Ismarus e gli altri. Nascita ed evoluzione di un sistema produttivo

From the early decades of the first century AD, the development of urbanistic policies linked to the Empire’s ideology rapidly increased the demand for bricks and tiles in Rome. In order to cope with this demand, which constituted a considerable profit prospect for the investors of the time, a production system which had been developed for the mass production of transport amphorae within the agricultural estates was resorted. The differences between the two modes of production will become more and more evident in time and are mostly related to the workers’ organization system. The life of Ismarus, who worked in the figlinae owned first by Cn. Domitius Afer and later by his sons Lucanus and Tullus, takes place at the very beginning of this process and almost constitutes a paradigm of the transformations which will characterize it