太田述正コラム#15256（2025.10.17）
＜Morris, Marc『The Anglo-Saxons: A History of the Beginnings of England』を読む（その２）＞（2026.1.11公開）

　「・・・The greatest city of all was London, founded soon after Claudius’ invasion to serve as an administrative hub for the newly acquired province. With walls some two miles long and enclosing an area of 330 acres, it was home to a population of perhaps 50,000 people, and its forum＜（注1）＞ was the largest north of the Alps.・・・

　（注1）(古代ローマの)公会広場
https://ejje.weblio.jp/content/forum
　In addition to its standard function as a marketplace, a forum was a gathering place of great social significance, and often the scene of diverse activities, including political discussions and debates, rendezvous, meetings, et cetera. In that case, it supplemented the function of a conciliabulum.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_(Roman)

⇒アルプス以北の、ということは、イタリア半島以外の、に等しい、と、言いたくなるところをぐっと堪えますが、ローマ領の全都市中、ロンドン（ロンドニウム）の公会広場が最も広かった、ということは、人口が最も多かった可能性すら示唆しています。
　それは、いずれにせよ、ローマ領のブリタニアの豊かさを示唆しています。（太田）

　Linking the thirty cities and seventy or so towns was an infrastructure so extensive and impressive that it would not be replicated in Britain for more than a thousand years.・・・

⇒これは、地理的意味での西欧全体についてあてはまるのではないかと思われますが、ローマの道路網は、1000年超、その後の西側世界よりも進んでいた、というわけです。
　このような道路網の整備状況は、同時代の漢のそれをも遥かに上回っていたことでしょう。（太田）

　The population grew to somewhere between 2 million and 6 million, a density that even at the lowest estimate would not be reached again until the time of the Norman Conquest.・・・

⇒漢の人口頂点は１世紀初の6000万人で、支那がこれを再達成するのは北宋時代末の12世紀で、恒久的にクリアするのは実に清時代の18世紀央になってからです。
https://chinastyle.jp/gdpjinkou/
　よって、こういう比較で言えば、４世紀のローマ時代の人口を早くも11世紀には回復することに成功するに至っていた、イギリスのアングロサクソン時代、は、立派なものです。（太田）

　Roman towns and cities, being carefully designed with drains and sewers, had better sanitation than their medieval successors.・・・
　At its maximum in the second century, the number of soldiers stationed in this extensive frontier zone was massive – something like 50,000 men, over ten per cent of the entire imperial army. In the following century these numbers were drastically reduced, falling to around a third of their peak before AD 300. This reduction in military expenditure had knock-on economic effects for Britain as a whole. Across the province towns shrank in size, and their public buildings and monuments fell into disrepair and decay. London in particular was badly hit – its population plummeted and many of its buildings were dismantled.

⇒ブリタニアに全ローマ軍の１割が駐屯していたということは、領内外のブリトン人を含むケルト文化系の人々がいかに軍事に長けていたかを推察させます。
　ただ、それよりも重要なのは、ブリタニアの人口増や経済的繁栄は、５万人に上るローマ駐屯軍の存在とそのソフト面やハード面での兵站を確保する必要性がもたらしたものであった、ということです。
　これまで、口を酸っぱくして言ってきたことですが、およそ、軍事抜きの繁栄などありえないのです。（太田）

　Meanwhile, by the middle of the third century, a new threat had emerged, as raiders from across the sea began attacking and plundering the southern and eastern coasts. They came from Germania, which was the catch-all Roman term for the region of Europe that lay outside the empire, north of the River Rhine and the River Danube, and west of the River Vistula. The particular German people that were raiding Britain were known as Saxons. But in spite of these cutbacks and menaces, peace in Britain was preserved. Though army numbers had been slashed, there was heavy investment in physical defences. Greater sums than ever before were spent on town walls, and a string of new fortresses was constructed along the southern and eastern coasts.」（17、12～15）

⇒ローマは、その後はブリタニア駐在兵力を大幅に減らす一方で、都市や沿岸拠点を要塞化して、サクソン人の襲撃に対処するようになったというのですが、これは、それまでに、内外、就中内、のブリトン人、の馴致化に相当程度成功していたおかげなのかもしれません。（太田）

（続く）