Debt in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near East

Debt in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near East PDF

Author: John Weisweiler

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2022

Total Pages: 297

ISBN-13: 0197647170

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In his Debt: The First 5000 Years, the anthropologist David Graeber put forward a new grand narrative of world history. From the Late Bronze Age onwards, all across the Near East and Mediterranean, relationships of mutual obligation were transformed into quantifiable and legally enforceable debts. Graeber suggests that this transformation made possible new economic institutions, such as IOUs, coinage, and chattel slavery. It also led to the emergence of modes of thought that have shaped Eurasian philosophical and religious traditions ever since. Debt in the Ancient Mediterranean and the Near East explores the implications of this theory for the history of the Mediterranean and Near East. A distinguished group of ancient historians assesses how well Graeber's interpretations fit current understandings of ancient and late antique economies. At the same time, this volume offers a history of premodern credit systems which takes seriously the dual nature of debt as both quantifiable economic reality and immeasurable social obligation. By exploring the diverse ways in which social relationships were quantified in different ancient and late antique societies, the work introduces a method of writing the history of premodern systems of exchange that departs from the currently dominant paradigm of neo-institutional economics.

Debt in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near East

Debt in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near East PDF

Author: John Weisweiler

Publisher:

Published: 2022

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780197647196

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"This volume reconsiders the economic history of the ancient and late ancient Mediterranean and Near East from the perspective of David Graeber's anthropological theory. It pursues two purposes. On the one hand, it tests the accuracy of the grand narrative put forward in his 2011 monograph Debt: The First 5000 Years. Does the concept of a 'currency-slavery-warfare complex', in which monetization, state formation and the subjection of new fields of life to the logic of the market go hand in hand, shed new light on the political economies of the Near East and Mediterranean from around 700 BCE to 700 CE? On the other hand, this volume offers a history of ancient and late ancient credit systems which takes seriously the dual nature of debt as both a quantifiable economic reality and an immeasurable social obligation. By examining the multiplicity of ways in which social relationships were quantified in different societies, it tries out a method of writing the history of pre-modern systems of exchange that departs from the currently dominant paradigm of neo-institutional economics"--

Origins

Origins PDF

Author: William W Hallo

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2023-08-21

Total Pages: 381

ISBN-13: 9004668853

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Modern western culture owes much to ancient Near Eastern precedent. Origins documents that debt in specific terms, covering a variety of topics from the alphabet and its order to the system of dating by eras, and including many of the institutions most essential to contemporary life -- and most often taken for granted.

The Open Sea

The Open Sea PDF

Author: J. G. Manning

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-06-09

Total Pages: 442

ISBN-13: 0691202303

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"In The Open Sea, J. G. Manning offers a major new history of economic life in the Mediterranean world in the Iron Age, from Phoenician trading down to the Hellenistic era and the beginning of Rome's imperial supremacy. Drawing on a wide range of ancient sources and the latest social theory, Manning suggests that a search for an illusory single "ancient economy" has obscured the diversity of lived experience in the Mediterranean world, including both changes in political economies over time and differences in cultural conceptions of property and money. At the same time, he shows how the region's economies became increasingly interconnected during this period." -- Publisher's description

Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean

Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean PDF

Author: Taco Terpstra

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2019-04-09

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0691172080

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How ancient Mediterranean trade thrived through state institutions From around 700 BCE until the first centuries CE, the Mediterranean enjoyed steady economic growth through trade, reaching a level not to be regained until the early modern era. This process of growth coincided with a process of state formation, culminating in the largest state the ancient Mediterranean would ever know, the Roman Empire. Subsequent economic decline coincided with state disintegration. How are the two processes related? In Trade in the Ancient Mediterranean, Taco Terpstra investigates how the organizational structure of trade benefited from state institutions. Although enforcement typically depended on private actors, traders could utilize a public infrastructure, which included not only courts and legal frameworks but also socially cohesive ideologies. Terpstra details how business practices emerged that were based on private order, yet took advantage of public institutions. Focusing on the activity of both private and public economic actors—from Greek city councilors and Ptolemaic officials to long-distance traders and Roman magistrates and financiers—Terpstra illuminates the complex relationship between economic development and state structures in the ancient Mediterranean.

Law and (Dis)Order in the Ancient Near East

Law and (Dis)Order in the Ancient Near East PDF

Author: Katrien De Graef

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2021-05-27

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 1646021207

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Mesopotamia is often considered to be the birthplace of law codes. In recognition of this fact and motivated by the perennial interest in the topic among Assyriologists, the 59th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale was organized in Ghent in 2013 around the theme “Law and (Dis)Order in the Ancient Near East.” Based on papers delivered at that meeting, this volume contains twenty-six essays that focus on archaeological, philological, and historical topics related to order and chaos in the Ancient Near East. Written by a diverse array of international scholars, the contributions to this book explore laws and legal practices in the Ur III, Old Babylonian, Middle Assyrian, and Neo-Assyrian periods in Mesopotamia, as well as in Nuzi and the Hebrew Bible. Among the subjects covered are the Code of Hammurabi, legal phraseology, the archaeological traces of the organization of community life, and biblical law. The volume also contains essays that explore the concepts of chaos/disorder and law/order in divinatory texts and literature. Wide-ranging and cutting-edge, the essays in this collection will be of interest to Assyriologists, especially members of the International Association for Assyriology.

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