Patterns in the Economy of Roman Asia Minor

Asia Minor under Rome was one of the wealthiest and most developed parts of the Empire, but there have been few modern studies of its economics. The twelve papers in this book, by an international team of scholars, work from literary texts, inscriptions, coinage and archaeology. They study the direct impact of Roman rule; the organisation of large agricultural estates; changing patterns of olive production; threats to rural prosperity from pests and the animal world; inter-regional trade in the Black Sea; the significance of civic market buildings; the economic role of temples and sanctuaries; the contribution of private benefactors to civic finances; monetization in the third century AD, and the effect of transitory populations on local economic activity.

Stephen Mitchell is Leverhulme Professor of Hellenistic Culture at the University of Exeter and a fellow of the British Academy. His previous books include Anatolia. Land, Men and Gods in Asia Minor (OUP 1993) and monographs on the Asia Minor cities of Cremna (1995) and Pisidian Antioch (1998), both published by the Classical Press of Wales. Constantina Katsari completed her Ph.D at University College London on coinage and the economy of the Roman East and is now a lecturer in ancient history at the University of Leicester.