Lixus
About
Salting tanks here could hold more than a million liters of fish at once, making Lixus the largest garum producer anywhere in the western Mediterranean. The factories sat inside the lower town gate, within sight of an amphitheatre and bathhouse the fish-salters' profits helped pay for. Production peaked under Claudius and was still running strong when Trajan died in 117 CE.
What happened here
Rows of stone vats sunk into the ground beside the sea, and the smell reaches a long way inland. Small fish and the guts of larger ones are layered with salt and left in the sun for weeks; the liquid that separates off is drawn away as fish sauce and the residue is sold cheaply as paste. Grades run from a luxury sauce that costs more than good wine down to the version bought by everyone else. Tunny is netted in season from lookout towers on the headland, and the fishing, salting, potting and shipping all happen within a few hundred metres. Amphorae are stamped with the maker's name. Towns built on this are rich, and they are built downwind of themselves.
In ancient writing
- Strabo, Geography 17.3.2-3
Strabo describes Lixus as a Mauretanian town on the Atlantic coast opposite Gades, linking it to the legendary Garden of the Hesperides and the palace of Antaeus.
Sources
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →