"The Old Testament states that in 600 BC, during the rein of King Nebuchadnezzar’s, a loaf of bread was worth 350 loafs of bread to one ounce of gold. Bread loaf just under one kilo size, not our reduced size loaf of today. This historical record is the price of bread compared to gold price which give s historical precedence to using this method in calculating gold versus bread loaf prices. Over the last 100 years it has varied from 300 to 388 loafs per ounce of gold so has been good parameter for historical records." from: https://www.coins-auctioned.com/learn/news/history-of-gold-ounce-price-comparison-to-a-loaf-of-bread Is that true that 300-388 loafs are worth 1 ounce of gold in average in the last 100 years (and during Nebuchadnezzar II's reign?) Because if these numbers are correct then I think we (perhaps) could figure out the buying power of a 40 Nummis or an Anonymous Follis. 1 ounce gold is 31,1 gram. During the reign of Justinian you need about 200 follis in order to buy a Solidus (4,5 gram gold). 7 times Solidus give you 31,5 gram gold. 1400 follis give you 31,5 gram gold (or 7 solidus) 1400 follis give you 350 loafs. With other words: 4 follis give you 1 loaf. Around year 1000 CE you need 288 Anonymous Follis to buy a Histamenon(4,5 gram gold coin). You need 2016 Anonymous Follis to buy 31,5 gram gold. For 31,5 gram gold you can buy 350 loafs. With other words: For 5,76 Anonymous Follis you can buy a loaf. The above examples are 100% amateurish guess based entirely on the fact that 350 loafs really are worth 1 ounce of gold. So, I want to ask: is it true that 300-388 loafs are worth 1 ounce of gold in average the last 100 years (and during Nebuchadnezzar II's reign?)
I'm not sure. What I really wonder about is the purchasing power of late roman bronze coins, some so tiny that you would need a bag of them seemingly to buy a loaf of bread. In Egypt these days you can buy 5 loaves of flatbread for 25 piastres, less than 1 cent per loaf.
Obviously the price will soar during hard times. - When Assad besieged Aleppo the food price in the besieged citadel was 40-80 times higher if my mind serves me right. "in Egypt these days you can buy 5 loaves of flatbread for 25 piastres, less than 1 cent per loaf." Respond: The arabic loaf of flatbread is almost nothing in gram I think. - Egypt is famous for bread-producing giving its corn-market and Nile River. Also the goverment do provide help to keep the price of bread down. Look here: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/08/egypt-protests-we-want-bread-subsidy-cut The source I provided is talking about bread of "just under one kilosize, not our reduced size loaf of today". - That is a bread which has somehow the size of a watermelon.
Thanks for this, @Herberto ! I'd like to quote (informally) some of your information in my Bible Study class sometime.
Hmm. The kind of bread I buy runs about $3.50 per kilogram, I think (if I buy on sale). So, yeah, an ounce of gold would buy about 340 loaves, if they came in that size. Seven years ago, though, it would've bought 500 or more -- and seven years before that, less than 200. Should've swapped gold for bread in 2011, I guess. It'd be stale by now, though.
During the reign of Manuel ( 1143-1180 AD) a letter was written from a student to a teacher mentioning the buying power of a regional tetarteron as one small loaf of bread, so Hendy figured it was 864 regional tetartera to the Hyperpyron. So 864 small loafs. Another letter around the same time spoke about a metropolitan billion tetarteron ( All of the tetartera minted in Constantinople were billion) as being able to purchase 10 mackerel.With a trade of 288 to the Hyperpyron that's 2,880 mackerel. The believed trade rate of the anonymous follis was equal to the billion tetarteron , they coins only coexisted during a short time while the coin reform was being placed. 1092. However the believed exchange between the regional and the metropolitan was thought to be 3. If true the Anonymous follis or Billion tetarteron could purchase 3 small loafs of bread. The letter does not mention the size of than being small loaf.
that's interesting...i can remember in the early '70's working at a IGA store and i put the bread up most everyday and the price of an IGA loaf then was 10 cents. minimum wage then was $1.60, so one could buy 16 loaves (w/o tax) i always compare todays bread prices/min.wage with those then and think wow... inflation...
The literary world is littered with references to prices and from many different time frames. Unfortunately a good portion of them may be inaccurate or tainted by translation. We can often get very small snapshots in time, specific to region, culture, local inflation (or not). It doesnt do much for the bigger picture unfortunately.
Does the Old Testament really state that, though? I'm not a Biblical Scholar, but I do not recognize the claim. Also not sure where he got a Babylonian or Hebrew unit to convert to an ounce or troy ounce. The rest of the post is interesting, though.
Your right Ken but it is not the translations that are the problem, it the fragmented information. My post above was based on Michael Hendy's work from the Dumbarton Oakes catalog ( For proposed coin values) and an article from Pagona Papadapoulou faculty from the Aristotle university of Thessaloniki( for the information on the translated letters for the purchasing power of the tetarteron). From that I worked out the value of the bread to the Hyperpyron. As you said many factors are left out such as did the price fluctuate due to crops?Quantity discounts? The price for the bread was in Thessaloniki,versus the price in Constantinople. Too many of the little details are left out to be accurate. I think it would be very difficult for someone 900 plus years in the future to figure out how our small change worked, like the Eastern Roman empire most important documents that would be translated would be regarding large transactions not so much the small ones. I have been reading a book that has mentioned land prices and tax rates in the 11th century, that info is much easier to come by but it is all in gold coin.
Hello again. I just found this in Cyril Mango's "Byzantium" on page 40: And the footnotes or endnotes: That book gives a bread a 3 folles as value at time of "shortage"
It is true that there are large leavened loaves for sale at a price of 1 pound (100 piastres) but these are infrequently seen, and not common in Upper Egypt. The average everyday Egyptian walks over to the local bakery in the morning and purchases 5 loaves of pita or flatbread for 25 piastres. The bakers take them directly from the oven and throw them in front of you on the counter, so you need a bag or you will burn your hands. I traveled around Egypt for four months a few years back and relied on a diet of flatbread, hummus, fuul (mashed fava beans), falafel, koshari, and occasional fried fish or roast chicken. The food never set me back much as it was very inexpensive. I procured lodging at local hotels (not expensive tourist hotels charging the equivalent of $200 per night) so I typically spent about 30 pounds per evening (the equivalent at the time of $6). I managed to get around the country by rail (stops in most small towns in the Nile Valley), donkey, camel, bus (to Mt. Sinai from Cairo) and from Alexandria to Siwa Oasis, and service taxi on occasion. I ended up with more money when I finished the trip then when I started out, so if you are a frugal traveler it is kind of a paradise especially considering all of the living history of Pharaonic times, Ptolemaic times, the Roman and Byzantine era, and of course Islamic times) you can witness in the towns, temples, churches, mosques, fortresses and other locales. By the time I left my Arabic had improved greatly... Anyway, a side story to this excellent thread...
