CliAP. VI. PRICES TN GREECE. 



the private soldiers in the later times, they 

 might be deemed entitled to less comparative 

 remuneration, and did not receive an augmenta- 

 tion in their pay correspondent to the decrease of 

 value which the metallic money had suffered. 



There is another circumstance which, though 

 not conclusive, seems to show the diminished 

 value of money in Greece. That sum which 

 was deemed a sufficiency for the support of a 

 family continued to be rated higher in the course 

 of years, in a manner somewhat similar to the 

 increase in the price of corn. At an early pe- 

 riod, about .550 years before Christ, the possessor 

 of a talent was considered in moderate circum- 

 stances, and was enabled to live on the income de- 

 rived from it by interest at the rate of twelve per 

 cent, per annum. ^Eschines, a celebrated orator, 

 who lived about two hundred years later, had 

 inherited a property of five talents, to which 

 he added two, accumulated by his professional 

 labours, and was deemed a man in easy circum- 

 stances. Demosthenes, who died about sixty 

 years after, when the Thracian mines had been 

 extended, died possessed of fourteen talents, 

 besides his female slaves, and is remarked as 

 moderately affluent. Conon, another Athenian, 

 noted in the year 240 before Christ, left behind 

 him forty talents, which is not spoken of as any 

 thing remarkable 1 . 



1 See Bceckh, vol. ii. p. 235. 

 VOL. I. M 



161 



