MOST of the wealth of Egypt was in the hands of either the Pharaoh, the temples or the Pharaoh’s regional governors and the monarchs.
The construction of the pyramids in Egypt built to house the bodies of their departed Pharaohs is an indication of the immense resources at the disposal of the Egyptians.
The material resources required to erect each edifice were staggering.
The largest, the Great Pyramid, is 786 feet on a side and 481 feet high.
It contains approximately two million stone blocks weighing over two tonnes each and took two decades to complete.
The workforce, estimated at 100 000 individuals, had to be housed, clothed, fed and, in many cases, even paid since they were free Egyptian farmers who worked on the pyramid during the season of the Nile flood which made agricultural activities redundant.
For the Egyptian farmers, the project represented both income, during the months when the land could not be worked, and the religious devotion of a people who believed that their rulers, the Pharaohs, were living gods whose earthly death was simply a transition, not an end. During the 3rd Millennium BC, approximately 35 large pyramids were constructed in Egypt.
Merchants and traders in the ancient Near East faced the formidable task of transportation.
For those living along the banks of the Nile or the Tigris or the Euphrates Rivers, water transport was both efficient and relatively inexpensive.
River barges could carry between 10 and 15 metric tonnes at a cost while ships on the Mediterranean could carry 500 metric tonnes.
Land transportation, which was accomplished most often in this early period by the use of donkeys, was for many products and distances, prohibitively expensive.
In spite of the high costs, however, significant trade took place over land, as evidenced by the great wealth of Ebla, whose commerce was carried out, at least at its outset, entirely by land.
One of the most extensive surviving records of long-distance overland commerce involved the northern Mesopotamian cities of Ashur and Kanesh, (now Turkey). In fact, the transport of grain overland to the city of Ashur was so common that grain came to be measured in units known as ‘donkey loads’.
Although the Ebla tablets make little mention of any role for religion in that economy, surviving texts from Egypt and Mesopotamia place religious institutions at the centre of their respective economies.
Priests were among the wealthiest individuals throughout the Near East while temples became the centres of economic life in many of the cities in Mesopotamia. Temple archives disclose that they owned vast tracts of land, some of which was rented, with the rest farmed by a large force of labourers.
Among the records are receipts for animals, grain, perfumes and precious metals brought to the temples as contributions.
The connection between the temple and the economy stemmed directly from the perceived relationship between the gods and the well-being of the community.
The gods were generally seen by the Mesopotamians as the true owners of the cities.
It was only natural, therefore, for the representatives of the gods to possess or control much of community’s wealth.
During the earliest stages of Mesopotamian civilisation, it was not uncommon for priests to hold political control of their respective cities.
From a very secular, business perspective, the temples had other advantages as well.
Temples and their holdings enjoyed tax exemptions, which could be considerable.
In the 2nd Millennium BC, the rulers of the city of Ur levied a 10 percent tax on all private commercial activity. To avoid taxation, many merchants would dedicate themselves to the gods and receive ‘the protection of the gods’ by doing so, which included tax exempt status. Working for the temples, however, entailed some loss of freedom, but most of these merchants, while doing the temple’s business, also did much of their own.
Temples for the worship of a particular city’s gods often were established as part of the creation of a trading colony in a foreign city.
Such a foundation would offer sanctuary to foreign merchants, owing to its religious nature.
Since these religions were polytheistic, there was a tendency to identify gods from different communities that shared common attributes.
Such identification would further enhance the trading community’s respectability and importance, making the relationship between the two societies that much closer. Some evidence exists that certain temples and priesthoods were established by merchants purely for pursuit of profit. In a polytheistic religion, the addition of some hitherto unknown god to the pantheon was always possible.
By creating such a religious establishment, the merchants would be in control entirely.
In their gratitude and ‘to honour the god’, the merchants would often give offerings to the god.
Among the numerous contributions were vast quantities of gold and silver.
This wealth would be in addition to what temples earned from their lands, flocks, factories and fees for the use of large storage facilities.
Large storage facilities, like the dura’ of Munhumutapa, were initially built to hold the produce
from the temple’s estates, but they later became commercial ventures, like modern day grain storage companies, such as the GMB in Zimbabwe.
Moreover, since the temples were considered to be under the protection of their particular god and had large secure doors and often guards, many private individuals would leave their valuables with the temple.
It was probably in this manner that banking arose in the Near East.
Initially, only kings and priests had the necessary capital for banking services; particularly giving out loans
on interest.
In due course, private individuals as well as temples and palaces joined in the profession.
The use of gold as proto-money has been traced back to the 4th millennium BC when the Egyptians used gold bars of a set weight as a medium of exchange, as had been done earlier in Mesopotamia with silver bars.
Likewise, the Pharaohs of ancient Egypt dominated their economies.
Often temples were associated with merchants and with trading colonies and, as a result, would regularly serve as clearing houses for trading accounts.
A foreign merchant might have ‘an account’ with a local temple.
When it came time to pay for goods, instead of personally going to the temple and retrieving the necessary funds, he would give the seller a written note ordering the temple to pay the bearer the amount owed from the account – not unlike modern banking.
Many women were in charge of temples. Priestesses enjoyed a special legal status throughout the Near East, and frequently ran temples devoted to the worship of female deities.
By the 5th Century BC, in addition to temple banks, there were prominent private banking houses in Babylon, large even by modern standards, which made loans both to private individuals and even to governments.
The evidence suggests, however, that these institutions did not predate the 6th Century BC; for most of the history of the ancient Near East, it was the governments and temples that had the capital and gave out loans.
Dr Michelina Andreucci is a Zimbabwean-Italian researcher, industrial design consultant and a published author in her field.
For views and comments, email: linamanucci@gmail.com