Garamantian agriculture and its significance in a wider North African context: The evidence of the plant remains from the Fazzan project

Abstract

The Garamantes, centred on the Wādī al-Ajāl in the Fazzan region of southern Libya, were an increasingly dominant power in the central Sahara from c.900 bc to ad 500. The rise in Garamantian civilisation and prosperity has been attributed to their successful agricultural regime and trade. This article examines the archaeobotanical evidence for the nature of that agricultural regime. Traditionally the Garamantes have tended to be viewed from the perspective of the Roman Empire using the Classical sources. Recent archaeological survey and excavation in northern and southern Fazzan has led to a more Saharan-centred view of the Garamantes. Archaeobotanical remains now suggest that the agricultural history of the region should also be seen from a Saharan-centred perspective. While the crop repertoire was initially inherited from the Mediterranean or Egyptian world, a specialised agricultural regime evolved reflecting the unique position at the centre of a Saharan trade network. This article argues that this agricultural regime involved both the cultivation of a broad range of crops, including sub-Saharan species as a way of adapting to the climatic limitations. In addition, if the evolution of the Wādī al-Ajāl as a node in long distance trans-Saharan trade is also seen as an adaptation towards long term economic survival of the population, then the production of certain crops, particularly cotton and perhaps dates, can also be suggested as characteristics of this specialist agricultural system.