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Ancient Finances

Exploring finances in times of the Viking Age, Roman Empire, and Alexander the Great.

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Tag: comparing wages/prices across time

Other eras

Military pay rates during World War Two compared to 2019

Posted on December 18, 2019December 18, 2019

What were the pay rates during World War Two in contrast to pay rates in the U.S. military today? What is the ratio of today’s pay compared to WWII? The Navy CyberSpace website provides 2019 U.S. Military Basic Pay Charts. That same web site also helpfully provides 1942-1946 U.S. Military Pay Charts. Both pay scales […]

comparison data

Pay rate for privates in each of America’s wars

Posted on December 16, 2019December 16, 2019

Pay for American soldiers during each major war is provided by We Are the Mighty. Their article, This is how much troops were paid in every major American war, provides the pay for a private in the major wars fought by the U.S. The then-current pay is also adjusted to an equivalent amount of money […]

Viking Era

One usuable indicator of the value of a Viking sword. How many weapons you could buy today for that price?

Posted on October 9, 2019October 9, 2019

What was the price of a Viking sword at the time? How about expressing a price then in some unit of measure we can grasp today? I have looked on the ol’ net but haven’t found any good guesses. Previous post discussed one indicator that I couldn’t process. Hurstwic website describes one sword that had […]

comparison data

Cost and time to cross the Atlantic has dropped by more than 90% in the last 500 years.

Posted on October 1, 2018

Transatlantic travel time has dropped radically in the last 500 years.  Time to transit the Atlantic has dropped about 99% and cost has dropped about 95% by my calculations. Let’s look at several data points for cost and time, then calculate one indicator of improved quality of life. (Article cross-posted from my other blog, Outrun […]

U.S. Civil War

Salary for top level military leaders during and after the American Civil War

Posted on July 18, 2018January 19, 2019

This may not be ancient finances, but salary paid to the senior level military commanders in the 1860s and 1870s provides a worthwhile point of reference. William Tecumseh Sherman: In the Service of My Country: A Life by James Lee McDonough is a delightful biography of the general. Gen. Sherman was a prolific letter writer. […]

Viking Era

One frame of reference for comparing time to construct large projects

Posted on February 3, 2018February 3, 2018

With about 40,000 hours of labor, you could build this in around 900 A.D. …. ..or with about 55,000 hours of labor, you could build this in 1942 A.D. …   I’ve noticed a few guesses of the time it took to build things during the Viking Age. Here are a few points of reference: […]

Alexander the Great

Abundance of food today compared with routine scarcity of food earlier than 150 years ago.

Posted on January 31, 2018

For most of history, one of the main challenges was getting enough food to eat. Keeping your family alive through the winter until you can harvest the first crop in the spring has been a worry for thousands of years. That point is important when considering ancient finances back in the days of the Roman […]

Viking Era

Estimate of price of silver and gold in Viking Age

Posted on December 22, 2017December 22, 2017

To give you a rough picture of relative values during the Viking Age, the items in each of the above photos would have approximately equal value: 8 ounces of silver = 1 ounce of gold = 4 cows = 24 sheep This post calculates my estimate of the price of gold and silver during the […]

comparison of living standards

Increase of income per person over last 200 years

Posted on December 8, 2017

(Article cross-posted from Outrun Change because it shows the radical change in per capita income over the last 200 years, which in turn illustrates the challenge of expressing ancient prices and incomes in terms of today.) Here is an approximation of annual per capita GDP from 1 AD through 1913: I’ve long been amazed at the […]

Other eras

Price tag for the first New Testament printed in vernacular expressed in terms of the cost of a butchered hog

Posted on October 24, 2017

I found an interesting way to convert the price of a New Testament bible in 1522 to current dollars. How does this sound for a price of a New Testament? About $900 for the first and second printing, and around $2,700 for the third printing. If that grabs your interest, let me explain how I […]

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American Civil War (6) coins (15) comparing wages/prices across time (25) construction/time/cost (14) economic development (2) hoards (9) money (21) Old Testament (4) population (3) prices (22) ships (17) travel cost/time (3) Ulvog farm (15) wages/compensation (19) weaponry (16) weights (3)
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