bitmap@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (03/19/84)
Larry Kolodney had an article which talked about private property
(land, in particular) under the economic system known as
"manorialism", which was the economic analogue of the political
system known as "feudalism". To be sure, manorialism was not a
free market system, and (as I understand it), Larry is correct in
his description of it. However, economic systems may come and go
during various times in history. Here are some selections from
"Western Civilization" by Langer, et al. (without permission)
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Writing was invented to avoid confusion of ownership: the
earliest pictographs are on sealings which identified property.
...
Land ownership, especially where irrigation is involved, as in
the land of the Twin Rivers [Tigris & Euphrates], is bound to
entail litigation; hence the early codification of the law. As
we have seen, Hammurabi's code, though not the first, is the most
complete extant synthesis of early Mesopotamian law, the best
document of its time (late eighteenth century B.C.) and place,
and therefore worthy of analysis...
...Estates were divided among male heirs...Women could engage in
litigation, conduct business, and own property.
The law of property recognized deeds of sale and purchase,
hire and lease, partnerships, and loans at interest. Judges were
available to those litigants who could not settle of of court...
...
During the course of the third millenium [B.C.], the temples
lost control of certain monopolies, and private property
increased; the economy became capitalistic. Sales were recorded
on tablets, letters of credit were in use, and businesses in
Mesopotamia had foreign branches in Syria and Anatolia...
...
[in another section, talking about Sumer & Akkad, pre 2000 B.C.]
Weavers worked in factories, and tablets record their wages,
sick leave, and the piecework done by each; other tablets record
inventories and receipts issued in finished cloth.
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These are the earliest cases of private property that I found
(indeed, these are some of the earliest civilizations), and,
although I'd thought that the narrow definition of private
property, "land", didn't develop as a concept until later, it
developed 4000 to 5000 (or before) years ago, as well as the more
usual definition of private property as "private possessions".
I didn't hunt for examples in later civilizations, as this seemed
to be enough to answer the questions that were raised.
So, to the original article of about a month ago, where someone
claimed that "private property" was a relatively new concept, I say
'Apparently not'.
"Western Civilization" also remarks, in its study of the
Egyptian civilization,
"Some observers have seen the Egyptian economy in the Twelfth
Dynasty as startingly like Marxism; it exhibited nationalization,
liquidation of the landed nobility, collective farms, state
monopoly and control of production, of guilds, and of foreign
trade; a monolithic society in which the individual existed for the
state." [ 12th Dynasty was from c. 2050 - 1786 B.C.]
Sam Hall, UCB