Economic Structures of Antiquity (Contributions in Economics and Economic History)

The economy of the ancient Middle East and Greece is reinterpreted by Morris Silver in this provocative new synthesis. Silver finds that the ancient economy emerges as a class of economies with its own laws of motion shaped by transaction costs (the resources used up in exchanging ownership rights). The ancient world was not static, Silver asserts; rather, periods of pervasive economic regulation by the state were interspersed with lengthy periods of relatively unfettered market activity. He finds that the economies of Sumer, Babylonia, and archaic Greece were capable of transforming themselves in order to take advantage of new opportunities.