Ancient Romans relied on the timber trade even over long distances, according to a study published on 4 December 2019 in the journal PLOS ONE (authors: Mauro Bernabei and colleagues from the National Research Council).

Analysing the demand for timber and the vastly different quality requirements in ancient Rome is quite complex today. The requirements included, for example, various tree species from different regions of the empire, which were used for equally diverse purposes such as construction, shipbuilding, and heating. Unfortunately, understanding the timber trade in ancient Rome is relatively difficult because few timber elements (components) from that era have survived that could be used for precise analysis. In the aforementioned study, M. Bernabei has very successfully selected, dated, and identified excellently (it must be said - unusually well) preserved timber samples from the time of the ancient Roman Empire.