- Kresge Hall 4353
1880 Campus Drive
Northwestern University
Evanston Il 60208-2200
Taco Terpstra
Northwestern University, Classics, Faculty Member
- Northwestern University, History, Faculty Memberadd
- Roman History, Classical Archaeology, Papyrology, Ancient Trade & Commerce (Archaeology), Roman Empire, Roman Economy, and 9 morePort cities, Graeco-Roman Egypt, Roman Archaeology, Ancient economy, Ancient History, Ancient Ports and Harbours, Archaeology, Phoenician Punic Archaeology, and Greek Papyrologyedit
From around 700 BCE until the first centuries CE, the Mediterranean enjoyed steady economic growth through trade, reaching a level not to be regained until the early modern era. This process of growth coincided with a process of state... more
From around 700 BCE until the first centuries CE, the Mediterranean enjoyed steady economic growth through trade, reaching a level not to be regained until the early modern era. This process of growth coincided with a process of state formation, culminating in the largest state the ancient Mediterranean would ever know, the Roman Empire. Subsequent economic decline coincided with state disintegration. How are the two processes related?
In Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean, Taco Terpstra investigates how the organizational structure of trade benefited from state institutions. Although enforcement typically depended on private actors, traders could utilize a public infrastructure, which included not only courts and legal frameworks but also socially cohesive ideologies. Terpstra details how business practices emerged that were based on private order, yet took advantage of public institutions.
Focusing on the activity of both private and public economic actors—from Greek city councilors and Ptolemaic officials to long-distance traders and Roman magistrates and financiers—Terpstra illuminates the complex relationship between economic development and state structures in the ancient Mediterranean.
In Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean, Taco Terpstra investigates how the organizational structure of trade benefited from state institutions. Although enforcement typically depended on private actors, traders could utilize a public infrastructure, which included not only courts and legal frameworks but also socially cohesive ideologies. Terpstra details how business practices emerged that were based on private order, yet took advantage of public institutions.
Focusing on the activity of both private and public economic actors—from Greek city councilors and Ptolemaic officials to long-distance traders and Roman magistrates and financiers—Terpstra illuminates the complex relationship between economic development and state structures in the ancient Mediterranean.
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The Roman Empire experienced both extensive and intensive economic growth. This article first surveys the role of technology in that process, engaging with recent literature on intensive growth under Malthusian constraints. It goes on to... more
The Roman Empire experienced both extensive and intensive economic growth. This article first surveys the role of technology in that process, engaging with recent literature on intensive growth under Malthusian constraints. It goes on to investigate the difference in technological progress between the Roman Empire and medieval Europe. It argues that political fragmentation explains why medieval Europe was more innovative than the Roman world, invoking a comparison with imperial China to complement the analysis. The technological success of China under the Tang and Song shows that political fragmentation is not a precondition for progress. However, Roman emperors never invested in the practical application of useful knowledge, the way Chinese rulers did.
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Introduction to Portrait of a Child: Historical and Scientific Studies of a Roman Egyptian Mummy, Essi Rönkkö, Taco Terpstra, and Marc Walton eds. (Evanston: Block Museum 2019)
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Chapter in Portrait of a Child: Historical and Scientific Studies of a Roman Egyptian Mummy, Essi Rönkkö, Taco Terpstra, and Marc Walton eds. (Evanston: Block Museum 2019)
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Neo-Institutionalism has had a deep impact on the economic study of antiquity, to the point where it has become the de facto scholarly default. But although it has been beneficial to analyses of discrete ancient economies it has yet to be... more
Neo-Institutionalism has had a deep impact on the economic study of antiquity, to the point where it has become the de facto scholarly default. But although it has been beneficial to analyses of discrete ancient economies it has yet to be employed to study the overall economic performance of the Greco-Roman world. The ancient Mediterranean seems to have experienced long-term trends of growth and contraction that transcended traditional chronologies, as suggested by archaeological data. Those data increasingly point to the need for an encompassing economic narrative. Neo-Institutionalism holds the promise of facilitating such a narrative, while avoiding the formalist/substantivist debate of the previous decades. A Neo-Institutional research agenda will allow scholarship to approach the question of what produced both the success and failure of the economies of the ancient world in the aggregate.
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The third and final excavation season at Stabiae of the Advanced Program of Ancient History and Art (APAHA) in 2014 intended to reach a better understanding of the architectural development of the Villa San Marco. To that end, two... more
The third and final excavation season at Stabiae of the Advanced Program of Ancient History and Art (APAHA) in 2014 intended to reach a better understanding of the architectural development of the Villa San Marco. To that end, two trenches were excavated. The first was located in a small, enclosed garden (viridarium) close to the atrium, suggested to be the Villa’s original core. This room is one of only a handful where two different architectural alignments meet (that of the Villa’s main part and that of its bathing complex) and where it is possible to excavate without removing mosaic flooring. In the adjacent architecture, signs of restructuring are visible, suggesting alterations to the arrangement of rooms. Those alterations notwithstanding, the results of the excavations showed that little rebuilding had occurred in this part of the Villa, except for a change to a system of drains related to a wall alteration. The second trench was located just north of the threshold of the Villa’s tablinum, where the threshold connects two sections of the Villa that have a different socioeconomic character: an undecorated working sector to the north and a decorated domestic sector to the south. Here as well the trench promised to be rewarding for investigations into architectural development. Together with the atrium, the tablinum is thought to have belonged to the Villa’s original construction. A surprise in this trench was that the tablinum foundation did not show signs of Republican-era construction. Another surprise was the discovery of a wide and deep wall, either the outside face of a large, out-of use cistern or the foundation for a demolished loadbearing wall.
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The third and final excavation season at Stabiae of the Advanced Program of Ancient History and Art (APAHA) in 2014 intended to reach a better understanding of the architectural development of the Villa San Marco. To that end, two... more
The third and final excavation season at Stabiae of the Advanced Program of Ancient History and Art (APAHA) in 2014 intended to reach a better understanding of the architectural development of the Villa San Marco. To that end, two trenches were excavated. The first was located in a small, enclosed garden (viridarium) close to the atrium, suggested to be the Vil-la's original core. This room is one of only a handful where two different architectural alignments meet (that of the Villa's main part and that of its bathing complex) and where it is possible to excavate without removing mosaic flooring. In the adjacent architecture, signs of restructuring are visible, suggesting alterations to the arrangement of rooms. Those alterations notwithstanding, the results of the excavations showed that little rebuilding had occurred in this part of the Villa, except for a change to a system of drains related to a wall alteration. The second trench was located just north of the threshold of the Villa's tablinum, where the threshold connects two sections of the Villa that have a different socioeconomic character: an undecorated working sector to the north and a decorated domestic sector to the south. Here as well the trench promised to be rewarding for investigations into architectural development. Together with the atrium, the tablinum is thought to have belonged to the Villa's original construction. A surprise in this trench was that the tablinum foundation did not show signs of Republican-era construction. Another surprise was the discovery of a wide and deep wall, either the outside face of a large, out-of use cistern or the foundation for a demolished loadbearing wall.
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In the summer of 2012, Columbia University, in collaboration with H2CU (Centro Interuniversitario per la Formazione Internazionale) followed up on its successful 2011 pilot season in ancient Stabiae as part of the “Advanced Program of... more
In the summer of 2012, Columbia University, in collaboration with H2CU (Centro Interuniversitario per la Formazione Internazionale) followed up on its successful 2011 pilot season in ancient Stabiae as part of the “Advanced Program of Ancient History and Art” (APAHA). The Program performs stratigraphic excavations in the Villa San Marco, one of the largest and most opulent villas in Campania, investigating both the Villa as a Roman elite structure and the pre-79 AD history of the site. The goal of the excavations is to give a full archaeological account of the stratigraphy from the eruption layers of Mt Vesuvius down to virgin soil. Building on the results from the previous year, the 2012 campaign had two main research goals: investigating the Villa’s system of water-supply and drainage, and clarifying the Villa’s relationship with the road that marks its northern limit. The results were on the one hand the discovery of a work area in the northern sector of the Villa, and on the other the clarification of the temporal relationship between the Villa and the road and a better understanding of the history of the road itself.