A major new economic history of the ancient Mediterranean world
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.
The Open Sea argues that the keys to understanding the region's rapid
social and economic change during the Iron Age are the variety of
economic and political solutions its different cultures devised, the
patterns of cross-cultural exchange, and the sharp environmental
contrasts between Egypt, the Near East, and Greece and Rome. The book
examines long-run drivers of change, such as climate, together with the
most important economic institutions of the premodern
Mediterranean--coinage, money, agriculture, and private property. It
also explores the role of economic growth, states, and legal
institutions in the region's various economies.
A groundbreaking economic history of the ancient Mediterranean world,
The Open Sea shows that the origins of the modern economy extend far
beyond Greece and Rome.
