fi rst millennium b.c.e. also has redistributive features and
had a negative eff ect on commercial long-distance trade.
Finally, domestic trade conformed to a commercial type
of exchange, with strangers trading goods or services on a
market in accordance with freely varying prices. Economic
value was expressed in quantities of certain goods, particu-
larly silver, a commodity that fulfi lled in antiquity many of
the functions of our money. Pairs of scales and stone weights
to weigh silver accurately, as well as the skill of converting
into foreign weight systems, belonged to the toolkit of every
ancient trader. Buying and selling, however, were oft en done
by barter, with several items agreed on as the countervalue in
a transaction, an ensemble that may include amounts of sil-
ver. Prices and commodity values fl uctuated and were subject
to supply and demand, but they usually adhered to custom-
ary rates attributable to social norms rather than government
interference or market price fi xing. Commercial, redistribu-
tive, and reciprocal modes of exchange existed alongside one
another, depending on social context or transaction type,
but their relative importance varied from place to place and
through time.
Sellers on the domestic market were the producers them-
selves. Potters, for example, produced for clients but also sold
their stock in marketplaces or from their workshops. Another
example is people who made their living from retail. Th is
group includes shopkeepers and vendors, occasionally spe-
cializing in products like salt or victuals. On a diff erent scale,
a class of wealthy merchants organized bulk transports of
goods and relied on commercial networks for acquisition and
distribution of merchandise. Th ose enterprises usually were
undertaken on behalf of the state, with merchants collecting
and selling agricultural taxes due to the state and repaying
the state in silver or other commodities. Merchants held vari-
ous positions; oft en they were entrepreneurs who entered into
contractual agreements to undertake these tasks, but at other
times and places they were more like government employees.
Some of these merchants also participated in long-dis-
tance commerce, but others dedicated themselves exclusivelyto trade expeditions to faraway destinations, exporting prod-
ucts of Mesopotamian manufacture, like textiles, vegetable
oils, and foodstuff s, and importing resources, such as metals,
stone, wood, aromatics, and slaves. City-states like Old As-
syrian Assur (ca. 1900 b.c.e.) prospered as a result of long-
distance trade, and merchants typically yielded much more
political infl uence than did merchants in territorial states.
Foreign commerce was based on family fi rms, with the
younger male members traveling abroad or residing in foreign
trade colonies like Kanesh, the central Anatolian settlement
of Old Assyrian traders who sold Iranian tin and Babylonian
textiles against Anatolian silver. Foreign trade depended
on favorable political relations, and arrangements for mer-
chants oft en were included in diplomatic treaties. Substan-
tial volumes of wares also traveled abroad as diplomatic gift s
between allied rulers—for instance during the Amarna Age
(14th century b.c.e.)—but this exchange cannot be defi ned
as trade as such, given that upholding social relations was its
main purpose. Nevertheless, commerce and diplomacy oft en
worked well together because diplomatic envoys took care of
their trade interests during missions abroad.
Th e natural landscape dictates how long-distance com-
munications and trade are conducted. Rivers are easy arteries
of transport, and the Euphrates has throughout the millen-
nia been the main pathway between the Persian Gulf and the
Mediterranean coast, carrying large volumes of commerce
that enrich ports of trade centers along its banks. Maritime
trade over the Persian Gulf was particularly important in
the late third millennium b.c.e., when traders from Meso-
potamia met their colleagues from the Indus Valley on the
island of Bahrain (ancient Dilmun). Th e Syrian and Phoeni-
cian cities of the Mediterranean coast were renowned trad-
ing centers from which the famous ship found at Uluburun
(off the Turkish coast) sailed in the 14th century b.c.e. and
where colonies were founded, such as Carthage in the ninth
century b.c.e. An important overland trade connected Mes-
opotamia through the Zagros Mountains with the Iranian
highlands; the same route became known as the Silk RoadGold bracelet or diadem, Phoenician, seventh to sixth century b.c.e., from the Phoenician trading center of Th arros, Sardinia; such jewelery, with
its mixture of infl uences, demonstrates Phoenician connections across the Mediterranean. (© Th e Trustees of the British Museum)trade and exchange: The Middle East 10990895-1194_Soc&Culturev4(s-z).i1099 1099 10/10/07 2:31:04 PM