The Economic History of Byzantium From

sium, leads from the south straight up the mountain (Fig. 2). Finds from older excavations show that there had been commercial establishments near the ruins of the Altar of Pergamon and in the vicinity of the substructure belonging to the south stoa of the upper Gymnasium. Excavations conducted by the local museums in the valley of the Ketios River led to the additional conclusion that here, as in classical times, there must have been pottery workshops in the middle and late Byzantine periods20 (Fig. 1).

The dwellings and most of the shops and workshops in the late Byzantine residential city of Pergamon were built of stones taken from the decayed ancient structures.21 From the material of archaeological finds, we can now draw certain conclusions about the nature of some of the goods produced and sold here. Signs of the production of metal and particularly of iron goods are most common. Not far below the acropolis there were businesses producing stirrups, snaffle-bits and chains, and also tools and weapons; in other words, items of equipment, which were probably used by the garrison of the castle. The area of the excavated residential city also yielded a number of smithies, in which nails, metal fittings, wires, hooks, cramp-irons, rings, and horseshoes were the main products, that is, items for the everyday needs of this predominantly agricultural settlement. Elsewhere, smaller objects were made of copper and bronze, including needles, clasps, belt buckles, and hinges. On the middle terrace of the Gymnasium, directly behind the late fortification walls, a hoard of finds indicates that iron jugs, buckets, pans, sickles, plows, axes, shovels, and other tools were produced or sold22 (Fig. 2).

Apart from these metal items, glass items were also produced, especially glass armlets, which were evidently very popular. Finds of these so-called millefiori were made in three places directly north of the main way to the acropolis (Fig. 2, G). The armlets were produced by simply drawing out the melted glass into small bars. By melting the glass bars together and twisting them with different colors, the production of multicolored jewelry was quite easy. In other stores, very large amounts of pottery were found, most of it consisting of pots, jugs, and amphoras for everyday use. There are no archaeological traces of the production of pottery within the residential area of the town. The shops where these large numbers of vessels have been found presumably used them for the storage of food and other goods. The production of the pottery took place northeast of the acropolis, in the valley of the Ketios with its extensive deposits of clay. Apart from the unglazed ware, which represents the biggest part of the archaeological material, considerable quantities of pottery with green, yellow, and brown glazes have

20Rheidt, Byzantinische Wohnstadt, 151, 170, 194ff, 209. On the pottery workshops along the Ketios, see S. Erdemgil, “Kestel Kurtarma Kazısı,” II. Kazı Sonuc¸ları Toplantısı (Ankara, 1980), 104ff, and S. Erdemgil, “Kestel Kazısı 1980 Yılı Calıs¸maları, III.” Kazı Sonuc¸ları Toplantısı (Ankara, 1981), 64. Cf. also, S¸. Karago¨z, W. Radt, and K. Rheidt, “Ein ro¨mischer Grabbau auf dem Niyazitepe bei Pergamon,” IstMitt 36 (1986): 102, fig. 1.

21Radt, “Wohnstadt,” 207. K. Rheidt, “Bautechnik und Bautradition im byzantinischen Perga-

mon,” Diskussionen zur archa¨ologischen Bauforschung 5 (1991): 187f. Rheidt, Byzantinische Wohnstadt, 21ff.

¨

Cf. also C. Bouras, “City and Village: Urban Design and Architecture,” JOB 31 (1981): 635.

22 W. Altmann, “Die Arbeiten zu Pergamon, 1902–1903: Die Einzelfunde,” AM 29 (1904): 199f, figs. 30–32. Conze, Stadt und Landschaft, 325f, figs. 117a–c. Cf. Rheidt, Byzantinische Wohnstadt, 210; idem, “Pergamon,” 404.

628 KLAUS RHEIDT

been found. The plates, bowls, and jugs often bear geometrical or figurative sgraffitto designs. The open vessels usually have three scars from the tripod-shaped legs used for separating the pots during baking. Many of these legs have been found in the southern part of the upper terrace of the ancient Gymnasium, an indication that the color glaze on the middle and late Byzantine pottery was applied to it within the confines of the settlement.

There are also enclosed spaces that, because of their position along the street, must have been of a commercial nature, though there are no specific finds of any kind to confirm this. It can be assumed that these would have been places where textiles and other goods for everyday consumption were manufactured, repaired, sold, and bought. However, apart from occasional raised platforms or courses of masonry suggestive of low walls, no trace of these commercial activities has remained.23

The processing of agricultural products took place mostly inside the dwellings, which often contained one or more storerooms with large jars for the storage of crops, cereals, or olive oil (Fig. 4). Chemical analysis of the remains of the contents inside some of these vessels showed distilled resin of pine or cypress, which had been used since ancient times for sealing containers and as a preservative in the storage of wine. The majority of the vessels date from the second half of the thirteenth century. Therefore, it seems that during that period at least viticulture was extensively practiced in Pergamon.24

Economic activity in Pergamon between the end of the twelfth century and the beginning of the fourteenth, as far as it can be substantiated by the archaeological finds, confirms the picture that we can also deduce from the unplanned layout of the settlement, where public buildings were inconspicuous and no central spaces25 existed, and from the construction of the simple groups of houses: the predominant orientation of this settlement was agricultural. There was barely any production of goods whose use exceeded everyday needs, such as weapons or jewelry. Nor can we infer any particular economic activity from the increased circulation of coins in the last quarter of the eleventh and toward the end of the thirteenth century.26 This is merely an indication that the city acquired some special significance for the defense of the empire and that there was a flow of money from the capital to Pergamon for the extension of the fortifications. Like many other Byzantine provincial towns, Pergamon was a metropolis without any real urban traits. The economic transactions of the settlement did not transcend its direct agricultural milieu. The results of extensive archaeological excavations have not pointed to any sort of exchange of goods with remote parts or with the capital. Ultimately, the Turkish conquest of the town had a beneficial consequence at least as far as the economy was concerned: with the end of compulsory fortification, the unattractive settlement on the hillside could at last be abandoned, and the population,

23Rheidt, Byzantinische Wohnstadt, 210f.

24Rheidt, “Byzantinische Wohnha¨user,” 198f; idem, Byzantinische Wohnstadt, 213ff.

25Rheidt, “Byzantinische Wohnha¨user,” 203f.

26Morrisson, “Byzantinische Mu¨nzen,” 11f.

released from the constant fear of devastation, were once again able to return to their villages and cultivate the fields in the fertile plain of the Kaikos.

Select Bibliography

Conze, A. Stadt und Landschaft. Berlin, 1913. On the city walls.

Gelzer, H. Pergamon unter Byzantinern und Osmanen. Berlin, 1903. For historical sources. Klinkott, M. Die Stadtmauern, pt. 1, Die byzantinischen Befestigungsanlagen. Berlin, 2001.

On the Byzantine fortifications of Pergamon.

Morrisson, C. “Die byzantinischen Mu¨nzen.” Pergamenische Forschungen 8 (1993). On Byzantine coins.

Radt, W. “Die byzantinische Wohnstadt von Pergamon.” Diskussionen zur archa¨ologischen Bauforschung 3 (1978). On residential settlement.

Rheidt, K. “Byzantinische Wohnha¨user des 11. bis 14. Jahrhunderts in Pergamon.” DOP 44 (1990). On residential settlement.

———.Die Stadtgrabung. Pt. 2, Die byzantinische Wohnstadt. Berlin, 1991. On the archaeology, construction, and history of Byzantine Pergamon.

———.“Pergamon and the Byzantine Millennium.” In Pergamon, Citadel of the Gods, ed. H. Koester. Harrisburg, 1998.

Thebes

Aspasia Louvi-Kizi

The role of Thebes1 as a place of importance has been documented since the early Christian era.2 After invasions by Huns and Slavs, Justinian walled the city.3 The fortified city of Thebes became capital of the theme of Greece after the ninth century, a position it retained until the end of the twelfth century.4 The prosperity of the city was inextricably bound up with the production and manufacturing of silk in the area, activities which boosted the growth of its trade and its economy. The agricultural produce of the fertile Lake Copaı¨s area (wine, olive oil, cereals)5 made a further contribution to the economic well-being of the city, but silk continued throughout the Byzantine and Frankish periods to reign unchallenged as the city’s major source of wealth.6 Development of the systematic production of silk in Thebes seems to have begun around the middle of the eleventh century.7 The product was of the highest quality, and it was made entirely in privately owned units, whether these were houses or industrial premises.8

This chapter was translated by John Solman.

1 The basic works used here are D. Jacoby, “Silk in Western Byzantium before the Fourth Crusade,” BZ 85 (1992): 452–500; A. Savvides, “ HJ Buzantinh´ Qh´ba 996/7–1204 m.C.” IstorikogewgrafikaJ´ 2 (1988):

¨

33–52; Ch. Bouras, “City and Village: Urban Design and Architecture,” JOB 31.2 (1981): 611–53; S. Symeonoglou, The Topography of Thebes from the Bronze Age to Modern Times (Princeton, N.J., 1985);

Arcaiologikoj´ Delti´o (AD) Cronika´ (1917–1986); P. Armstrong, “Byzantine Thebes: Excavations on the Kadmeia, 1980,” BSA (1992): 295–335; The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela, trans. M. Adler and A. Asher, ed. M. Signer (Malibu, Calif., 1993).

2The bishop of Thebes was among the participants in the Council of Serdica (343); see A. Komenes, “ Episkopikoij´ kata´ logoi Qhbw'n,” Epj. EtJ.Ster.Mel. 18. For the importance of the city as a center in the production of art, see J.-P. Sodini, “Mosaı¨ques pale´ochre´tiennes de Gre`ce,” BCH 94 (1970): 699–753.

3Prokopios, De aed. 4.3.5.

4Savvides, “Buzantinh´ Qh´ba,” 33–35, 38.

5J. Koder and F. Hild, Tabula Imperii Byzantini, vol. 1, Hellas und Thessalia (Vienna, 1976), 269–71, and J. Herrin, “Realities of Byzantine Provincial Government: Hellas and Peloponnesos, 1180–1205,” DOP 29 (1975): 253–84.

6For the role of Thebes as a center in the production of silk, see Savvides, “Buzantinh´ Qh´ba,” and Jacoby, “Silk in Byzantium,” which provides a complete bibliography on the subject.

7Jacoby, “Silk in Byzantium,” 481.

8Ibid., 467.

632 ASPASIA LOUVI-KIZI

The great importance of Thebes can be seen in the particular references made to it in the texts of the successive treaties by which commercial privileges were conceded to Venice. These treaties, concluded between the time of Alexios Komnenos (1082) and the end of the twelfth century, led to the progressive safeguarding of the right of the Venetian merchants resident in Thebes to own silk factories and to trade in their product at greatly reduced tariff rates.9 The quality of Theban silk was also connected with the Jewish presence in the city, whose silk producers and craftsmen had formed guilds long before the Norman invasion of 1147.10 The fact that the Normans forcibly removed the silk workers to Sicily does not seem to have had much impact on the production of silk in Thebes. Only a few years later, Benjamin of Tudela (1165) found in Thebes a flourishing community of two thousand Jews whose members included the best-known makers of silk and purple-dyed cloth.11 The landownership register of Thebes rounds off this picture of prosperity, providing evidence that the city—the see of a metropolitan bishop—was also home to a very vigorous local aristocracy.12 After 1204, Thebes became the see of the Latin archbishop and, with all of Boeotia, Attica, and the Megarid,13 was irrevocably severed from the trunk of the Byzantine Empire. Social changes occurred, but the city continued to prosper, thanks to the same sources of wealth. In the late thirteenth century, Nicholas II de St. Omer reinforced the walls with towers and built a luxurious palace in the Kadmeia.14

Today, with the exception of the Frankish tower in the precinct of the Museum, almost nothing has survived of the walls, streets, palaces, houses, and workshops of medieval Thebes. Even the churches can be located only by archaeological excavation or have preserved features of their original appearance in a form that is hard to decipher.15 The assemblage of information about Byzantine Thebes is thus confined to the archaeological finds that have been coming to light continuously since the early twentieth century. It is extremely difficult to reach any conclusions on the basis of these finds, given that the city has been occupied without interruption since prehistoric times.16 However, most of the finds come from the early Christian and Byzantine strata, re-

9R.-J. Lilie, Handel und Politik: Zwischen dem byzantinischen Reich und den italienischen Kommunen Venedig, Pisa und Genua in der Epoche der Komnenen und der Angeloi, 1081–1204 (Amsterdam, 1984), 210–13, and esp. Savvides, “Buzantinh´ Qh´ba,” 41–42.

10Savvides, “Buzantinh´ Qh´ba,” 42, and Jacoby, “Silk in Byzantium.”

11Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela.

12N. Svoronos, “Recherches sur le cadastre byzantin et la fiscalite´ aux XI et XII sie`cles: Le cadastre de The`bes,” BCH 83 (1959): 1–145.

13Savvides, “Buzantinh´ Qh´ba,” 51.

14W. Miller, Essays on the Latin Orient (Cambridge, 1921), 76.

15Bouras, “City and Village,” 625.

16In 1968, E. Vakalopoulou ( Arcitektonikaj´ qe´mata 2 [1968]: 100–107) proposed the removal of the then-modern city of 15,000 people from the Kadmeia, the historic center of Thebes for centuries. Since that time, the modern-day city, now with a population of 45,000, has been reconstructed, principally where the buildings inside the Kadmeia are concerned. Over that period, the Archaeological Service—under intense pressure from the needs of the reconstruction process—recorded the successive strata revealed by the continuous rescue excavations.

Thebes 633

vealed by rescue excavations.17 Mosaic floors have been identified at various points of the confusing early Christian strata in the Kadmeia18 and also outside it, where the finds were primarily of burials.19

The finds almost everywhere in the Byzantine strata are of an architectural nature,

17The fate of the medieval strata was not a particularly happy one: on the one hand, the purpose of the archaeologists was primarily to identify the prehistoric strata, and on the other, archaeologists specializing in Byzantine antiquities worked systematically on the Byzantine strata only after 1979. In most cases, the records of those strata are disappointingly brief, and thus the information brought together in the Cronika´ of the Arcaiologikoj´ Delti´o is all the more valuable even today. S. Symeonoglou, in Thebes, was the first scholar to assemble all the archaeological evidence discovered up to 1973. Of the 270 recorded archaeological sites, the Byzantine ones are noted on two topographical charts, bearing the general archaeological site’s numeration. These records also include information collected directly from the archaeologists who carried out the excavations from 1974 to 1976. Most of them are to be found in AD for those years, which came out after the publication of Symeonoglou’s book. In this chapter, I propose a supplementary map noting the published early Christian and Byzantine strata identified during the period from 1976 to 1987, that is, to the time of the last AD published. The Symeonoglou numbering has been retained and extended, so as to aid readers who may wish to consult the AD. The corresponding references are as follows: position 270: AD (1972): 321, AD (1973): 285, and AD (1974): 430, 455; position 271: AD (1974): 437; position 272: AD (1974): 441; position 273: AD (1975): 128; position 274: AD (1976): 121; position 275: AD (1976): 126 (the Pagonas house); position 276: AD (1976): 126 (the Kokinis house); position 277: AD (1976): 126 (the Drakos house); position 278: AD (1976): 126 (the Bardosas house); position 279: AD (1976): 126 (the Koukoulis house); position 280: AD (1976): 127 (the Anastasiou house); position 281: AD (1976): 127; position 282: AD (1977): 98 and AD (1978): 78; position 283: AD (1978): 115 (the Yannopoulos house); position 284: AD (1978): 115 (the Zaroukian house); position 285: AD (1978): 115; position 286: AD (1978): 115 (St. 104, Pyri); position 287: AD (1978): 117; position 288: AD (1978): 117; position 289: AD (1979): 166; position 290: AD (1979): 166; position 291: AD (1979): 172 (Kolonaki); position 292: AD (1980): 217 and Armstrong, “Excavations,” 295–335; position 293: AD (1980): 218; position 294: AD (1980): 220 (the Ziomas house); position 295: AD (1980): 220 (the Stefas house); position 296: AD (1981): 189 (corner of Oedipos and Kaloktenous Sts.); position 298: AD (1981): 191, AD (1982): 77, and AD (1984): 68; position 299: AD (1981): 192; position 300: AD (1981): 77; position 301: AD (1982): 165; position 302: AD (1982): 169; position 303: AD (1982): 170; position 304: AD (1982): 239; position 305: AD (1984): 68; position 306: AD (1984): 27, AD (1987): 117–18, and Tecnologi´a 3 (1989): 23–24; position 307: AD (1986): 27; position 308: AD (1986): 28; position 309: AD (1986): 28–29; position 310: AD (1987): 118; position 311: AD (1987): 119. A total of 112 Byzantine positions had been found inside the Kadmeia and 72 outside it by 1987.

18At position 221: early Christian burials (Keramopoulos, AD [1917]: 120). At position 18: with burials, an early Christian floor (AD [1965]: 237, 253–55, AD [1966]: 189–91, AD [1969]: 188, study of which has confirmed the existence of a local workshop (Sodini, “Mosaiques,” 699–753). At position 270: apart from findings relating to a Byzantine church (Keramopoulos, AD [1917]: 66; Orlandos, Arcj.Buz.Mnhm. EllJ. [1939]: 121, 144), an early Christian floor has also been identified (AD [1972]: 321). Floors with the same decoration were also found on the adjacent sites (positions 266 and 270); these presumably belonged to the same building, whose use is difficult to determine (AD [1977]: 430 and 455–59, and AD [1979]: 321). At position 273: the floor of an early Christian bath has been identified on two adjacent sites (AD [1975]: 134, and Arcaiologikaj` Anaj´ lekta ejx Aqhnw'nj[1980]: 139). At position 287: a floor with simple single-colored tesserae (AD [1978]: 117). At position 296: an early Christian floor, probably dating from the 5th century (AD [1984]: 68). At position 297: an early Christian mosaic floor with laminae (AD [1981]: 189). At position 300: part of an early Christian mosaic (AD [1982]: 77). At position 307: another early Christian floor (AD [1984]: 68).

19Keramopoulos (AD [1917]: 100–120), catacombs at Kastellia; a cemetery with twenty-four tombs on Kolonaki hill, in use between early Christian and late Byzantine times (AD [1979]: 172).

634 ASPASIA LOUVI-KIZI

with a particular wealth of pottery. Of these finds, only those of position 292 have been studied and published to date.20 Byzantine walls have been identified in sixty excavations. In more than half these sites, storage diggings have been recorded, and some have underground pipes (Fig. 1). The mere number of the “Byzantine storage diggings,” “small masonry storage vessels,” “rubbish disposal pits, plastered inside,” “storage jars” or “masonry storage jars,” “pear-shaped plastered diggings,” or simply “Byzantine stores” or “tanks-stores” mentioned in the “Chronicles” of the Archaiologikon Deltion as being located all over the city gives some idea of the special importance for these finds for the general urban fabric of Thebes. Unfortunately, however, not one of the scores of pits referred to in the “Chronicles” has been accurately surveyed. In a few cases, some of their dimensions are given,21 varying from 1.50 to 3.50 m in depth and from 1.20 to 3.10 m in maximum diameter. In most cases, the depth is not recorded, although there is one reference to a “pear-shaped pit” with a depth of 9 m.22 Only in one case are we given all three of the dimensions of a pit: it was 3.50 m deep, had an opening with a width of 1.30 m, and its maximum diameter was 2.60 m,23 thus giving it a capacity of approximately 30 m3. It is worth noting that (as far as I am aware) most of these pits were lined with water-resistant plaster, thus confirming their use for storage purposes. We could hypothesize that the pits up to 2 m deep were used to store agricultural produce; as for those of a greater depth, they must have been for the purpose of collecting water and would have been linked to the city water supply network.

According to the account given by the “lost ancient biography” of St. John Kaloktenes, metropolitan of Thebes, among that cleric’s charitable works was the “introduction into the town of exceedingly fine water,” for which purpose he seems to have constructed an aqueduct that brought the water into the Kadmeia from the height on the south side of the city.24 This twelfth-century construction project is shown on the map of Fabricius,25 and was located along the axis of Epaminondas Street, outside the south side of the walls. This position is confirmed by the accounts of local people26 recorded before the arches of the aqueduct (the kamares) were totally demolished in the early twentieth century.

Sections of underground pipes—some consisting of earthenware sections, some built from stone, some hewn from rock—have been identified in various parts of the city.27 However, the network of underground pipes has been recorded with such brevity

20Armstrong, “Excavations,” 295–335.

21Positions 14 and 304, AD (1965): 239; position 236, AD (1971): 227; position 249, AD (1976): 127; position 275, AD (1975): 126; positions 94 and 295, AD (1980): 220; position 311, AD (1986): 28–29.

22Position 14, AD (1965): 239.

23AD (1965): 239.

24V. Delvenakiotou, “ Oj mhtropoli´th" Iwaj´ nnh" oJ Kalokte´nh" kai` aiJ Qh'bai(Athens, 1970), 72–73.

25E. Fabricius, Theben: Eine Untersuchung u¨ber die Topographie und Geschichte der Hauptstadt Boetiens

(Freiburg, 1980).

26Delvenakiotou, Kalokte´nh", 73, and AD (1917): 123 n. 2.

27Position 267: AD (1972): 321; position 116: AD (1968): 212; position 273: AD (1975): 128; position 274: AD (1976): 121; position 278: AD (1976): 126; position 281: AD (1976): 127; position 283: AD (1978): 115; position 287: AD (1978): 117; position 290: AD (1979): 166; position 292: AD (1980):

1b. Thebes, map of the modern city with indications of archaeological finds based on bibliography to 1994 (copyright: the author)