Ancient Greek Agriculture
Thessaly was one early area to contain stock-raising, as well
as horse raising. Horses played a significant role in the military.
In the rest of Greece the soil was devoted to agriculture.
The most widely seen crops were olives, vines, and fig trees.
In some of the plains wheat was grown. Usually not enough wheat
was grown to feed neighboring urban areas. Timber was needed, but
good timber was rarely seen. Even today, only about 9% of the Greece
contains forest. Boetia and Thessaly, which were two main agricultural
areas, were densely populated.
There were pirates in ancient Greece. They ravaged the Aegean coasts,
and often carried off corn or cattle. Soon colonies began to migrate and
expand. Societies based on agriculture had to adapt to different climates.
Land was often handed down from generation to generation. This caused
the value of land to go up, which caused the farmers to make better use
of it. Farms formerly used for stock-raising, acorn-growing, or forestry
were now used to grow wheat, barley, olives, and vineyards. Poems from
this time also mentioned use of fertilizers, rotation of crops, and
irrigation. A primitive plow also may have been used, because soils
were not fertile. Pretty soon agriculture alone didn't provide a means
of existence. City-States were being created, and it became common for
farm-laborers to go to town to trade milk or grain for tools of anything
else they needed. Long distance trade was also becoming common. Sicilian
colonies exported wheat and timber, Cyrene exported spices and wool, Aegean
colonies exported oil, figs, and wine, and the Greeks exported grains and
salted fish.
Sailing was becoming popular, and soon a fishing fleet was created. Old
poems talk about harpooning and net-fishing. Fish was becoming a popular
Greek food, and fishing towns became rich.
There was a agricultural classification system in Athens. The top category
contained anyone who harvested five hundred bushels of wheat. The second
category was those who could afford a horse, the third was those who owned
a pair of bulls, and below them were a class of people called the thetes, or wage earners.
Agricultural, Pre-Hellenic people created the Gods of the field and Gods of
the underworld.
Peisistratus, who was a leader in Athens around 550 B.C., used two agriculturally based plans
to prevent revolutions. One was a credit-bank to lend farmers money
to buy new equipment, or the bank could hold their money. The second was a sort
of traveling judge, who saved farmers from having to make long journeys to town
to get justice.