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Money and Trade in the Ancient World
How ancient societies exchanged goods: gift and barter, silver by weight, the invention of coinage, and the long-distance routes that linked distant civilizations.
Persia and Asia
Trade, Money and Markets
How coins, merchants, weights and sea routes tied the ancient world together.
Assyrian Merchants at Kanesh
Thousands of clay tablets from Kanesh in Anatolia reveal how Assyrian families ran private trade in tin, textiles and silver about four thousand years ago.
Banking and Credit in Babylon and Rome
How loans, deposits, temple finance and money-changers worked in Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome, and where ancient lending differed from modern banking.
How Ancient Coins Were Struck
The hand process behind ancient coins: preparing blanks, engraving dies, striking with a hammer, and what coin designs told their users about issuing authorities.
Monsoon Trade Between Rome and India
How seasonal monsoon winds let sailors cross the Arabian Sea between Egypt's Red Sea ports and India, carrying pepper, pearls and Roman goods.
The Amber Trade of Ancient Europe
How fossil resin from the Baltic coast reached Mycenaean Greece, Italy and Rome along river routes, and why amber was valued for beauty and supposed powers.
The Silver Mines of Laurion
How the silver-bearing mines of Laurion in Attica, worked largely by enslaved people, supplied Athenian coinage and helped pay for the fleet of the fifth century BCE.
Weights, Measures and Standards of Value
How shekels, minas, talents and standard weights let ancient merchants and states agree on fair exchange before coins, and how the units continued alongside coinage.
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