public amenities and of terracotta roof tiles. These material enhance-
ments are visible throughout the region and on an increasing scale
over thefive-hundred-year period examined here, although there were
marked fluctuations in the dissemination of specific artefacts and
commodities.
Economic connections resulted from specific historical initiatives,
which were driven by social or political imperatives, but they were also
related to perceived ecological variability—the scarcity of certain min-
erals, and the need for shipbuilding timber, for instance.^10 Those seeking
resources developed in our region included distant partners such as the
Athenians, as well as partners from the region itself, such as coastal
harbours in need of metal ore. The targets of significant external bulk
trade were mainly located in lower Macedonia and north of Rhodope,
although some of the coastal towns along the north Aegean periphery
were also net consumers of wine in particular, from Thasos, Chios, Kos,
and Rhodes, whilst Pontic producers (mainly Herakleia Pontika, Sinope,
and Chersonesos) competed with the former on an increasing scale in
thefinal three centuriesbc, albeit primarily to satisfy consumption
within the Black Sea region and adjacent inland sites. The apparent
impenetrability of Rhodope is largely the result of modern national
border administration; distributions of archaeological material within
the mountain region do not support the idea that trade did not cross
upland terrain.^11 In addition to the relatively well-known pattern of
exchange between Aegean or Black Sea producers and Balkan con-
sumers, new trading connections have recently been detected, delivering
products from hitherto unknown producers in the east Balkan region
(notably in Mesambria during the middle decades of the third century
bc) to clients inland and to overseas destinations.^12 These kinds of
network connections reinforce the robustness of the regional network
envisaged here.
It has been apparent to researchers that significantfluctuations did
occur in the demand and supply patterns between major consumer
centres and major suppliers over three centuries (that is, between the
earlyfifth and the late third or early second centuriesbc). Thesefluctu-
ations have been hard to understand, beyond the curves and dips shown
on charts and graphs from different consumer centres. The quantities of
(^10) See below, n.33.
(^11) Archibald 1998, 49–52, 126–35; Nekhrizov and Mikov 2000, 161–70; see further
below on the Pistiros inscription and its implications for movement across Rhodope.
(^12) See esp. Stoyanov 2011 and other contributors to Tzochev et al. 2011.
198 Regionalism and regional economies