AEGEAN-LEVANTINE TRADE, 600–300 BCE 291
One thing that is immediately striking about these observations is thatthose goods generally considered to be important high-volume commodities
in internal Aegean trade – grain, wine, fish, and (olive) oil – do not appear
prominently at all in Aegean-Levantine trade. Some quantities of wine and
oil were shipped east and west, but on what appears to be a rather small scale;
fish products cannot be found at all. What foodstuffs there were in this trade
were mostly exotic types originating in the east: rice, sesame, dates, semidalis.
Of these, the presence of rice seems minimal, while sesame, dates, and semidalis
were used in the Aegean mostly for special occasions, like weddings, indicating
their comparative rarity and expense.^30
One could surmise from this list that while it is lengthy, the actual volumeof goods in trade and thus its overall scale might not have been all too grand,
reflecting the traditional approach to low-volume, high-value luxury trade.
A couple of points should caution us from reaching this conclusion too quickly,
however. First, Thucydides tells us that in the second year of the Archidamian
War (430/29 BCE), the Athenians sent out a squadron of six triremes to Caria
and Lycia in order to collect money, and to stop Peloponnesian sea-raiders
from molesting merchant ships coming in from Phaselis and Phoenicia (Thuc.
2.69). Clearly, Levantine-Aegean trade was recognizably large and impor-
tant enough to the Athenians to warrant special attention on at least this one
occasion. Secondly, the number of Archaic and Classical coin hoards found
throughout Egypt and the Near East, especially those containing Athenian
owls, indicates there was an appreciable silver drain from the Aegean towards
the east, presumably at least in part as payment for many of the goods moving
westward.^31 Although, in general, Levantine-Aegean trade was not big on the
basics, like oil, wine, and grain, still it contained items that were apparently in
high demand, which was then presumably met with adequate supply.
Discussion
To be sure, the desiderata for this list of commodities are as lengthy as the list
itself. To truly grasp the nature of Levantine-Aegean long-distance trade, we
should like to know with greater precision when certain commodities were
introduced to the trade, the annual amounts shipped and prices, what pro-
portion of the items in transit were in a commodity versus a gift state, what
proportion of the items gravitated toward the luxury end of the consumption
spectrum, and so on. But even with the rough and noisy data as we have them,
we are able to draw some conclusions about these commodities, especially
how they relate to the notion of self-sufficiency.
As noted, there seems to be little question that the Greek world, particularlythat portion of it with access to the sea in the Aegean and in the West, experi-
enced significant intensive and extensive economic growth in the second half