Bringing in the Sheaves : : Economy and Metaphor in the Roman World / / Brent Shaw.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter UTP eBook-Package Backlist 2000-2015
• VerfasserIn: Shaw, Brent,
• Place / Publishing House: Toronto : : University of Toronto Press, , [2016]; ©2012
• Year of Publication: 2016
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource :; 4 maps
• Other title: Frontmatter --; Contents --; List of Illustrations --; List of Tables and Maps --; Introduction/Preface --; 1. Under the Burning Sun --; 2. Primus in arvis/First in the Fields --; 3. Sickle and Scythe/Man and Machine --; 4. The Grim Reapers --; 5. Blade of Vengeance --; Appendix 1: Harvesting Contracts from Roman Egypt and Italy --; Appendix 2: The Maktar Harvester Inscription: Text and Commentary --; Appendix 3: The Gallo-Roman Reaping Machines: Iconographic Data --; Abbreviations of Sources --; Tables --; Notes --; Bibliography --; Index --; Backmatter
• Format: Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.
• ISBN: 9781442661592; 9783110667691; 9783110490954
• DOI: 10.3138/9781442661592
• Access: restricted access
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: Brent Shaw.

The annual harvesting of cereal crops was one of the most important economic tasks in the Roman Empire. Not only was it urgent and critical for the survival of state and society, it mobilized huge numbers of men and women every year from across the whole face of the Mediterranean. In Bringing in the Sheaves, Brent D. Shaw investigates the ways in which human labour interacted with the instruments of harvesting, what part the workers and their tools had in the whole economy, and how the work itself was organized.Both collective and individual aspects of the story are investigated, centred on the life-story of a single reaper whose work in the wheat fields of North Africa is documented in his funerary epitaph. The narrative then proceeds to an analysis of the ways in which this cyclical human behaviour formed and influenced modes of thinking about matters beyond the harvest. The work features an edition of the reaper inscription, and a commentary on it. It is also lavishly illustrated to demonstrate the important iconic and pictorial dimensions of the story.