Economic Structures of Antiquity Recent Titles in Contributions in Economics and Economic History Development versus Stagnation: Technological Continuity and Agricultural Progress in Pre-Modern China Gang Deng Commodity Chains and Global Capitalism Gary Gerejfi and Miguel E. Korzeniewcz, editors Global Telecommunications Policies: The Challenge of Change Meheroo Jussawalla, editor The State and Capitalism in Israel Amir Ben-Porat The Economy of Iraq: Oil, Wars, Destruction of Development and Prospects, 1950-2010 Abbas Alnasrawi The Economy in the Reagan Years: The Economic Consequences of the Reagan Administrations Anthony S. Campagna Prelude to Trade Wars: American Tariff Policy, 1890-1922 Edward S. Kaplan and Thomas W. Ryley Projecting Capitalism: A History of the Internationalization of the Construction Industry Marc hinder Recent Industrialization Experience of Turkey in a Global Context Fikret §enses, editor The Chinese Financial System Cecil R. Dipchand, Zhang Yichun, and Ma Mingjia The Sports Stadium as a Municipal Investment Dean V. Bairn Food and Agrarian Orders in the World-Economy Philip McMichael Economic Structures of Antiquity Morris Silver Contributions in Economics and Economic History, Number 159 George Schwab, Series Adviser Greenwood Press Westport, Connecticut • London Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Silver, Morris. Economic structures of antiquity / Morris Silver. p. cm. — (Contributions in economics and economic history, ISSN 0084-9235 ; no. 159) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-313-29380-5 (alk. paper) 1. Economic history—To 500. I. Title. II. Series. HC31.S555 1995 330.9'09'01—dc20 94-17306 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 1995 by Morris Silver All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 94-17306 ISBN: 0-313-29380-5 ISSN: 0084-9235 First published in 1995 Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. Printed in the United States of America The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48-1984). 10 987654321 To my wife Sandy, who made everything possible This page intentionally left blank Contents Acknowledgments xi Author's Notes xiii Transcriptions and Phonetics xiii Symbols xv Abbreviations xv References xvi Chronological Table xvii Introduction xxi Part I Structural Characteristics of the Ancient Economy 1 1. Gods as Inputs and Outputs of the Ancient Economy 3 A. The Contribution of Gods to Economic Growth 3 B. Syncretism as an Investment in Trust 7 C. Oaths and the Gods 10 D. The Contribution of Temples to Economic Growth 18 E. Contribution of Economic Growth to the Gods: An Application of Behavioral Economics 34 viii Contents 2. Adaptations of Markets and Hierarchical Relationships to Transaction Costs 39 A. Symbolic Action and Recitation in the Contractual Process 39 B. Code of the Merchant: Investment in Name Capital 42 C. An Alternative Interpretation of "Gift Trade" 45 D. Importance of Family Firms 50 E. Family Ties and Innovation 53 F. Women as Businesspersons and Entrepreneurs 54 G. Employment of Slaves and Adoptees 64 H. Size of Firm and Versatility of Firm 66 3. Who Were the Entrepreneurs? The Problem of "Public" Enterprise 73 4. Commercial Transport, Gains from Trade, Storage, and Diffusion of New Technology 81 A. Land Transport 82 B. Water Transport 85 C. Storage and Monopoly Power 88 D. Diffusion of Technology 91 Part II Markets in Antiquity: The Challenge of the Evidence 95 5. The Existence of Markets 97 6. The Credibility of Markets 153 Part III The Response to Changes in Economic Incentives and Public Policy 179 7. New Markets and Land Consolidation 181 A. Sumer 182 B. Archaic Greece 184 C. Babylonia 189 Contents ix 8. Changes in Economic Policy and Organization 195 9. Concluding Remarks 201 Selected Bibliography 205 Index 243 This page intentionally left blank Acknowledgments For their patient assistance in the development of this project, I owe a deep debt of gratitude to numerous scholars. Special thanks are due to Michael Astour, J.A. Brinkman, Mark E. Cohen, Chris J. Eyre, Thomas Figueira, Benjamin Fos­ ter, Louis Heller, K.D. Irani, Benjamin J. Klebaner, J.R. Kraus, Niels Peter Lemche, Donald Norman Levin, Baruch Levine, E. Lipinski, David Lorton, Donald N. McCloskey, Douglass C. North, Marvin A. Powell, Erica Reiner, Noel Robertson, Chester G. Starr, Piotr Steinkeller, Jacob Stern, Gordon Tul- lock, and Norman Yoffee. I owe special thanks to Stanley Friedlander and to George Schwab for including this work in the series Contributions in Economics and Economic History. My research was greatly facilitated by a grant from a fund created by the will of Harry Schwager, a distinguished alumnus of the City College of New York, class of 1911. The Schwager Fund also provided a grant for support of type­ setting costs. I also wish to express my gratitude to the City College of New York for a Fellowship Award leave that enabled me to complete this volume. This page intentionally left blank Author's Notes TRANSCRIPTIONS AND PHONETICS General Notes Certain conventions have been accepted for representing ancient languages in romanized script. For example, Sumerian words are indicated in Roman type with a widening of the spaces between letters. There are, more importantly, conventions for representing the signs for phonetic values, distinguishing (usu­ ally by means of subscript numbers) among signs with the same phonetic value, representing word signs (logograms), and representing unpronounced phonetic or semantic indicators (determinatives). These conventions permit specialists in ancient languages to restore the original signs from transliterations and to be alerted to uncertainties concerning their value. These conventions will not be observed in this book because it has been written by a professional economist for a wide audience consisting of all those (including nonspecialists in ancient languages) who are fascinated by ancient economies. All foreign words, with only a handful of exceptions, are transcribed in italic type, in the lower case, on the line, and with normal spacing between the letters. The use of brackets within quotations indicates that the transcription is my own, not that of the cited authority. Proper names are not italicized and are usually transcribed without diacritics. Notes on Individual Languages 1. Greek (Alphabetic). The transcription of Greek letters is standard. Eta, long e, and omega, long o, are written with the circumflex. Upsilon is written XIV Author's Notes as y or as u when it follows alpha, eta, or omicron. The transcription of Greek words is according to the ancient orthography; individual letters are not accented and no attempt is made to reproduce the ancient pronunciation of words. Many of the familiar names are given in their Latin form. Less-known names are transliterated from the Greek. 2. Mycenaean Greek (Linear B). Transliterations of Linear B words employ dashes to divide one group of letters representing one syllabic sign from another. Normalized transcriptions are not sign-by-sign transliterations and are not writ­ ten with dashes. 3. Egyptian. The Egyptian system of writing was a consonontal script; as in old Semitic languages such as Ugaritic, Hebrew, Phoenician, and Arabic, the vowels of the words were not written. Personal and place names are written in this book in their familiar vocalized form. As an aid in the pronunciation of Egyptian words, I have (following a conventional procedure) mechanically in­ tercalated an e between consonants except when a 3 (double aleph) or a e (ayin), which may be read a, are present. (There does seem to be a correspondence between Egyptian 3 and Semitic r.) Note also that / and r are interchangeable in ancient Egyptian. 4. Sumerian. Sumerian words have been transcribed without diacritics. 5. Semitic Languages. Personal and place names are written in their familiar vocalized form. Transliterations of vowel signs are retained when provided in my sources. The macron or the circumflex are placed over a vowel to show that it is long. The breve is placed over a vowel to show that it is short. In a few instances the value of the vowel is indicated by raising it over the line. Vocalization is not supplied for words given in my sources in an unvocalized form. 6. Near Eastern Languages. The following table shows the standard dia­ critical marks for consonants and how each is transcribed in this book. Standard Diacritical Mark Nontechnical Transcription ' aleph; smooth breathing or glottal stop Not rendered at the beginning or end of a word; otherwise ' e ayin; rough breathing Semitic: e ; Egyptian: a 3 Egyptian vulture or double aleph a \ Egyptian semivowel or vowel indica- a tor d Egyptian dj g Egyptian g h Semitic rough h ch [(c)h at beginning of word] h Egyptian intensified h h h Semitic hard h ch [(c)h at beginning of word] h Egyptian kh [(k)h at beginning of word] Author's Notes xv h Egyptian kh [(k)h at beginning of word] k Egyptian like q in queen k s s s sh\ ssh for double occurrence s emphatic s ts [(t)s at beginning of word] ( emphatic t t t Egyptian tj SYMBOLS Translations enclosed in brackets—[ ]—are restorations by the translator of material that is obliterated in the original or an explanatory comment by the present author. Translations enclosed in parentheses—( )—indicate words necessary for English idiom or clarity but are not present verbatim in the orig­ inal. An asterisk (*) before an ancient word means that the word is recon­ structed—that is, the form cited is not directly attested to in the ancient sources. ABBREVIATIONS AHw.: W. von Soden, Akkadisches Handworterbuch A.P.: Athenaion Politeia (Athenian Constitution) of Aristotle Boisacq: Emile Boisacq, Dictionnaire Etymologique de la Langue Grecque CAD: I.G.