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Theory, Evidence and the Ancient Economy

Professor Finley's Sather Lectures of 1972, here published in amplified form and with full annotation, are naturally an event for ancient historians. The author begins with a modest disclaimer— ' it is not a book one would call economic history ' (p. 9); indeed, he does not set out to describe ' the economy' of the ancient world in the usual manner—at least as this is understood in the English tradition, where the works of Rostovtzeff and Tenney Frank have been influential. But his aim is a wide one; essentially, it is to characterise the ancient economy. Economic thought, he argues, was embryonic, a matter of a few empirical maxims (Ch. 1). Attitudes were dominated by the city state (for ' the authority of the state was total', 154), its institutions, its hierarchy of orders and statuses, its structures mentales; the upper classes frankly accepted wealth as the ultimate good, since it was used to achieve status; the whole ethos was antagonistic to commerce and manufacture, and thus to the specializations which economic progress must encourage and recognize (so Ch. 2). Slavery and the semi-free statuses of antiquity, which might have provided the labour for early capital accumulation, must rather be seen structurally; their labour supplied the wealthy classes with leisure to pursue political power and military glory (Ch. 3). Agriculture was the main basis of wealth (Ch. 4), but it subserved the demands of social rank and prestige, and so remained stagnant and undeveloped. An examination of the varied pattern of town and country (Ch. 5) confirms the importance of agriculture and natural resources in the economy, the minor and parasitic positions of commerce and manu- facture. Finally (Ch. 6), a wide-ranging survey shows that governments had no economic policies beyond the protection of basic necessities like corn, or the crude advantages to be gained from military conquest and imperialism. Although, in my view, we must have reservations about parts of Finley's argument and approach, it must be said that the book is exceptionally lucid, stimulating and learned. Finley felt the influence