Observations On The Economy in Kind in Ptolemaic Egypt PDF

Observations on the Economy in Kind in Ptolemaic
Egypt
University Press Scholarship Online
Oxford Scholarship Online

The Economies of Hellenistic Societies, Third to
First Centuries BC
Zosia Archibald, John K. Davies, and Vincent Gabrielsen
Print publication date: 2011

Print ISBN-13: 9780199587926
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: March 2015
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199587926.001.0001
Observations on the Economy in

Kind in Ptolemaic Egypt
Lucia Criscuolo
DOI:10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199587926.003.0008
Abstract and Keywords

This chapter evaluates the following assumptions: that the
Egyptians either remained, or tended to remain, devoted to an
economy in kind, only lightly touched by increasing
monetization, and always under fiscal pressure; while the
Greeks were the main recipients of any provision taken by the
central administration involving the use of money. These are
examined from two perspectives: first whether the countryside
did or did not tend to use agricultural products as money; and
secondly the hypothesis that such a use was preferred by the
Egyptians.
Keywords: Egyptians, Greeks, economy, money, countryside, agricultural

products
In recent years a complex and far-reaching labour of revising

interpretations of the Egyptian economy has been undertaken
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Egypt
both by some of the scholars who took part in the 2006
Conference at Copenhagen and by many others. They have
devoted attention to general features of the Ptolemaic
organization of the economy1 and to its essential character
(for example, whether it was part of an ancient economy and,
if so, according to which systemoriental, mercantilistic, or
rational),2 or have examined more specific aspects. Such
(p.167) aspects have included monetization and the
consequent development of a sort of superstructure erected
on top of the traditional economy of the country, created by a
monetized fiscal system and by a lease-system for
monopolies.3 The portrait drawn of the Ptolemies is generally
that of a foreign dynasty, followed by a huge stream of Greekspeaking people, in desperate need of identifying
commodities, mainly but not only wheat, which could be sold
abroad, in order to procure as much silver as possible. Thus it
is agreed that from the Ptolemies onwards the Egyptian
economy was monetized. However, more or less explicitly this
portrait has normally given the Egyptians a passive role in the
economic development of Hellenistic Egypt, while the
dynamics of changes, even in exploitation, were credited to
the Greeks. Such a theory is particularly strong in the matter
of management of agriculture, where Egyptians represented,
according to the topos, the efficiency and self-sufficiency of
the pharaonic tradition, a constant for thousands of years. In
contrast, in the chra the Greeks, or the Greek administration,
played the role of colonials, essentially uninterested in the
organization of the land, unless it compromised its
rentability.4 They were dominated by the logic of traditional
systems whose success, in terms of production, was enough:
their affair was its evaluation and transformation into coined
money.
In this chapter I aim to consider whether the following
assumptions are valid or misleading: (1) that the Egyptians
either remained, or tended to remain, devoted to an economy
in kind, only lightly touched by increasing monetization, and
always under fiscal pressure, while (2) the Greeks, whether in
Egypt or abroad, were the main recepients of any provision
taken by the central administration involving the use of
money.5 I shall examine them from two perspectives: first
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whether the countryside did or did not tend to use agricultural
products as money, and secondly the hypothesis that such a
use was preferred by the Egyptians. As already observed by
Briant, for a similar reality une opposition aussi tranche
entre conomie dite naturelle et conomie montaire releve
dune vision grecque qui semplifie outrageusement le
mcanisme des changes de biens6 and, I would add, the
mechanism of their evaluation as well. But it is a vision still
very popular among scholars.
(p.168)
The main issue is the so-called monetary use of wheat.
Papyri have often been presented as proof that such a

phenomenon was typical: I shall present a reading of some of
them and of some other texts, in order to test if their current
interpretation is still acceptable.
In P. Lond. VII 19945,7P. Cairo V 59825, all from the Zenon
archive (third century BC), P. Tebt. III 832 (second century
BC), and SB XVI 12675 (probably 100 BC) other products, or
even money, appear to be related to wheat according to
different values: prima facie wheat would actually seem to play
the role of an exchange tool, especially in the papyri of the
second century. P. Lond. VII 1994 and 1995, together with
P.Cairo Zen. II 59292, are accounts of grain put at the disposal
of Herakleides over a period of three years.8 The deliveries
were made for a number of different purposes, e.g. sowing,
but also as a form of payment to cultivators, etc. For the
editor, T.C. Skeat, Herakleides as myriarouros was the chief
farmer of the dorea of 10,000 arourai owned by the dioikts
Apollonios, while I consider him as an official in charge of the
drainage and first exploitation of a fixed extension of land. For
Skeat the object of the account was to define the position of
the myriarouros in relation to his employer; for me it was
intended to justify, within the administration of the dorea but
perhaps also vis--vis the royal treasury, some heavy losses
and to throw some responsability onto a state official.
However the documents were written in and for a Greek
milieu.
It appears that each year Apollonios sent out a memorandum
specifying the amounts of various grains for sowing, which
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were to be placed by the granary of the dorea at the disposal
of Herakleides. While the amounts remained the same for
three years, in fact the actual quotas changed, though the
value was calculated by the granary in terms of wheat, so any
excess issues were set off against the deficits. Eventually the
net total, expressed in wheat, was compared with the total
value (also in wheat) of the quotas, and a balance was struck
in order to show whether Herakleides was in credit or debit
overall. The contents of this long roll of accounts were set out
by the editor in a series of Tables. Here it is quite clear that,
despite the hypomnma sent by the dioikts, the seeds given
to Herakleides did not correspond to the amounts fixed. What
is even more important is that Herakleides received less wheat
than planned. Nevertheless, he gave it back regularly: the
losses were due to other kinds of grains, especially barley and
the oil seeds (whose equivalences to wheat were particularly
unbalanced), which were given to him in a higher quantity and
not returned. This is quite interesting because we know that in
the Revenue Laws it was stated not only that doreai could keep
their oilseeds, but also
(p.169)
that the price for oilseeds paid
by the state to them was 2 dr. per artaba more than to other
farmers. It therefore appears quite understandable that the
local administrators of the granary of the dorea tended, on the
one hand, to concentrate on guaranteeing the availability of
wheat, since that was the primary interest both of the state
and of their master Apollonios and could be sold on the free
market. If on the other hand some speculation in oilseeds was
perhaps attempted, the deficit balance of outcome and income
could be better hidden by manipulating its equivalents with
other grains (as happened in the first two years, when a
surplus of oilseeds compensated for a loss of barley). The main
target in any case was to keep and procure as much wheat as
possible.
What, in my opinion, can be excluded is that the accounting of
Apollonios dorea granary can show us the survival of
pharaonic practice. The equivalence of different seeds with
wheat did not have an economic or monetary function, but
was directed towards justifying an internal granary budget.
There are other reasons for that conclusion too: the ratio
which we find between wheat and barley, which is 1 : 0.6, is
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the same as in other official documents of the second century
BC,9 and it appears to be fixed in Alexandria.10 It is therefore
startling to find in another (apparently private) third-century
text, P. Gurob 29,11 a different ratio, yet more favourable to
wheat, of 1 : 0.5, but the grain which seems to be the
equivalent is barley, not wheat. In this case, therefore, the
equivalence did not arise from an absolute or general use of
grains in accounting, but was connected to a specific need, on
the part of that manager, for expressing outcomes in terms of
barley.
Another example claimed to be of the use of wheat instead of
money is P. Cairo Zen. V 59825 (24 May 252 BC). This is a
duplicate document, the first one being an abstract of the
second which is in the form of a letter.12 Zenon orders various
payments to be made to the banker Artemidoros: the upper
text, an anonymous order, is an abstract, and is much more
accurate than the lower text. The first text mentions payments
to Pyron as clothing allowance for the 34th year 30 dr.; and,
on paying his salary for Phamenoth, Pharmouthi, Pachons,
enter as deduction 62 dr. 3 ob. for 60 artabai of wheat, 20 dr.
for 15 minai of wool, and the travelling allowance of 8 dr.,
while in the second one
(p.170)
we find a deduction from the
salary, for wheat delivered to him from the granary of the

dorea, of 50 dr. for 60 artabai and for two different amounts of
wool, the deduction amounting in total to 33 dr. 2 ob. The
editors of the papyrus, Gueraud and Jouguet, left unexplained
the difference between the two figures for the price of wheat
(line 6: 62 dr. 3 ob.; line 31: 50 dr.) and the different amounts
for the price and the quality of wool (line 6: 20 dr. for 15
minai; lines 324: 13 dr. for 10 minai plus 20 dr. for another
10 minai) unexplained. In order to explain the inconsistency of
the figures, Gara proposed to consider this text as a proof of
the use of wheat as the actual object of the payments, the
money being only an accounting tool, one which was moreover
used inaccurately.13 However, if we look carefully at the text
we notice that the puzzle arises because the supplement of 60
artabai of wheat in line 31 has simply been repeated from line
6 without considering the difference between the total sums (
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dr. against 50 dr.): but as the quantity of the wool was higher
in lines 324, the amount of wheat could easily be lower, for
example 52 artabai. As there are other lacunae, and as the
papyrus lacks the final figure of the second part (which
probably had to be the same as in the first one), it is possible
that the figures in the lacuna were slightly different (like the
two sums of wheat and wool, 80 dr. versus 83), though giving
the same total. And again wheat clearly did not play the role of
money; it was simply part, as usual, of the salary of Pyron, a
salary which, as attested in another text,14 is likely to have
been much higher than 10 dr. per month.
Now we find a similar situation if we consider some
documents, public or private, of the second century BC. A
good example is given by UPZ I 14 (157 BC), a long dossier
belonging to the archive of Ptolemy son of Glaukias. Ptolemy
has sent a petition to the king in order to get a position in the
army for his brother Apollonios: the king has accepted and
authorized the request. Apollonios is enrolled on the same
conditions as other soldiers assigned to the Memphis garrison,
that is a salary fixed in cash and kind at 150 dr. and 3 artabai
of wheat, of which 1 artaba in wheat and the other 2 artabai at
the equivalent of 100 dr. each.15 The adaeratioand that at a
very low priceis here applied by the king: either because
there existed a special market for military men, as in Roman
times, or it was a pure speculation made by the royal
administration. In either case the logic was to spare wheat as
long as possible.
(p.171)
P.Tebt. III 832 and IV 1129 (but there are other texts
as well) are likewise official documents, one probably from

Oxyrhynchos, one from Kerkeosiris, which give equivalences
between wheat and other products and even with money.16
Some equivalences are the same as in the third century
(barley is 0.6 of wheat), while others have changed (sesame is
worth 700 per cent more than wheat; in the third century it
was 600 per cent). Again, the accounting of money in terms of
wheat has been considered by some scholars to be a
consequence of an economic system based on agricultural
exploitation:17 as with many taxes, the rents of the land were
fixed in wheat, but payments in other grains or a pure
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adaeratio were regularly accepted by the authorities, even
(perhaps surprisingly) on an equitable basis. In P.Tebt. III 832
it is in fact possible to calculate the price of wheat: 130 units
of copper, chalkoi (coins of 20 dr., i.e. deben), which
correspond to
artabai, give a price of 400 dr. per artaba of wheat, which
seems very low.18 A similar situation is attested in P. Tebt. IV
1129, col. II, line 33, and col. III, lines 567, an official account
of rents from Kerkeosiris dated 123 BC, where we find
payments of rents made respectively both in cash and in
products other than wheat. I therefore doubt that it is entirely
acceptable to say that the persistence of taxes and private
rents in kind constitutes the most obvious limitation on the
monetization of the agrarian economy.19 In fact, in these
documents it is possible to find the same features as in the
third century: the central administration required, and tried to
procure, a regular income in wheat, while at the same time it
supported the cultivation of monopolised produce such as
oilseeds for oils and barley for beer, and possibly combed
through the surplus, trying to discourage less profitable
cultivation. Yet on the whole we should admit that, according
to these documents, the state administration was as interested
in receiving moneyfrom an adaeratio convenient to farmers
or from taxes on monopolized productsas it was in collecting
wheat. So for the peasants, who were mostly Egyptian, it
might be more convenient, depending on varying economic
situations, to pay in kind, if the harvest was abundant, or
(p.172) conversely in cash, if the yield could make a better
profit on the market that way. In any case it is quite evident
that only a radical assimilation of the monetary system within
the management of agricultural exploitation can explain such
documents. Moreover, in the same text we can find three
different prices for wheat, probably depending on different
qualities or seasons or even on its status as a gift.20 That
would obviously create many problems in the case of pure
calculations in kind.
In private accounts we find similar equivalences. SB XVI
12675 is a very inaccurate account of expenditures in money
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and in kind. In the recto of this papyrus we find a total amount
of drachmai which corresponds to
artabai of pyros, at a price of 1080 dr. If the price were that
fixed at Alexandria in silver drachmai, it should be from 1 to 2
dr. per artaba, which would give a price in bronze from 1080
to 540 dr., thereby providing an approximate bronze : silver
ratio as well.21 What follows seems to imply that the amount of
wheat had to be calculated as a part of a salary fixed at
artaba of wheat per day, which the Egyptian carpenter
Petermouthis had to pay to some Egyptian contractors. Again,
the recto of this papyrus has been used by scholars to support
the idea that every economic value, along with most of the
actual exchanges in the chora, was expressed in wheat. But
the verso of the same papyrus itself shows, in my opinion, that
this cannot be true: the conclusion of the account is expressed
in money, and salaries, fixed in kind and in cash, were actually
calculated, and probably paid, in cash, as in the third-century
orders of payments by Zenon.
Another relevant group of texts, which are usually considered
as a proof of the major importance of the economy in kind in
Hellenistic Egypt, is that of loans in kind.22 It is well known
that the interest for these loans was normally 50 per cent and
was generally included in the sum that had to be returned by a
certain date, the inclusion being denoted by the expression
atokos. The vast majority of the loans in kind from the
Ptolemaic period are of corn. They were mostly stipulated in
Choiak (about November), that is a month of the sowing
season, and had to be returned on harvest, in Pachon or at
latest in Mesore (from April to July). However, the economic
relationship between borrower and lender is more balanced
than appears at first sight. Through the loan the borrower
could procure a larger amount of seed, perhaps in order to
enlarge the area of land sown, and could pay an actual interest
of 5 per cent (10 artabai sown normally produced a harvest of
100 artabai). The lender could then bargain away seed that
would presumably otherwise rot, and would receive an actual
50 per cent of fresh wheat more after only 56 months.
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(p.173)
A similar situation is documented by P. Dryton 16 (4
Jan. 131 BC, from Pathyris, in Upper Egypt) and P. Dion. 20

(10 Jan. 105 BC, from Akoris in Middle Egypt), the only
difference being in the penalty stated in case of default. In the
case of the loan by Drytons wife Apollonia, also called
Senmontis, the debtors would have to pay a sum 50 per cent
more than the corrresponding market price for a loan of 35
artabas of wheat.23 On the use of this form of parachrma24
the editor, Vandorpe, states in her commentary that in this
case too the fine would consist of money resulting from the
market price if higher than the amount borrowed increased
by 50%. I do not think that such a choice was given here to
the borrower. The fine had to be specified in money in case
the borrower could not return the loan in kind, and the
mention of market price probably meant that this price was
usually higher than the official one. Furthermore, in P. Dryton
16 the editor inserted into her translation an or: they shall
return (the 35 artabas) increased by 50% (or) the current
market price. The word or is not in the text and does not
make much sense. If we retain a literal translation, then in this
papyrus, as in P. Dryton 25, P. Grenf. I 28 (but in lacuna), and
in other documents such as P. Lond. II 218, 15, the penalty is
directly stated in money, so that the lender Apollonia seems to
be interested more in money than in wheat, at least for these
transactions. On the other hand, it was specified in the case of
Dionysos son of Kephalas that he should pay a forfeit of 3000
dr. per artaba borrowed, that is
times the official price of an artaba, which was 1200 dr.25 As
we do not know how high, or low, the price of wheat on the
market could have been, and as moreover we cannot know
what was taken as the accounting date, we cannot compare
the severity of the penalties in these two deeds. But what is
clear is that, on the one hand, the practice of borrowing seeds
on the private market was obviously quite common, as in the
rural economy of any period, and on the other hand, that in
real terms the economic exploitation and control of this
practice was confined to money, the only medium which was
able to guarantee a correct and constant evaluation of the
investment. And what is relevant to our point, the deeds were
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stipulated in an Egyptian milieu, the Egyptian towns of central
and southern Egypt.
The last documents I wish to examine are leases of land
combined with loans, both from Tholthis, a small village in the
Oxyrhynchite nome.26 In both
(p.174)
cases the land was
leased by cleruchs, and the rent had first of all to cover the
rent in kind due to the state. This is particularly evident in the
first papyrus, P. Frank. 1 (Jan.Febr. 213 BC), which is
however a sort of antichretic lease of a whole klros of 30
arourai. Its rent is identical with the diartabieion that had to
be paid for it, viz. 60 artabai of wheat, so it was certainly quite
favourable to the lessees.27 Nevertheless, it is noteworthy,
first, that the fine for the lessee Neoptolemos, in case of
default, was extremely high (10 dr. per artaba, certainly a
consequence of an assessment of the risk of loss of the klros
by the tenant Apollonios). However, on the other hand it also
deserves note that if the debtor-lessor could not return the
sum lent (60 dr.) before the expiry of the lease deed, the
creditor-lessee could deduct from the rent in kind (60 artabai)
the amount of wheat whose price on the threshing-floor would
be equivalent to the loan. Hence, if the price were, as it
probably would be, slightly higher than 1 silver dr. per artaba
(the official price?), the creditor would get his loan repaid plus
a certain amount of new credit (that is interest) on the rent in
kind. Again it was the monetization of the value of wheat that
generated a form of potential speculation.
Even more interesting, as a lease, is BGU X 1943 (215/14
BC).28 In this text Pyrrhos sublets a part of the klros of a
certain Hermias to two men, one Greek, Klados, and one
Egyptian, Phamounis. The rent is fixed at 8 artabai per aroura,
seed included, that is presumably a net rent of 7 artabai, on an
extension of a klros, not yet delimited by the geometrai, and
therefore probably a fallow area (if the supplement
in line 5 is correct) which was to be sown with wheat. As
nothing is said of the rent due to the state, this should imply a
theoretical yield of 2 art. for the lessees (10 art. of harvest per
aroura, less 8 for the rent), and for the lessor one of 5 art. per
aroura (8 art., less the rent of 2 art. to the crown, and less 1
for seed). Hence, if Pyrrhos had to pay the diartabieion per
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aroura to his lessor Hermias (as in P. Frankfort 1, for instance)
or even 1 or 2 artabai more, his net profit, as a pure
investment, would be from 1 to 3 artabai per aroura. But the
advantage for the two lessees was very small, indeed too
small. Why would they lease land under such conditions? We
can of course only speculate, but it is tempting to imagine a
hidden loan of money from Pyrrhos to Klados and Phamounis,
whose return was to be in kind, (I would guess) in work in
bringing his land back into cultivation, and in paying his rent
to Hermias fully plus a profit. If however Pyrrhos could not
keep the land at the disposal of the two lessees (against
possible claims by Hermias?), the fine, epitimon, would be in
cash (line 18), so a balanced combination between monetary/
agricultural needs and resources is again documented. What is
not attested is any link between ethnicity and medium of
payment.
(p.175)
To sum up: in Ptolemaic Egypt, the interrelationship
between an economy in kind and a monetary economy was

much more developed and intricate than is commonly stated,
and involved Egyptians as well as Greeks. As von Reden has
written, In a tense coincidence of presence and absence,
money was a crucial social bond between central and local
authorities, Greeks, and Egyptians, lenders and borrowers, as
well as taxpayers,29 and this, I might add, despite the fact
that money often played only the role of accounting unit.30
Even though the social history of the Egyptian part of the
kingdom certainly had to deal with established ethnic
identities, divisions, and even social discriminations, and often
could not cope with them, economic life could not share out
incomes and outcomes, profits and losses, ability or luck, by
ethnos. As the Mediterranean ambition of the new rulers
compelled them to measure, transform, and often transfer
their wealth-in-kind into coin, it was paradoxically the very
predominance of agriculture in the Egyptian economy which
allowed and compelled the Egyptian population to enter
definitively the wonderful world of money.
Bibliography
Bibliography references:
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Bingen, J. (1978), The Third-Century B.C. Land-Leases from
Tholthis, ICS 3: 7480.
Bogaert, R. (1988), Les Oprations en nature des banques,
AncSoc 19: 21324.
Bresson, A. (20078), Lconomie de la Grce des cits. Paris.
Briant, P. (1996), Histoire de lempire perse de Cyrus
Alexandre (Achaemenid History, X). Paris.
Clarysse, W., and Lanciers, E. (1989), Currency and the
Dating of Demotic and Greek Papyri from the Ptolemaic
Period, Anc Soc 20: 11732.
Criscuolo, L. (2007), Gli Egiziani e la cultura economica
greca: qualche documento riconsiderato, in T. Gnoli e F.
Muccioli (eds.), Incontri tra culture nellOriente ellenistico e
romano, Ravenna 1112 marzo 2005. Milano: 5570.
Foraboschi, D. (2008), La moneta di conto nellEgitto grecoromano, AIIN 54: 3546.
and Gara, A. (1982), Leconomia dei crediti in natura
(Egitto), Athenaeum 60: 6983.
Gara, A. (1984), Limiti strutturali delleconomia monetaria
nellEgitto tardo tolemaico, in B. Virgilio (ed.), Studi
ellenistici, I. Pisa, 10734.
(1988), Il significato economico della politica monetaria
nellEgitto ellenistico, in Stato Economia Lavoro nel Vicino
Oriente antico. Milano, 12837.
Manning, J. (2004), Property Rights and Contracting in
Ptolemaic Egypt, JITE 160: 75864.
(2005a), The Relationship of Evidence to Models in the
Ptolemaic Economy (33230 BC), in AncEcon 16386.
Manning, J. (2005b), Texts, Contexts, Subtexts and
Interpretative Frameworks. Beyond the Parochial and toward
(Dynamic) Modeling of the Ptolemaic Economy, Material
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Egypt
Culture and Texts of Graeco-Roman Egypt: Creating Context,
Debating Meaning, BASP 42: 23556.
(2006), The Ptolemaic Economy, Institutions, Economic
Integration, and the Limits of Centralized Political Power, in
Approches 25774.
(2007), Ptolemaic Egypt, in CEHGRW 43459.
Rowlandson, J. (2001), Money Use Among the Peasantry of
Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt, in A. Meadows and K. Shipton
(eds.), Money and Its Uses in the Greek World. Oxford: 145
55.
Schaps, D.M. (2004), The Invention of Coinage and the
Monetization of Ancient Greece. Ann Arbor.
Verhoogt, A. (2005), Regaling Officials in Ptolemaic Egypt. A
Dramatic Reading of Official Accounts from the Menches
Papers, P Tebt.V (P. L. Bat. 32). Leiden and Boston.
Von Reden, S. (2006), The Ancient Economy and Ptolemaic
Egypt, in P. F. Bang, M. Ikeguchi, and H. G. Ziche (eds.),
Ancient Economies, Modern Methodologies. Archaeology,
Comparative History, Models and Institutions. Bari: 16177.
(2007) Money in Ptolemaic Egypt. From the Macedonian
Conquest to the End of the Third Century BC. Cambridge.
Notes:
I thank Vincent Gabrielsen for inviting me to this conference

and J.K. Davies for introducing me to such a friendly group of
scholars and for correcting and revising my English text. Since
this paper was presented at Copenhagen in September 2006, a
number of important contributions have been published on
similar subjects, among which the most relevant, both for size
and content, are Bresson 20078 and von Reden 2007. In
particular the latter study, which I could not know in 2006 but
is closely connected to this chapter, is remarkable for its
accuracy and wide-ranging documentation, and I agree with
the author on most of her conclusions. Nevertheless it may be
useful to offer some of the observations and new
interpretations which I made four years ago on some papyri
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which have been quoted also by von Reden, but, obviously, in
a different way. This chapter is partly an enlarged English
version of Criscuolo 2007.
(1) See esp., beside the bibliography quoted in the following
contributions, the article written recently by myself, and above
all Manning 2004, 2005a, 2005b, 2006, and 2007. Some of
Mannings contributions deal with the possibility of using the
New Institutional Economics for creating an interpretative
model of the Ptolemaic economy, even envisaging a tendency
toward a federal state (see Manning 2004: 761). However, on
the so-called Ptolemaic economy I make one remark: we
should be very careful and precise in the extent to which we
equate Ptolemaic state with Ptolemaic Egypt (see Manning
2006: 259 ff.), because the economic system of Ptolemaic
Egypt does not represent ipso facto the economy of the whole
kingdom, even if it comprised the largest amount of territory,
population, and resources (see Criscuolo 2007: 56 and n. 3).
Yet the political weight of this part of the Lagid kingdom was
often, and particularly in the third century, much less relevant
than its other so-called outside possessions, even though we
cannot evaluate their economic position or assess the
influence that their economies had on central decisions and
initiatives. These aspects are still to be investigated.
(2) Von Reden 2006: 16177.
(3) Criscuolo 2007: 5570; but more importantly and
comprehensively von Reden 2007, also including a wide
bibliography on the Ptolemaic economy.
(4) An exception is commonly considered to be the
management of doreai, such as that of the dioiketes
Apollonios, which are considered to be a means of providing
revenue for the king and his circle (cf. Manning 2006: 261). I
do not wholly accept this definition, but I will discuss it
elsewhere.
(5) For a more prudent (if not primitivistic) use of categories
based on modern conceptions of money and monetisation in
Classical Greece, see Schaps 2004, esp. 150221.
Page 14 of 18

Egypt
(6) Briant 1996: 41718. On the other hand in Egypt, exactly as
in Rome, we find examples of activity, that is of management
of assets in kind run by banks, though it was rare and
probably due to particular circumstances (cf. Bogaert 1988,
esp. 223).
(7) See most recently von Reden 2007: 85, and, with a strong
assertion of the monetary use of wheat, Foraboschi and Gara
1982: 71.
(8) I quote essentially the description given by the editor of P.
Lond.VII, T.C. Skeat, who provided a splendid edition of these
long and complicated papyri.
(9) See below, p. 171 with n. 17.
(10) The same ratios for barley and olyra can be found in P.
Hib. I 85 (261 BC) or P. Hib. I 119 (260 BC); for the latter see
von Reden 2007: 1223.
(11) P. Gurob 29, lines 1924: [() 1] |
() 7, () 1 | () 8 | () 11 12 |
() () 27 12, () 1 () 2, | ()
() [29 12]. Lines 448: () 5 |
() 32 | () 30 | () 63 12 |
() () 130 12, () 23 () 1 13.
(12) From the photograph in Plate VI of the edition, the second
part of the order seems to have been written first, so the
structure of the texts could easily include a different
distribution of the amounts.
(13) Cf. Gara 1988: n. 23.
(14) Cf. Criscuolo 2007: 64 with n. 26 for the puzzling
relationship between Zenon and Pyron, whose salary in cash,
mentioned also in another papyrus, P. Cairo Zen. IV 59647
(n.d.), apparently of 10 dr. plus 3 artabai of wheat, had
increased at least to about 20 dr. per month, since the
deduction for 3 months had to be of more than 60 dr. for
wheat alone. Otherwise the order would be meaningless. See
Page 15 of 18

Egypt
also, though again in a more traditional perspective,
Foraboschi 2008: 412.
(15) Lines 4350. The papyrus, lines 703, also mentions a sort
of supplementary amount after each year of 1 artaba of
wheat and for the rest 100 dr. per artaba.
(16) Here is the translation of P. Tebt. III, 832, lines 14, the
beginning of a land survey, given by the editors: son of
Petosis son of Pha ( ):
arurae 41 artabae; of these,
in Hephaistiou, of which
sown with wheat,
with barley, in Chr ( )
of which 3 sown with wheat,
with hay, total
of which
in wheat,
in hay,
in barley, making
; of these (the hypothetical rent) is
art. of wheat,
of barley = 1 of wheat, 1 of sesame = 7, 130 units of copper =
; according to the crops sown,
arurae in wheat, rent
art.,
Page 16 of 18

Egypt
in hay, rent
,
in barley, rent
; total
arurae 41 art; seed
art. of wheat.
(17) See Gara 1984: 1301.
(18) On this price and the use of deben in calculating the
adaeratio see the commentary by J. Shelton to P. Tebt. IV
1104, line 2. The same phenomenon, of a lower price for
wheat adaeratus, is attested in demotic texts, cf. Clarysse and
Lanciers 1989: 119.
(19) Rowlandson 2001: 147. On the other hand, von Reden
(2007: 152) seems to accept that in the second and first
centuries BC goods as a means of payment regained
importance because of the declining trust in coined money.
Distrust is probable, but it was not sufficient to demolish the
structural function of money, either in accounts or in actual
payments.
(20) Cf. Verhoogt 2005, App. II: 210 ff.
(21) See Gara 1984: 131. If the official price was 1200 bronze
dr. per artaba in this period (see below, p. 173 with n. 25), this
equivalence was made on a rather lower value, so that the
resultant salary was also lower.
(22) See now von Reden 2007, esp. 1512 and the relevant
chapter.
(23) P. Dryton 16, lines 1922: []
, []
[] .
Page 17 of 18

Egypt
(24) Attested also in P. Dryton 11, line 118, where the
parachrma can be either a simple hemiolion in kind or 150
per cent of the market price of the amount of wheat borrowed.
(25) P. Dion. 20, lines 224: [] ['
, ] [] []
; and see the
commentary of the editors, 1721.
(26) On these documents see now also von Reden 2007: 1867;
not relevant to this discussion is the fact that these leases
might or might not include the provision of seed for the land
rented (cf. ibid. 207).
(27) Cf. Bingen 1978: 77.
(28) See now on this text, mentioned as a flexible contract,
von Reden 2007: 128 n. 29.
(29) See von Reden 2001: 74.
(30) Von Reden 2007: 77. To be paradoxical: these days we use
less and less cash, but money certainly remains the standard
measure of economic value.
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Print publication date: 2011