The location of the colony of Arles at the head of the Rhône delta corresponds to a major geopolitical fact : the important role played by the Rhône in the Roman era.
The territory near the city is subject to a major hydrologic pressure whose variability has become the object of study based on current concepts of fluvial geomorphology.
Historians have believed that in the Roman era the extension of Arles to the east was in compensation for the aridity of the territory.
An integrated study of written, archaeological, and environmental sources bearing on the lower plain of the Rhône in the Roman era permits us to reconsider an ancient conception concerning the relation that the city had with the river and the deltic environment
