Meninx is now one of the best-studied port cities on the entire southern coast of the Mediterranean, thanks to multiple recent archaeological projects, the latest of which is published here by a Tunisian and German team. This work is important because while large port cities such as Carthage, Alexandria, and Lepcis Magna have been relatively well examined, the more numerous small- and mid-sized ports have been less frequently investigated. The abandonment of Meninx in late antiquity and lack of subsequent resettlement have presented archaeologists with the chance to redress the balance of information on mid-sized ports by focusing on chronological questions, the social and economic uses of imported goods, trade and export activities, expressions of imperial ideology, and more. These important issues are thoughtfully addressed in this report, which consists of 40 chapters in one volume, a separately bound booklet with plans, and an online database, “The Meninx Archaeological Project” (https://field.idai.world/project/meninx-project) documenting the results in impressive detail.

The Meninx Archaeological Project’s initial investigations consisted of an extensive magnetometer survey over an approximately 12 ha area (8–11, 23–27). The survey revealed a surprising and distinctive quasi-­orthogonal urban layout (fig. 1). It was organized around long main avenues whose orientation varied from about 35° to 55°, roughly parallel to the coastline. Cross-streets ran perpendicular to these avenues but, again, were not all oriented at the same angle and formed insulae of different shapes and sizes. The investigators argue that such a layout was conditioned by the city’s relationship to the sea (27). They observe that it is not common in North Africa, or elsewhere in the ancient Mediterranean, and deserves highlighting as an important new discovery.

With the city’s layout grasped, the project turned to an investigation of the occupation history of the site, conducting several excavations at the forum, macellum, basilica, baths, public cisterns, and two houses. The results clearly identified the earliest settlement as dating from the mid fourth century BCE and largely confirmed previous research indicating that the city had been abandoned by the end of the seventh century CE. More than simply substantiating earlier results, they offer new findings and occasional contradictions.

A striking new discovery came from three underwater trenches in the vicinity of the ancient port. Meninx was known in antiquity for its shoals (see the story of Roman ships running aground while conducting a raid during the First Punic War and escaping only after throwing their heavy cargo overboard: Polybius 1.39). The team noticed that due to these extensive shallows, large ships could have approached the city only via a channel 6 m deep and 50 m wide that ran parallel to the coastline at a distance of about 350 m from the shore. Two trenches placed in the channel revealed many artifacts in a complete or near-complete state, presumably lost as ships had anchored and transferred objects to smaller vessels (327–35; online database: Trench 10; Trench 11). Fragments of the sides of two ships that had wrecked in the channel were examined with radiocarbon analysis; the earlier dated to 50 BCE–50 CE (168–70), the later to the 17th–20th centuries. Another trench was placed alongside a hitherto unknown ancient jetty, now submerged offshore approximately between the macellum and the horrea (see fig. 1). Its outer, L-shaped end extended nearly as far as the deep channel and provided a docking platform in deeper water for vessels loading and unloading cargo. This jetty was in use during the second and third centuries CE. It was perhaps abandoned due to changes it had caused in the coastal environment, even as shipping continued via the deep channel for a further 300 to 400 years (334, online database: Trench 12).

It is also worth noting that other excavations revealed several new examples of Roman marble statuary. Six statues were found below a rubble layer of the fourth century CE in a round pool at the forum baths: a peplophoros, an enthroned Jupiter, a nymph, the torso of a nude male, and both a male and a female robed statue. These statues may have been initially carved in the second half of the second century and were deliberately buried after the baths had gone out of use. Their context, therefore, offers evidence for at least part of the original decoration of a bath building. A marble bust of Antoninus Pius was found in a late destruction layer in the forum. While it may derive from a different monument, its carving suggests that it was originally designed for a niche.

In a short book review, it is impossible to mention each of the 40 chapters and 39 contributors in this multifaceted field report, so I have chosen to highlight above the significance of only a few areas. Readers may of course wish to examine in detail other areas that might interest them, such as ceramics, glass cups, metalworking, wall painting, mosaics, baths, cisterns, quarries, and a building tentatively interpreted as a sanctuary of Isis.

The online database contains records of nearly 1,000 stratigraphic units and more than 10,000 artifacts and ecofacts. I found its descriptions and ­images—many more than would normally be present in a print ­publication—particularly useful as I sought to understand the trenches, quarry investigations, and finds. The organization and navigation are well conceived, and most records contained the detail necessary to answer my questions. Some images loaded slowly, but this was a minor price to pay for the volume of information available.

One aspect of the database caught my attention: faunal remains constitute 44% of its records. They tell a compelling story. Meninx was famous in antiquity as the source of the best purple-dyed garments in Africa (Plin., HN 9.60). Massive deposits of mollusk remains had been well studied in earlier reports, confirming the evidence from textual sources. There was little information on sheepherding, and the extensive record of animal bones collected by the project yields new insight into the city’s economy.

Zooarchaeologists Simon Trixl and Joris Peters determined that there was a sheep-to-goat ratio of about 5:1 (345). They used the logarithmic size index method to identify the animals’ sex, which during the first to fifth centuries CE was predominantly male. Both of these indicators are consistent with a herding strategy aimed at the production of high-quality wool. In addition, the absence of younger animals suggests that breeding and lambing took place in the wider hinterland rather than at Meninx. The sex ratio of adult sheep in the sixth and seventh centuries shifts toward females, however, suggesting that the purple-dying industry had diminished and that flocks were now managed to produce more milk and meat (349). Such conclusions fit the broader patterns of intense economic exchange in the first to fifth centuries and then a decline in the Byzantine era that has been offered by the excavations results, and already noted in the important earlier work on Meninx.

In summary, this field report is exemplary for presenting very well the combination of geophysical and excavation results that the Meninx Archaeological Project achieved, and it is equally notable for its appearance only a short time after the completion of fieldwork in 2019. As a new project at Meninx gets set to start later this year, one can hope that it will improve our knowledge about what is becoming one of the most extensively studied ports in the Mediterranean.