All Questions
Tagged with economy roman-empire
13 questions
6
votes
1
answer
560
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How was the Pandidakterion organised?
How was the Pandidakterion organised?
Wikipedia:Pandidakterion states that the Pandidakterion lacked 'corporative structure'. I do not understant exactly what the corporative structure is and how was ...
- 163
1
vote
1
answer
182
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How did production of grain change with Hellenistic Egypt coming under Roman rule?
As far as I know Egypt, under the Ptolemies, became famous in Hellenistic world for vast agricultural production due to the strict and harsh administration installed there by Greeks.
Still I wonder - ...
3
votes
2
answers
6k
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How could the Roman sestertii/sesterces be converted into modern terms (say 2017 US$)? [closed]
Of course, the value of the sesterti must itself have fluctuated over the centuries it was in use. And so if I must narrow it down, I am particularly interested in its value during
the time of ...
user3521
7
votes
1
answer
3k
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What would be the GDP of the Roman Empire?
I understand that this particular question is hard to answer. However, do there exist any historical record to how much was the GDP of Rome at some period? If not, could you give me a speculation or a ...
- 357
10
votes
3
answers
2k
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Why was the government expenditures of the Roman Empire very low compared to modern governments?
I was trying to compare the military spending of the Roman empire in the 1st century with modern military spending and how much of a burden that was to Roman people. The Wikipedia page of the ...
- 519
7
votes
3
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1k
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Are the quantities of gold that the Roman Empire looted and mined known?
I am having trouble finding information on the quantities of looted and mined gold by the Roman Empire.
How much did they loot from the Dacians?
How much did they loot from the Jews?
And how much ...
12
votes
2
answers
6k
views
Gap between poor and rich in the Roman Empire
Was the difference in purchasing power between the poor and the wealthy in the Roman Empire, greater than or less than than the difference between rich and poor people in modern western economies?
...
- 221
8
votes
3
answers
657
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Why did overestimated coins led to inflation and well-estimated coins to deflation?
It is said in Debt, the first 5,000 years by David Graeber (chapter 4, note 2) that when the value of metal coins represented exactly their weight, the result was deflation. The author says that when ...
- 175
17
votes
3
answers
18k
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How rich were carpenters in Roman Galilee in the 1st century AD?
According to the Biblical account, Jesus was the son of a carpenter, Joseph of Nazareth (Matthew 13,55).
How rich could a carpenter become in the Roman province of Galilee in 1st century AD? What ...
- 7,151
19
votes
2
answers
2k
views
How much of an impact did the Roman emperors' civil wars have on their decision to debase the coinage?
From Adrian Goldsworthy's How Rome Fell: "Civil war remained a common event, ...the economy collapsed, as successive emperors massively devalued the coinage to pay for their wars."
Other sources say ...
- 449
50
votes
2
answers
10k
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Where did the Romans store their cash?
In the era before banking was invented, where did wealthy Romans store their cash? The emperor probably could store it somewhere in the imperial palace thanks to the Praetorian guard, but what about ...
- 2,209
12
votes
1
answer
4k
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Where did the money come from to build the Colosseum?
Where did the money come from to finance the building of the Colosseum?
- 1,399
19
votes
3
answers
5k
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Was the Roman Empire based on a 'plunder economy'?
It has been stated by Arnold J. Toynbee and James Burke that:
The economy of the Empire was a Raubwirtschaft or plunder economy
based on looting existing resources rather than producing anything
...
- 1,273