Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East
This book explores the agrarian landscape and economy of the eastern Mediterranean from modern Israel to Turkey. This region experienced a surge in population between the fifth and sixth centuries AD that raised the population to levels often only regained in the late twentieth century. Cities expanded and the eastern lands reached a pinnacle of cultural expression and economic prosperity in the century before the arrival of Islam. Behind all this lay the ability of Roman farmers to feed themselves by producing a reliable surplus of food. Michael Decker describes precisely how this was done: how plants critical to survival were grown and how new plants were introduced. He also catalogues the range of intensive farming methods used and the rise of cash-crop farming based on olive oil and wine that was traded throughout Europe, western Asia, and parts of Africa.
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Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East
This book explores the agrarian landscape and economy of the eastern Mediterranean from modern Israel to Turkey. This region experienced a surge in population between the fifth and sixth centuries AD that raised the population to levels often only regained in the late twentieth century. Cities expanded and the eastern lands reached a pinnacle of cultural expression and economic prosperity in the century before the arrival of Islam. Behind all this lay the ability of Roman farmers to feed themselves by producing a reliable surplus of food. Michael Decker describes precisely how this was done: how plants critical to survival were grown and how new plants were introduced. He also catalogues the range of intensive farming methods used and the rise of cash-crop farming based on olive oil and wine that was traded throughout Europe, western Asia, and parts of Africa.
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Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East

Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East

by Michael Decker
Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East

Tilling the Hateful Earth: Agricultural Production and Trade in the Late Antique East

by Michael Decker

Hardcover

$190.00 
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Overview

This book explores the agrarian landscape and economy of the eastern Mediterranean from modern Israel to Turkey. This region experienced a surge in population between the fifth and sixth centuries AD that raised the population to levels often only regained in the late twentieth century. Cities expanded and the eastern lands reached a pinnacle of cultural expression and economic prosperity in the century before the arrival of Islam. Behind all this lay the ability of Roman farmers to feed themselves by producing a reliable surplus of food. Michael Decker describes precisely how this was done: how plants critical to survival were grown and how new plants were introduced. He also catalogues the range of intensive farming methods used and the rise of cash-crop farming based on olive oil and wine that was traded throughout Europe, western Asia, and parts of Africa.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780199565283
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Publication date: 10/04/2009
Series: Oxford Studies in Byzantium
Pages: 368
Product dimensions: 6.40(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Michael Decker is Maroulis Professor of Byzantine History and Orthodox Religion at the University of South Florida.

Table of Contents

1. The land: climate and geography2. The countryside in Late Antiquity3. Hand to mouth: grain in Late Antiquity4. The vine5. The ‘queen of all trees': the olive in late antique agriculture6. Invading the desert: irrigation and agrarian expansion7. Mixed farming and limited specialization: methods and means of intensification8. Trade, agriculature, and the economy of the late antique East
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