This chapter builds upon a reconstruction of the agricultural landscape of Roman Central Italy where, from the second century and increasingly in the course of the first century BCE, (i) peri-urban areas were developed into small, intensively cultivated and irrigated plots devoted to market gardening and to the supply of urban markets; (ii) more hill slopes were terraced and adapted to cultivation. Based on archaeological and literary evidence, this reconstruction emphasizes how the food production system was increasingly exposed to the risks of erosion, waterlogging and shortage. It is also consistent with the legal texts and, arguably, it helps contextualize two legal mechanisms notably developed at the same period: the servitude to draw water (servitus aquae ducendae) and the action to ward off rainwater (actio aquae pluviae arcendae). However, while this reconstruction of the productive landscape is credible enough for the region around Rome, we may wonder if it is sensible to extrapolate from these results to reconstruct the productive landscape of the provinces. In the last part of this chapter, I will study some examples in Gaul to explore this crucial question for our understanding of the agricultural production and of the diffusion of the Roman law.