Economy
The east-west Roman roads carried a variety of commodities: wine, manufactures, and luxury goods from the coast; metals, cattle, timber, wool, skins and leather from the interior. This economic development made it possible for the creation of the Empire. Important roads were the ancient Roman Via Militaris, Via Egnatia, the Via de Zenta, and the Kopaonik road among others. Ragusan merchants in particular had trading privileges throughout the realm.
Srebrenica, Rudnik, Trepca, Novo Brdo, Kopaonik, Majdanpek, Brskovo and Samokov were the main centers of the mining of iron, copper and lead ores, and silver and gold placers. The silver mines provided much of the royal income, and were worked by slave-labour, managed by Saxons. A colony of Saxons worked the Novo Brdo mines and traded charcoal burners. The silver mines processed an annual 0.5 million dollars (1919 comparation). In East Serbia were mainly copper mines.
The currency used was called dinars, an alternative name was perper, derived from the Byzantine hyperpyron. The golden dinar was the largest unit; the imperial tax was one dinar coin, per house, annually.
Read more about this topic: Serbian Empire
Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“It enhances our sense of the grand security and serenity of nature to observe the still undisturbed economy and content of the fishes of this century, their happiness a regular fruit of the summer.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“War. Fighting. Men ... every man in the whole realm is in the army.... Every man in uniform ... An economy entirely geared to war ... but there is not much war ... hardly any fighting ... yet every man a soldier from birth till death ... Men ... all men for fighting ... but no war, no wars to fight ... what is it, what does it mean?””
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“I favor the policy of economy, not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save people. The men and women of this country who toil are the ones who bear the cost of the Government. Every dollar that we carelessly waste means that their life will be so much the more meager. Every dollar that we prudently save means that their life will be so much the more abundant. Economy is idealism in its most practical terms.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)