There has been scholarly debate about some of the units of measurement within his Wars, and this had led some people to doubt the reliability of Procopius. The first part of the paper is concerned with Procopius’ account of the battle of Dara. Study of the landscape provides a different, complementary perspective which is in some ways more reliable, as the physical features have not changed too significantly over the centuries, and modern technology has opened up new ways of reading them. The traditional approach to this history has been to use written sources only, but, as will be shown, these are subject to multiple interpretations. 'This paper examines Procopius’ descriptions of Roman, Persian and Gothic strategies to control Dara in 530 and Rome in 537-8 by reconciling texts with the landscapes of the areas concerned drawing on satellite imagery, cartography and field visits. The years 200–500 comprise major shifts in the power structure of the Roman Empire and the rise of new driving forces which transform Rome’s spatial configuration and the physical and mental limits between centre and periphery.

This marks the end of the period under investigation in this article. However, after 500 this flourishing is concentrated in only two areas: the Lateran and Vatican, probably due to the huge loss in city population at that time.

The following three centuries present a flourishing periphery all around Rome. The defined period begins with the Severan dynasty’s monumentalization of the area between Porta Esquilina and Porta Maggiore around 200. The main focus of thisinvestigation will be on areas and situations contextually related to the Via Tiburtina, mainly from the Clivus Suburanus inside the Porta Esquilina to and somewhat beyond the Aurelian Wall. Our thesis is that the periphery in this period obtained a new meaning and gradually began to surpass the centre in importance, and that this displacement of activity-nodes and movement created decisive prerequisites for the polycentric structure which was to dominate the urban development of Rome up to the nineteenth century. This study concerns the urban periphery of Rome in the period 200 to 500 AD.

The City Moated and Walled by W. Todd