The Rhine as transport axis. Markets and transports of raw materials and goods in the context of Rhenish river ports during the 1st Millennium AD.

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For more than two thousand years, the Rhine has been one of the most navigated European waterways. Since the time of the Roman Empire, many goods from all over the world have been transported to Central Europe and raw materials extracted there as well as products of the region have been exported. Many of the Roman port facilities built for goods exchange have been insufficiently researched so far. In the scope of a joint project of Bonn University, of the LVR (Rhineland Regional Council)-office for archaeological monument conservation in the Rhineland, of the LVR (Rhineland Regional Council) -State Museum Bonn, the LVR-Archaeological Heritage Site and Museum Xanten, the museum Burg Linn in Krefeld and the Roman-Germanic Museum of the City of Cologne selected facilities are therefore examined by means of natural scientific and archaeological methods. The objective is, on the one hand, to determine the exact type and construction of the port facilities as well as the effects of ecological factors on their usability. On the other hand, the economic interrelations in the surrounding area of the ports are examined on the example of selected particularly significant types of goods. In addition, the long period of usage of many port locations on the Rhine, some beyond the middle ages, allows examination of the consequences of economic, social and cultural changes at the transition period between the classical era and the high middle ages for the Rhine trade.