By Angeliki E. Laiou, Harvard University Press, January 2002

The Byzantine state was one of the most successful medieval economies. Using historical and archeological approaches, Laiou considers factors such as climate, terrain, and technology in the creation of the structure and evolution of this economy. The Byzantine economy emerges as a complex and flexible one, which had great longevity and success in meeting the needs of both state and society.

Angeliki E. Laiou is Dumbarton Oaks Professor of Byzantine History at Harvard University and a former Director of Dumbarton Oaks.

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Book Review (The American History Review):

Angeliki E. Laiou, editor. The Economic History of Byzantium from the Seventh through the Fifteenth Centuries. In three volumes. Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. 2002. Pp. x, 391; vi, 394–905; 910–1205. $180.00 the set.

Readers of this mixed review should probably be warned that the reviewer has strongly disagreed with the book's editor-in-chief (a former Director of Dumbarton Oaks) over Harvard University's decision to abolish Dumbarton Oaks' Center for Byzantine Studies under that name and to dissolve its research faculty in 1979. Both measures have, in my view, harmed Byzantine studies in America, despite Dumbarton Oaks' continuing a few highly visible projects, including publishing this three-volume work. Just three of the book's thirty-four collaborators are, to my knowledge, Americans, a proportion that only slightly exaggerates the eclipse of American Byzantinists. In fact, the book gives a broadly accurate picture of the present state of Byzantine economic history, now largely dominated by French and Greek scholars. (The National Bank of Greece is also publishing a Greek edition.)

After a short introduction by Angeliki E. Laiou on the problems of Byzantine economic history and the basic course of Byzantine political history, part one covers "The Natural Environment, Resources, Communications, and Production Techniques." Bernard Geyer's opening chapter on physical phenomena deals well with the difficult questions of erosion and climate and rightly emphasizes the catastrophic effects of the sixth-century and thirteenth-century plagues. Laiou's chapter on human resources gives a fair summary of current demographic estimates, suggests an estimate of her own that I find too high, and correctly remarks that our ignorance of Byzantine life expectancy results from insufficient research rather than inadequate sources. The chapters that follow vary in their success. Anna Avramea's chapter on land and sea communications summarizes much valuable material, but George Makris's chapter on Byzantine ships and Maria K. Papathanassiou's chapter on metallurgy seem too brief and rambling, even for topics that need much more study. Anthony Bryer's chapter on farming tools mostly poses witty questions that are unanswerable without further research. Klaus-Peter Matschke's chapter on mining skillfully summarizes the scanty evidence. Longer chapters by Jean-Pierre Sodini on marble and stoneworking and by Anna Muthesius on the silk industry are the most informative, being based on the most evidence and research.

Part two, "The Sixth Century Background," trying to compensate for the book's starting only with the seventh century, has a long chapter on the sixth-century economy by Cécile Morrisson and Sodini and a short, archeological "case study" on the Anatolian town of Anemourion by James Russell. Morrisson and Sodini seem uncertain as to whether the plague of 541–42 marked a decisive shift from economic expansion to economic contraction (as Laiou and I believe) or whether the evidence, which is often hard to date, reflects a less clear course of development. Russell's archeological data could be read either way.

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