Animal Extinctions caused by the Roman Military

[Ironhand]

I wish there were still aurochs, but only because I want a more authentic drinking horn. :wink:

Sometimes we are a bit too quick to blame people in the past for extinctions, perhaps since most of the time now we usually are to blame. Look how much effort it was to wipe out the buffalo in North America and that was a lot of people purposefully attempting to slaughter them in as wasteful a manner as possible in a relatively limited area. Causing a species to become extinct purposefully in the past is not an easy thing and sometimes we miss the point that other factors can be involved than the wrath of mankind.

[Endre Fodstad]

Tell that to most of the other megafauna of North America (Giant Tylodon, Giant Sloth, Short Faced Bear, Stag-Moose, etc). It is quite likely stone age humans managed to hunt all these to extinction.

[Ironhand]

Really?, I kind of doubt that myself. Personally I have the feeling that people are missing some important information and blaming people is an easy scapescoat rather just saying I'm not really sure. Scientific journals want to see definate results. Tribal cultures are rarely capable of being responsible for massive extinctions like that. Most of the time animal populations far exceed human populations and tribal cultures rarely kill more than necessary. Killing just for the sake of pleasure or trophies is a more civilized trait.

[Endre Fodstad]

Megafauna is a bit of a special case; they are fairly easy for organized humans to kill, even the carnivorious megafauna - when man reached a certain level of organization and tool usage, "the bigger they are, the harder they fall".

Of course it is not one hundred percent guaranteed - but nothing is, once we get back to the prehistoric...which most scientific papers acknowledge, I think.

[Tarbicus]

Getting back on track...

It's become fairly clear to me that pagan Rome didn't exterminate species worldwide. Perhaps in their own vicinity in a couple of cases, but it took centuries before the species itself was wiped out everywhere else (often by Victorian age geezers).

[jkaler48]

Here is a plant, Silpium, that went extinct possibly due to overuse by the Romans:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium

[Viventius]

I think it was sylphium. Seem to remember it's mentioned in one of Lindsey Davis' Falco novels. And Jona mentions it here:
http://www.livius.org/ct-cz/cyrenaica/cyrenaica.html

EDIT: just seen the previous post as well

MARCvSVIBIvSMAvRINvS wrote

I heard also some cooking herbs became extinct due to over use by the Romans, which ones i forgot..

[Antonius Opilio]

They had a segment about animal extinction on the series "Rome Power and the Glory" narrated by Peter Coyote. However, they said the majority of extinctions were caused by capturing animals to be used in Gladitorial games.

[DECIMvS MERCATIvS VARIANvS]

On the other hand though, do you really want lions in Europe? I'd prefer to have to go on safari to see them myself.

Of course. Maybe they'd eat some of the troublemakers.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Well, even trying to re-introduce the beaver to the UK seems to be raising some protest.......some have suggested wolves too!!

Imagine bringing the lions back to the Balkans and Aitolia!! hock: :lol:

[M. Demetrius]

Remember the raccoon thread? Rabbits in Australia? Fire Ants in the US South? Kudzu in the US? English sparrows and Greek rock doves (pigeons)? Say goodbye to your aspen and birch forests if you bring beavers in. They are good at felling trees, and they don't submit to anybody's rules about water supplies, and blocking creeks, etc. No concern for those downstream.

It's never been a good idea yet to introduce a species into a place where it didn't previously exist. The system follows design methods much beyond the shortsightedness usually preceding decisions to do that. One island in the 1700s was infested with rats from ships. When sailors came back a few years later for water, they couldn't land for all the savage rats. So they returned with a batch of cats to kill the rats. Guess what? When they returned a few years later, they were attacked by packs of feral cats.

[Theodosius the Great]

In one of my books there's a map showing where animals were imported from for use in the ampitheatre.

Northern Europe : Wild boars and Aurochs

Britain : Bears and Wolfhounds

Spain : Horses

Greece : Bulls

Mauretania (Morocco) : Wild Ass

North Africa : Rhinoceros and Leopard

Egypt : Camel, Gazelle, Crocodile, and Hippopotamus

Near East : Lion, Tiger, and Wild Ass

In the year 107 AD, about 11,000 animals were slaughtered in Trajan's Games. What disturbs me is that moderns tend to feel more sympathy for the animals than for the people. hock:

~Theo

[Bran ap Maclou]

Hi!

Ironically, a recent directive from the european commision in Brussel says that any species who once existed on a territory of the european union can justify a project of reintroduction.
So, I was laughing the other day with a friend who asked me to be scientific counselor for the reintroduction project of the Atlas lions in the region of Narbonne in southern France. I was laughing but we already have a lot of concerns with the wolves who come back by themselves from Italy and our last 3 brown bears... Anyways, things seem well advanced for the Lynx (european bobcat) in UK and perhaps for wolves in Scotland (good luck guys !). However Some private efforts are also made for Przewalski horse or european buffaloes in Lozére. That's not yet freedom but their number increase well AFAIK.

Anyways, for some species still considering France, It's a bit difficult to say if the romans eliminated them or if the celtic populations did it before the conquest (eventually to sell the animals to romans) some species are also quite mysterious like the leppard or perhaps cheetahs in Spain. Finally some of the last representants of these african fauna in southern Europe todays are Jackals in Greece and Bulgaria and some small animals, Chameleos, Geckos, insects and a few birds like Beecatchers or some egyptian vultures ... Anecdotically some impalas (and wallabys) live freely in the forest of Rambouillet but that's a tolerated accident.

However, romans modified their environment so deeply that some species of big fauna have no chance to survive. One never repeat it enough, we can't protect a species, we must protect its environment. The mediterranean zone in southern France is very narrow, so the installations of latifundias don't give a chance to animals necessiting huge territories and big preys. Same problem in south Africa today though a strong will of animal preservation for farms outside reservations.

About elephants during the punic wars, it seems that they were a dwarven species (originally) from Sicily close to african elephant (not the forest one though). That's a normal phenomenon for animals of big sizes when they are blocked on an Island to reduce their size. You can compare that to the last mammoths blocked on the Islant of Watt in Siberia who decreased to 1m50 from soil to withers and extinguished by themselves only about 3000BC.

To conclude, let's say that romans are perhaps not totally guilty in the disapearing of the great fauna in southern Europe. It began before them (neolithic for the Hyena in France it seems). Yet some animals modified their behaviour, the european beaver, fiercely hunted during a long time only rarely build a dam and some hut though totally protected and in expansion today. Nevertheless, the romans also introduced some species. For southern France, we suspect them for the introduction of a Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) still here today, or a partridge (Alectoris graeca) or even guinea fowl or mehari or camels that we won't see again in France for centuries.

Bye

[Bran ap Maclou]

Oh, I forgot to say that the wild white horse and the wild camarguan fighting bulls we have in the Rhône delta are supposed to have been fitted by romans
(A local legend says that Julius Caesar gave some white horses to former soldiers settled in the delta)

Here in France some people want to protect the blue cornflower, which is a weed. It seems that these flower comes from the eastern mediterranean area. The seeds were probably shipped with some of the first wheat seeds. Some searchers think it's neolithic, some others think it's more recent during greek or roman times.

Also concerning plants, in the region of Bordeaux there's a "wild" tulip which grows spontaneously in some of the most ancient vineyards. Some people from the linnean society of Bordeaux try to protect the last spots and told me that classical botanists think that these flowers have been brought by former roman soldiers from somewhere but no one managed to find this tulip somewhere else at the moment AFAIK.


Bye

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Apparently the beaver was native here once.......so the story has been going.

Also there was a species of pygmy elephant that lived on Cyprus I believe in the distant past too.