At the same period it is clear that trade was carried <m between Babylon and the Syrian cities (see Hub- bard, Commerce </ Ane, Bab, in the Biblical Btpoe, July, 1837), and also that gold and silver ornaments ▼ere common among the S3man and Arabian races ; a trade which was obviously carried on by land-carriage (Num. xxxi, 60; Josh, vii, 21; Judg. v, 80; viii, 24; Job vi, 19). See Babylon.
Sidon, which afterwards became so celebrated for the wonderful mercantile exertions of its inhabitants, ▼as founded about 2200 years before the Christian era. The neighboring mountains, being covered with excel- lent cedar-trees, ftimished the best and most durable timber for ship-building. The inhabitants of Sidon *cooidin{^ built numerous ships, and exported the
produce of the adjoining country, and the various ar- ticles of their own manufacture, such as fine linen, embroidery, tapestry, metals, glass, both colored and figured, cut, or carved, and even mirrors. They were unrivalled by the inhabitants of the Mediterranean coasts in works of taste, elegance, and luxury. Thehr great and universally acknowledged pre-eminence in the arts procured for the Phcsnlcians, whose prbcipal seaport was Sidon, the honor of behig esteemed, among the Greeks and other nations, as the inventors of com- merce, ship-buUding, navigation, the application of as- tronomy to nautical purposes, and particularly as the discoverers of several stars nearer to the north pole than any that were known to other nations ; of naval war, writing, arithmetic, book-keeping, measures and weights-^ which, it is probable, they might have added money. See Sidok.
The earliest accounts of bargain and sale reach no higher than the time of Abraham, and his transaction with Ephron. He is said to have weighed unto him ** 400 shekels of silver, current laoney with the mer- chant'* (Gen. xxiii, 16). The word merchant implies that the standard of money was fixed by usage among merchants, who comprised a numerous and respectable class of the community. Manufactures were by this time so Car advanced that not only those more immedi- ately connected with agriculture, such as flour ground ttom com, wine, oil, butter, and also the most neces- sary articles of clothing and furniture, but even those of luxury and magnificence, were much in use, as ap- pears by the ear-rings, bracelets of gold and of silver, and other precious things presented by Abraham's steward to Bebecca (Gen. xxiv, 22, 58.) See Bab-
OAIN.
In the book of Job, whose author, hi the opinion of the most learned commentators, resided in Arabia, and was nearly contemporary with Abraham, much light is thrown upon the commerce, manufactures, and science of the age and country in which he lived. There is mention of gold, iron, brass, lead, crystal, jewels, the art of weaving, merchants, gold brought ftom Ophir, which implies commerce with a remote coui^ry, and topazes from Ethiopia; ship-building, so far improved that sonM ships were distinguished for the velocity of their motion ; writing in a book, and engraving letters or writing on plates of lead and on stone with iron pens, and also seal-engraving ; fishing with hooks, and nets, and spears; musical instru- ments, the harp and organ; astronomy, and names given to particular stars. These notices tend to prove that, although the patriarchal system of making pas- turage the chief object of attention was still main- tained by many of the greatest inhabitants where the author of the book of Job resided, the sciences were actively cultivated, the useful and ornamental arts in an advanced state, and commerce prosecuted with dil- igence and success ; and this at a period when, if the chronology of Job is correctly settled, the arts and sciences were scareely so far advanced in Eg3rpt, from whence, and from the other countries bordering upon the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea, they after- wards gradually found their way into Greece. See Job.
The inhabitants of Arabia appear to have availed themselves at a very early period of their advanta^ geous situation between the two fertile and opulent countries of India and Egypt, and to have obtained the exclusive monopoly of a very profitable carrying trade between those countries. They were a class of people who gave their whole attention to merehandise as a regular and established profession, and travelled with caravans between Arabia and Egypt, carrying upon the backs of camels the spiceries of India, the balm of Canaan, and the myrrh produced in their own country, or of a superior quality frt>m the opposite coast of Abyssinia — all of which were in great demand among the Egyptians for embalming the dead, in theii*
COMMERCE
436
COMMERCE
religicms ceremonies, and for ministerfaig to the pleu- ores of that superstitioos and loxarioas people. The merchants of one of these caravans bought Joseph from his brothers for twenty pieces of silver, and carried him into Egypt. The southern Arabs were eminent traders, and enjoyed a large proportion, and in general the entire monopoly, of the trade between India and the western world from the earliest ages, until the sys- tem of that important commerce was totally over- turned when the inhabitants of Europe discovered a du*ect route to India by the Cape of Good Hope. See Arabia.
At the period when Joseph's brethren visited Eg3rpt, inns were established for the accommodation of trav- ellers in that country and in the northern parts of Arabia. The more civilized southern parts of the pe- ninsula would no doubt be ftimished with caravan- serais still more commodious. See Caravahsbrai.