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Ancient Greek Agriculture: An Introduction PDF

245 Pages·1995·4.29 MB·English
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ANCIENT GREEK AGRICULTURE ANC IENT GREEK AGRICULTURE An introduction Signe Isager and Jens Erik Skydsgaard London and New York First published 1992 Paperback edition first published 1995 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2001. Disclaimer: For copyright reasons, some images in the original version of this book are not available for inclusion in the eBook. © 1992, 1995 Signe Isager and Jens Erik Skydsgaard All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Isager, Signe Ancient Greek agriculture. I. Title II. Skydsgaard, Jens Erik 630.932 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Isager, Signe. Ancient Greek agriculture: an introduction / Signe Isager and Jens Erik Skydsgaard. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Agriculture–Greece–History. I. Skydsgaard, Jens Erik. II. Title. S429.I73 1992 338.1’0938–dc20 ISBN 0-415-00164-1 (Print Edition) 0-415-11671-6 (pbk) ISBN 0-203-03774-X Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-203-17861-0 (Glassbook Format) CONTENTS List of Plates and Figures vii Preface ix Part I The art of agriculture 1 INTRODUCTION 3 1 THE GEOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND 9 2 TILLING AND CROPS 19 3 AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS 44 4 AGRICULTURAL BUILDING 67 5 ANIMAL HUSBANDRY 83 6 AGRARIAN SYSTEMS 108 Part II State and agriculture 115 INTRODUCTION 117 7 PRIVATE LAND 120 8 TAXES IN AGRICULTURE 135 9 OTHER LAWS 145 10 LABOUR AND STATE 149 Part III Gods and agriculture 157 INTRODUCTION 159 11 THE CALENDAR 160 12 AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS FOR THE GODS 169 13 LAND BELONGING TO THE GODS 181 14 THE ANIMALS OF THE GODS 191 EPILOGUE 199 Appendix: The sacred olives 203 Bibliography 206 Index of passages cited 224 General index 228 v LIST OF PLATES AND FIGURES Illustrations indicated with (S) are provided by Skydsgaard, the others are supplied by the respective museums. We should like to thank the authorities for permitting reproduction. Plates 1.1 The Marathonian Plain (S) 16 1.2 Landscape with terraces, Methana (S) 16 2.1 Triptolemus with ear of corn, Attic red-figure hydria, Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek, Copenhagen 23 2.2 Ear of corn, stater from Metapontum, National Museum, Copenhagen 23 2.3 Cuttings of vine, Ithaka (S) 30 2.4 Vineyard just before pruning in January, Methana (S) 30 2.5 Vine, Chios (S) 31 2.6 Wild olive, Athens, Areopagus (S) 34 2.7 Domesticated olive, Methana (S) 34 2.8 Grafting on a wild olive, Methana (S) 37 2.9 The same grafting as in Plate 2.8, six months later (S) 37 2.10 Old olive tree, cut down, with new shoots growing from the trunk, Crete (S) 39 2.11 Picking the olives, Attic black-figure amphora, British Museum 40 3.1 Plough, Boeotian terracotta, Louvre 48 3.2 Modern plough (ard), Mykonos (S) 48 3.3 Agricultural labours, Attic black-figure kylix, Louvre 50–1 3.4 Pruning-hooks and reaping sickle, Olynthos 54 3.5 Threshing-floor, Methana (S) 54 3.6 Picking and treading the grapes, Attic black-figure kylix, Cabinet des Medailles, Paris 58 3.7 Treading the grapes, Attic red-figure krater, Museo Civico, Ferrara 58 3.8 Treading the grapes on a stone pressing-bed, Attic red-figure amphora, Museo Civico, Bologna 59 vii LIST OF PLATES AND FIGURES 3.9 Stone pressing-bed, Olynthos (S) 59 3.10 Oil-mill (trapetum), Olynthos (S) 62 3.11 Oil-mill (trapetum), Pompeii (S) 62 3.12 Olive-press, Attic black-figure skyphos, Boston (M.H. Hansen) 64 3.13 Olive-press, Attic black-figure skyphos, Boston (M.H. Hansen) 64 3.14 Bags with crushed olives under the press, relief, British Museum (S) 65 5.1 Athenian horsemen, Elgin Marbles, British Museum (S) 86 5.2 Mating donkeys, Attic red-figure oinochoe, Munich 88 5.3 Donkey with packsaddle, cameo, Thorvaldsen Museum, Copenhagen 88 5.4 Herakles leading a bull, Attic red-figure amphora, Boston (after Pfuhl 1923) 90 5.5 Cows in sacrificial procession, Elgin Marbles, British Museum 90 5.6 Goats and herdsman, Attic black-figure kyathos, Louvre (after Pfuhl 1923) 92 5.7 Odysseus escaping under the ram, Attic black-figure lekythos, National Museum, Copenhagen 92 5.8 Going to market with pigs, Attic red-figure pelike, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge 94 5.9 Cocks, Attic Tyrrhenian amphora, National Museum, Copenhagen 95 Figures 1.1 Orographic map of Greece 12 1.2 Hydrographic map of Greece 13 3.1 Diagram of a plough (after Drachmann 1938) 47 3.2 Diagram of olive-mill (trapetum) (after Drachmann 1932) 60 4.1 Country house near the Cave of Pan at Vari (Jones/Graham/Sackett 1973) 73 4.2 Small country house near Vari (after Lauter 1980) 75 4.3 Country house no. 26 at the Crimean Chersonesos (Dufková/Pecírka 1970) 77 11.1 The agricultural year and the Attic calendar of festivals 162 12.1 The offering of animals in individual months, Erchia 176 viii PREFACE The concept of this book originated some years ago in a Scandinavian symposium on Ancient History. It was obvious that agriculture played an important role in the history of ancient Greece and that there was need of a textbook that could serve as an introduction. Discussions with colleagues have supported the authors in their pursuit of the task and now, with some delay caused by the very disparate work of university teachers, the book is finished. During our studies we have seen the interest of ancient agriculture grow, resulting in a nearly overwhelming flow of articles and books. Neither of us can say – with Cassius Dio (1.1) – that ‘I have read almost everything that has been written by anybody’ but we can confirm that ‘we have not included all in the treatise’. Selection is difficult and we have decided to concentrate on Greek agriculture of the city-states, that is, from Homer to Aristotle and Theophrastus. The task has been divided. Skydsgaard undertook to write the first, more technical, part whereas Isager has written the latter parts, on the relationship between agriculture on one side and state and gods respectively on the other. We have, nevertheless, collaborated step by step, discussing most of the topics several times. Each of us is therefore responsible for the entire book. We should like to thank our universities for granting terms free from teaching from time to time. The Carlsberg Foundation and Churchill College, Cambridge, granted Skydsgaard a sabbatical term in Cambridge which was very fruitful, not least because of the hospitality and interest of the colleagues there, including that of the late Moses I. Finley, who kindly encouraged the studies. We also spent a week in Methana as the guests of Lin Foxhall and Hamish Forbes, discussing various aspects of agriculture there, and should like to thank them very much for their hospitality. ix

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The initial focus of Ancient Greek Agriculture is firmly on the art of agriculture proper, the tools and the technique, the plants cultivated and the animals reared. Thereafter, Isager and Skydsgaard focus on the position of agriculture in the society of gods and men in the Greek city-states . The a
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