Early European History. Hutton Webster
made into beads, necklaces, charms, and seals. The precious metals were employed for a great variety of ornaments. Egyptian paintings show the goldsmiths at work with blowpipe and forceps, fashioning bracelets, rings, and diadems, inlaying objects of stone and wood, or covering their surfaces with fine gold leaf. The manufacture of tiles and glazed pottery was everywhere carried on. Babylonia is believed to be the original home of porcelain. Enameled bricks found there are unsurpassed by the best products of the present day.
TRADE
The development of the arts and crafts brought a new industrial class into existence. There was now need of merchants and shopkeepers to collect manufactured products where they could be readily bought and sold. The cities of Babylonia, in particular, became thriving markets. Partnerships between tradesmen were numerous. We even hear of commercial companies. Business life in ancient Babylonia wore, indeed, quite a modern look.
MONEY
Metallic money first circulated in the form of rings and bars. The Egyptians had small pieces of gold—"cow gold"—each of which was simply the value of a full-grown cow. [3] It was necessary to weigh the metal whenever a purchase took place. A common picture on the Egyptian monuments is that of the weigher with his balance and scales. Then the practice arose of stamping each piece of money with its true value and weight. The next step was coinage proper, where the government guarantees, not only the weight, but also the genuineness of the metal.
[Illustration: EGYPTIAN WEIGHING "COW GOLD"]
COINAGE
The honor of the invention of coinage is generally given to the Lydians, whose country was well supplied with the precious metals. As early as the eighth century B.C. the Lydian monarchs began to strike coins of electrum, a natural alloy of gold and silver. The famous Croesus,[4] whose name is still a synonym for riches, was the first to issue coins of pure gold and silver. The Greek neighbors of Lydia quickly adopted the art of coinage and so introduced it into Europe. [5]
BANKING
The use of money as a medium of exchange led naturally to a system of banking. In Babylonia, for instance, the bankers formed an important and influential class. One great banking house, established at Babylon before the age of Sennacherib, carried on operations for several centuries. Hundreds of legal documents belonging to this firm have been discovered in the huge earthenware jars which served as safes. The Babylonian temples also received money on deposit and loaned it out again, as do our modern banks. Knowledge of the principles of banking passed from Babylonia to Greece and thence to ancient Italy and Rome.
15. COMMERCE AND TRADE ROUTES
ASIATIC COMMERCE
The use of the precious metals as money greatly aided the exchange of commodities between different countries. The cities of the Tigris- Euphrates valley were admirably situated for commerce, both by sea and land. They enjoyed a central position between eastern and western Asia. The shortest way by water from India skirted the southern coast of Iran and, passing up the Persian Gulf, gained the valley of the two great rivers. Even more important were the overland roads from China and India which met at Babylon and Nineveh. Along these routes traveled long lines of caravans laden with the products of the distant East—gold and ivory, jewels and silks, tapestries, spices, and fine woods. Still other avenues of commerce radiated to the west and entered Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. Many of these trade routes are in use even to-day.
[Illustration: Map, ANCIENT TRADE ROUTES]
COMMERCE WITH EUROPE
While the inhabitants of Babylonia and Assyria were able to control the caravan routes of Asia, it was reserved for a Syrian people, the Phoenicians, to become the pioneers of commerce with Europe. As early as 1500 B.C. the rich copper mines of Cyprus attracted Phoenician colonists to this island. [6] From Cyprus these bold mariners and keen business men passed to Crete, thence along the shores of Asia Minor to the Greek mainland, and possibly to the Black Sea. Some centuries later the Phoenicians were driven from these regions by the rising power of the Greek states. Then they sailed farther westward and established their trading posts in Sicily, Africa, and Spain. At length they passed through the strait of Gibraltar into the Atlantic and visited the shores of western Europe and Africa.
[Illustration: Map, PHOENICIAN AND GREEK COLONIES]
PHOENICIAN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS
The Phoenicians obtained a great variety of products from their widely scattered settlements. The mines of Spain yielded tin, lead, and silver. The tin was especially valuable because of its use in the manufacture of bronze. [7] From Africa came ivory, ostrich feathers, and gold; from Arabia, incense, perfumes, and costly spices. The Phoenicians found a ready sale for these commodities throughout the East. Still other products were brought directly to Phoenicia to provide the raw materials for her flourishing manufactures. The fine carpets and glassware, the artistic works in silver and bronze, and the beautiful purple cloths [8] produced by Phoenician factories were exported to every region of the known world.
PHOENICIAN VOYAGES OF EXPLORATION
The Phoenicians were the boldest sailors of antiquity. Some of their long voyages are still on record. We learn from the Bible that they made cruises on the Red Sea and Indian Ocean and brought the gold of Ophir—"four hundred and twenty talents"—to Solomon. [9] There is even a story of certain Phoenicians who, by direction of an Egyptian king, explored the eastern coast of Africa, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and after three years' absence returned to Egypt through the strait of Gibraltar. A much more probable narrative is that of the voyage of Hanno, a Carthaginian admiral. We still possess a Greek translation of his interesting log book. It describes an expedition made about 500 B.C. along the western coast of Africa. The explorers seem to have sailed as far as the country now called Sierra Leone. Nearly two thousand years elapsed before a similar voyage along the African coast was undertaken.
PHOENICIAN SETTLEMENTS
Wherever the Phoenicians journeyed, they established settlements. Most of these were merely trading posts which contained the warehouses for the storage of their goods. Here the shy natives came to barter their raw materials for the finished products—cloths, tools, weapons, wine, and oil—which the strangers from the East had brought with them. Phoenician settlements sometimes grew to be large and flourishing cities. The colony of Gades in southern Spain, mentioned in the Old Testament as Tarshish, [10] survives to this day as Cadiz. The city of Carthage, founded in North Africa by colonists from Tyre, became the commercial mistress of the Mediterranean. Carthaginian history has many points of contact with that of the Greeks and Romans.
16. LAW AND MORALITY
BABYLONIAN CONTRACTS
It is clear that societies so highly organized as Phoenicia, Egypt, and Babylonia must have been held together by the firm bonds of law. The ancient Babylonians, especially, were a legal-minded people. When a man sold his wheat, bought a slave, married a wife, or made a will, the transaction was duly noted on a contract tablet, which was then filed away in the public archives. Instead of writing his name, a Babylonian stamped his seal on the wet clay of the tablet. Every man who owned property had to have a seal.
CODE OF HAMMURABI
The earliest laws were, of course, unwritten. They were no more than the long-established customs of the community. As civilization advanced, the usages that generally prevailed were written out and made into legal codes. A recent discovery has given to us the almost complete text of the laws which Hammurabi, the Babylonian king, ordered to be engraved on stone monuments and set up in all the chief cities of his realm. [11]
SUBJECT MATTER OF HAMMURABI'S CODE