Capital, Investment, and Innovation in the Roman World

Investment in capital and innovation in its uses are often considered the linchpin of modern economic growth, but has this always been so?

This volume aims to shed new light on the ancient Roman economy in the first book-length contribution focusing on the allocation and uses of capital and credit and the role of innovation in the Roman world.

Frontmatter; List of Figures; List of Tables; List of Abbreviations; List of Contributors; 1 Paul Erdkamp, Koenraad Verboven, and Arjan Zuiderhoek: Introduction; I.

Investment and Innovation; 2 Paul Erdkamp: Population, Technology, and Economic Growth in the Roman World; 3 Cristiano Viglietti: Innovations and Uses of Wealth in Archaic Rome and Latium (Late Eighth to Early Fourth Century BC); 4 Wim Broekaert and Arjan Zuiderhoek: Capital Goods in the Roman Economy; 5 Andrew Wilson: Roman Water-Power: Chronological Trends and Geographical Spread; 6 Nicolas Monteix: The Archaeological Perception of Capital and its Transformations in Urban Occupations; II.

Capital and Investment in the Rural Economy; 7 Marguerite Ronin: Funding Irrigation: Between Individual and Collective Investments; 8 Mick Stringer: Impensae, operae, and the pastio uillatica: The Evaluation of New Venture Investments in the Roman Agricultural Treatises; 9 Annalisa Marzano: A Story of Land and Water: Control, Capital, and Investment in Large-Scale Fishing and Fish-Salting Operations; 10 Tamara Lewit: Invention, Tinkering, or Transfer?

Innovation in Oil and Wine Presses in the Roman Empire; III.

Human Capital, Financial Capital, and Credit Markets; 11 Norman Underwood: Labouring for God: The Clergy and Human Capital in the Later Roman Empire; 12 Koenraad Verboven: Capital Markets and Financial Entrepreneurs in the Roman World; 13 Jean Andreau: Capital and Investment in the Campanian Tablets; 14 Merav Haklai: Credit and Financial Capital in Roman Egypt; 15 Leonardo Gregoratti: Temples and Traders in Palmyra; Endmatter; Index