the region between Apollonia Pontika and Perinthos, as being part of
Byzantine territory. The likeliest period of the city’s expansion into these
areas coincides with Polybius’ account, and helps to explain the
heightening of tension on the landward, European side of the Bosporus,
as well as in the Straits.
Byzantion had for many years paid a ballooning tribute to the Galatian
enclave at Tylis in south-eastern Thrace.^130 At the same time, Byzan-
tion’s territorial claims were being challenged. The Byzantines are com-
pared by Polybius with Tantalos: they could see the fruit of their labours
but not enjoy them, as‘their’crops were being either damaged or
appropriated by the local Thracian inhabitants (4.45). The city expanded
territorially because it was economically successful. Nor was this success
due simply to brinkmanship in the extraction of protection money for
ships passing through the Bosporus. The Byzantines had developed an
expertise in organizing monopolies. The attempts to raise civic revenues
through the sale or leasing of certain rights, includingfishing and salting,
show how this kind of expertise may have emerged. In the third quarter
of the third centurybc, the Byzantines progressively created a monopoly
of control over Bosporan trade, which, with the purchase of Hieron, and
consequently the city’s complete dominance of the channel, was in
danger of stifling the very partners who helped to make this a success
story for Byzantion. This critical juncture masks a different kind of
monopolistic activity, manifested in the city’s protest, inc. 255 bc,at
the creation of a more remote monopoly, namely at the western Pontic
harbour town of Tomis, by its near neighbour, Kallatis.^131 If Kallatis
could have created a situation (by monopolizing Tomis) in which the city
had a critical advantage in the pricing of saltedfish, then this would have
had a direct effect on the goods that Byzantion specialized in selling,
namely salt and preservedfish (Plb. 4.38.4–5). The convoying of Black
Sea grain transports made Byzantion a major clearing house for grain
and other regional produce that often travelled alongside cereals—slaves,
cattle (and hides), honey, and wax. Much of this arrived at the city’s
to the Black Sea: Diod. 20.111.3 fr. 302; Plb. 4.50.3; territorial acquisitions in Mysia:
PhylarchusFGrH81 F8; Plb. 4.50.4, 9; Str. 12.8.11.
(^130) Gabrielsen speculates that the Celts of Tylis had a reasonably accurate idea of what
they could extract from Byzantion in the form of tribute (they demanded 80T per annum in
c. 220 bc: Plb. 4.46.3–4). If the capacity of an average vessel was 3,000medimnoiof grain,
and the price of grain 5 drachmas amedimnos, this would deliver a toll of 15,000 drachmas
per ship (Gabrielsen 2007, 295, 316; Bresson, 278 and n.66). For a recent review of the
kingdom of Tylis, see the contributions to Vagalinski 2010. 131
Memnon of Herakleia,FGrH434 F13 (Photios 228a–b); Avram 2003, 1187–8;
Gabrielsen 2011, 223–7.
244 Regionalism and regional economies