Society and Economy
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• Decurions long list of tasks, some of which involved them dipping into their pockets – run away, church teacher no heir, so rich into senate exempted from duty.  Midle 6^th century – councils practically extinct
• Bishops took over administration of everything, choosen from landed gentry – not necessarily religious.
• Department of social welfare - but large income from heiress and state subsidy.  However upkeep of churches by no means cheap.
• Church building beyond capacity, ceased in 6^th century
• Church an important social function, redistributes income from rich benefactors (threatened with hell or paradise) to poor – but large amounts go on clergy and buildings.
• Solidus – relatively stable until 11^th century, obviously fluctuated at time of shortage and crisis.
• 1.  Huge income inequalities / Working in government leads to huge riches / unskilled and skilled workers poorly remunerated – labourer or mason surviving on or below starvation line
• 1000 soldi a year in middle government – patronage and geographical ties very important
• Little money to be made from trading: - weak purchasing power of public, self-sufficiency of most districts, risks of long-distance travel.  Also state not that a big spender – nationalized – corn, flax, wool etc, levied in kind
• Slaves on land not great, mainly in cities – large estates yes, but fragmentation of land and landowners owned large number of smaller plots.
• Colonus slave to the land – used by government for taxation – a third of yield taxed, plus rents.  Highly regressive taxation – desertion to enemies high
• Planned economy – from last decade 3^rd century – how else could find so much money for army – thus more and more officialdom, more and more tax – we see land out of cultivation.  Repressive measure from colonus to decurion.
• Rigidity tempered by evasion in social structure –
• Under Heraclius provincial reform (themes) – whole inner state became a frontier zone with a standing army, saved it from Arabs with this radical reform
• Large landholding into much smaller plots in this period
• Historians have been looking for an agrarian revolution – but it was urban life that collapsed and conditions in the countryside deteriorated.  Simply empire was ruralised – lack of big urban population to feed, infusion of fresh manpower into the countryside, plenty and cheapness of foodstuffs.  Same time cost of barbarian mercenaries decline as not used, complex constraints Byzantines Empire ceased.  If peasants regain a bit of freedom, probably due to plenty of them.
• Church fortunes decline with that of urban life – donations into independent monasteries, dreary life away from Constantinople – less rich than they once were.
• Troubles of 7^th and 8^th centuries appear to have pretty much obliterated the leading families of the previous period – new ones that come in last longer

Other Notes in this Category

1. A Continuous History
2. Education
3. Ruling the late Roman and Byzantine City
4. Society and Economy
5. The Disappearance and revival of cities
6. The Rise and Fall of the Curiales
7. The Wealth of the Late Roman Cities in the Near East

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