1996-2001
Two articles by VON REDEN have sought to place Ptolemaic coinage against the background of other monetary media and customs in Hellenistic Egypt. In the first [122] she turns her attention to the question of how far the Ptolemies were responsible for the monetisation of Egypt. She notes the extent to which Egypt was already monetised in the dynastic period, stressing the use of money of account and the use of this in circles where physical forms of money did not in fact circulate, and the ability of different social strata to participate in the resulting monetary economy. Set against this background, the introduction of coinage into Egypt can be seen as restrictive rather than enabling. For this reason, and because of the weakness of local silver supplies, the local economy of Egypt, she suggests, continued to operate on a money of account basis, which may in turn account for the observable instability of ratios between silver (interstate currency) and bronze (epichoric). In the second [123] she develops this idea of dichotomy in the monetary instruments of Ptolemaic Egypt, by stressing on the one hand the symbolic value of high-value precious metal coinages, and on the other the ability of the chora to function economically in the absence of physical monetary instruments. ROWLANDSON too [110] has emphasised the extent to which the coin in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt can be deeply embedded within existing non-coin monetary practice, such as to make its form almost incidental.⬈#p29
BOGAERT has produced two further studies on the workings of banks in Ptolemaic Egypt. In one [67] he examines them from an operational point of view. Of particular numismatic interest is his summary of an earlier article (Historia 33 (1984), pp. 181–198) on the state-contracted banking activities, including the role of such banks in the exchange of foreign currency for local, and epichoric silver for bronze. He also discusses the role of private banks in the latter activity. In the other [66] he gives an overview of banking in Ptolemaic Egypt and the overseas dependencies, providing a list of known banks and bankers arranged geographically.⬈#p30
Once known as the copper standard, but to be re-christened, as LE RIDER and CADELL [72] insist, the idea of a bronze standard distinct from the silver standard has long been current among papyrologists and numismatists. The supposition of a dislocation between the two ‘standards’, imposed by the Ptolemaic rulers from the reign of Philopator onwards seemed a necessary conclusion to be drawn from the escalating bronze prices observable in the papyri from this period onwards. This assumption has lain behind the book length attempt by MARESCH [98] to establish the relative values of bronze and silver throughout the history of Graeco-Roman Egypt. His discussion is unfortunately compromised in some of its detail by various assumptions concerning the bronze coinage, arrived at in collaboration with W. Weiser that seem at best questionable. LORBER [300] in her review of the latter author’s catalogue of the Cologne collection, and in her other publications on the third century bronze (see above), has highlighted some of the problems. Nonetheless MARESCH’s basic conclusion, that the silver and bronze standards were unified under Ptolemy II and then became dislocated under Philopator may well be close to the truth. The question of the relationship between the pre- and post-reform bronze of Philadelphus remains moot, however. That the steep rise in prices was the result of dirigiste policy on the part of the Ptolemaic rulers has recently been called into question, however, by CADELL and LE RIDER [72]. Instead of seeing in the price rise a reaction to a devaluation of the bronze coinage, they suggest that the rise in prices may simply have been the result of inflation, due to an increase in the money-supply. Certainly, on the basis of the grain prices they trace over the third and early 2nd century BC, the inflation seems not to be as regular or extreme as earlier theories of royal intervention have postulated. The rupture between the silver and bronze standards was a reaction to this price inflation: an attempt by the administration to maintain the price of grain for the foreign market by fixing it in silver drachms, and allowing the bronze in use in the chora to find its own level against this. Whether an increase in money supply could have been sufficient to cause inflation at the level at which it occurred, remains a matter of uncertainty: doubt is cast on this by BAGNALL [291]. HUSTON and LORBER [178] add further doubts about the mechanism adopted by the authorities to deal with the inflation. They suggest that, in the monetary reform they have identified in the reign of Ptolemy IV, there may be evidence for an attempt on the part of the government to demonetise old coin stock and reduce the money supply. It remains unclear whether the obvious reductions in weight standard now identified by LORBER and HUSTON [291] in the reigns of Ptolemies IV and V were solely reactive, or whether they were part of the driving force behind inflation at this period. It seems nonetheless clear that this problem is more complex than had for long been thought.⬈#p31
2002-2007
Both numismatists and economists have become deeply interested in the role of coinage in the Ptolemaic economy, seeking to determine the degree of monetization and to define the operations and character of the economy. In addition, numismatists and papyrologists continue to draw on written documents, and to compare them to the numismatic record, in an attempt to refine the chronology and to establish the face values of Ptolemaic bronze coins. So many important and detailed publications have appeared that it is impossible to summarize them adequately.⬈#p32
Several works in this subject area include accounts or partial accounts of the development of Ptolemaic coinage (BURKHALTER AND PICARD [68], CUVIGNY [75], LE RIDER AND DE CALLATAŸ [91], MONSON [104], MUHS [105], PICARD [20], VON REDEN [120], [121]. There is growing consensus that the early Ptolemies imposed monetization through their tax policies, and several scholars emphasize the connection between the new tax laws promulgated after 264 (partially recorded in P. Rev.) and the introduction of an expanded system of bronze denominations in the late 260s (MANNING [97]; MUHS [105]; PICARD [20], [282]; VON REDEN [120], [121]. Some scholars also underline the profits inherent in closing the economy to foreign coinage, in striking gold coins underweight, and in promoting the use of fiduciary coinage for internal payments (PICARD [20]; LE RIDER AND DE CALLATAŸ [91].⬈#p33
LE RIDER AND DE CALLATAŸ [91] collaborate in a comparison of the monetary systems and fiscal policies of the Ptolemaic and Seleucid kingdoms. They contrast the closed economy of the Ptolemies with the open economy of the Seleucids, pointing out that both developed from models already present in the Greek world. The authors’ central object is to define the role of coined money in both economies. They draw attention to the continuing importance of payment in kind and are not persuaded that either government sought to impose monetization on rural areas. Because both dynasties had ample reserves of precious metals in the form of plate, jewelry, and other luxury items, Le Rider and de Callataÿ reject the common assumption that monetary production was constrained by shortages of bullion. For these authors it reflects the preferences of the monarchs, whose principal need for coinage was to support military preparedness.⬈#p34
PICARD [20] also sees the desire for a strong military as the principal motive behind Lagid fiscal policies. He discusses the early evolution of Ptolemaic coinage in relation to three of those policies: taxation in kind for the grain economy, to keep the price low and to ensure that the king had a large supply for sale abroad; the money taxation of oil products, which were consumed internally; and the apomoira, which extended the power of the treasury in the service of royal cult.⬈#p35
MANNING [97] treats coinage as an aspect of the development of the Ptolemaic state. Currency itself was an expression of sovereignty, as was the imposition of its use, effected through tax laws and through the introduction of Greek financial institutions, especially banks and tax farming. Early Lagid economic policy was designed to ensure stability and predictability, to insulate the treasury from risk, and only then to capture as much revenue as possible through taxation; the result was an economic intensification that eventually contributed to rural unrest. Within this framework, Manning discusses specific taxes required in cash; the codification of the legal traditions of the various ethnic communities; the role of temples in the monetized economy; use of cash by the native Egyptians; and loans, interest rates, and the limitations of the credit market. In a chapter on the relevance of Ptolemaic Egypt for studies of “the ancient economy,” VON REDEN [120] characterizes coinage and contracts as economic institutions whose introduction, in combination with Ptolemaic royal ideology and rituals, served to integrate Egypt both politically and economically while stimulating economic growth. The papyrological evidence implies widespread commercial exchange within Egypt; however this was not a Greek market driven by individual profit seeking but rather one in which many individuals were motivated by ideals of service to the monarchy and ambition for positions of power at the court or in local hierarchies. The major purpose of the salt tax was to compel circulation of the king’s coinage and to force the population into paid labor contracts. Local taxes collected in bronze coinage were recycled locally through paid labor, especially for maintenance of the irrigation system (under the Ptolemies, even compulsory labor was paid by the local administration or set off against taxes). Von Reden mentions papyrological evidence for royal financial problems under Ptolemy IV, describes his monetary reform, and refers to the subsequent redefinition of the bronze drachm as “the stater of an independent currency.” The problems of the late third century indicate that the cohesion of the economy did not emanate from economic mechanisms alone, but depended importantly on the authority and charisma of the king, which was maintained through extensive public ritual, aimed at both Greek and Egyptian subjects, in which coinage played a part.⬈#p36
VON REDEN’S book on money in the Ptolemaic economy [121] is, like the two preceding studies, limited to the third century, and develops many of the same themes, but in much greater detail. Two chapters are devoted to the evolution of the coinage, covering familiar ground but also offering fresh ideas and useful information from the field of papyrology. The early coinage was linked to the legitimization of Lagid rule, with gold coinage in particular associated with state payments and royal cult. Precious metal coins were aimed at Alexandria, the harbors, and the economy of cleruchs, while bronze coins were intended for the chôra; although they were exchangeable, these were essentially separate currencies, hoarded separately and usually separated in accounts. By the 230s precious metal coins had largely disappeared from the chôra, and exchange between silver and bronze currency became a matter of negotiation and local policy, apparently controlled by royal banks. Monetization was uneven and in the chôra it could only be maintained by an extensive system of credit. Under these circumstances prices were not sensitive to money supply, so that the inflation of the late third century cannot be explained by an oversupply of coinage or a shortage of goods. (This conclusion ignores the current tendency of economists to consider credit as part of the money supply and the recent painful lessens that credit can indeed lead to price inflation.) Von Reden critically reviews the documentary evidence for the inflation of the late third century and suggests that the disappearance of monopoly banks (responsible for money changing) after the reign of Ptolemy III and of the salt tax after 217 may have contributed to a piecemeal disintegration of the monetary system under Ptolemy IV, which culminated in the removal of most bronze coinage from circulation. (In contrast, CLARYSSE AND THOMPSON [73] submit that the salt tax continued to be levied to the end of the Ptolemaic dynasty, and that the lack of records is an accident of survival.) A sixty-fold elevation in wages toward the end of the century indicates that bronze coinage had become an independent currency in which the bronze drachm served as a unit of account equivalent to one sixtieth of the silver drachm, consistent with the traditional Egyptian silver : bronze ratio of 1 : 60. The earliest unequivocal attestation of the new system is P. Tebt. III 829, dated 201. Another chapter details the exchange of bronze and silver and the circumstances governing allagé (the commission paid to exchange bronze coinage for silver, or silver coinage for gold). The rest of the book minutely examines every aspect of the Ptolemaic economy: money taxes and taxes in kind; rents; cash wages and consumption allowances of oil, wine, and clothing; labor contracting; loans, including those attached to a pending or actual sale, a lease, or a labor contract; the role of patronage and protection in economic life; and banking.⬈#p37
In their study of the salt tax registers of P. Count [73], CLARYSSE AND THOMPSON provide many details about the process of census taking and tax collection in the nomes covered by their documents, as well as a full account of the various taxes of third-century Egypt. They touch on some of the same themes as the above studies of monetization but rarely allude to coinage per se except as it is reflected in the rates of the salt tax (which applied to animals as well as to people). Complexity is a characteristic of Ptolemaic rule, resulting from particular adaptations of ancient institutions, such as the imposition of tax farming upon the existing system of tax collection by royal officials. Egyptian scribes continued to work in record keeping, but this was now a bilingual operation at the lower levels of the hierarchy, and the scribes had to add the Greek terminology of drachms and obols to the Egyptian terminology of deben and kite. The latter, the authors note, was not well suited to recording the small amounts of cash involved in salt tax levies. The salt tax, the obol tax, and other cash taxes were pervasive but modest, suggesting a symbolic importance at least as great as their economic importance. The rates were repeatedly lowered, a development that may reflect some difficulties in collection but also attests to the concern of the rulers for the welfare of their subjects and their land. In addition various occupations and groups were exempt from these taxes, and the earliest exemptions—of teachers, athletic coaches, Dionysiac artists, victors in the national games—illustrate official Ptolemaic support for Greek culture. These and other exemptions highlight the privileged position enjoyed by the immigrant population and by those natives who assisted in the royal administration. Census registers confirm privileged status of immigrants vis-à-vis Egyptians, evident in their larger households, slave holding, and ownership of cattle and sheep. It was newcomers who invested in lucrative new sectors such as livestock, vineyards, orchards, and olive groves; these were cash products sold mainly in Alexandria, and subject to money taxes, so that they contributed to the process of monetization. Another feature of Ptolemaic rule was the omnipresence of police, for whom pay figures are provided, and various kinds of armed guards. Cash for their pay was not always on hand and sometimes improvised measures were necessary.⬈#p38
VON REDEN [119] is an early statement of her insight that money in circulation in Ptolemaic Egypt was probably not sufficient to pay taxes, because of the large number of subjects taxed, so that credit extended by royal banks or between private individuals was a vital precondition to the operation of the tax system. BINGEN [65] reprises his negative judgment of the same phenomena. For him, the formation of groups to put up even modest sums reflects both the insufficiency of cash in circulation and the insufficiency of individual financial resources. The prevalence of borrowing is proof of the deleterious impact of the monetary economy, new tax structures, and Greek capitalism on native Egyptians, many of whom were destitute and unable to amass even the small sums of cash required for the payment of taxes. Adding to their burdens was the need for sureties to guarantee future payments and appearances.⬈#p39
Other specific aspects of Ptolemaic taxation received attention in our period. In a study of tax receipts from early Ptolemaic Thebes, MUHS [105] reports a great increase in the number and extent of money taxes before year 22 of Ptolemy II, with most receipts for the yoke tax, levied on males only, probably at the rate of 4 kite (8 drachms) annually, and replaced by the salt tax in 264. The proliferation of money taxes led to the introduction of tax farming, first documented in a demotic contract dated year 14 of Ptolemy I. Muhs provides a detailed account of the processes involved in tax farming and describes the numerous taxes, including the amounts of money paid. His discussions of the coinage trace exchange rates, weight reductions, the development of bronze coinage and its face values, the introduction of the “copper standard,” and demotic accounting, relying especially on Hazzard and Reekmans. Documents pertaining to Ptolemaic taxation are far more rare outside of Egypt. MEADOWS [101] reinterprets an inscription at Argos that records donations by the coregents Ptolemy VI, Ptolemy VIII, and Cleopatra II, and by several Cypriot cities. He suggests that the latter may represent the apomoira, and that these donations to Argos could be related to the service of Polycrates of Argos to Ptolemy V, father of the three rulers.⬈#p40
CUVIGNY [75] surveys the use of the term chrysous in Egyptian documents of the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. The form is adjectival, with stater understood, and outside of Egypt it referred to the gold stater on the Attic standard. In Egypt under the reign of Darius II, numerous documents attest to the equivalence of the silver deben (c. 91g) and the Attic-weight gold stater, itself equivalent to 20 silver drachms or 87.5g of silver. In the Ptolemaic period the chrysous is rarely mentioned as the equivalent of 20 silver drachms except in a particular type of demotic marriage contract involving a (probably fictive) payment from bride to groom of deben of silver from the treasury of Ptah, and translated in Greek registers as syngraphe trophitis argyriou chryson drachmon—evidence that the term chrysous could be used to refer to silver. This ambiguity is relevant to interpreting the term chrysoi in the Greek text of the Pithom Stele (Raphia Decree); Cuvigny concludes that it was used as an accounting term only, reflecting the expenditure of 6 million drachms of unspecified metal. Another question that engages Cuvigny is the name of the quarter mnaiaion: MARESH (Bronze und Silber (Opladen, 1995), p. 108) proposed that this coin was called a chrysous, but Cuvigny rejects the interpretation because the only support for it comes from P. Oxy. XLIX 3455.28–29, a theoretical document from the third or fourth century A.D. The nomenclature of gold coinage had an additional role in metrology. The term mnaiaion referred to an actual coin but was also a unit of weight; similarly, the term chrysous was the Greek equivalent for the deben as a unit of weight. In this perspective, the deben, as a unit of weight equivalent to 20 drachms, was perhaps reduced to 72g to conform to the weight of 20 Ptolemaic drachms of 3.27g. The tetarte was an accounting unit only, reckoned as one sixteenth of the mnaiaion and one quarter of the chrysous, but with no corresponding coin.⬈#p41
BURKHALTER AND PICARD [68] review the papyrological evidence for the monetary units employed in different periods of Ptolemaic history, contrasting the bronze drachm of the third century, which could (with the payment of allagé) be exchanged for a silver drachm at a slight discount, with the bronze drachm of the second and first centuries, which must have been a unit of account rather than an actual coin, since prices for this period are given in minae and talents. The actual record of coin production does not support the thesis of CADELL and LE RIDER (Prix du blé (Brussels, 1997)) that these prices were due to a normal if aggravated inflationary process fueled by an excessive supply of money, but points instead to a monetary reform at the beginning of the second century. Burkhalter and Picard also compare the Egyptian bronze coinages of Cleopatra VII and Augustus, both of which employed marks of value, and conjecture that the 80-drachm bronze of Cleopatra was equivalent to an octobol on the silver standard, that of Augustus to a tetrobol. A lengthy table at the end of the article summarizes relevant documents that record allagé, silver/bronze conversions, penalties, and obols and fractions.⬈#p42
The monetary terms of the second and first century are further confirmed from documents published by HAGEDORN [83], SCHENTULEIT [112], and SALMENKIVI [111], the last of whom also cites P. Berol. inv. P. 25903 (Busiris, 86 B.C.) for the conversion of silver drachms to “copper” drachms of account at the ratio 1 : 500. VERHOOGT [118], commenting on late second century texts from Kerkeosiris, notes the mention of small sums in bronze—5, 10, 20, 50, 60, and 120 drachms—and suggests these might correspond to the face values of actual coins; as for larger sums, he reasonably proposes that they must have been stored in pouches or vessels. Verhoogt also reports six prices for the silver tetradrachm, ranging from 1500 to 2000 bronze drachms over a period of just a few years, and points out that the price of the tetradrachm fluctuates even within individual accounts, presumably in response to the condition and/or weight of the coins involved. These prices demonstrate that tetradrachms traded as market commodities, while the keeping of separate accounts for bronze and silver supports the idea of two standards advanced by other papyrologists.⬈#p43
The publication and interpretation of papyri and ostraca continue to enlarge our dossier of actual prices, penalties, wages, and concession fees and to confirm known patterns in the use of monetary units (COWLEY [74], KALTAS [85], MANNING [96], RODRIGUEZ [109], SALMENKIVI [111], SCHENTULEIT [112], SOLDATI [114], VANDORPE [117], VERHOOGT [118]. MONSON [104] offers a particularly interesting study of the finances of private religious associations, which assessed dues and penalties, paid death benefits, and provided aid to wrongly imprisoned members, all in cash. The wheat equivalents provided by the author show the annual contributions of office holders in the third-century Ghoran association sometimes exceeded the price of a year’s supply of wheat. Also interesting is a demotic annuity contract of 176/5 published by FARID [80], in which a son promises 15 sacks of emmer annually to his mother in exchange for her surrender of “10 silver pieces = 50 staters = 10 silver pieces, copper 24, kite 2.”⬈#p44
