254 Baker
regular monetary administration, although we may glean this from documen-
tary rather than numismatic sources.50
Numismatic data, like other forms of material evidence, are particularly
important for regional or site-related histories within Greece, particularly
since written sources may be good and plentiful in some respects, but are never
quantifiable and diachronic. As indicated, quite detailed accounts for Athens,
Corinth, Thebes, Glarenza, Argos, Sparta, Arta, and other smaller sites can be
given, some of which run counter to the generally assumed developments.
Certain regions can be completely re-evaluated in demographic and economic
terms, for instance the territories taken by the Catalans, or Epirus. Some fun-
damental relations between territories can be described, for instance a triangle
between the Cyclades, the Peloponnese and Crete, and a clear shift in orienta-
tion away from the Aegean towards the Ionian and Adriatic in the course of
the 13th century, which was only partially reversed in the latter course of the
14th century with the strengthening of the economic and political might of the
eastern Aegean.
50 Νikos Moschonas, “Νομίσματα με νόμιμη κυκλοφορία στο Ιόνιο κατά την περίοδο της βενετικής
κυριαρχίας” [“Coins under Legal Circulation in the Ionian during the Period of Venetian
Rule”], in Το Ιόνιο, Οικολογία-Οικονομία-Ρεύματα ιδεών, (Ζάκυνθος 24–27 Οκτωβρίου 1985)
[The Ionian, Ecology-Economy-Currents of Thought (Zakynthos 24–27 October 1985)] ed.
Nikos Moschonas (Athens, 1990), pp. 197–235.