Lecture: Ecology year 0. By Jordi Catalán (CSIC) and Enric Cahner (Badalona City Council).

Although we cannot speak, in Roman times, of an ecological consciousness, a way of thinking was created in relation to the fact that, for the first time, it was humanity that dominated nature and put it at its service.

The Romans were the first to intensively exploit all their natural resources: forests, mines, quarries and seas. But they were also aware that the gods had dominion over nature, and therefore misuse could make them angry and turn against them, so they respected it minimally. A bad harvest, a plague of locusts… could leave a large part of the population without food, and this led to poverty and disease.

Thanks to this two biologist we will be able to learn what climatology and the marine ecosystem were like in Roman times. If it was very different from what we know, or to what extent the Romans dominated and exploited its main resources.

On occasion of the XVIII Magna Celebratio, the roman festival of Badalona.