Rome
On Roman prices there is a large literature. Some material on prices appears in Michael Rostovtzeff, The Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (2 vols., Oxford, 1926; rpt. 1957); much more is in Tenney Frank, ed., An Economic Survey of Ancient Rome (Baltimore, 1933–40).
An important survey is A. H. M. Jones, “Inflation under the Roman Empire,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 5 (1953) 293–318; a second edition, revised and corrected, appears in P. A. Brunt, ed., The Roman Economy: Studies in Ancient Economic and Administrative History (Oxford, 1974), 187–229.
Much data is collected in Richard Duncan-Jones, The Economy of the Roman Empire: Quantitative Studies (Cambridge, 1974); idem, “The Price of Wheat in Lower Egypt,” in Structure and Scale in the Roman Economy (Cambridge, 1990), 143–56; idem, “The Price of Wheat in Roman Egypt under the Principate,” Chiron 8 (1978) 541–60; J. Kolendo, “L’arrêt de l’afflux des monnaies romaines dans le ‘Barbaricum’ sous Septime-Sévère,” Les Dévaluations a Rome 2 (Rome) 169–72.
Also useful are G. Rickman, The Corn Supply of Ancient Rome (Oxford, 1980); S. Bolin, State and Currency in the Roman Empire up to A.D. 300 (Stockholm, 1958); F. M. Heichelheim, “New Light on Currency and Inflation in Hellenistic-Roman Times, from Inscriptions and Papyri,” Economic History 10 (1935) 1–11; Sture Bolin, State and Currency in the Roman Empire to 300 A.D. (Stockholm, 1958); P. Louis, Ancient Rome at Work (London, 1927); H. Mattingly, Roman Coins from the Earliest Times to the Fall of the Western Empire (New York, 1928).
Period-specific studies include Claude Nicolet, “Les variations des prix et la ‘théorie quantitative de la monnaie à Rome, de Cicéron à Pline l’Ancien,” Annales E.S.C. 26 (1971) 1203–27; Z. Yaveta, “Fluctuations monétaires et condition de la plèbe à la fin de la République,” Recherches sur les societes anciennes (Caen, 1971); Tenney Frank, “The Financial Crisis of 33 A.D.” American Journal of Philology 56 (1935) 336–41; L. C. West, “The Coinage of Diocletian and the Edict on Prices,” in P. R. Coleman-Norton, ed., Studies in Roman Economic and Social History in Honor of Allen Chester Johnson (Princeton, 1951), 290–302; Marta Giacchero, ed., Edictum Diocletiani et collegarum de pretiis rerum venalium … (Genoa, 1974); C. R. Whittaker, “Inflation and the Economy in the Fourth Century A. D., in C. E. King, ed., Imperial Revenue, Expenditure, and Monetary Policy in the Fourth Century A.D. (Oxford, 1980), 1–22; M. Fulford, “Coin Circulation and Mint Activity in the Late Roman Empire: Some Economic Implications,” Archaeological Journal 135 (1978) 67–114.
Palestine
Prices in Palestine are examined in Daniel Sperber, Roman Palestine, 200–400: Money and Prices (Ramat-gan, 1974); A. Kindler, ed., The Patterns of Monetary Development in Phoencia and Palestine in Antiquity (Jerusalem, 1963).
Byzantium
For the eastern empire and Byzantine history, see G. Ostrogorsky, “Löhne und Preise in Byzanz,” Byzantische Zeitschrift 23 (1932), Italian trans. in Romano, I Prèzzi in Europa, 47–85; H. Antoniadis-Bibicou, “Démographie, salaires et prix à Byzanze au XIe siècle,” Annales E.S.C. 27 (1972) 215–46; D. A. Zakythinos, Crise monétaire et crise économique à Byzance du XIIIe au XVe siècle (Athens, 1948); Michael F. Hendy, Studies in the Byzantine Monetary Economy, c. 300–1450 (Cambridge, 1985); Angeliki LaiouThomadakis, Peasant Society in the Late Byzantine Empire: A Social and Demographic Study (Princeton, 1977); A. L. Harvey, “The Growth of the Byzantine Rural Economy (thesis, Birmingham, 1983); A. M. Andréadés, “De la monnaie et de la puissance d’achat des métaux précieux dans l’empire byzantin,” Byzantion 1 (1924) 75–115; C. Morrison, “La dévaluation de la monnaie byzantine au XIe siècle: Essai d’interprétation,” Travaux et Mémoires 6 (1976) 3–48; Franz Dölger, Beitrage zur Geschichte der byzantinischen Finanzverwaltung (Darmstadt, 1927).
Islam
For Islamic prices and wages the leading authority is Eliyahu Ashtor, Historie des prix et des salaires dans l’Orient médiéval (Paris, 1969); tr. as A Social and Economic History of the Near East in the Middle Ages (London, 1976); idem, Les métaux precieux et la balance des payements du Proche-Orient à la fin de la basse époque (Paris, 1971); idem, The Medieval Near East: Social and Economic History (London, 1978), a collection of essays on prices, wage and interest movements; idem, “La recherche des prix dans l’Orient médiéale,” Studia Islamica 21 (1964); idem, “Prix et salaires dans l’Espagne musulmane aux Xe et XIe siècles,” Annales E.S.C. 20 (1965) 664–79; “Matériaux pur l’histoire des prix dans l’Egypte médiévale,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 6 (1963) 158–89; idem, “Le coût de la vie dans l’Egypte médiévale,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 3 (1960) 56–77; idem, “Le coût de la vie dans la Syrie médiévale,” Arabica 8 (1961) 59–73; idem, “Le coût de la vie en Palestine au Moyen Age,” in L. A. Mayer Memorial Volume, 154–64; also published in Eretz-Israel 7 (1963); also idem, “Prix et salaires à l’époque mamlouke,” Revue des Études Islamiques (1949) 49–94; idem, “Essai sur les prix et les salaires dans l’empire califien,” Rivista degli Studi Orientale 36 (1961) 19–69; idem, “L’évolution des prix dans le Proche-orient à la basse-époque, Journal of Economic and Social History of the Orient 4 (1961) 15–46.
Especially strong on the demographic and ecological history of Islam is Xavier de Planhol’s excellent Les fondements géographiques de l’histoire de l’Islam (Paris, 1968). For a fiscal perspective see H. Rabie, The Financial System of Egypt, A.H. 564–741/A.D. 1169–1341 (London, 1972); William Popper, Egypt and Syria under the Circassian Sultans (1382–1468 A.D.) (Berkeley, 1955).
Ancient Africa
Useful works include M. Malowist, “The Social and Economic Stability of the Western Sudan in the Middle Ages,” Past & Present 33 (1966) 3–15; E. W. Bovill, The Golden Trade of the Moors (Oxford, 1958); and J. Devisse, “Routes de Commerce et échanges en Afrique occidentale en relation avec la Méditerranée,” Revue d’histoire économique et sociale 1 (1972) 42–73, 357–97.
Polynesia
A. T. Wilson, “Isotope Evidence for Past Climatic and Environmental Change,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 10 (1980) 241–50, is an important work on climate and historical change in Oceania.
East Asia
General works on East Asian civilizations before the modern era include Ping-ti Ho, Studies on the Population of China, 1368–1953 (1959, 2d ed., Cambridge, 1967); Mark Elvin, The Pattern of the Chinese Past; A Social and Economic Interpretation (London, 1973); P. Liu and K. Huang, “Population Change and Economic Development in Mainland China since 1400,” in C. Hou and T. Yu, eds., Modern Chinese Economic History (Taipei, 1977), 61–81. An older but still useful survey is C. P. Fitzgerald, China, A Short Cultural History (New York, 1935, 1972).
Period-specific studies are R. Hartwell, “A Cycle of Economic Change in Imperial China: Coal and Iron in North-east China, 750–1350,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 10 (1967)
On the Sung and Ming periods, there are M. Cartier, “Notes sur l’histoire des prix en Chine du XIVe au XVIIe siècle,” Annales E. S. C. 24 (1969) 1876–89; idem, “Les importations de métaux monetaires en Chine: Essai sur la conjoncture chinoise,” ibid., 36 (1981) 454–66; Ch’uan Han-sheng, “Sung-Ming chien pai-yin kou-mai-li ti pien-tung chi ch’i yuan-yin,” [“Fluctuations in the purchasing power of silver at their cause from the Sung to the Ming dynasties,”] Hsin-ya-hseuh-pao [New Asian Journal] 8 (1967) 157–86, with a summary in English; M. Cartier, “Notes sur l’histoire des prix en Chine du XIVe au XVIIe siècle,” [1368–1644] Annales E. S. C. 24 (1969) 1876–89; idem, “Les importations de métaux monetaires en Chine: Essai sur la conjoncture Chinoise,” ibid., 36 (1981) 454–66; W. S. Atwell, “Notes on Silver, Foreign Trade, and the Late Ming Economy,” Ch’ing shih wen-ti 3 (1977) 1–33; idem “International Bullion Flows and the Chinese Economy, circa 1530–1650,” Past & Present 95 (1982) 68–90.
For the Ching period, see Yeh-chien Wang, “The Secular Tre
nd of Prices during the Ch’ing Period,“ Journal of the Institute of Chinese Studies of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, 5 (1972) 364; Han-sheng Ch’uan and Richard A. Kraus, Mid-Ch’ing Rice Markets and Trade: An Essay in Price History (Cambridge, 1975).
The Western World in the Early Middle Ages
On the early medieval West, Rosamond McKitterick, ed., The New Cambridge Medieval History, vol 2, c. 700-c. 900 (Cambridge, 1995), has chapters on economic organization by Adriaan Verhulst (481–509) and on money and coinage by Mark Blackburn (538–62) but nothing on prices.
Price lists for this period appear in Claudio Sánchez-Albornoz, El precio de la vida en el reino astur-leone’s hace mil Años (Buenos Aires, 1945), a rare work that can be found in the New York Public Library.
General works of economic history on this period include Robert Latouche, Les origines de l’économie occidentale IVe–XIe siècle (Paris, 1956); and Georges Duby, The Early Growth of the European Economy: Warriors and Peasants from the Seventh to the Twelfth Century (Ithaca, 1978).
Other works centering on the question of subsistence and commerce include P. Grierson, “Commerce in the Dark Ages: A Critique of the Evidence,” Royal Historical Society Transactions 9 (1959) 123–40; R. Hodges, Dark Age Economics: The Origins of Towns and Trade, A.D. 600–1000 (London, 1982); S. R. H. Jones, “Transaction Costs, Institutional Change, and the Emergence of a Market Economy in Later Anglo-Saxon England,” Economic History Review 46 (1993) 658–78; P. Grierson, “Commerce in the Dark Ages: A Critique of the Evidence,” Royal Historical Society Transactions 5th ser. 9 (1959) 123–40; M. de Bouard, “Problemes des Subsistence dans un État medievale: le marché et les prix des céréales au royaume angevin de Sicile,” Annales d’Histoire Économique et Sociale 10 (1938) 483.
On money and coinage, see P. Grierson and M. Blackburn, Medieval European Coinage (Cambridge, 1986); A. Blanchet, Les tresors de monnaies romaines et les invasions germaniques (Paris, 1900); Marc Bloch, “Le probleme de l’or au moyen age,” Annales d’Histoire Économique et Sociale 5 (1933) 1–34, Eng. tr. in Land and Work in Mediaeval Europe: Selected Papers by Marc Bloch (Berkeley, 1967), 186–229; Carlo Cipolla, “Currency Depreciation in Medieval Europe,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 15 (1962–63) 413–22.
The Medieval Price Revolution
General works include Georges Duby, L’économie rurale et la vie des campagnes dans l’ Occident médiéval (2 vols., Paris, 1962), trans. C. Postan as Rural Economy and Country Life in the Medieval West (London, 1968); idem, The Early Growth of the European Economy: Warriors and Peasants from the Seventh to the Twelfth Century (Ithaca, 1974) with a “bibliographical guide”; M. M. Postan, The Medieval Economy and Society: An Economic History of Britain in the Middle Ages (London, 1972); idem, “Economic Foundations of Medieval Society,” in idem, Essays on Medieval Agriculture and General Problems of the Medieval Economy (Cambridge, 1973), 2–27; idem, Medieval Economy and Society (1972); J. Z. Titow, English Rural Society, 1200–1350 (London, 1969); H. E. Hallam, Rural England, 1066–1348 (Brighton, 1981); Edward Miller, “England in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries: An Economic Contrast?” Economic History Review 2d ser. 24 (1971) 1–14.
A heroic attempt to model the main lines of medieval economic history appears in Richard H. Britnell and Bruce M. S. Campbell eds., A Commercialising Economy: England 1086 to c. 1300 (Manchester, 1995). Graeme Donald Snooks, “The Dynamic Role of the Market in the Anglo-Norman Economy and Beyond, 1086–1300,” ibid., 27–54, discusses great waves in prices, population, domestic product, and product per capita from the eleventh century to the present. Nicholas Mayhew, “Modelling Medieval Monetisation,” ibid., 55–77, offers a very different estimate of medieval domestic product. The disparity derives from different readings of Domesday evidence. We are still a long way from closure on questions of economic growth in the middle ages.
Major local studies of general interest in France include Robert Fossier’s excellent La terre et les hommes en Picardie, jusqu’ a la fin du XIIIe siècle (2 vols., Paris and Louvain, 1968); Y. Bezard, La vie rurale dans le sud de la région parisienne (Paris, 1929); A. Fierro, “Un cycle démographique: Dauphiny et Faucigny du XIVe aux XIXe siècle,” Annales E.S.C. (1969); Joseph Strayer, “Economic Conditions in the Country of Beaumont-le-Roger, 1261–1313,” Speculum 26 (1951) 277–87; Ph. Wolff, Commerces et marchands de Toulouse (vers 1350-vers 1450) (Pion, 1954); J. Yver, “Remarques sur l’évolution de quelques prix en Normandie aux XIVe et XVe siècles,” Revue d’Histoire du Droit Français et Étranger 4 (1958) 145–54; G. Fourquin, Les campagnes de la région parisienne à la fin du moyen age (Paris, 1964); G. Lesage, Marseille Angevine (Paris, 1950).
Among Belgian and Dutch local histories there are L. Genicot, L’économie rurale namuroise au bas Moyen Age, 1199–1429 (Louvain, 1960); G. Sivery, Structures agraires et vie rurale dans le Hainaut à la fin du Moyen Age (Lille, 1973); N. DePauw, ed., Ypre jeghen Poperinghe angeande den verbonden: Gedingsstukken der XIVde eeuw nopens het laken (Ghent, 1899); G. Des Marez and E. De Sagher, eds. Comptes de la ville d’Ypres de 1267 à 1329 (2 vols. Brussels, 1909).
English local studies include H. P. R. Finberg, Tavistock Abbey: A Study in the Social and Economic History of Devon (Cambridge, 1951; 2d ed., Newton Abbot, 1969); W. G. Hoskins and H. P. R. Finberg, Devonshire Studies (London, 1952); H. P. R. Finberg, Gloucestershire (London, 1955); W. G. Hoskins, Leicestershire (London, 1970); Edward Miller, The Abbey and Bishopric of Ely (Cambridge, 1951); J. B. Harley, “Population Trends and Agricultural Developments from the Warwickshire Hundred Rolls of 1279,” Economic History Review 2d ser.II (1958) 8–18; Frances Davenport, The Economic Development of a Norfolk Manor, 1086–1565 (Cambridge, 1906); E, Miller, The Abbey and Bishopric of Ely: The Social History of an Ecclesiastical Estate from the Tenth Century to the Early Fourteenth Century (Cambridge, 1951); Alan Everitt, Continuity and Colonization: The Evolution of Kentish Settlement (Leicester, 1986); J. Hatcher, Rural Economy and Society in Medieval Cornwall, 1300–1500 (Cambridge, 1970); H. E. Hallam, Settlement and Society: A Study of the Early Agrarian History of South Lincolnshire (Cambridge, 1965); idem, Rural England, 1066–1348 (Brighton, 1981).
Italian studies include H. Bresc, Un monde méditerranéean: économie et société en Sicilie, 1300–1450 (2 vols., Rome, 1986).
For Spain there is C. Dufourcq, L’Espagne catalane et le maghrib aux XIIIe et XIVe siècles . . . (Paris, 1966).
For demographic trends in medieval Europe, see J. Z. Titow, “Some Evidence of the Thirteenth-Century Population Increase,” Economic History Review 14 (1961) 218–23; Josiah Russell, Late Ancient and Medieval Population, 20; idem, “Recent Advances in Medieval Demography,” Speculum 45 (1965) 84–101; idem, “Aspects démographiques des débuts de la féodalité,” Annales E.S.C, 20 (1965) 1118–27; a critique of Russell’s estimates appears in G. Ohlin, “No Safety in Numbers: Some Pitfalls in Historical Statistics,” in H. Rosovsky, ed., Industrialization in Two Systems: Essays in Honor of Alexander Gershenkron (New York, 1966), 70–81. Other essays include M. M. Postan, “Some Economic Evidence of Declining Population in the Later Middle Ages,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 2 (1950) 221–46; Julian Cornwall, “English Population in the Early Sixteenth Century,” Economic History Review, 2d ser. 23 (1970) 32–44; H. E. Hallam, “Population Density in Medieval Fenland,” Economic History Review 14 (1961) 71–79; and “Some Thirteenth-Century Censuses,” ibid. 10 (1957) 340–61; idem, Rural England, 1066–1348 (Brighton, 1981), 245–50; H. E. Hallam, “Population Movements in England, 1086–1350,” in Hallam, ed., The Agrarian History of England and Wales (Cambridge, 1988), II, 508–593; Enrico Fiume, “Sui rapporti economici tra cittá e contado nell’ etá communale,” Archivio Storico Italiano 114 (1956) 18–68; David Herlihy, “The Medieval Marriage Market,” Medieval and Renaissance Studies 6 (1976) 3–27; idem, “The Generation in Medieval History,” Viator 5 (1974) 347–64; E. Baratier, “La démographie Provençale au XIIIe et XIVe siècle (Paris, 1961).
On medieval price movements, the literature is most abundant for England. Besides William Beveridge, Prices and Wages in England from the Twelfth to the Nineteenth Century cited above; idem, “The Yield and Price of Corn in the Middle Ages,” Economic Journal, Economic History Supplement 1 (1926–29) 162–66; A. L. Poole, “Livestock Prices in the Twelfth Century,” English Historical Review 55 (1940) 284–95; M. M. Postan and J. Titow, “Heriots and Prices on Winchester Manors,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 11 (1959) 392–411; J. Longden, “Statistical Notes on Winchester Heriots,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 11 (1959) 412–17.
The best and most comprehensive studies of English medieval prices are those of D. L. Farmer (University of Saskatchewan): “Some Price Fluctuations in Angevin England,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 9 (1956–57) 34–43; “Some Grain Price Movements in Thirteenth-Century England,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 10 (1957) 207–20; “Some Livestock Price Movements in Thirteenth–Century England,” Economic History Review 2d ser. 22 (1969) 1–16; “Crop Yields, Prices, and Wages in Medieval England,” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 6 (1983) 117–55; “Grain Yields on Westminster Abbey Manors, 1271–1410,” Canadian Journal of History 18 (1981) 331–47; “Prices and Wages,” in H. E. Hallam, ed., The Agrarian History of England and Wales, vol. 2, 1042–1350 (Cambridge, 1988), 716–817; “Prices and Wages, 1350–1500,” in E. Miller, ed., The Agrarian History of England and Wales, vol. 3, 1348–1500 (Cambridge, 1988), 431–525.
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