Romanization of Hispania: Society, Economy, and Culture
Romanization of Hispania
Society
During the second century AD, the population of Hispania is estimated to have been between three and a half and five million people. This population was composed of a conglomeration of social groups differentiated by their degree of wealth, rights, and participation in public affairs. It was a slave-based society. During the Late Empire, a transition to the colonato regime began because of the scarcity of slaves and the decay of the city as the unit of production and consumption.
We can distinguish different social groups:
- At the top was the senatorial order, formed by individuals of the Roman general, turned into large landowners who monopolized control of officials from provincial and local governments. They were Romans.
- Next in importance was the equestrian order, which controlled part of the military, civil service, and religious orders. It comprised a cluster of small owners who participated in municipal life.
Both “groups” belonged to the category of cives Romani (Roman citizens), characterized by having full political rights, including access to tribunals and public offices. They were, in turn, honestiores.
- The populus, or commoners, consisted of a cluster of small proprietors, artisans, and freedmen. They were free citizens but had no political rights. Humiliores.
- At the base of society were slaves, a large group of fundamental economic importance. One could become a slave by conquest, award, purchase, or inheritance. Slaves lacked personal autonomy and could not constitute a family or own property. From the second century AD, their status tended to be economically and legally equated to that of the freedmen.
Latinization
Latinization was a slow and gradual but irreversible phenomenon. Latin was the language of administration and government. There was resistance from the Iberian and Celtic languages, but the adoption of Latin was complete because writing was introduced late in their own alphabets. Knowing Latin was a prerequisite for access to the status of a Roman citizen. Mountain communities or poorer areas took refuge in their tongues and kept them longer, but without developing a literate culture, such as the Basque.
Roman Law
Another important aspect was the acquisition of Roman law, one of the greatest creations of the Roman people. For a long time, the Romans were governed by legal provisions inspired by custom, which were later codified and written, thus becoming well-publicized. Roman law, as opposed to the collectivism of pre-Roman peoples, claimed individual rights and individual property. It did not disappear with the political power of Rome; it was accepted and assimilated in the Middle Ages by the barbarians and is today the core of Western law.
Religion
Although Roman religion spread throughout Hispania, including the official worship of Rome and the emperor, native cults of the pre-Roman period survived. We also found abundant expressions of Eastern cults, such as Isis or Mithras. Later came Christianity, which spread noticeably across the peninsula from the third century AD. At that time, Christian communities were found more or less structured in the peninsula. After state repression, the Edict of Milan, issued by Constantine, established the freedom of the Church and its legal capacity to own property, starting a period of growing influence supported by economic growth and the number of faithful. With Theodosius, Christianity became the official religion of the state, and the parallel state-church began to unfold.
Examples of Romanization
Examples of Romanization, the degree of assimilation, and integration into the Roman world can be seen in figures who have excelled in all fields: Hispanics such as emperors Hadrian and Trajan, the rhetorician and philosopher Seneca, the poet Lucan, the agronomist Columella, the satirist Martial, the poet Quintilian, and the geographer Pomponius Mela.
Apart from our language and many roots of our culture and way of life, we keep in our country many Roman remnants. We can contemplate them not only in museums and cultural centers but also on the ground, spread across our country. Countless bridges, one of the most significant at Alcántara, driveways roaming the Peninsula, are the basis of many existing roads. Many cities from Roman times retain not only the name but also the remains of walls, aqueducts, temples, thermal baths, and other buildings.
Economic Activities
At first, Rome considered Hispania a quarry for metals, agricultural products, and slaves. With the final settlement on the peninsula, the exploitation of resources diversified.
Hispania stood out in the field of agriculture for the cultivation of wheat, vines, and olive trees, and for sheep livestock. Crops were located mainly in the regions incorporated in early Rome, such as Andalusia, where large landed estates, or villas, were developed and worked by slave labor. Another highly developed dry farming, especially in the region of Cartagena, was esparto. Along with rainfed agriculture, there was also irrigation, as in the region of Sagunto, Murcia, and Almería, for the cultivation of flax and vegetables. In the less fertile areas for agricultural production, cattle were developed. In the plateau of the Duero, the breeding of sheep gave birth to the manufacture of wool, and the same happened in Andalusia. To the wool of the Guadalquivir valley was added that of cattle.
Fishing was also important, especially the salted fish industry on the Andalusian coast.
Rome encouraged mining with slave labor. The main extractions were gold (Sierra Morena and the northwest), silver (Cartagena), copper (Rio Tinto), lead (Cantabria), tin (northern Galicia and Portugal), and cinnabar (Almadén). In all cases, the massive use of slave labor secured the removal of large quantities of ore.
Craft production took place in small workshops: ceramics, metalwork, glass, and mosaics.
Slaves were the inhabitants of the indigenous towns who, having been occupied by the Romans, had revolted against them. Senior officials sold them to merchants, and they were sent to the slave markets.
Hispania’s economy was plunged into a market that covered the entire Mediterranean area. From Hispania, wine, metals, and oil were exported, and manufactured items and luxury goods were imported. Besides, currency began circulating in virtually all the territory.