THE decisive encounters between Greece and the East had as an inevitable consequence the displacement of the centre of gravity of the economic world. Once the conquest of Ionia by the Persians had prepared for the greatness of Athens; the conquest of Asia by Alexander diverted big production and big business towards the East.
It had the same effect on the cities of ancient Greece as the discovery of America on the countries of modern Europe. An enormous crowd of emigrants made for the new world. Mercenaries greedy for high pay or good land, traders confident of making their fortune in a new country, artists, writers, and scholars summoned by enlightened and generous princes, physicians and tutors required by the immigrants and, soon after, by the natives, parasites, adventurers, and courtesans dazzled by the example of the illustrious Thais, they spread in their thousands as far as the Cataracts of Syene and the banks of the Indus. The spontaneous exodus was followed by systematic colonization, organized by the kings. Their object was military and political as much as economic and social. By settling the soldiers on kleroi and attracting business men, they hoped to defend the frontier and to form a body-guard for themselves, and also to extend agriculture, to enlarge the cities, to mix the populations, and to increase the general wealth. At the call of the Ptolemies the Greeks came in haste; they filled the newly built metropolis, occupied the fields of the Delta, and rescued from the desert and fertilized the whole province of the Fayum. At a beck from the Seleucids another swarm distributed themselves over the centres of administration and civilization assigned to them. Greece was being emptied. To compensate these losses it could not count on a rise in the birth-rate. People were too fond of comfort to burden themselves with a big family; they practised systematic celibacy and the exposure of new-born infants. Greece suffered from that deep-seated, incurable evil which Polybius called “the lack of children” and “dearth of men.”
Resources diminished with the population. Greece grew poor. Its mediocre land could not support the competition of the most fertile plains in the world; it had not enough raw materials to develop its industry; it was too far from the great routes which were now opening to trade. Gradually it lost the habit of work. The rich shut themselves off from the world in their selfishness. In their greed they thought only of quietly rounding off their estates; in their extravagance they indulged in unbridled luxury or sought out the vilest pleasures. The picture which we have of Bceotia, with its banquets and its drinking-bouts, is simply appalling. Beside this class, which could no longer make productive use of its wealth, was a wretched proletariat whose hatred grew daily greater. The more manly of the poor had gone to the East; those who remained had too often no other resource than to wait for the bounty of euergetai, or to evade difficulties by debts, and debts by demands backed with violence. Plots and riots followed each other without interruption. The fewer men there were, the more fiercely they contested the land. They fought over ruins. The land remained untilled. The deserted cities fell into the condition of overgrown villages. Grass grew on the squares, and the cattle came and browsed there. Ancient Greece was at the point of death.
A few cities only, in Europe, retained some remnants of their lost splendour. Corinth still enjoyed the advantages afforded by her Isthmus. Syracuse did not cease to attract the agricultural riches of Sicily, and even to take a part in the exchanges between Greece and the West. Athens continued to be queen of the universe, but her sovereignty changed in character. Political power was out of the question for her now. Demetrios of Phaleron undertook to inculcate resignation upon her and to bend her pride to fate; he made himself the organizer of Athens at her smallest. He abolished the democratic fiscal system with its “liturgies” and its misthoi, and he reduced the fleet; he was the trustee of an immense bankruptcy. The poor left in crowds, the miners for Thrace and the rest for Cyrene. The population decreased in the city, and still more in the agricultural Mesogaea. On the coast at least it remained stationary. For the commercial decline was slow, thanks to the force of habit; the Attic tetradrachm was still legal tender all over Greece, and ships deserted the Peiraeeus only gradually. In any case it was no longer there that the emporium of the world must be sought. Athens was henceforward a city of art and science, of luxury and pleasure. Foreigners came because life there was more pleasant than anywhere else. Over the squares, with their population of lovely statues, brilliant processions passed. In the theatre the Dionysiac artists organized excellent performances. The courtesans set the fashion in dress as in other things. The sculptors received orders from kings, and the architects and contractors were invited in every direction by cities which vied with each other in magnificence. A crowd of students came to sit under rhetoricians and philosophers, whose schools constituted a veritable university. Athens remained the intellectual metropolis. She distributed glory; she was “the beacon which alone sheds forth the renown of men to the confines of the earth.”
While economic life withdrew imperceptibly from the centre towards the extremities, it flowed towards the historic towns of Asia Minor. It was they which profited by the increasing relations with the interior of the continent. Ephesos and Smyrna prospered once more; Miletos again had a hundred thousand inhabitants; Pergamon had, as a capital, a short life but a brilliant one; Lampsacos, Cyzicos, Heracleia, and Sinope grew rich. An extraordinary development of city life appeared in every form. The towns competed in aggrandizement. By grants of isopoliteia and citizenship they snatched single individuals from one another; by sympoliteia burghs were amalgamated; by synoecism big towns absorbed small. For municipal administration, once so neglected, the golden age began. The authorities regulated the width of the streets and the upkeep of the public fountains, and ordered the removal of refuse. Quite a second-class town, Priene, was remarkable for its clean appearance and its air of daintiness and gaiety. The townsfolk were proud of the fine architecture of their covered markets. Miletos boasted three; the Corn Hall was 535 feet long, the North Agora, at the foot of stairs 459 feet broad, was surrounded by marble galleries in two storeys, lined with stalls, and the South Agora was on a colossal scale, with its porticoes one over the other, its hundreds of columns, and its endless rows of shops and workshops.
But it was not these cities of ancient Greece which profited most by the extension of the Greek market; for new connexions new centres were needed. In the countries recently opened to the activity of the Hellenic race the need for urban concentration was met in an original and grandiose manner. Never in the history of the world, except in America in the XlXth century, did so many cities rise from the ground at once. At a nod from a king they appeared out of nothing. The conquerors must not scatter and lose themselves in the conquered peoples. They were kept together. Thus strategic positions were occupied, stations were placed along the trade-routes, points of attraction were created for the nomad tribes, and centres were established from which civilization would radiate. It was a vast policy of military, administrative, economic, and moral dominion, a great foundation for the future. The rules of the system were laid down at the very outset by the powerful intuition of Alexander. From Egypt to Sogdiana, from the Caucasus to India, he founded over seventy cities, and the names of Alexandria, Alexandretta, Herat, and Kandahar are sufficient evidence of his wide view and his foresight. The Ptolemies had merely to carry out the programme which he had drawn up. The internal government of the Seleucids lay entirely in the distinction between the military administration of the countryside and the civil administration of the towns and their outskirts; but these towns, which were intended for Greek settlers, had almost everywhere to be created lock, stock, and barrel, after which their territory was extended in proportion to the influence which they exercised over the surrounding peoples. In the seventy-two satrapies Seleucos I founded nine Seleuceias, six Antiochs, five Laodiceias, three Apameias, and one Stratonice. From Latakia to Merv every city in his empire recalled to him family memories and his glory as the founder. In one century Antioch on the Orontes increased fourfold. The kings of Pergamon followed the example of the Seleucids. Even the kings of Thrace and Macedonia had their Lysimacheia, or Cassandreia, or Demetrias. These towns could not all be equal successes; some were still-born, many did modest service, some were destined to an illustrious future, and one was to become the true capital of the Hellenistic world.
Never had the genius of Alexander revealed itself with more force than on the day when he declared that he would make Rhacotis, a fishing village, the future capital of Egypt. Between the island of Pharos and Lake Mareotis, sheltered from the silt which a regular current carried eastwards, the place was marked out for a huge city and for excellent harbours, to which the Mediterranean, the Nile, and the Red Sea could bring thè merchandise of the whole world. The great king’s idea was realized by Ptolemy I, the plans drawn by Deinocrates of Rhodes were carried out by Sostratos of Cnidos, and Alexandria was the result. Two great avenues crossed at right angles in the centre of the town and ran to its four ends. They thus bounded four quarters, in which all the streets crossed at right angles. Everywhere there were drains, a novelty, and there was drinking-water in abundance. A few years were enough for Alexandria to show, against the monuments of the most famous cities, the tomb of Alexander, the king’s palace, the Sarapeion, and that unequalled Museum with its Library, which offered students a catalogue of two hundred thousand volumes. When the city was completely built, over five hundred thousand inhabitants crowded inside it, a turbulent medley of Macedonians, Greeks, Persians, Jews, Egyptians, Arabs, and negroes. Scholars were attracted by the pensions which ensured them a respected existence in a studious shade, rich men rushed to the centre of luxury, fashion, and pleasure, and the innumerable plebs, the true plebs of a great city, filled the lower quarters. Active manufactures produced textiles, metal goods of all kinds, chariots, furniture, vases, terra-cottas, glassware, and papyrus. But the great resource and pride of Alexandria were her ports, full of ships. The roadstead, sheltered by Pharos, was divided in two by the Heptastadion mole, which ran from the shore to the island. On the east was the War Harbour, and on the west the Merchant Harbour, the Eunostos. Both were magnificently lit up at night by the first of lighthouses. A canal connected the sea harbours with the inner harbour on Lake Mareotis. Other canals allowed ships to reach the Nile valley and, very soon, the Red Sea. The great routes of the south and south-east thus met those of the north and west. There were vast warehouses for goods intended for export, for masses of corn and manufactured articles, and for the Eastern goods which went through in transit. Alexandria, worthy to give her name to the new civilization, took for many centuries the place of the Peirseeus as the emporium of world trade.
But there was still a good position to be had in the Ægean, where two currents of trade met, one from south to north and the other from east to west. It was taken by Rhodes. Her situation gave her great advantages. All ships from Egypt had to rest there before scattering in every direction; all goods from the Euxine, Asia Minor, Cyprus, and Phoenicia must concentrate there before sailing for Sicily and Italy. The fall of Tyre and the foundation of Alexandria opened vast prospects to Rhodes; the skill and energy of her sailors and the practical sense of her ship-owners and merchants conquered all markets for her. Her realist policy was one of peaceful commercialism, based on a powerful fleet and a jealous love of independence. The Rhodians, ready to go to any length to safeguard their liberties, victoriously stood up to Demetrios the Town-Taker, compelled the Byzantines to abolish the toll which they used to levy on passing ships, fought Eumenes when he wanted to close the Euxine to them, and waged energetic war on the Cretan pirates. They spread their monetary system at the expense of Athens, and promulgated a code which was to govern Mediterranean navigation for centuries. This republic of merchants enjoyed sufficient prestige to be able to seek the friendship of kings without abasement; she had such means of information and such astute diplomatists that she foresaw the greatness of Rome, and as early as 306 she made with that city a commercial treaty which was a veritable draft on the future. She treated others as she expected them to treat her, conferring on foreigners established in the island more extensive rights than Athens ever granted to her Metics, and permitting them to form associations without even grouping by nationalities. On the whole, no city did so much to win and make use of the favours of fortune. The results were splendid. The vases with the Rhodian stamp were almost the only ones received at Pergamon and Alexandria, and even the competing cities of Delos and Athens had to accept them. A big transit business passed through the port of Rhodes. The customs duties, which were 2%, brought in a million drachmas net; this must have represented a movement of goods, inwards and outwards, worth considerably over fifty millions. But the Rhodians, who sailed everywhere, made still more money as international brokers. They were celebrated in antiquity for their great wealth, and they displayed it with the grandiloquent pomp and love of colossal size affected by parvenu peoples. For a century and a half the Rhodians had no competition to fear. They were as sure of their customers as of themselves. When an earthquake destroyed their city in 225 they were able to rebuild it speedily, thanks to the liberality of every state. This remarkable zeal shows both the importance of Rhodes as a commercial centre and the solidarity of interests which united all the markets.
Then, all of a sudden, this prosperity dried up, cut off at the very source. For a long time Delos, the Holy Island, had striven to become a centre of trade. She had entered into relations with Egypt, and had then turned to Macedonia. As early as 179 her dealings with the West had been sufficiently continuous for Massinissa to send her a royal gift. She had thus become an entrepot for corn. The Agora, surrounded by porticoes, was very fine; the Trade Exchange was imposing, with its pillared front facing the sea and the four aisles of its hypostyle hall. The growth of the foreign population caused a rapid rise in rents. Already the Phoenicians were coming to sell their ivory, the Egyptians were building themselves shrines, and the Italians were beginning to appear on the scene. Then the Roman merchants, tired of paying double duties at Rhodes on goods in transit, persuaded the Senate to quarrel with their old ally. In 166 the Athenians were placed once more in possession of Delos, on condition that they established a free port there. The result was immediate. In two or three years the proceeds of the Rhodian customs fell from a million drachmas to 150,000. Delos was going to take the place of Rhodes.
Delos offered every security to shipping and every convenience to trade. The anchorage was protected against the north wind by a strong breakwater. A mole divided it into two parts. On one side was the Sacred Harbour, intended for the caiques which carried the pilgrims; the landing-stage with which it was provided adjoined a big meeting-place of streets and an agora. On the other side was the Merchant Harbour, where the heavy cargo-boats came in. It was divided into portions, bounded by stones, and was fringed with wharves on to which warehouses and stores opened. Behind were the Deigma and the market, divided into sections in which each class of commodity was sold by sample or in bulk. All around stretched the commercial quarter, with shops, workshops, bazaars, and hostelries all heaped together. There the craftsmen were established, marble-workers, potters, blacksmiths, dyers.
But it was not local industry which maintained a business activity which was at least equal to that lost by Rhodes. Delos, now become “the common emporium of the Greeks,” collected all the products of Oriental Greece, from Egypt to the Euxine, in order to forward them to Italy, either to Taras or to Puteoli, the “Little Delos.” She organized the uninterrupted passage of slaves, grain, spices, etc. This almost barren islet served as a meeting-place for men of every country and every race; only the Rhodians stood aloof. Many of these foreigners disappeared as soon as they had settled their business. Almost all belonged to brotherhoods in which nationalities or related professions were grouped; the Merchants and Ship-Owners of Heracles of Tyre formed a society of mutual assistance, the Merchants, Ship-Owners, and Warehousemen of Poseidon of Berytos founded a club with its own shrine, and exchange, the Egyptians forgathered in dining-halls and the Jews in the Synagogue, and the merchants and ship-owners trading in Bithynia, the Hermes- makers, and the oil-merchants discussed their common interests together. As men came together, families were founded by mixed marriages. A certain Dionysios was the son of one Sostratos of Athens and a Rhoumatha of Antioch. The only association which stood aside and took a political attitude was that of Mercury, in which the Romans placed themselves at the head of the other Italians. For, though Delos might be officially a dependency of Athens, she was much more the trading station of Rome in Eastern waters. The finest monument on the island was the Agora of the Italians. The great bankers were P. Æmulius, Marius Gerillanus, and Lucius Aufidius. The vases which took the place of those of Rhodes in Sicily bore the Delian stamp of Trebius Luisus. All these foreigners gave the economic life of Delos extraordinary breadth and intensity. Land and houses acquired an enormous value; the smallest corners were taken up by buildings all entangled one in another; the population steadily moved further towards the higher quarters. Who would recognize the Holy Island now? Even on the days when the festival attracted, as of old, the boats of the neighbouring islands, in the midst of the hymns and the processions, the merchants lingered to beat down the price of slaves under the colonnades of the market.