A. D. 214. 201 



their country, and to make peace with him. Such tributes foon ex- 

 haufted his ill-managed treafury ; and he was driven to the tyrannical 

 (hift of creating a fiditious kind of money, made of gilded copper and 

 lead plated with filver, which, as he could not pay his allies in fuch 

 coin, he compelled his unhappy fubjeds to receive and circulate among 

 themfelves. [Dion. Cajf. L, Ixxvii.] 



216 — The fanguinary monfler, to whofe frantic and arbitrary com- 

 mands the many millioTis of people compofing the Roman empire tame- 

 ly fubmitted the difpofal of their lives and fortunes, thought proper to 

 amufe himfelf with the fpecflacle of a general maflacre of the citizens 

 and flrangers in Alexandria, whereby he very nearly depopulated that 

 , hitherto flourifliing city, almofl the only feat of commerce within the 

 grafp of their power, which had been preferved from dellrudion by the 

 Romans. 



The ruin of almoil every commercial ftate, which fell under the do- 

 minion of Rome, neceffarily reduces the materials for commercial hif- 

 tory in thefe ages to a very narrow compafs, and in a manner obliges 

 me, in order to preferve fome degree of chronological connexion, to 

 deviate a little into the general hiftory of our own ifland, deftined to 

 make fo important a figure in the commercial hiftory of fucceeding 

 ages. 



230 — The emperor Alexander Severus made fome regulations in the 

 cuftoms, which, being flill extant, (hew that the Oriental trade was then 

 nearly in the fame flate as it is delcribed by the author of the Periplus 

 of the Erythraean fea. In order to induce merchants to refort to Rome, 

 he favoured them with feveral immunities. He reduced the rate of in- 

 tereft to four per cent (' ad trientes penfiones'). And he encouraged li- 

 terature and learned men. 



272 — The commercial republic of Palmyra, after maintaining its in- 

 dependence for ages, had been Iwallowed up in the vaftnefs of the Ro- 

 man empire. The merchants of Palmyra being found ufeful as com- 

 petitors with thofe of Alexandria for conveying the rich merchandize 

 of the eail to Rome, their commerce was not crufhed, but appears even 

 to have increafed during their fubjedion to Rome. In the confufions, 

 •which now announced the approaching downfall of the Roman empire, 

 the citizens of Palmyra, under the iovereignty of Odenathus and his 

 heroic widow Zenobia, afpired to conquelt and dominion, and acTiuaily 

 formed a new empire confifting of moll of the Aliatic provinces and 

 Egypt, all which they had rent from tue dominions of Rome. But 

 merchants never profper as conquerors ; nor do the imaginary advan- 

 tages of victory by any means compeul'ate the real calamities of even a 

 luccefsful war, which at the expenl'e of the blood and treafure of the 

 community only elevates individuals to a lupremacy over their fellow 



Vol. I. ' Co 



