Exchange

The imports into Athens include luxury products or the raw materials needed for their manufacture, such as ivory and gold. But these goods, intended for a relatively small elite, constituted a very minor part of the total import basket. The main bulk of imports consisted of essential products: wood, metals, and ores (which also had military-strategic importance), slaves, and above all, foodstuffs. Athens was not capable of feeding its own population. How much food had to be imported, we do not know: there are too many unknown factors involved, as we do not know the exact extent of the arable land, how it was farmed, the yields per hectare, and the size of the population. But we can make some rough calculations, and these indicate that food imports must have been quite substantial.

For the 5th century BC (before the Peloponnesian War), the number of citizens has been estimated as 50,000 at the most, and for the 4th century as 30,000. We should multiply

This by about 3.5 to include women and children. We have no idea how many slaves and free non-citizens lived in Athens. Estimates put the total population in the 5th century at 350,000 at the most for the whole of Attica, and in the 4th century at 200,000. It is certain that even with 200,000 residents, Athens was the most populous polis of the Greek world. The arable land in Athens, even if it was wholly under grain—which it was not—could not have supported a population of that size. Thus, structural imports of foods from elsewhere were an absolute necessity. This was a unique situation: other poleis imported food at some stage of their existence, but no polis was as dependent on the outside world as was Athens during its heydays.

What exports could balance these imports from regions with an agricultural surplus production, such as the south of Russia? We often hear olives and wine being mentioned, but quite a large part of the total production—about which again we have no precise information—must have been consumed locally. And even if there was a large exportable surplus, where would it be exported to? Almost all poleis had olive groves and vineyards of their own. Athens will, however, have exported manufactured products, above all the still-famed Attic ceramics, and raw materials, especially marble and other building stone. But these are all fairly small sectors of the economy. The main export of Athens must have been silver: profits from the empire, in the form of tribute and of harbor duties, and above all income from the silver mines at Laurion in the south of Attica.