for their construction. At played an important role in the transport of goods and sol- least seven subsequent forts were built at the site during diers between the different castella along the Limes. Roman occupation (Zandstra and Polak 2012). The outline and size of castellum Fectio in the first and second centu- Fieldwork and lithology ries is unknown, but it may have covered a surface of ca. 4.5 ha. Stone walls were erected in the third century and A sediment core was taken on November 10th 2011 from the fort covered ca. 2.6 ha. Fectio was the largest castellum the infill of the residual channel of the Rhine. The core in the Netherlands and it probably served as a command location was situated ca. 75 m north of the former castel- centre of the Limes segment west of the legionary for- lum wall (youngest phase) and ca. 25 m from the southern tresses at Nijmegen and Xanten. The vicus (civilian set- edge of the former channel (Fig. 1). Approximately 6.7 m tlement) was situated both east and west of the castellum of sediment was recovered (core diameter 6 cm, Table 1). (Hessing et al. 1997) and covered ca. 10 ha during the The top 110 cm was discarded as it consisted of subrecent second century A.D. (Kooistra 1996; van Dinter 2013). overbank deposits and reworked material.