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Thread: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

  1. #81

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by HackneyedScribe View Post
    If slaves have no money then their "wage" is equivalent to just their upkeep. If you think slave masters provide for their slaves more than what slaves earn for their masters, I would like you to provide that information.



    If money was given to the slave owner: Slave workers earn nothing but their upkeep
    If slave masters take money from their slaves: Slave upkeep comes from the money they originally earned anyways
    If the owner rents out the slave, then the "wages" would be the cost rhe owner rented the slave out for. And the costnof the initial purchase price needs to be taken into account when computing a slaves effective "wage".

    It sounds like you want to discard the practice of solely using archaeological evidence to prove the existence of large ships. In which case Simaqian recorded that Tower ships were over 10 zhang high.
    The Tower ships were river ships, not sea going ships, and essentially nothing more than very large barges. In any case, unlike Roman ships, we have no evidence they actually existed.

    Contemporary evidence shows that Zheng He's Treasure ships were 5000 liao in size (1250 tons), not 300 tons
    The 5000 Liao ships you mentioned were not specifically said to be Zheng He's ships. While, given that the size was mentioned on a Hong Bao's tomb who was an official on Zhrng He's voyages, it is likely the 5000 liao ships did refer to Zheng He's ships, it is still not certain. But it is also possible that the 5000 Liao were some other ships, like the river going Tower ships you mentioned earlier.

    Actual contemporary inscriptions thst mention Zheng He's ships only give sizes of 1500 and 2000 liao ships. There are different opinions on the size of the Liao, with some estimates of it being 300 lbs, making a 2000 liao ship only 300 tons as said. Even using the larger value of the liao and a size of 5000 Liao, the 1250 tons bm would still be less than the 1400 tons bm of the contemporary Grace Dieus, for which we have actual archeological evidence of, unlike Zhrng He's 5000 liao ship. And that still isn't bigger than the 1400 tons Roman ISIS from a 1000 years earlier, or Caligula's Giant Ship, which again we have actual remains.



    Sally K Church:
    A ship of about 200-250 ft would make much more sense than the 450 ft one. Such a ship would be large enough to transport the required number of people and amount of supplies and treasures. Although this was the maximum size of wooden ships in the West, this is not the reason why we should accept it as an optimum size. Gong Zhen’s evidence is perhaps the soundest – his statement that there were 200-300 men on the ships. This number of men could not have man- aged a ship of 20,000 tons, but would have been quite adept at handling ships of a smaller size, such as the Razee Corvette, a Ship-of-the-Line manned by 205- 220 men, or the Fifth Rate (46-gun) ship with a complement of 280-300 men.The Razee Corvette was 145 ft long, and 38.5 ft in the beam with a burden of 944 tons and a displacement of 1,280 tons. The Fifth Rate was over 150 ft long and 40 ft in the beam with a capacity of 1,063 tons burden and a displacement of 2,154 tons.132 Ships that are too large also have certain disadvantages, foremost among which is a loss of maneuverability. This lesson was learned by the Spanish Armada
    Sally Church argument is weak here. The 5th rate HMS Serapis was 879 tons and a crew of 280, and the 44 gun USS Constitution was 1575 tonnage, and 2,200 tons displacement, with a crew of 450. In addition, the far closer in time 15th century Harry Grace a Dieu was 1000 tons burden, and had 300 sailors with a total compliment of 600 including Marines and that is probably a better guide than the later 18th 5th rate ship example you used, being closer in time. Also, the ratio of.1062 and


    In addition, in a section of Church's work you did not mention, the reports a Ming official reporting of a 1000* liao ship with a crew of 100. For a crew of 200, that would imply a ship of 2000 Lial, consistent with the sizes mentioned in the conetmporary inscriptions of Zhrng He's voyages. Church's speculation tends to inflate the size of Zheng He's ships. Her example of a fifth rate ship has a rather low number of crew and high tonnage compare to other fifth rate ships, and her value of displacement is also high with respect to tonnage. The HMS Victoria had 2142 tons burden and 3500 tons displacement, for a ratio of .612, and the USS Constitution had a tonnage of 1575 and a displacement of 2,200 tons, for 0.72, while the ratio in her example is .49, rather low. Not sure where she got her figures from.

    *Corrected a miss quote, originally I said the ships were 500 Liao, but checking back on the source, on page 15 Church said 1000 piculs, which were equivalent to 250 tons (1000 liao).

    She didn't have the evidence from Hong Bao's tomb which was excavated after her article. The tomb gives the first primary source evidence which says that Zheng He had 5000 liao ships,
    As I mentioned, the tomb did not specifically state they were Zheng He's ships.

    And it might not have made any real difference in her article. The Gong Zhen ships are not necessarily the same ones as described in Hong Bao's tomb, since Zheng He had several different voyages and the ship sizes might not have been always the same. As noted, contemporary inscriptions only mention ships of 1500 and 2000 liao, but the inscriptions only describe certain voyages. In any case, even the dimensions given on Hong Bao tomb don't support the excessive claims made in later official Chinese accounts. If the Qing officials were clearly exaggerating, why couldn't the Ming officials start exaggerating the size of Zheng He's ships as well? Not as great an exaggeration, true, but Hong Bao was closer in time to the actual voyages.



    which is equivalent to 1250 tons burthen and 2000 tons displacement. This coroborrates with Sally K.'s estimation using Gong Zheng's quote that the ships were crewed by 200-300 men, from which she concludes that a ship of 300 crewmen would be the size of a fifth rate ship (1063 tons burthen, 2154 tons displacement, 150 feet in length). Still very large for the time period.
    Only if you use the larger value for the liao. Using other estimates of the liao only gives a size of 750 tons for a 5000 liao ship. Even at the larger 1250 tons, that is still smaller than the 1400 tons of the contemporary Grace Dieus, and the 1000 year earlier Roman ISIS and giant Caligula ship.

    Using a size of 2000 Liao found in the inscriptions, and the lower value of 300 lbs, gives 300 tons, the size of actual Song Dynasty shipwrecks we have found.
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 10, 2019 at 01:14 PM.

  2. #82

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by Common Soldier View Post
    Sally Church argument is weak here. The 5th rate HMS Serapis was 879 tons and a crew of 280, and the 44 gun USS Constitution was 1575 tonnage, and 2,200 tons displacement, with a crew of 450. In addition, the far closer in time 15th century Harry Grace a Dieu was 1000 tons burden, and had 300 sailors with a total compliment of 600 including Marines and that is probably a better guide than the later 18th 5th rate ship example you used, being closer in time. Also, the ratio of.1062 and
    ...really, extrapolating from European ships is tricky, and it's totally wrong to use warships from a different era.

    Crew complement vs. displacement (or weight) do not even scale the same way. Larger ship will have less crew per ton than smaller ship. Type of rigging and any mechanical assist will also significantly change crew complement. But even bigger issue is the number of combat personnel.

    Even largest warships of the age of sail required a sailor complement around 200, with far less being a "skeleton crew", that is absolute minimum of sailors required to control the ship. The rest of the crew were gun crews and marines. A frigate of the era could be sailed with one or two dozen sailors as a skeleton crew.

    But even if we try to extrapolate from more closer parallels, we run into problems. Santa Maria, largest ship in Columbus' famous expedition, was a carrack design, with length ~49 m, beam (width) 5.5 m and tons burthen (cargo capacity, rather obscure method of defining it from the size of the ship, but good way to get a sense of overall dimension of a wooden ship, rather just length) ~108 tons. Crew complement 40. Looks like a good baseline, being an explorer, right?

    But that's also a crew complement of a much larger (although roughly same length) of a 19th century Chinese transocean cargo shipKeying, with 800 tons burthen, and twice as wide and much taller hull than Santa Maria. Being junk rigged like Zheng He's ships, it might also give a good base for the comparison.

    And just to give you a taste how mechanical assist can change things...largest sailing ship built, a steel-hulled Preussen, used donkey engines to drive the sail winches and such stuff, had a crew of 45...for displacement of over 11000 tons at full load...for comparison, Santa Maria had 150 ton displacement. Tons burthen for comparison are not applicable for steel hulled ships.

    Bottom line, trying to establish size of the ships from crew complement is not a good idea. We have no idea how much of Zheng He's crew were either marines or auxiliary personnel over the normal complement, meant to replace losses that were expected at such long voyages, nor do we have a good idea about how the size scales with crew for a ship of that design and rigging...because that might matter a lot. Junk rig is heavy for the motive power it provides, meaning it will need a lot more of muscle to raise and reef on large vessels.

  3. #83

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    I agree that using crew size is not a good way of estimating ship size, but in the case of Zheng He's Treasure ships, crew size is sometimes all we havw. We have crew sizes given by someone who sailed with Zheng He (Gong Zhen) but he did not give any dimension to the ships. Crew can give us a very rough idea of how big a ship is, in the absence of other data, in that a large crew implies a rather big ship, how big is a matter of debate - if if Zheng He's ships were only 300 tons, that would still be large ships for the time, since the majority of ships throughout history until our times being small ,being under 100 tons I would say.

    My view, is that conteary to Sally Church's opinion, Zheng He's ships probably had larger.crews than average, both because the voyage was long and you would likely extra crew as replacement.for crew loss due to.illness and injury, and because Zheng He's ships would like have to fight, and were involved in fighting, which again would mean you wanted more men than on a typical cruise. So going just by crew size would tend to inflate the ship size of Zheng He's fleef, in my opinion. The example odnrhe Keying, which was neither carrying cargo nor expected to fight, would not be very representative of Zheng He's crew size, and the Keying being 400 years later would also make it less representative. As you pointed, technology can significantly reduce manpower requirements. An account of N office who sailed the Keying it would have taken 30 men to handle the rudder in rough weather without block and tackle, but only 15 men using block and tackle.


    The Tek Sing, a 1000 tons Chinese junk that sank in 1822, had a crew of 200, and would be more represenrative than the Keying, being on a more typical voyagd rather than a special purpose trip solely like the Keying's.But how representative in manpower a ship from 400 laters would be to the earlier ships is unknown.
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 10, 2019 at 02:26 PM.

  4. #84

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by Common Soldier View Post
    I agree that using crew size is not a good way of estimating ship size, but in the case of Zheng He's Treasure ships, crew size is.sometimes all we havw. He have crew sizes given by someone who sailed with Zheng He (Gong Zhen) but he did not give any dimension to the ships. Crew can give us a very rough idea of how big a ship is, in the absence of other data, in that a large crew implies a rather big ship, how big is a matter of debate - if if Zheng He's ships were only 300 tons, that would still be large ships for the time, since the majority of ships throughout history until our times being small ,being under 100 tons I would say.
    Are you talking here about empty weight, maximum displacement (that is essentially total weight of fully loaded ship), or tonnage (capacity in tons burthen)? Those are vastly different values, but all use some kind of ton as a unit. I'm still not sure into which of these does Chinese measurement translate. These values can be vastly different...for example, Golden Hind, Drake's galleon which is a good example of a "workhorse" small galleon of the 16th-17th century, had empty weight 120 tons, displacement ~300 tons and tonnage somewhere in 100-150 tons burthen range.

  5. #85

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by Sar1n View Post
    Are you talking here about empty weight, maximum displacement (that is essentially total weight of fully loaded ship), or tonnage (capacity in tons burthen)? Those are vastly different values, but all use some kind of ton as a unit. I'm still not sure into which of these does Chinese measurement translate. These values can be vastly different...for example, Golden Hind, Drake's galleon which is a good example of a "workhorse" small galleon of the 16th-17th century, had empty weight 120 tons, displacement ~300 tons and tonnage somewhere in 100-150 tons burthen range.
    Most of th e time when talking about ships of the past I am referring to tons burthen. 0ld sources such at the Tudor Anthony Rolls gives ship sizes in turns of tons burthenz, I suppose because capacity of a ship was of more interest than its displacement weight. But innthr more modern we, with steam engines and fuel storage, tons burthen became less useful term. A tons burthen figure for a nuclear submarine wouldn't be that useful a figure. In the case of HMS Victory, it was 2142 tons burthen, and 3500 tons displacement. So thsre is a variation between tons burthen and tons displacemrnt, but generally it seems to me that tons burthen seems typically somewhere in the ball park of 2/3 of the displacement from the most of the examples I have seen.

    When it comes to premodern Chinese sources, capacity is what seems to have been meant from what I have seen. For.example, the Ming minister Song Li was clearly talking about capacity, not displacement, when he was making comparisons between an ocean going ship with a crew ofn100 carrying 1000 piculs with that of a river craft carrying 200 piculs (liaos) requiring only 10 men, in the example from Sally Church's work late 15 ("Zheng He: Plausibiltiy of 450-FT Treasure Ships"), so it appears that Chinese sources meant capacity and not displacement in the other times ship's tonnage is mentioned.

  6. #86
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Also Ellen Wood has argued that Athenian agriculture was mostly subsistence grain, not cash crops. From where did you get the data that Athenian agriculture was mostly cash crops?
    Argument does not hold water for one (this is a pun which I will deal with in another post).


    Substance agriculture simply can't explain Athenian wealth nor its need or ability to import vast amounts of grain (and other things). No you really can't get that just out of silver. A Marxist theory of self sufficiency (at substance levels) view of a peasant culture is deeply counter to the economy Athens had. Yes, the bitter good and beautiful aristocrats moaned the ideal of the self sufficient aristocrats (and their loss of debt slaves) as the only citizens - as if they would have it without the democracy while being Persian serfs... But the government of coup of the 400/5000 gives lie to their ideals. Only 5000 in a place that had 60,000 or more (*) male citizens in 431BC. The problem is how many of those 5000 only held their status due to the Athenian Empire of the 5th century and so had vast land holding all over the Empire and access to commercial loan investments again a function of the economy the Democracy made. So again the government of the 5000 that lost the empire and and would have lost to Persia and also produced the traitors who lost the war finally and the 30 Tyrants. Eloquent men (and well published and of course saved by other men of wealth and status through the ages), not so much the workers who made their wealth by labor or farming - but in retrospect the Democracy of Athens and Samos should have cleaned house.


    From what I can read of EW's book (and its in pieces via multiple different previews) she seems a bit detached from the actual economic and climate realities of Athens as is Jameson who she cites and then criticizes. Neither seem to have any command of the reality dry land agriculture, the particular micro climate of Attica, or the results of the inter-cropping or the nature of the micro climates in the Aegean when making comparisons to say Lemnos (at the time) or Argos or Rome 500 years later are difficult at best.


    Anyway still toiling away at your challenge to produce an Athenian basket. Its- A :difficult and B: I am rapidly loosing respect for the process since I think Allen started something he invested not much effort into in going back to Rome nor have his academic followers either. The level of filling putty in the gaps without discussion is very problematical as I see it. You cannot blandly point to other household market labor while not accounting for the fact somebody has to process all the raw goods in your basket. Unless you think people just eat wheat seeds raw, you do need to think on the labor time to turn that into something edible and account for what that means. I don't think any of Athens or Rome or Han China had a Ronco 'set it and forget it cooker' so somebody is you know tied to the kitchen, and the mill and getting water, making clothes etc...


    But give me a day or so (or more I mean really in the desire to be exact it took me a year or more to get around to following up on my reply about Macedonia and its coinage) I will answer the question but I think in a different thread and also consumer baskets. This one seem to be more about Rome vs Han at this point in technology pissing. However the point I was getting at was I don't think you can use them (baskets) as a tech better thing. Also of course it requires a bit of consideration of how much forced labor a society had. In this the Han certainly had less of the bright and shining line of slave vs free than Athens had (although not very low value of a very not solid solid work of some 70 years ago that seems to have become concrete too the benefit of many and Han China in particular) but it had very,very many of the kind of residents that the Athenians would not consider free who were not slaves and rather worse off than even Metics.


    * As far as I know only M H Hansen has looked at just how profound was the scale lost manpower Athens sustained from the Peloponnesian war and its colonial efforts (and from plague). But that was just a faction of the longer term drain on Athenian citizen manpower of the 5th century, to war, defeats, and colonial ventures (the kind that did no see citizens return). To go from 8000-9000 hoplites at Marathon to 29000 (and 1200 cavalry vs some 90, mind while still having a population to sustain at least partially 300 ships [theoretically 60000 bodies] and 1600 archers) in 431 BC requires more than substance peasants. Once you count in all the prospective losses from the long years of the war with Persia and the 'First' Peloponnesian war and revolts etc. Again as Hansen notes the recovered casualty lists from the Peloponnesian war show our surviving literary sources under count the daily grind of loss fairly dramatically and ignore small events. You have to have a rather more dynamic society than peasant subsistence farmers to keep up that kind of population growth. One could note Sparta was correct in being conservative. Its rather far more wealthy and stable agricultural base could not in fact sustain even a fraction of the losses Athens tossed into the fire year after year.

    ---



    But anyway I will post in a new thread on this line of discussion
    Last edited by conon394; November 15, 2019 at 11:18 PM.
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    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

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  7. #87
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    @Hackneed soldier.

    If you don't mind I'm looking for a couple clarifications or and expanded references if you will allow.

    First to start I still retain a bit of a problem with the van Leeuwen et al take on wages (while I attempt an Athenian basket) the data offered remain curt and not persuasive.

    “For the Han dynastyChina around100 BC the wage was taken to be 62.5 grams of silver, which was equal to about 500 wuzhuqianper month, hence about a soldiers wage or 5 times the wage of a female maid around 100 BC(Wen 2002). One might argue, however, that a soldier’s wage is not representativeof that of a laborer. However, evidence that a soldier’s wage can be taken as representative has been found by Sun (2010), who shows that the daily wage of a soldier is about equal to the daily cost of transporting 39.5 kilo of salt (not using a wagon)–a task which could be performed by any “unskilled laborer” “

    OK so I get there is a typo, because the maid wage is really 300 a month cash (restated later page 15 – which matches a source I actually have access to). The discussion on pg 15 should rightly be here since it would support the Solider over the Female on the basis of undervalued woman’s work. Although were I to be picky the undervaluation argued there is more 65-70% not 60%. However more problematic is the part in bold. A days work transporting salt is equal to the soldier stipend? How recall the original basis for Allen is a 250 days of work. Thus it would be nice to know the basis for this symmetry. Is our labor earning something over 16 cash a day for 30/31 continuous days?

    [From #39]

    I don't know where you got a day's work being 1-10 cash from the Nine Chapters on Mathematical Art, but the grain price in the book is only about a dozen cash per hu, compared to the 100 cash per hu that Vas Leeuwen used based on the Chu-yen slips.
    So if they indeed get paid only 150 cash per month, 30% of the paper's estimated wage, their grain cost is only 12% of the paper's estimated cost, so they in fact have even more buying power at least in terms of grain.
    Probably not. At the end of the day the NCofMA is a text book and story problems while perhaps based in reality do not require the author to run down to the market and get quotes on the day he though up the problem or even be somebody who hires day laborers on a regular basis. The recovered slips used would seem a more solid base for inference.

    I got the 1-10 cash from Peng (cited above). He cites as “Nine Chapter Calculating Classic, 6.” without discussion. Yep its the same thing I complained about in van Leeuwen et al. I don't like even if it my best source. Can't find access to the Nine Chapters on Mathematical Art so got no way to be sure what it says.

    On to the Math book

    Nine Chapters of Mathematical Art:
    "Now given a problem of fair distribution of tax millet. The tax bureau is at County A, which has 20,520 households and where millet costs 20 coins a hu. County B, 200 li away from the bureau, has 12312 households and millet costs 10 coins a hu there. County C, 150 li away, has 7182 households, and millet costs 12 coins a hu. County D, 250 li away, has 13,338 households, and millet costs 17 coins a hu. County E, 150 li away, has 5130 households, and millet costs 13 coins a hu. The total tax millet for the five counties is 10,000 hu. A cart carries 25 hu; the transport cost is 1 coin a li. Assume the payment by each household is equal in cash and labour. Tell: how much millet should each county pay?"
    Btw, same book says an empty cart can travel 70 li per day and a full cart travels 50 li per day. At another place it says:

    Now a labourer is hired to carry 2 hu of salt. For 100 li he gets 40 coins. Assume he carries 1 hu 7 dou 3 1/3 sheng of salt for 80 li. Tell: How much will be paid?
    Answer: 27 11/15 coins.

    ^I used the salt transporter because that seems more relevant to what Van Leeuwen used.
    First thing carry does mean carry in the second question - I assume yes.

    [From #43]

    The load is 25 hu of grain, I never said it was carried by ox. The Han had the wheelbarrow whereas Rome probably did not.
    OK so this was perhaps poor communication. But for not it remains a point unskilled labor reference cost via the NcofMA?

    With a wheelbarrow two hu should've be easy. By hand two hu of salt (around 88 lbs) is hard, but not impossible as modern soldiers and firefighters could carry heavier loads.
    So wait can stay with the labor carrying or not, for the 2 hu?

    Now I could be wrong wrong but I have a Han li at .415 km so 100 li = 41.5 km

    First off that means the second example from the math book is well a rhetorical exercise. Pretty much nobody is going to do 100 li with 88 lbs. Although as to the number s it closer to 130 lbs for that many liters of salt as I do the math.

    But no matter. For comparison a quick march of ~35 km with a 45lbs the Romans expected that done in ~6 hours. At double the load I doubt our laborer could even better than the normal march of ~30 km. But what ever I suppose he did not need to fortify a camp. But to be simplistic he would have to walk back as well as forth.

    That is if we are assuming this is in a day. So what are we alos assuming just the loaded push rate for a barrow at 50? Is this the basis for the Sun reference. Because it seems to me not to work. 620 cash if the guy works 31 days. And only ~430 if we assume the 250 days of work thing.

    Most Han Garrison soldiers were conscripts. How did you conclude that they are choosing the highest possible number?
    A Han soldier just by himself would get 333 cash equivalent per month
    Each additional dependent(wife or kids) gets him over 100 cash per month.
    Leeuwen is calculating that the soldier has 3 dependents. He's using a lower wage if anything.
    The abstraction assumes one working person to be valid and it accepts other income is a reality you can't count it. Or you have to work out potential income for all family members. Are you suggesting data you are aware of contradicts the 500 cash a month assumption?
    Last edited by conon394; December 02, 2019 at 09:21 AM.
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

    'One day when I fly with my hands - up down the sky, like a bird'

    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  8. #88

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    @Hackneed soldier.

    If you don't mind I'm looking for a couple clarifications or and expanded references if you will allow.

    First to start I still retain a bit of a problem with the van Leeuwen et al take on wages (while I attempt an Athenian basket) the data offered remain curt and not persuasive.

    “For the Han dynasty China around 100 BC the wage was taken to be 62.5 grams of silver, which was equal to about 500 wuzhuqian per month, hence about a soldiers wage or 5 times the wage of a female maid around 100 BC (Wen 2002). One might argue, however, that a soldier’s wage is not representative of that of a laborer. However, evidence that a soldier’s wage can be taken as representative has been found by Sun (2010), who shows that the daily wage of a soldier is about equal to the daily cost of transporting 39.5 kilo of salt (not using a wagon)–a task which could be performed by any “unskilled laborer” “
    For comparison, it is interesting to note that in the 1st century, a days pay was around a denarius, which was somewhere around 3.2 grams of silver in content. (The New Testaments gospels, which are first century text, talk about day workers getting a denarius for a day's wage in several parable examples). Taken over a month, that would work out to something like 77 grams of silver per month, assuming a six day work week, which would be true for the Jewish setting of the NT gospels.

    Now, day laborers might not always be steadily employed, and workers who could count on regular payment might have received slightly less per day. Roman soldiers at the time of Caesar/Augustus were paid around 900 sestertii per year (equivalent to 225 denarii), which assuming an equivalent of a 250 day working year also works out to close to a denarius day. https://www.researchgate.net/publica...rmy_Pay_Scales, or the equivalent of 67 grams of silver a month. (Note, legionnaires also periodically received additional bonus payouts, and a "retirement" payout worth the equivalent of 13 years salary, and that does not include any potential loot the soldier might obtain while on a campaign, so the soldier actually "earned" a bit more than a common laborer. Auxiliaries were paid less, but received Roman citizenship upon their completion of service, a valuable compensation.)

    Of course, without knowing the total cost of goods, it is difficult to make a direct comparison in the pay between Chinese and Roman sources, and Roman pay and cost varied with time. Roman prices changed significantly over the course of the Roman empire, and while I don't think the Han empire experienced quite the same degree of inflation, it does not mean that cost and pay remained entirely fixed over the life of the Han Empire. Making an accurate comparison between cost is actually rather tricky. Grain might be more expensive in one area, but other stables like wine and oil might be cheaper. Silk might be cheaper in one area, but wool more expensive, and while silk is largely a material for the well off, wool is typically a clothing material used by the common people. Cotton might be cheaper in one area, but looses all insulting properties, while wool still retains much of its insulting properties when wet, an important factor in cool wet climates. And cost can change over time. We seldom have a complete breakdown of every good cost, and even when we do have a fairly comprehensive list of cost, such as the Edict of Maximum Prices under Diocletian, those cost might only reflect what the cost the government wanted, not actual reality, or might reflect local costs and not for the region as a whole.

    Still, it seems wages were rather comparable between Han dynasty Chinese and Romans. One of the questions would be income distribution. It may be while the common worker seems to have had similar pay, the income inequality might have been greater for one region or the other. A Roman centurion was paid around 15,000 sestertii per year, about 15 times the pay of an ordinary legionnaire http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/rom...ld-today-46042. It would be interesting to see the pay of an equivalent Han dynasty officer.

    I
    OK so I get there is a typo, because the maid wage is really 300 a month cash (restated later page 15 – which matches a source I actually have access to). The discussion on pg 15 should rightly be here since it would support the Solider over the Female on the basis of undervalued woman’s work. Although were I to be picky the undervaluation argued there is more 65-70% not 60%. However more problematic is the part in bold. A days work transporting salt is equal to the soldier stipend? How recall the original basis for Allen is a 250 days of work. Thus it would be nice to know the basis for this symmetry. Is our labor earning something over 16 cash a day for 30/31 continuous days?
    Even in today, women still get paid on the average significantly less than men than men on the average, so it is not surprising that was true in ancient times as well. . While men were often expect to provide support for both themselves and their families, women, especially people like maids, likely would not be expected to support a family solely based on their wages.

    Servants are often paid less, since they often get food, clothing, and housing as part of the job, and we have to take these indirect payments into account when comparing with a day laborer. When comparing soldier pay with an unskilled laborer, does the soldier get food and shelter as part of of his employment? If so, just reporting what the soldier is actually paid and not including these other factors under reports a soldier's pay. Also, there is risk - high risk jobs tend to get paid relatively more than lower risk jobs, all factors equal. A soldier is more likely to get killed on a job than a maid, and should be compensated for those risk factors.
    .
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 22, 2019 at 05:48 AM. Reason: fix typo

  9. #89

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    Argument does not hold water for one (this is a pun which I will deal with in another post).


    Substance agriculture simply can't explain Athenian wealth nor its need or ability to import vast amounts of grain (and other things). No you really can't get that just out of silver. A Marxist theory of self sufficiency (at substance levels) view of a peasant culture is deeply counter to the economy Athens had. Yes, the bitter good and beautiful aristocrats moaned the ideal of the self sufficient aristocrats (and their loss of debt slaves) as the only citizens - as if they would have it without the democracy while being Persian serfs... But the government of coup of the 400/5000 gives lie to their ideals. Only 5000 in a place that had 60,000 or more (*) male citizens in 431BC. The problem is how many of those 5000 only held their status due to the Athenian Empire of the 5th century and so had vast land holding all over the Empire and access to commercial loan investments again a function of the economy the Democracy made. So again the government of the 5000 that lost the empire and and would have lost to Persia and also produced the traitors who lost the war finally and the 30 Tyrants. Eloquent men (and well published and of course saved by other men of wealth and status through the ages), not so much the workers who made their wealth by labor or farming - but in retrospect the Democracy of Athens and Samos should have cleaned house.
    The Greeks early on traded wine and olive oil for other goods (including grain), which implies more than just substance farming.

    Second, 4th century BC Athens is equivalent to the Warring States period, not the Han Dynasty. Even though there were no fundamental changes during the Roman Empire, a lot of improvement on existing methods and in better transportation (more comprehensive roads, bridges, elimination of piracy) had their effect, and extrapolating what was true for the Han dynasty to the Warring States is not necessarily valid.



    From what I can read of EW's book (and its in pieces via multiple different previews) she seems a bit detached from the actual economic and climate realities of Athens as is Jameson who she cites and then criticizes. Neither seem to have any command of the reality dry land agriculture, the particular micro climate of Attica, or the results of the inter-cropping or the nature of the micro climates in the Aegean when making comparisons to say Lemnos (at the time) or Argos or Rome 500 years later are difficult at best.
    It is a common fallacy that the ancient times were constant and unchanging, they were't, even if they didn't change as rapidly as modern times.

    Anyway still toiling away at your challenge to produce an Athenian basket. .... I don't think any of Athens or Rome or Han China had a Ronco 'set it and forget it cooker' so somebody is you know tied to the kitchen, and the mill and getting water, making clothes etc...
    By Han Dynasty, Athens was part of the Roman Empire, and so the comparison should be with the Warring States China, not Han Dynasty. In any case, 4th Century BC Athens was not necessarily comparative to Greece as a whole or other parts of the ancient Mediterranean world of the time.

  10. #90
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    By Han Dynasty, Athens was part of the Roman Empire, and so the comparison should be with the Warring States China, not Han Dynasty. In any case, 4th Century BC Athens was not necessarily comparative to Greece as a whole or other parts of the ancient Mediterranean world of the time.
    Ahh see you are missing the point of trying to construct a basket or the more simple wheat equivalent wage or earnings is to allow some kind of comparison across time and space. In this case one of the lowest class of society how 'good' was their life. Or more generally given the wealth in society which one provided more of it the its lowest classes and which one simply had a 1-2% and of haves and a rather lot of have nots.

    Yes Athens was not comparable to much of greece in the extreme but in general rather it was. I think broadly the evidence would show day laborers in most of Classical greece of moderate oligarchy or conservative democracy were also significantly and unusually well off (in world standards), but in a sense that is my point. Which I will endeavor to prove. That is quite without a lot tech glitz you can show for either Rome or the Han. The lower class and even the lowest of class (slaves) lived better in Athens than in either of those two on average (forced labor compared to forced labor). That was the result overwhelmingly of social choices. I focused on the 4th century because you cannot point at some parasitic empire as the reason (although as things go Athenian imperialism was profoundly modest at it worst compared to many and generally just light indeed).
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

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    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  11. #91

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    Ahh see you are missing the point of trying to construct a basket or the more simple wheat equivalent wage or earnings is to allow some kind of comparison across time and space. In this case one of the lowest class of society how 'good' was their life. Or more generally given the wealth in society which one provided more of it the its lowest classes and which one simply had a 1-2% and of haves and a rather lot of have nots.
    Because for the most part our data is incomplete, you end up having to make estimates for a lot of items on the basket of goods, which can introduce errors. Seldom to we have a complete price list for wages and goods similar to Diocletian Edicts and even then, the prices listed might merely be what the government would like them to be, not what they actually were. All the guess work makes the results of any basket of goods analysis highly suspect, at least before modern times.

    In the case of Leeuwvan's "The standard of living in ancient societies: a comparison between the Roman Empire, the Han Empire and the Babylonian Empire", they got some of their figures wrong on their table for forr the Roman Empire basket of goods. The listed the monthly silver income as only 18 gram for an unskilled laborer in 100 AD, which seems way too low. We know that day laborers earned 1 denarius a day, and in 100 AD, a denarius was still close to 3 grams per silver, so the monthly silver income would be more than 60. Assuming 250 working days per year, that averages out to 62.5 grams or so. Not sure what the silver content of the denarius was in 200 AD. Also, Diocletian Edict gave the daily laborer wages as 25 denarii Commodus, and wheat as 100 denarii per modiuz (8 l), so 190 kg, assuming .79 of/l, works out to only 48% of the unskilled laborer's income, not 61.6% they gave. Since the denarii by that time had very little silver content, I am not sure how they derived rhe silver prices they used.

    I suspect that the error in the value of monthly income, the problem was in the source they used. Walter Scheidel "Real Wages in Early Econie: Evidence for Living Standards from 1800 BCE to 1300 CE", he listed annual income as 250 to 288, and treated it as if were drachma, which it clearly can't be. The figure is clearly meant to be 250 denarii, and Walter said the denarius was equal to 4 drachma. I think the problem arose because all the rest of the values are given in drachma, since Roman Egypt unlike rhe rest of the Roman Empire used drachma, not denarius, and either Scheidel misunderstood Allen, the source he used, or Allen made the mistake. I suspect that Leeuwen got the 18 grams by using the silver content of drachma, not the denarius. 18 x 4 = 72, which would out to 1 denarius a day for a 6 day work week. Given those kind of errors, I am not sure how accurate their calculations are for the Roman basket of goods.

    (It is possible that Roman Egypt pay was somehow much less than the rest of the empire, but it seems unlikely. Roman legionnaire pay of 225 denarii a year seems consistent with a day laborer earning 1 denarius a day working 225 to 250 days a year. It may also be possible that a day laborer earned more per day then other workers, since they did they did not work steadily, and so charged more when they did work than others.)


    Yes Athens was not comparable to much of greece in the extreme but in general rather it was. I think broadly the evidence would show day laborers in most of Classical greece of moderate oligarchy or conservative democracy were also significantly and unusually well off (in world standards), but in a sense that is my point. Which I will endeavor to prove. That is quite without a lot tech glitz you can show for either Rome or the Han. The lower class and even the lowest of class (slaves) lived better in Athens than in either of those two on average (forced labor compared to forced labor). That was the result overwhelmingly of social choices. I focused on the 4th century because you cannot point at some parasitic empire as the reason (although as things go Athenian imperialism was profoundly modest at it worst compared to many and generally just light indeed).
    My impression that people were materially better off during Roman times than Classical or Hellenistic times. I read one writer where he saying you find a lot more imperial Roman artifacta and stuff than earlier times, implying people were better off. Certainly, shipping seems to have vastly increassd during early imperial Roman times than the previous Hellenistic period based on the evidence of shipwrecks, and the harbors the Romans built. While Classical Athens was certainly wealthy for its day, I am not convinced it was necessarily wealthier than either Han China or Imperial Rome, although it was probably comparable.

  12. #92
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Because for the most part our data is incomplete, you end up having to make estimates for a lot of items on the basket of goods, which can introduce errors. Seldom to we have a complete price list for wages and goods similar to Diocletian Edicts and even then, the prices listed might merely be what the government would like them to be, not what they actually were. All the guess work makes the results of any basket of goods analysis highly suspect, at least before modern times.
    This is a given . Nobody says other wise, but the effort is worth a try for reasons. Again any historical analysis is fraught with assumptions and paste. Be it emendations of documents or trying to reconstruct an ancient battle.

    In the case of Leeuwvan's "The standard of living in ancient societies: a comparison between the Roman Empire, the Han Empire and the Babylonian Empire", they got some of their figures wrong on their table for forr the Roman Empire basket of goods. The listed the monthly silver income as only 18 gram for an unskilled laborer in 100 AD, which seems way too low. We know that day laborers earned 1 denarius a day, and in 100 AD, a denarius was still close to 3 grams per silver, so the monthly silver income would be more than 60. Assuming 250 working days per year, that averages out to 62.5 grams or so. Not sure what the silver content of the denarius was in 200 AD. Also, Diocletian Edict gave the daily laborer wages as 25 denarii Commodus, and wheat as 100 denarii per modiuz (8 l), so 190 kg, assuming .79 of/l, works out to only 48% of the unskilled laborer's income, not 61.6% they gave. Since the denarii by that time had very little silver content, I am not sure how they derived rhe silver prices they used.
    Re above. Mistakes in any one paper do not invalidate an attempt.

    My impression that people were materially better off during Roman times than Classical or Hellenistic times. I read one writer where he saying you find a lot more imperial Roman artifacta and stuff than earlier times, implying people were better off. Certainly, shipping seems to have vastly increassd during early imperial Roman times than the previous Hellenistic period based on the evidence of shipwrecks, and the harbors the Romans built. While Classical Athens was certainly wealthy for its day, I am not convinced it was necessarily wealthier than either Han China or Imperial Rome, although it was probably comparable.
    I will show my hand when ready but suffice to say stature and stable isotope analysis of presumed poor in Athens and Thebes shows they had a diet comparable to Roman elite and were defiantly living better than poor Romans or the poor Hellenistic compatriots. The absolute wealth of Rome might have been greater (or Han) but my interest is that the distribution of wealth was profoundly unequal by design in both Rome and Han compared to Classical Greece. Although even Rome was more equitable than say pre -revolutionary France (or Italy at the same time - thus the Romans never had to lower height requirements as drastically as Napoleon had to for Italian conscripts).

    Ship finds are tricky. There is no doubt that the Pax Roman allowed more larger regular commerce. But the detection of wreck is not a Med/Black sea wide systemically random sweep with equal effort or resources. Consider for example did the Athenians just become litigious in the 4th century? Aristophanes would say no since the law courts are prime stock of his 5th century comedies, but the ideal of publishing your speeches seems to be a 4th century thing rather detached from the reality of the courts or professional politicians.
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

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    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  13. #93

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    This is a given . Nobody says other wise, but the effort is worth a try for reasons. Again any historical analysis is fraught with assumptions and paste. Be it emendations of documents or trying to reconstruct an ancient battle.



    Re above. Mistakes in any one paper do not invalidate an attempt.



    I will show my hand when ready but suffice to say stature and stable isotope analysis of presumed poor in Athens and Thebes shows they had a diet comparable to Roman elite and were defiantly living better than poor Romans or the poor Hellenistic compatriots. The absolute wealth of Rome might have been greater (or Han) but my interest is that the distribution of wealth was profoundly unequal by design in both Rome and Han compared to Classical Greece. Although even Rome was more equitable than say pre -revolutionary France (or Italy at the same time - thus the Romans never had to lower height requirements as drastically as Napoleon had to for Italian conscripts).
    Given that Leeuwen under reported the income of a Roman unskilled worker in 100 AD by a factor of 4, it is possible thst even unskilled Roman workers had incomes well beyond mere subsistence levels and perhaps higher than either Han dynasty China or 4th century BC Athenns, at least for free labor. This would be consistence with the archeological evidence - Roman infrastructure works as aquaducts, roads, bridges, dams, and Civic building far surpasses 5th century Athens. Even a provincial city like Arles could boast impressive amphitheaters not much smaller than the Coliseum itself, and even a remote province like Britain had impressive and sophisticated structure like the Roman baths had in Bath, Englsnd. Things like Roman baths, aquaducts, amphitheaters benefited common people.as well as the elites.

    Note, if we use Leeuwen's value of .20 grams of silver per kg of wheat, then the wheat wage of an unskilled Roman worker around 100 AD would be around 15kg of wheat per day, similar to Greece at its peak.

    Now, Roman did have a large slave population, and their living standard was likely far lower than those of free citizens, so if you factor those people in the living standard could indeed be below that of Arhens when you average it out. I don't think Athens or Han China was as dependant on slave labor.

    Ship finds are tricky. There is no doubt that the Pax Roman allowed more larger regular commerce. But the detection of wreck is not a Med/Black sea wide systemically random sweep with equal effort or resources. Consider for example did the Athenians just become litigious in the 4th century? Aristophanes would say no since the law courts are prime stock of his 5th century comedies, but the ideal of publishing your speeches seems to be a 4th century thing rather detached from the reality of the courts or professional politicians.
    It is not just the shipwrecks, but the infrastructure that went with the shipping that indicate a rise in shipping. Artificial harbors like Caesaria, Israel indicate the scope of Roman shipping. Also, the size of the shipwrecks is another indication as well. Large shipwrecks (>100 tons) are far more common in Roman time, and no Classical or Hellenistic ship found compares in size to the larger Roman ships that have been found. Multiple.lines of evidence all indicate a sharp rise in both the scale of shipping and the size of the largest ships. And nobody is specifically searching for just Roman shipwrecks, Greek ships are just as likely to be discovered as Roman ones, and most of the places Roman ships sailed to is where Greek ships had earlier sailsed to. If more Roman wrecks have been found, it is because there were simply more to be found.
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 22, 2019 at 10:28 AM.

  14. #94
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    I don't think it's been mentioned yet, but it deserves an honorary mention: the invention of the manually-operated rotary fan for air conditioning by Ding Huan in the 1st century BC during the Western Han dynasty. This was followed up in the 8th century AD during the Tang dynasty by a hydraulic powered rotary fan for air conditioning. The similarly operated winnowing fan for separating chaff from grain was also invented during the Han period as proven by a tomb model, and later described in writing by Tang dynasty author Yan Shigu during the 7th century AD. Not to be like Needham comparing everything to Europe or anything, but we don't see a similar device in the West until the 16th century with ventilation fans used in mining shafts, as illustrated by Georgius Agricola in his 1556 De Re Metallica.

  15. #95

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by Roma_Victrix View Post
    I don't think it's been mentioned yet, but it deserves an honorary mention: the invention of the manually-operated rotary fan for air conditioning by Ding Huan in the 1st century BC during the Western Han dynasty. This was followed up in the 8th century AD during the Tang dynasty by a hydraulic powered rotary fan for air conditioning. The similarly operated winnowing fan for separating chaff from grain was also invented during the Han period as proven by a tomb model, and later described in writing by Tang dynasty author Yan Shigu during the 7th century AD. Not to be like Needham comparing everything to Europe or anything, but we don't see a similar device in the West until the 16th century with ventilation fans used in mining shafts, as illustrated by Georgius Agricola in his 1556 De Re Metallica.

    This isn't really a thread about a the great inventions rhe Chinese did, we all know they had created a lot. The point is that other people also chad 5heienshare of clever inventions too.

    It is interesting to note, that for all the Chinese inventions in agriculture, the cost of the output, which is ultimately what people care about, doesn't have seen to been any cheaper in China based on Leeuwen's Baske5 of Good's table measures in previous post. In the table for Han China 100 BC, Leeuwen gives the price for rice as 0.7 grams of silver per kg, which is much more than 5hr 0.2 to 0.22 grams of silver per 1kg of wheat given in Leeuwen's tables for 100 AD & 230 AD Roman Egypt, and less than the 0.39 grams of silver per kg in his table for 300 AD. According to Leewuna's tables, grain was much more expensive in Han China.

    Now, you might propose the price difference in grains could be explained by the Chinese having much higher wages, since prices are higher in countries with higher wages. But I have already shown that the income of Roman unskilled workers were comparable 5o that of Chinese ones. It is known that ordinary Roman workers earned 1 denarius a day, and that a denarius was 3 grams of silver. Assuming the worker worked 21 days a month, he would earn 63 grams of silger, the same as given for the Chinese unskilled worker. So grain, vital part of a workers budget, was much, much cheaper for the Roman worker.

    There could be reasons for the Chinese agricultural innovations don't seem to have translated into cheaper food prices..

    A. Despite being more efficient, the winning fan and other machinery cost money, and maybe if labor is cheap enough and available, it was simply cheaper to use the old fashion methods than the machines. Machines cost money 5o build and maintain, and sometimes using people can be cheaper.

    B. In the case of the winnowing machine, maybe it requires a full grown man 5o run, while the old fashion method of tossing the grain in the air could be done done by women and children you didn't have to pay as much. Cheaper labor could offset greater efficiency.

    C. Or perhaps transportation cost were higher, and the price one pays for food includes the cost of transports.

    D. Bottom line, a customer doesn't really care about the farmer yields and effeciencies, the consumer cares only about what they have to pay. If a farmer has to use a bunch of expensive chemicals and treatment to get twice the yield, another farmer who gets a lot lower yield might still be able to produce his crops at a similar cost. As I said, for all the Chinese innovation in agriculture, it doesn't seem reflected in lower food prices, for grain at least..


    Now Leeuwens table prices may be incorrect. I have already shown in a previous post how Leeuwen's tables under report the income for an unskilled Roman working in 100 and 230 AD by a factor of 4, and according to a number of other contemporary sources unskilled Roman workers would have been making 3 to 4 times as much as Leeuwen reported. We know from the New Testament and other sources a common unskilled worker earned 1 denarius a day, and a denarius was 3 grams of silver in weight, so according to Leeuwen's table figures an unskilled worker worked only 6 days a month, which is absurd. I am not sure where the value for wheat prices were obtained, since Leeuwen's table values were largely ultimately derived from Allen or Scheidel with regard to Roman prices, and I have not been able to get Allen's paper yet. Scheidel at one time estimated the cost of wheat at around 0.268 grams of silver per kg, which isn't too far off from the values of Leeuwen, and still muchnless than Han China. But Egypt was Rome's bread basket, and the cost of wheat there may have been particularly low.

    I don't know where in the world Leeuwen obtained a value of 0.39 grams of silver per kg wheat for Roman 300 AD...Diocletian Edict gave prices in denarii communes, and the amounts of food in modii, which sources I have read assume was 8 liters. I think that they figured out the value of denarius communes in silver, by knowing that in 300 - 301 AD, a 1200 d.c. equaled a gold aures, which was 6.5 grams of gold. 25 denarius (3 grams silver) equaled one aureus, giving a silver to told exchange rate of 11.5. So a denarius communes comes out to 0.06 grams of silver, and an unskilled worker earned 25 d.c. a day, and assuming he works 250 days a year, that works out to him earning 31.2 grams of silver a month, which is the figure on Leeuwen's table for 300 AD. Note this is half of what the unskilled Roman worker earned in the first century AD, but the time of Diocletian was a time of great economic stress and turmoil, so it seems reasonable.

    Using the prices of on Diocletian Edict of sheet being 100 d.c. per modii.(8 litre), that works out to around 0.94 grams of silver per kg of wheat, not the 0.39 grams/kg wheat Leeuwen table gives. Now 300 AD was a time of great inflation in 4ur Roman world, which likely would distort the prices. Still, the value of .94 grams is a lot closer to the ..79 grams/it wheat I calculated for Han China that Leeuwen's table 0.39 grams. I would really like see the raw source for the wheat values for 100 and 230 AD Roman Egypt came from, since I suspect the properly calculated they will give a cost similar to the Han dynasty cost. The Diocletian price list probably inflates rhd cost of wheat compared to earlier more stable times in the Roman empire.
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 23, 2019 at 03:58 PM.

  16. #96
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    This would be consistence with the archeological evidence - Roman infrastructure works as aquaducts, roads, bridges, dams, and Civic building far surpasses 5th century Athens
    Its not consistent however with bone data for stature or diet. The elite of Rome certainly lived well. But the average marcus publius lived less well than either his Hellenistic or Classical Greek compatriots, although notably better that most 17 to 19th century peasants in Europe.

    Walter Scheidel "Real Wages in Early Econie: Evidence for Living Standards from 1800 BCE to 1300 CE", he listed annual income as 250 to 288, and treated it as if were drachma, which it clearly can't be. The figure is clearly meant to be 250 denarii, and Walter said the denarius was equal to 4 drachma. I think the problem arose because all the rest of the values are given in drachma, since Roman Egypt unlike rhe rest of the Roman Empire used drachma, not denarius, and either Scheidel misunderstood Allen, the source he used, or Allen made the mistake. I suspect that Leeuwen got the 18 grams by using the silver content of drachma, not the denarius. 18 x 4 = 72, which would out to 1 denarius a day for a 6 day work week. Given those kind of errors, I am not sure how accurate their calculations are for the Roman basket of goods.
    Nothing in the Scheidel's paper suggests such a mistake of drachmas for denarius. The discussion of women's wages makes no sense otherwise. The placement in Egypt is specific that all wages and prices are in the local currency. Notably the paper was published a year after v4.0 was on the public view and Princeton/Stanford working papers and previous version were essentially years older. I would be shocked if such a basic mistake failed to noted by anyone. The reality is Scheidel is almost certainly accurate. Its not clear to me how van Leeuwen et al derived their number I assume out of Scheidel's drachma figure and at the before the devaluation to ~85% silver for the denarius. Scheidel's first period number is solid and you can't just blow it up by 4.

    Care to source your one denarius a day for Egypt circa 100 BC?
    Last edited by conon394; November 23, 2019 at 08:54 PM.
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

    'One day when I fly with my hands - up down the sky, like a bird'

    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  17. #97

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    Its not consistent however with bone data for stature or diet. The elite of Rome certainly lived well. But the average marcus publius lived less well than either his Hellenistic or Classical Greek compatriots, although notably better that most 17 to 19th century peasants in Europe.
    I would like to see the evidence that supports your claims. I grant you that the average slave was likely was likely worse off than the worker, and so if you take all the Roman slaves into account, what you say might be true, but so far I haven't seen any real data.

    Evidence from bones can be tricky, since you might have some kind of selection bias at work. Bones of rich people like kings and nobles are more likely to be preserved than the bones of an ordinary person, which can skew the results. Only the rare case like Pompeii can depend on getting an accurate cross section of the pooula4ion


    Nothing in the Scheidel's paper suggests such a mistake of drachmas for denarius. The discussion of women's wages makes no sense otherwise. The placement in Egypt is specific that all wages and prices are in the local currency. Notably the paper was published a year after v4.0 was on the public view and Princeton/Stanford working papers and previous version were essentially years older. I would be shocked if such a basic mistake failed to noted by anyone. The reality is Scheidel is almost certainly accurate. Its not clear to me how van Leeuwen et al derived their number I assume out of Scheidel's drachma figure and at the before the devaluation to ~85% silver for the denarius. Scheidel's first period number is solid and you can't just blow it up by 4.
    Note, Scheidel acknoedges he was using Allen's work, so 5he pay may have been an error in Allen's work that he just copied over. If he is talking about using early rabbinic writings, which would have dated from the 5th century at the earliest, for the pay in Roman Palestine, he must not have very good sources odf good sources to use for pay. The bottom line is that we have 1st century sources that show the pay of ordinary Roman workers being around 1 denarius per day, and since Scheidel says 1 drachma was a 1/4 of a denarius, this makes his figures for wages off by a factor of 4, unless Roman Egypt wages were only 1/4 those of other parts of 5hr Roman Empire. The pay of 1 denarius a day is solid, Scheidel firgurres are just guess work.

    Care to source your one denarius a day for Egypt circa 100 BC?
    Since Scheidel was using figure for Roman Egypt, and in 100 BC, Egypt wasn't part of the Roman Empire, why should I? What was true of 100 BC might no longer be true for 100 CE.

    Since you claim Scheidel's work is accurate, provide the actual contemporary Egyptian source that Scheidel obtained his value for annual pay. You seem to know his work, I could not find a specific course he mentioned in his paper where it gave either the daily or annual wages of an unskilled ordinary worker.

    Scheidel himself mentioned 1st century CE sources that states 4 sesterii (1 denarius), but dismissed it since it couldn't prove that it referred to ordinary workers. If he can mention specific sources for the pay of set nurrses, why in his work is there no mention of a specific contemporary source mentioning the pay of ordinary workers? He mentions that Cicero said a slave could be rented out for 3 sesterrii a day, but it doesn't seem to register that actually supports rhr idea that the pay of an unskilled worker was 3 to 4 sesterii, i.e., around 1 denarius per day, since if an unskilled daily worker could be hired for less, then no one would bother hitirng the slave. Again, this supports the fact that Scheidel's annual wage figure were off by a factor of 3 to 4, since the sesterrii was 1/4 of a denarius, the same as a drachma.

    PS - If, in the fact, the wages in Roman Egypt were much less than other parts of the Roman Empire, the data from Roman Egypt prices might not tell us much about the Basket of Goods in the rest of the empire. Prices of commodities could be equally off as wages, and the results ofntur basket of goods would tell yoinonly about Egypt, and little about the rest of the Empire.
    Last edited by Common Soldier; November 24, 2019 at 03:17 AM.

  18. #98
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quick Note for now. Made a mistake above.

    Scheidel considers 3 time periods. correctly AD ~100-160, AD 190 - 270, and a revisit of Allen's Diocletian Edit date (AD 301) work. I meant to be referring to the ~AD 100-160 data not a BC date. His work is based off Allen in the sense that he is producing baskets nothing suggests his two Roman Egyptian baskets are not unique.

    addendum:

    Using the data from Harper for large estate wages for unskilled labor up to the antonian plague ~ AD 165

    https://www.cambridge.org/core/journ...73DFFB5D5C029C

    There are there cluster of data (pg 825) averages are

    AD 109/110 3.8 ob
    AD 150s 6.02 ob

    That cannot be a mistake for a denarius.

    7 ob to a dr, 4 dr to a denarius. The larger data set of often difficult to manage combos of food and wage is consistent and suggests real wages vs nominal may have been falling in wheat equivalent terms up until the plague. In any case I can find no justification that Scheidel is mistaking drachmas for a full denarius in period one which would roughly equivalent to the Roman Egypt period one of van Leeuwens et al.
    Last edited by conon394; November 24, 2019 at 09:01 AM.
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  19. #99

    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    Quote Originally Posted by conon394 View Post
    Quick Note for now. Made a mistake above.

    Scheidel considers 3 time periods. correctly AD ~100-160, AD 190 - 270, and a revisit of Allen's Diocletian Edit date (AD 301) work. I meant to be referring to the ~AD 100-160 data not a BC date. His work is based off Allen in the sense that he is producing baskets nothing suggests his two Roman Egyptian baskets are not unique.

    addendum:

    Using the data from Harper for large estate wages for unskilled labor up to the antonian plague ~ AD 165

    https://www.cambridge.org/core/journ...73DFFB5D5C029C

    There are there cluster of data (pg 825) averages are

    AD 109/110 3.8 ob
    AD 150s 6.02 ob

    That cannot be a mistake for a denarius.


    7 ob to a dr, 4 dr to a denarius. The larger data set of often difficult to manage combos of food and wage is consistent and suggests real wages vs nominal may have been falling in wheat equivalent terms up until the plague. In any case I can find no justification that Scheidel is mistaking drachmas for a full denarius in period one which would roughly equivalent to the Roman Egypt period one of van Leeuwens et al.

    The annual wages that Scheidel gave for his Period 1 (up to 160 AD), don't match either of the wage firgues you gave for Egyptian wages covering the same time period:

    1. 3.8 ob/7 x 250 days gives only 136 Dracula's, not the the 250 drachma annual wages Scheidel gave

    2. 6.02 ob/7 x 250 days still only gives 215 drachmas

    3. For .people working on a farming estate, food is likely to be included in pay. I thinkk you were saying assigning a value to this food that is provided is difficult. If Scheidel is doing this to get his 250 to 288 drachma figure, then he must be making some assumptions and estimates that could be wrong, and his figure could widely be widely off. Greater emphasis should be placed on records that specifically state what the pay of unskilled workers were than on the "estimates" and guesses Scheidel used, a 60% rise, which does not seem very stable.5o me

    4. The evidence you provided seem 5o show a sharp rise in income before the Antonine Plagu3le, not a decline as you said. 150's AD is before the Antonine Plague, yet that period say a sharp rise in wages per your firgues.

    5. Your figures indicate that pay was not as stable as Scheidel assumed. 150's CE wa.still part of the first period of price and save stability that Scheidel assumed, yet pay arose from 3.8 to 6.02, a rise of almost 60%.

  20. #100
    z3n's Avatar State of Mind
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    Default Re: Was China really that far ahead of everyone else in the past?

    The steppe people brought metallurgy to China, and by extension were responsible to a part for the development of cast iron as they kick started the metallurgy discovery process.

    Archaeologists worldwide have shown much interest in the origins of metallurgy in China (e.g. Mei 2005; Hanks et al. 2007; Parzinger 2011; Fan et al. 2012). Around 2200–1700 BC, the Seima-Turbino Culture originated in the Altai Mountains of Central Asia and spread across the Eurasian steppes (Chernykh 2004, 2008). The most iconic artefact of this culture is the socketed spearhead with single side hook; these have been found across the Eurasian steppes (Figure 1: 1–2). Two new observations of these spearheads suggest that Seima-Turbino metal-casting technology was responsible for the development of metallurgy in China....


    To develop the theory on the origin of Chinese metallurgy further, two observations have been made. First, a chronological observation suggests that the early spearheads have a narrower head in the shape of a willow leaf with a hook and triple-line decorations (Figure 1: 2–3), whereas the later spearheads have a wider willow-leaf-shaped head but retain the triple-line decoration (Figure 1: 1). The former type is similar to south Siberian Okunevo culture spearheads (c. 2400–1800 BC), while examples of the latter type are from the Rostovka Cemetery near Omsk (Figure 1: 1) (Chernykh 1992; Svyatko et al. 2009).


    Spearheads of the latter type have also been discovered in China (Figure 1: 4). These Chinese imitations are, however, in the shape of a broad leaf, without the triple-line decoration. The metal spearhead from Chaoyang has a narrower head in the shape of a willow leaf but lacks a hook (Figure 1: 6). This is the same form as the Rostovka Cemetery spearheads, and similar to the Seima-Turbino spearhead housed in the Shanxi Crafts Museum. Examination of the Chaoyang spearhead indicates that it was made of a Cu-Sn alloy.


    The Niuheliang site, which yielded evidence for Chinese bronze casting, is very valuable to the study of the origins of Chinese metallurgy (Li et al. 1999). Although this site was initially dated to the Hongshan Culture (c. 4500–3000 BC) (Liu & Chen 2012), radiocarbon analysis has placed it at 3300±300 to 3494±340 cal BC, roughly correlating in date to the Lower Xiajiadian levels at the site (An 2003; Gu 2015).


    These new observations suggest that the distribution of metal spearheads from the Seima-Turbino Culture to northern China represents the diffusion and spread of the metallurgical technique. From the metallurgical perspective in particular, the bronze casting of spearheads indicates the origin of piece-mould casting and core-casting technology, which influenced the bronze vessel casting method in China. We therefore suggest that the early Chinese metallurgy of the Lower Xiajiadian Culture in the western Liao River area can be linked to the Seima-Turbino Culture; this technique had spread from the Altai Mountain area to northern China via the Taosi Culture. After spreading to the Lower Xiajiadian Culture, it finally arrived at the Qijia Culture of Qinghai and Gansu provinces in the west (Figure 3).


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