Greek and Roman Policy

⁴⁷ The policy of the ancient Greek and Roman republics honoured agriculture more than manufactures or foreign trade.

They discouraged manufactures or foreign trade more than encouraging agriculture directly or intentionally.

In several ancient Greek states, foreign trade was banned.

In several others, the employments of artificers and manufacturers were considered hurtful to the human body’s strength and agility.

• It rendered the body incapable of martial habits
• Such employments disqualified the body from the fatigues and dangers of war.

The Labor of Slaves is More Expensive than Those of Free Men

Manufacturing and trade were considered fit only for slaves.

• It was banned for the free citizens.

Most people of Rome and Athens were effectively excluded from all trades even if trade and manufactures were not banned.

Trades are now exercised by the lower sort of people of towns.

Such trades were all occupied by the slaves of the rich.

• They exercised trades for their masters’ benefit.*

It was almost impossible for a poor freeman to compete with the work of those slaves because of their masters’ wealth, power, and protection.

Slaves are very seldom inventive.

All the most important improvements were the discoveries of freemen:

• machinery,
• the arrangement and distribution of work which facilitate and abridge labour.

If a slave proposes any similar improvement, his master would consider it as the suggestion of laziness.

• The master would think that the slave wanted to save his own labour at the master’s expence.
• The poor slave would probably receive much abuse or some punishment instead of reward.

In the slave manufactures, more labour is employed to the same work done by free men.

• The work of slaves is generally more expensive than the work of free men.

Montesquieu remarked that the Hungarian mines always operated with less cost and more profit than the Turkish mines in their neighbourhood.

• The Hungarian mines are not richer than the Turkish mines, but they were wrought by free men.
  • Those free men employ a lot of machinery which facilitate and abridge their own labour.
• The Turkish mines are wrought by slaves.
  • The hands of those slaves are the only machines the Turks employed.

High Prices of Ancient Goods

Very little is known about the price of manufactures in the Greek and Roman times.

• It appears that the finer manufactures were excessively dear.

Silk was sold for its weight in gold.

• In those times, it was all brought from the East Indies, and not made in Europe.
• The transportation costs may account for its high price.

The price which a lady paid for very fine linen seems equally extravagant.

Linen was always a European or an Egyptian manufacture.

• Its high labour costs account for its high price.

Those labour costs again was due to the awkwardness of the machinery which it used.

The price of fine woollens was not so extravagant.

• It was much above the current price.

According to Pliny, some cloths dyed in a particular way cost 100 denarii or 800 pence per pound weight.

• Others dyed in another manner cost 1,000 denarii or 8,000 pence per pound weight.
• This high price was principally due to the dye.

The Roman pound contained only 12 of our avoirdupois ounces.

But had the cloths not been so dear, expensive dyes would probably not have been used on them.

The disproportion between the value of the accessory and the value of the principal would have been too great.

The Triclinaria were a sort of woollen pillows on couches.

Pliny mentions their price with some costing more than £30,000, and others more than £300,000.

• This high price was not due to the dye.

Dr. Arbuthnot observes that there was much less variety in the dress of fashionable people in ancient than in modern times.

The little variety in the dress of ancient statues confirms his observation.

He infers that their dress must have been cheaper than ours.

• His conclusion does not seem to follow.

When the expence of fashionable dress is very great, the variety must be very small.

But when the expence of any dress becomes very moderate, the variety will naturally be very great.

This lower expence is from the improvements in manufacturing productivity.

The rich will not be able to distinguish themselves by the price of any dress.

They will naturally distinguish themselves by the multitude and variety of their dresses.