Clarification requested [Was Re: Imperialism etc.]

From: Torsten
Message: 67660
Date: 2011-05-31

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Torsten" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "gknysh" <gknysh@> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Torsten" <tgpedersen@> wrote:
> >
> > > I find the 'speculations' of Crawford and Lockyear pretty solid.
> >
> > ****GK: Have I missed something? (entirely possible). I read
> > through the Lockyear thesis you kindly provided to us for
> > consultation in pdf form. As I remember it, he contradicts
> > Crawford on a number of crucial points. He (Lockyear) does not
> > believe that there was some substantial increase in slave trade on
> > the Danube in the years associated with unusually high influx of
> > Roman denarii into Dacia, and he castigates Crawford for not
> > noticing how many of these denarii (and esp.later since hoarding
> > was a continuous process) were "local imitations" (which means
> > they would hardly have been used by Romans to buy things from the
> > Dacians).
>
> Against which I'd argue that slave trade was private, not public
> business, and propose that those who bought the slaves, likely
> financed by Sulla's taxes on the Asian cities, ran out of Roman
> money so they minted coins themselves.

Or, alternatively (since dies for striking coin have been fond within Dacia), the slave traders were dealing in general with a local 'wholesaler'/warlord/capo, paying him either in Roman coin, or, when that ran out, with silver, from which he then struck coin himself for distribution among his 'retailers'/retainers; one day Decineus came to Burebista and became his consigliere, and then Burebista defeated all the others, but never got around to striking his own coin; why would he bother with the extra work of re-striking the coins he already had?


Torsten