The civitates of Roman Britain developed at varying speeds and in different ways according to the impact of the Roman presence on their social systems. Despite these variations in the pattern of development there is a series of characteristics which typifies the British civitates to the early third century - through the period often seen as the Golden Age of the Empire. These characteristics define the nature of the whole province, but are most conveniently examined by taking separately the evidence of the towns, the countryside and the flows of goods between them.

This chapter serves as an introduction for what follows by placing the volume’s approach into the wider context of the past and current study of central Italic architecture. It points out some of the issues that underlie and join the subsequent analyses, including why so many major building projects were undertaken in Etruria, Rome, and Latium in this period, who and what was moving to create them, and how the results blur the boundaries of what has traditionally been considered ‘Roman’. Fundamentally, it argues not only for the value of central Italic architecture as a source for regional social and economic histories, but also for its potential contribution to the study of ancient architecture as a whole.