Economic activities of Athens and Sparta

The economic system of ancient Greek cities includes operations in the commodity market, work, services with the purpose of profit and satisfaction of the needs of the inhabitants of policies. The economic activities of Athens, like Sparta, were mainly focused on agriculture. A little later, it includes the sale of goods, which contributed to the access to the sea routes.

The economic activities of Athens are significantly different from Sparta because of the different organization and way of life. Although both policies have a common feature - the use of slave labor to meet all the needs of the ruling elite. Caught in debtors and having lost land, peasants also could get into distress and give a harvest from their lands as a payment of debt.

Conditions for the development of economic activity in Ancient Greece

In the ancient Hellas, technical progress was in full swing - this determined the beginning of the archaic era. Widely distributed iron, which affected production - from the craft it took a serial nature. The advent of additional funds accelerated the development of workshops and became an incentive for a larger trade. Because of this, small and medium-sized peasant households stopped, debt bondage was becoming more common. The sharp increase in the number also affected the situation among landowners - the struggle for territory is getting tougher.

There is a fragmentation of peasant plots and their concentration in the hands of ancestral noble families. All this entails the growth of the agrarian crisis. Stability is violated in society, tyrannical regimes appear over time. Technical progress made handicrafts more independent economically and socially. It combines with trade. In society there is a layer of the population controlling the craft - this is the nobility, which linked economic activity only with trade. Slaves are used to perform large volumes of work. Debt slavery is gaining more and more turns, many peasants are devastated and deprived of land.

The economic activities of Athens, and Sparta, and Rome had its own characteristics and quite different from the eastern. Economic prosperity and development was based on slave labor, it was the slaves who became the producers of all the material wealth of these policies. In their category were captured prisoners of war or slaves sold in special markets. Often, the number of slaves were recorded representatives of barbarian peoples, which sold the ruling aristocracy. The state forbade doing so by its citizens.

Agriculture in Ancient Greece

Agriculture was the main activity, the inhabitants of the country grew wheat and barley, but the volume of the crop was insufficient. Because of the hilly terrain and stony soil, it was difficult to plow and work. The local area was more suitable for growing oil-bearing and fruit trees, grapevine. Gardening replaced the grain economy. Thanks to the high yield of olives and grapes, the local population not only provided for their needs, but also started selling products. However, this required an influx of labor, which became slaves.

Also, the Greeks bred sheep, workers and draft animals. Cattle breeding was present, but on a small scale. To the meat and milk, the ancient Greeks were more indifferent and did not use them as staple food. The economic activities of Athens in ancient Greece also did not pay much attention to the breeding of horses. Agriculture was diversified, there was a commodity orientation.

Craft in Ancient Greece

Among the most important handicraft industries can be identified construction and shipbuilding, a lot of attention was paid to ceramics and weaving, mining and forging craft. There were a number of small workshops that were called ergasteries. The results of economic activity, such as increasing demands for raw materials, which were not enough in the local areas, the overcrowding of the domestic market with wine and oil, the expansion of the sphere of handicraft production, pushed the Greeks to active foreign trade.

Trade in Ancient Greece

Greek handicrafts and trade were interrelated. In the market, the masters sold their products, bought raw materials and tools for work, slaves and food products were sold here. In the bazaars you could buy resin, wood, leather, honey, ivory, iron, handicrafts.

Athens and Sparta type of economic activity

The economic activities of Athens and Sparta differed. The first type was understood as states with developed trade and craft activity, commodity-money relations. In these policies, developed production was built on the labor of slaves, the device is democratic. Mass labor of slaves is one of the reasons why economic activity has developed successfully. Athens, Megara, Rhodes, Corinth are examples of such policies. States with this type of economic activity were usually by the sea, the territory was small, but the population was quite numerous. Polis were the centers of Ancient Greece, under their influence there was all economic activity - Athens were considered the most important.

The Spartan type includes agrarian states, in which agriculture predominates - trade, commodity-money relations and crafts are poorly developed. There are a large number of dependent workers, a device of the oligarchic type. Such states include Sparta, Boeotia, Arcadia and Thessaly.

Economic activities of Sparta in Ancient Greece

After the conquest of the well-populated territory, the Dorian nobility realized the need for constant control of the population to maintain strict discipline. This affected the early appearance of the state. In Sparta, agriculture always prevailed. Sparta's policy was to seize the territories of its neighbors to expand its territories. After the Messenian wars, each Spartiat (family of the community) received identical parcels of land or clerks. They were intended only for use, they could not be divided. The helots worked on the clerks (the rural population), and the Spartiates devoted their time to the military affairs, the organization of their economic activities did not concern them.

After Messenia lost its independence, almost all of its population became helots. Since then, Sparta's economy has held on to their exploitation. Each ilot paid the citizen the established rate of tribute with grain, oil, meat, wine and other agricultural products. Apophore (obrok) was about half of the entire crop, the rest of the workers left themselves. Due to such partial independence, sometimes among them there were well-to-do residents. However, the social status of the helots was terrible, however, the developing economic activities of Athens also forced slaves to a huge amount of work to meet all their needs.

Modern Sparta

To date, the city has lost its former grandeur. In the 19th century, most of it was rebuilt. Modern Sparta is a large capital attracting tourists. Most of the territory is allocated for agricultural activities. In 2001, the population numbered 18 thousand people. Most of the local population is engaged in agriculture. Particular attention is paid to the processing of olive and citrus fruits. This Sparta was famous from ancient times. In summer, you can see even a festival in honor of olives. With the process of processing the fruits of these trees can be found in the museum of the city. The chemical, tobacco, textile and food industries are represented in modern Sparta by small enterprises.

The economic activities of Athens in Ancient Greece

The early history of Attica and Athens (the main city) does not contain much information. The closed dominant nobility was called eupatridas, and the rest of the free population was demos. The economic activities of Athens in the ancient era depended on the work of the second category of citizens and slaves. Among the latter are small and medium-sized peasants, shipowners, merchants, small craftsmen, etc. In the 7th-6th centuries BC, E. The rural population is in decline, the peasantry is ruined, it is increasingly losing land. Barley is the most widespread bread culture that could grow on the lands of Attica. From the 6th century BC. E. Agriculture is concentrated on the cultivation of olives and grapes. In the depths of Attica, valuable varieties of marble, plastic clay used in pottery were extracted. Also this territory was famous for the richest silver mines in the whole country. In the southern part of Attica there were also iron mines. The economic activities of Athens during the antiquity developed thanks to the fertile lands of the plain Pedion, located near the city.

Usury and trade are not yet very common, but they are becoming larger in time. The land is an inseparable property of the family, not subject to sale or repayment for debts. However, usurers-eupatrides invented a method by which debtors, formally remaining owners, actually had to give the most part of the crop from their territory. Many aristocrats were enriched by maritime commerce, not landownership.

With the coming to power of Solon, a number of reforms are taking place, the economic activity of Athens is improving. To work on agricultural lands imported foreigners, social and economic life of the free part of the community rises. Solon permits to alienate the land, which becomes a great benefit for large landowners-eupatridians. The cultivation of horticultural crops is promoted, the cost of bread is lowered due to the export and sale of olive oil abroad and the introduction of a ban on grain exports. The financial position of the townspeople improved.

As the history says, Solon also encouraged the expansion of crafts, realizing the impossibility of a limited number of fertile land to feed the inhabitants. Each father had to teach his son some skill, otherwise the son will be able, according to the law, to refuse to support the elderly father. From many craftsmen from foreign countries, economic activity was also dependent, Athens endowed the settlers who moved to the city with their citizenship. With the arrival of the tyrant Pisistratus, the economic power of the city is strengthened. With the increase in the urban population, the number of craft workshops, workers in the port, merchant and military fleet has also increased. Not only slaves were involved in the work, but also peasants who did not have land, as well as workers with the right to choose. There is a creation of new external and internal markets for the sale of agricultural products of Athens and the whole of Attica. Most of all, olive oil was provided for marketing. The Black Sea coast presented archaeologists and historians with evidence of trade of the Northern Black Sea coast and Athens under the administration of Pisistratus - attic ceramics.

Modern Athens

The second half of the 19th century was marked by rapid economic growth in Athens. After the city becomes the capital, there are industrial enterprises. Thanks to a favorable economic and geographical position, the main land routes of Greece went to the spacious sea routes. In Greater Athens, more than half the population is employed in the manufacturing industry. Here are textile, leather-shoe, sewing, food, chemical, metalworking and metallurgy, printing and other industries. The shipyard, the metallurgical and oil refineries remained in the vicinity of Athens after the war. In a year the city processes more than 2.5 million tons of oil, through it the most part of import (about 70%) and about 40% of export is transported. The largest Greek banks are in Athens. The end of 2009 was the beginning of a decline in the economy and economic activity.

Economic activities of Athens and Sparta

The appearance of cities, as well as the economic activities of Athens and Sparta, have changed significantly since ancient times. It would seem that they have lost their former power, but no one knows what history will write for these two ancient policies in the future.