Sense and Nonsense in the Statistical Approach of Babylonian Prices

Abstract

Introduction Economic history of the ancient world is usually impaired by the lack of numerical data which allow statistical approach. It is therefore a great excitement for the historian of the Hellenistic period to find a fairly detailed recording of prices of food and wool over a period of more than four centuries in the so-called astronomical diaries from Babylon. The astronomical diaries give us a unique view of the development of prices over a very long period of ca. 464 61 B.C. in a degree of detail which is exceptional for ancient history. The diaries are monthly reports, copied on clay tablets in the Babylonian cuneiform script, of the movement of the planets in the starry sky. For historical research it is of the utmost importance that the astronomers to an increasing extent noted down observations of other kinds at the end of the monthly reports. They registered the purchasing power of the shekel (ca. 8.33 grammes of silver, roughly two drachms) in relation to five basic foodstuffs: barley, dates, mustard (cascuta?), cress (cardamom?) and sesame (all in litres), and wool (in