Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
October 2000
By the end of the first century B.C., there was a great expansion of international trade involving five contiguous powers: the Roman empire, the Parthian empire, the Kushan empire, the nomadic confederation of the Xiongnu, and the Han empire. Although travel was arduous and knowledge of geography imperfect, numerous contacts were forged as these empires expanded—spreading ideas, beliefs, and customs among heterogeneous peoples—and as valuable goods were moved over long distances through trade, exchange, gift giving, and the payment of tribute. Transport over land was accomplished using river craft and pack animals, notably the sturdy Bactrian camel. Travel by sea depended on the prevailing winds of the Indian Ocean, the monsoons, which blow from the southwest during the summer months and from the northeast in the fall.
A vast network of strategically located trading posts (emporia) enabled the exchange, distribution, and storage of goods. Isodorus of Charax, a Parthian Greek writing around 1 A.D., described various posts and routes in a book entitled Parthian Stations. From the Greco-Roman metropolis of Antioch, routes crossed the Syrian Desert via Palmyra to Ctesiphon (the Parthian capital) and Seleucia on the Tigris River. From there the road led east across the Zagros Mountains to the cities of Ecbatana and Merv, where one branch turned north via Bukhara and Ferghana into Mongolia and the other led into Bactria. The port of Spasinu Charax on the Persian Gulf was a great center of seaborne trade. Goods unloaded there were sent along a network of routes throughout the Parthian empire—up the Tigris to Ctesiphon; up the Euphrates to Dura-Europos; and on through the caravan cities of the Arabian and Syrian Desert. Many of these overland routes ended at ports on the eastern Mediterranean, from which merchandise was distributed to cities throughout the Roman empire.
Other routes through the Arabian desert may have ended at the Nabataean city of Petra, where new caravans traveled on to Gaza and other ports on the Mediterranean, or north to Damascus or east to Parthia. A network of sea routes linked the incense ports of South Arabia and Somalia with ports in the Persian Gulf and India in the east, and also with ports on the Red Sea, from which merchandise was transported overland to the Nile and then to Alexandria.
Citation
Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Trade between the Romans and the Empires of Asia.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/silk/hd_silk.htm (October 2000)
Further Reading
Milleker, Elizabeth J., ed. The Year One: Art of the Ancient World East and West. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000. See on MetPublications
Simpson, St. John, ed. Queen of Sheba: Treasures from Ancient Yemen. London: British Museum Press, 2002.
Whitfield, Susan. Life along the Silk Road. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
Whitfield, Susan, with Ursula Sims-Williams, eds. The Silk Route: Trade, Travel, War and Faith. London: British Library, 2004.
Additional Essays by Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Hittites.” (October 2002)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Halaf Period (6500–5500 B.C.).” (October 2003)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Ubaid Period (5500–4000 B.C.).” (October 2003)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Ur: The Royal Graves.” (October 2003)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Ur: The Ziggurat.” (October 2002)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Uruk: The First City.” (October 2003)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Ebla in the Third Millennium B.C..” (October 2002)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Ugarit.” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Animals in Ancient Near Eastern Art.” (February 2014)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Urartu.” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Parthian Empire (247 B.C.–224 A.D.).” (originally published October 2000, last updated November 2016)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Nabataean Kingdom and Petra.” (October 2000)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Palmyra.” (October 2000)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Art of the First Cities in the Third Millennium B.C..” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Sasanian Empire (224–651 A.D.).” (originally published October 2003, last updated April 2016)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Colossal Temples of the Roman Near East.” (October 2003)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Assyria, 1365–609 B.C..” (originally published October 2004, last revised April 2010)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Lydia and Phrygia.” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Achaemenid Persian Empire (550–330 B.C.).” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Akkadian Period (ca. 2350–2150 B.C.).” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Year One.” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Early Dynastic Sculpture, 2900–2350 B.C..” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Early Excavations in Assyria.” (October 2004; updated August 2021)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Trade Routes between Europe and Asia during Antiquity.” (October 2000)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Phrygia, Gordion, and King Midas in the Late Eighth Century B.C..” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Trade between Arabia and the Empires of Rome and Asia.” (October 2000)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Nahal Mishmar Treasure.” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Phoenicians (1500–300 B.C.).” (October 2004)
- Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “The Seleucid Empire (323–64 B.C.).” (October 2004)
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List of Rulers
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Keywords
- 1st Century A.D.
- 1st Century B.C.
- Africa
- Anatolia and the Caucasus
- Ancient Greek Art
- Ancient Near Eastern Art
- Ancient Roman Art
- Animal
- Arabian Peninsula
- Asia
- Boat
- Camel
- Central and North Asia
- China
- East Asia
- Eastern Africa
- Eastern Mediterranean
- Egypt
- Greek Literature / Poetry
- Han Dynasty
- India
- Iran
- Iraq
- Kushan Period
- Literature / Poetry
- North Africa
- Parthian Art
- South Asia
- Syria
- Trade
- Turkey
- Vehicle
- West Asia