Altaweel, Mark; Squitieri, Andrea; (2025) Population Movement, Labour and Wages in the Age of Universal Empires in the Near East. In: Fabian, Lara and Leese-Messing, Kathrin and Weaverdyck, Eli and Morris, Lauren and Dwivedi, Mamta, (eds.) Economies of the Edge Frontier Zone: Processes at Regional, Imperial, and Global Scales (300 BCE–300 CE). (pp. 205-231). Heidelberg University Publishing: Heidelberg, Germany.

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Abstract

Archaeological evidence on increased mobility at the time of large empires of the Near East (c. 800 BCE-651 CE) is combined with historical texts on wages to present a new analysis that argues that increased population mobility helped to create a general trend of declining wages as well as greater wage convergence in Egypt and Mesopotamia during the late 1st millennium BCE and beginning of the 1st millennium CE. Wages between 450 BCE-550 CE averaged about 3.86 wheat litres/day for unskilled labourers, while averages between 2300-505 BCE were 8.42 wheat litres/day for similar work. As unskilled labour became more mobile, increasingly similar wages became evident in some economic sectors in regions such as Egypt and Mesopotamia. We present empirical data to support our conclusions and demonstrate how different datasets indicate a similar pattern in relation to wages and mobility. Changes to wages also likely reflect economic shifts towards more extensive and intensive specialised agriculture, including production used for trade, that became increasingly possible as population mobility increased during the period of large empires and states. Results suggest wage patterns witnessed today may also have an earlier precedent.

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