The film starts with an excellent battle scene as the Emperor Marcus Aurelius attacks the German tribes in his drive towards the Odra and then the Wisla. What is fairly clear is that Marcus Aurelius, having failed to suppress the Sarmatian war and trade machine on the Danube, then tried a 'left hook' through Germany in order to reach the Baltic coasts which he could then control. Worthy objectives for any Roman emperor with a Sarmacki problem. Just as today British troops campaign at the behest of their own and western governments to capture and control the rebel-held diamond fields of Sierra Leone, so did Marcus Aurelius endeavor to control his similar problem in a similar way then. Sarmatian control of the bursztyn business is well documented and entirely logical.
Much mention is made of it.
Much less mention is made, if any, of the Phoenician presence in the same trade. That the Phoenicians were every bit as important in the trade of this vital material that essentially underwrote transactions in the equally vital tin or kassiterite trade is very clear. Roman industry disliked being held to ransom by Sarmatians and Phoenicians with their kassiterite and bursztyn as much as we dislike being held to ransom in matters of oil and petrodollars. That the Phoenicians traded Baltic bursztyn or succinite through west Danish ports seems well proven, and the reason for it supportingly sensible. Such a relationship, if proven, would shed a new light on the story of Romano-Sarmatian military legacies in Britain and the Arturian legends that spring from that.