Ancient Trade & Commerce (Archaeology)

The invisibility of merchants both in the ancient Egyptian material record and in published work on ancient Egypt is striking, especially when compared with the data from and publications on contemporary societies in the Levant and Mesopotamia. With knowledge of shipbuilding and access to the necessary resources, in addition to the centrality of the Nile to ancient Egyptian life, one might assume the presence of full-time merchants. When considering the ancient Egyptian evidence for merchants, however, one is restricted to a few tomb scenes, the actual presence of foreign goods, and a few unique texts. Indeed, with such foreign goods as incense and cedar being considered so valuable, it would be logical for those who were responsible for their attainment, transportation, and sale to possess some level of prestige and so leave behind a record of their work. Yet, there are not even any titles from ancient Egypt that strictly deal with the responsibilities of traders. This limited corpus of evidence for ancient Egyptian merchants stands in contrast to contemporary evidence from Ugarit to Mesopotamia in which merchants could achieve, at least, some prestige. This paper will investigate the evidence for merchants moving goods from Egypt abroad using both Egyptian-based sources and non- Egyptian-based sources. In framing this discussion within Liverani’s (1990) understanding of the dual nature of the Egyptian state, this paper suggests that the evidence for merchants that does exist can move beyond the simple conclusion: there were no ancient Egyptian merchants.

Session: Archaeology of Egypt I (Friday, Nov 22 12:20 PM)

and Keywords Salt was an important commodity throughout the human past. Although salt (sodium chlo ride) is essential to human health, the desire for salt in humans cannot be explained by physiological need alone. Instead, both biology and culture drive the taste for salt. The re sult is that salt was frequently highly valued, with its production and trade important in economic, social, and political systems of the past. Despite this importance, salt is an elu sive item to study since it does not preserve well and is mostly consumed. Production sites are often the only places with any discernible remains related to salt use. However, historical and ethnographic material are rich sources of analogies of how salt was pro duced and traded in preindustrial societies. There are frequently large-scale similarities in traditional salt-making practices despite tremendous technological, organizational, and environmental contexts. These show that salt production technology is mostly robust and fairly simple and that salt can be made with very little investment in infrastructure. As a result, many communities with access to salt sources could be self-sufficient. In the ab sence of readily available salt, trade networks developed around its distribution over medium and long distances. Consequently, control over this spatially restricted resource was often an important factor in regional politics, and in several cases played an impor tant role in the development of hierarchical systems of power. It is, however, important to discern between specialization production for trade by a small group of producers and production by multiple small-scale producers for their own use, since the archaeological remains of these two different production strategies may look very similar. As a result, ar chaeologists need to employ multiple lines of evidence in discerning the organization of production.

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In this article we present a lot of Greek pottery found in different excavations carried out in the laietan settlement of Turó de Ca n 'Olivé. We also present a stadistical comparison of other ceramic categories coming from the same settlement (imported amphores and different kinds of imported pottery), and also with other contemporary pottery lots of laietan and cossetan area.

This paper concerns Sasanian to Early Islamic period transport containers, usually lined with bitumen, known as Torpedo jars. Widely distributed throughout the western Indian Ocean, with outliers as far west as Egypt and to the east in Indonesia, they are an important marker of maritime exchange. Their area of production is thought to be central/southern Iraq or southwestern Iran, the latter in keeping with proposed bitumen sources in the region of Ilam/Khuzestan. Here thirteen Torpedo jar samples from Siraf (southern Iran), belonging to two class categories defined by form and macroscopic fabric, were analysed. The technology of manufacture and potential source areas were examined in thin section by polarising, digital and scanning electron microscopy. These same techniques were used to examine the bitumen layer, providing insight into the vessel lining process. Analysis generally validated the distinction between the two classes; fabric variation within the classes identified eight petro-fabrics, suggestive of at least five workshops. These results point to regionally related workshops for each class category, exploiting distinct clay resources, rather than two single production sites. Suitable clay resources are widely available throughout central/southern Iraq and southwestern Iran, including Ilam/Khuzestan.

ABSTRACT:  It is a distinct pleasure to write an article in honor of James (“Jim”) Hoffmeier, a friend and project director with whom I have worked at Tell el-Borg (North Sinai) in recent years, plus a well-respected and prolific colleague whose many and wide-ranging works I have consulted since the advent of my studies in the 1980s regarding both Egyptology and the Ancient Near East. Selecting a pertinent topic for his Festschrift was initially tricky, since Jim’s interests are equally broad and varied, but this final selection has been drawn and expanded from a portion of a manuscript I am currently completing.  In researching the broader relations between Egypt, sub-Saharan Africa and other regions, I became intrigued by three or four “imports” that often appear together in different groupings with dwarfs, especially during the Old Kingdom, namely sub-Saharan African dogs, felines (usually leopards), and primates (i.e., baboons; monkeys); Egyptian dwarfs appear frequently alongside these exotic imports, but are overshadowed somewhat by the novelty and rarity of imported sub-Saharan “pygmies” who are distinguished by a different nomenclature in Egyptian texts. This paper supplements the Old Kingdom portion of Veronique Dasen’s 1993 seminal study on Dwarfs in Ancient Egypt and Greece, by adding some less well-known and new examples; it applies some quantification and statistical analyses to the apparent Old Kingdom preference for using indigenous dwarfs as handlers of imported dogs, primates, and sometimes felines (e.g., from Nubia, sub-Saharan Africa, Punt, and occasionally the adjacent deserts and oases); and it reviews Egyptian dwarfs and foreign pygmies’ presence in other professions and activities in the Old Kingdom (and later periods). Published July 2020.

Discovery of two lamps at the Roman fort of Apsaros (Gonio, Georgia) offers further insights concerning adaptation of the pelta motif on Roman lamps. Inquiry into the nature of the ornaments on the base – previously unknown in Colchis – leads to conclusions about the possible influx of goods to the fort located on the outskirts of the Roman Empire.

Preface: Anastasia Gadolou. Introduction: Catherine Morgan.
Nel volume sono esaminati i reperti ceramici d'importazione e di produzione coloniale di periodo arcaico, editi e non, provenienti dagli scavi effettuati entro gli insediamenti antichi di Sibari, Crotone e Caulonia. L'indagine si inserisce nell'ambito delle ricerche sulle poleis achee dell'Italia meridionale e sull'Acaia propria, condotte negli ultimi decenni seguendo metodologie di analisi comparativa delle evidenze e delle problematiche dei singoli centri e delle regioni nelle quali ricadono nei loro vari periodi di vita. I risultati raggiunti attraverso l'analisi e la presentazione in dettaglio di una parte consistente delle testimonianze di cultura materiale disponibili intendono offrire un contributo alla conoscenza dei siti considerati, la fisionomia dei quali è ancora, sotto il profilo archeologico, in larga parte da definire.

This paper explores how and why ancient Indigenous societies, exchanged information. The emergence of symbolic productions or early languages is explored through scholarly work provided by archaeologists and anthropologists, as well as others such as paleobiologists and paleogeologists. Ancient communication forms are described with respect to the following dimensions: the media used, the motifs, designs and colors depicted, location, diffusion through time and space, and some specific social uses. Information about birthing, habitat, orientation, transportation, hunting and life skills, and religious/cosmological beliefs is also included.