The Popular Morality of Ancient Greek Commerce

The concept of moral economy is both absent and present in the study of the economic history of Greco-Roman antiquity. While little use has been made of the catchphrase itself, the economic effects of ethics have long been among the most-debated topics in the field. So far, however, opposing sides in the debate about embeddedness shared a common understanding of ethics as either absent or inhibiting business. This chapter suggests a different understanding of the role of moral norms in profit-oriented economic activity. It sets out to systematically trace the religious roots of the popular morality of ancient Greek commerce. While Greek ritual focused on individual welfare, it was nonetheless guided by beliefs in divinely ordained justice. The reciprocal obligations towards the gods encompassed a collective obligation to enforce justice among humans as a realization of divinely ordained custom. This religious foundation of the moral economy of the Greek marketplace saw gradual changes, but no general decline from the archaic down to the hellenistic period.