Models, Methods, and Morality

Sarah C. Murray is Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Toronto. She holds a PhD in Classics from Stanford University and  has published widely in ancient economic history and archaeology.Seth Bernard is Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Toronto. He holds a PhD in Ancient History from the University of Pennsylvania and has published extensively on the Ancient Roman economy and economic history of the ancient world.

• 1. Introduction: Models, Methods, and Morality in the Study of Ancient Mediterranean Economies.- Part I Methods and Historiography.- 2. For Those Who Curse the Candle: A Culturally and Historically Relativistic Proposal for Rethinking the Approach to the Ancient Economy (via Archaic Rome).- 3. Can Ancient History still Engage the Social Sciences?.- 4. The Creation of Wealth and Inequality in the Graeco-Roman World: Tactics from Law and Racial Capitalism.- Part II Measurement and Morality.- 5. The Economics of Immorality: The U.S. Antebellum South, Stalinist Russia and the Roman Empire.- 6. Before the economy? Growth, institutions, and the Late Bronze Age.- 7. Standardization as Economic Institution.- 8. Towards An Ethics of Quantification : Relationality, “Common Sense”, and Incommensurability.- Part III Paths Forward.- 9. Science, Morality, and the Roman Economy.- 10. The Other Side of the Ledger: Calculating the Costs and Benefits of Energy Capture.- 11. These Old Bones: An Osteobiography of an Archaic Cemetery at Agia Paraskevi, Thessaloniki.- 12. The ‘Health Problem’ in Roman Economic History: A Prolegomenon.- 13. Why a Human Ancient Economy Should Be Posthuman.- Part IV Responses.- 14. The Perils — and Rewards — of Constantly Re-inventing the Wheel.- 15. Cursing the Candle: Models, Methods, and Morality.- 16. Towards an Historically Informed Understanding of Institutions and Economies.- 17. Epilogue: The Potentials of a New Ancient Economic History.