People have have lived in the Camargue for centuries, affecting it with drainage, dikes, rice paddies, other cultivation and salt pans. The Camargue was exploited by the Romans for salt production. In the sixteenth centuries large estates were founded here by merchants from Arles. Throughout these periods the Rhône Delta, drifted, as river deltas do constantly moving the Camargue Island. The Camargue was entirely wild, with free-roaming herds of cattle, sheep and wild horses.