Institutionalization and Market Integration in the Archaic Greek Economy: Modelling Overseas Trade from the Distribution Pattern of Samian Transport Amphoras

Abstract

This article advances the view that there was widespread institutionalization in the early Greek economy from the end of the eighth century bce. Challenging the widespread assumption that Mediterranean market integration crystallized much later and only by the end of the ‘archaic period’, agent-based modelling is used here alongside the archaeological distribution of Samian transport amphoras to demonstrate the coordination that must have existed between trade partners in shipping olive oil from one end of the Mediterranean to the other. ‘Brownian flow’ models of randomized drift fail to properly reproduce the amphora pattern, while a model based on a network of trade hubs stretching from the Black Sea to the shores of modern-day Spain provides a much more robust solution. These results shed light on the navigation of various environmental niches, on the lived experience of the sailors distributing products such as Samian olive oil, and most importantly suggest that the early Greek economy was more organized— and earlier, too —than we have previously suspected.