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The Economic System
The Egyptian economy was largely dependent on the
fertility of the Nile. In times of peace and prosperity, when the
kingdom was united and the irrigation system was effectively
maintained, the economy was stable. Political strength ensured that
a centralized bureaucracy was able to organize the country and to
provide stockpiles of food that would offset the effects of poor
inundations. Egypt was fortunately able to produce its own
essentials grain, fish, vegetables, fruit, and textiles to provide
food and clothing for its own relatively small population, and
usually there was an excess that, together with gold and
manufactured items such as papyrus, pottery, and luxury goods, could
be traded for the wood, silver, copper, and spices that the country
lacked. The economic system was basic and relied on the annual
production and immediate consumption of foodstuffs. A unique and
important aspect was the continuing requirement to produce
sufficient food not only for the living but also for the dead and
the gods. Egypt never developed a proper commercial class partly
because the economy was based on a barter system; coinage was not
introduced until c.525 BC (and even then had limited use).
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Economic Hierarchy
In theory the king owned all land, buildings, materials, and people, although in reality there was a system of private ownership that had developed through custom. Private property was owned by the temples, the nobles, and officials, and this diversification of wealth was increased by the king’s presenting of gifts, hereditary offices, and privileges to priests and nobles and, in periods of royal weakness, by the seizures of some royal privileges by these people. Although in theory all aspects of the economy were effectively controlled and organized by the king, in reality the pharaoh often delegated many of these duties by granting lands either to royal officials, who managed the estates on a basis of life tenure and received the estate revenues in payment, or to the temples in perpetuity. In order to cultivate the land and prepare the building materials for the great state monuments (making bricks and quarrying stone) as well as to provide the soldiers and sailors who manned the mining and trading expeditions, the Egyptians relied on the corvée system. Under this system every man (in theory) could expect to be requested to undertake these duties for the king; in practice only the poor were employed by corvée as the need arose, creating a class of serfs who were not legally “slaves” but who had few choices in their lives. The craftsmen and artisans, however, who stood slightly above the peasants in the social hierarchy had status and enjoyed a reasonable standard of living. They included sculptors, goldsmiths, jewelers, carpenters, leather workers, masons, metalsmiths, and many others. Most craftsmen and artisans remained anomymous partly because they worked in teams. Many were organized in state or temple workshops where a range of activities were brought together under a high official. Each item was produced by several craftsmen who either worked together on the piece or passed it along the line. For complex items such as furniture or a statue the various parts were finished separately and then assembled. Each piece was presumably first designed and planned by a master craftsman, however, so that the individual workers could be given detailed instructions. Tradition and technical skill were all important elements of this teamwork. Above the artists were men with the title “Chief of Works” who held important positions and supervised the many aspects of designing and constructing great monuments. Sometimes architects of temples and tombs were able to claim credit for their work, and there are examples where these men managed to have themselves depicted on the walls of the buildings they had designed for royal or wealthy owners. From the inscriptions it seems that it was traditional for architects and craftsmen to hand on their skills and occupations within their own families. .
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Barter and Coinage
The Egyptians lacked good quality timber, copper, silver, and spices, but in exchange for them they could offer cereals, papyrus, textiles, dried fish, and various luxury items. It was the responsibility of the state to acquire these products from neighboring countries, and this was achieved in a number of ways. Kings sent royal expeditions to sources of supply such as Nubia, Byblos, or Punt, and they also engaged in warfare, which brought great rewards including booty and prisoners, although the extent to which economic considerations prompted their conquests remains uncertain. In addition, through international diplomacy, they received gifts of foreign goods from other rulers. Both foreign trade and Egypt’s own economy were based on barter since coinage was not introduced until the Persian Period (c.525 BC). The Egyptians sold goods, lent interest, paid salaries, and collected taxes using only the exchange of goods and produce, but such primitive methods of payment nevertheless seem to have enabled them to carry out quite complicated transactions. Goods rather than treasure represented Egypt’s wealth: Full granaries, flourishing herds, and ample game and wildlife were depicted in tomb scenes as symbols of affluence. Food production was essential not only to feed the living but also to offer to the gods and the dead, and the economy was primarily organized for this purpose. In addition, considerable resources were devoted to the building, decorating, and furbishing of the tombs and temples. Although barter a simple exchange of goods met the society’s needs in earlier times, increased trade requirements eventually brought about the introduction of an arbitrary standard by which the value of objects destined for exchange could be measured and compared. This was achieved by using a third common commodity, often wheat, as the standard, against which the products for exchange were measured and their market value was assessed accordingly. With this system, if there was a slight difference in the value of the two goods being compared, then a small amount of the standard commodity could be used to adjust the discrepancy. However, the standard commodity was generally not used at all in payment. In Egypt from c.1580 BC all items were given a value in gold, silver, or copper to facilitate trade and commerce. Fixed weights were also introduced, but the use of a system of metal valuations which may have been introduced from Asia did not create a monetary system, and barter remained the sole means of trade and commerce. Both taxes and tribute continued to be paid in kind. Likewise, there undoubtedly were merchants, small traders, and even people who made loans and charged interest. However, lack of a true monetary system did not encourage the development of a national trading or commercial class, and these people apparently carried out their activities only in their own districts. Therefore, barter continued to dominate the economy. Tomb scenes show that the collection of taxes and the reception of tribute from various districts were organized in this way, and in scenes in Queen Hatshepsut’s temple at Deir el-Bahri that depict the famous Punt expedition the Egyptians and Puntites carry out their exchange change of goods by means of barter. In the Late Period, however, changes were introduced. Although most transactions continued to be carried out by means of payment in kind, a standard was still used, but it was now based not only on wheat but also on silver. At first the silver was measured in weight and used accordingly; even the Persian and Greek coins that were now available were only accepted according to their weight rather than at their face value. The concept of a monetary economy gradually began to take hold in Egypt, however, and coins particularly where their quality and weight were completely consistent started to be accepted at face value. The introduction of coinage with its many advantages over barter was one of the major areas of foreign influence exerted upon Egypt during the Persian Period. Nevertheless, it was only in the Ptolemaic Period that a true monetary system with significant coin production was introduced; until then barter remained the predominant method of exchange..
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Weights and Measures
Egypt and Mesopotamia both developed standardized systems of weights and measures that enabled both commercial activity and building construction to be undertaken. .
COUNTING AND MEASUREMENT
At an early date the Egyptians devised a decimal
system of counting. Units were indicated by strokes, and tens,
hundreds, and thousands were represented by hieroglyphic signs;
thus, a finger was drawn to convey 10,000; a tadpole, 100,000; and a
god with upraised arms, 1 million. Methods of surveying and land
measurement were also well developed, and their knowledge of
geometry and mathematics was used to great effect in the
construction of monumental buildings. Units of measurement were
based on the distances between various points on the human body. A
cubit (approximately 20 inches, or .523 meter), the largest unit,
was the distance from the point of the elbow to the tip of the
middle finger. This was generally divided into smaller units: The
Egyptian royal cubit consisted of seven palms; a palm was measured
across the knuckles on the back of the hand and, therefore, had four
finger widths. The finger width and the foot were other measurements
as was the span, which was the distance from the tip of the middle
finger to the tip of the thumb on an outstretched hand.
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WEIGHTSEgypt
had metric weights. The standard units were the deben (approximately
3 ounces, or 91 grams) and the kite (one-tenth of the deben), which
were only used for measuring metals. The other standard commodities,
grain and cereals, were weighed in bushels. Set standards, measured
in gold, silver, or copper, had been introduced by the Egyptians in
c.1580 BC, and goods could then be measured against these. This
assisted the system of barter, the main method of transaction for
trade and commerce. Fixed weights were also used, and there are tomb
scenes that show treasury officials weighing out the deben (in the
form of gold rings) against fixed weights. Gold was extracted from
the mines and was either smelted at the site or brought back as dust
in bags to Egypt. For commercial use it was made into gold rings,
which seem to have varied in thickness but had a uniform diameter of
about five inches. When used in a transaction the deben were weighed
and the result duly recorded in a book. It was the international
trade in metals carried out throughout the Near East that led to the
need for a universal system of weights. However, although these were
all based on a theoretical unit the weight of a grain of wheat the
systems varied from one country to another. Some used multiples of
the grain to make larger units, and a shekel could vary from 120
grains in one district to over 200 elsewhere. There were also larger
units the mina and the talent which were multiples of the shekel,
and these were widely used throughout the Near East. Egyptian
weights were different from those found elsewhere. Made of hard,
polished stones into which the weight mark was cut, they were
geometrically shaped with rounded corners and edges. In appearance
and weight they were distinguishable from pieces used in other
countries, and because the systems in different countries varied
considerably it was necessary for visiting merchants to carry their
own set of weights so that they could trade in many places.
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THE KAHUN EXCAVATION
At Kahun, the pyramid workmen’s village, the
excavator W. M. Flinders Petrie found an interesting set of weights
and measures. He maintained that they included a high proportion
that were not Egyptian in origin and claimed that none of the
measuring sticks was the usual Egyptian cubit. One example, a wooden
rod measuring a cubit in length, conformed to the Egyptian standard,
but it had one beveled edge on which cuts were marked off dividing
it into six instead of the usual seven palms. In Mesopotamia the
cubit had also always been used as a standard of measurement, but it
was subdivided into different sections. Two other wooden rods found
at Kahun were unusual in that one was divided into seven palms, but
its total length was equivalent to the double foot used in Asia
Minor, while the other scale was subdivided into seven and one-half
spaces. Petrie concluded that the rods combined elements of
measurement systems in use in Egypt and elsewhere, and he claimed
that they represented attempts by foreigners living at Kahun to
imitate the local system. He also identified a significant number of
foreign weights among the group found at Kahun; not one-sixth
conformed to the Egyptian standard, and even those that did were
made of soft materials rather than the usual hard polished stones.
The Egyptians used hard stone weights in their balances that,
consisting of a simple scale with two pans, were very sensitive.
This collection of weights and measures was one piece of evidence
Petrie used to support his theory that there was a substantial
immigrant community at Kahun who lived alongside the local residents
and included craftsmen, merchants, and laborers.
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The Economic System
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