Moses I. Finley
Encyclopedia
Sir Moses I. Finley CBE
, FBA
(May 20, 1912–June 23, 1986) was an American
and English
classical scholar
. His most notable work is The Ancient Economy
(1973), where he argued that status and civic ideology governed the economy in antiquity rather than rational economic motivations.
as Moses Israel Finkelstein to Nathan Finkelstein and Anna Katzenellenbogen; died in 1986 as a British subject
. He was educated at Syracuse University
and Columbia University
. Although his M.A. was in public law
, most of his published work was in the field of ancient history
, especially the social and economic aspects of the classical world.
He taught at Columbia University
and City College of New York
, where he was influenced by members of the Frankfurt School
who were working in exile in America. In 1952, during the Red Scare, Finley was fired from his teaching job at Rutgers University
; in 1954, he was summoned by the United States Senate
Internal Security Subcommittee and asked whether he had ever been a member of the Communist Party USA
. He invoked the Fifth Amendment
and refused to answer.
Unable subsequently to find work in the United States, Finley moved to England in 1955, where he taught classical studies for many years at Cambridge University
, first as a Reader
in Ancient Social and Economic History
at Jesus College
(1964–1970), then as Professor of Ancient History (1970–1979) and eventually as Master of Darwin College
(1976–1982). He broadened the scope of classical studies from philology
to culture
, economics
, and society. He became a British subject in 1962 and a Fellow of the British Academy
in 1971, and was knighted in 1979. He was a doctorate adviser to Paul Millett
, now also a Classics professor at Cambridge.
Among his works, The World of Odysseus (1954, revised ed. with additional essays 1978) proved seminal. In it, he applied the findings of ethnologists and anthropologists like Marcel Mauss
to illuminate Homer
, a radical approach that was thought by his publishers to require a reassuring introduction by an established classicist, Maurice Bowra
. Paul Cartledge
asserted in 1995, "... in retrospect Finley's little masterpiece can be seen as the seed of the present flowering of anthropologically-related studies of ancient Greek culture and society".
Following the example of Karl Polanyi
, Finley argued that the ancient economy should not be analyzed using the concepts of modern economic science, because ancient man had no notion of the economy as a separate sphere of society, and because economic actions in antiquity were determined not primarily by economic, but by social concerns. This important text has come under scrutiny in recent years with varied criticism coming from, amongst others, Kevin Greene
who argues that Finley underplays the importance of technological innovation, and Whittaker,
who refutes the concept of a 'consumer city'.
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
, FBA
British Academy
The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national body for the humanities and the social sciences. Its purpose is to inspire, recognise and support excellence in the humanities and social sciences, throughout the UK and internationally, and to champion their role and value.It receives an annual...
(May 20, 1912–June 23, 1986) was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
classical scholar
Classics
Classics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...
. His most notable work is The Ancient Economy
The Ancient Economy (book)
The Ancient Economy is a book about the economic system of classical antiquity written by the classicist Moses I. Finley. It was originally published in 1973. Finley interprets the economy from 1000BC to 500AD sociologically, instead of using economic models . He attempted to prove that the ancient...
(1973), where he argued that status and civic ideology governed the economy in antiquity rather than rational economic motivations.
Early life and career
He was born in 1912 in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
as Moses Israel Finkelstein to Nathan Finkelstein and Anna Katzenellenbogen; died in 1986 as a British subject
British subject
In British nationality law, the term British subject has at different times had different meanings. The current definition of the term British subject is contained in the British Nationality Act 1981.- Prior to 1949 :...
. He was educated at Syracuse University
Syracuse University
Syracuse University is a private research university located in Syracuse, New York, United States. Its roots can be traced back to Genesee Wesleyan Seminary, founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1832, which also later founded Genesee College...
and Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
. Although his M.A. was in public law
Public law
Public law is a theory of law governing the relationship between individuals and the state. Under this theory, constitutional law, administrative law and criminal law are sub-divisions of public law...
, most of his published work was in the field of ancient history
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
, especially the social and economic aspects of the classical world.
He taught at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
and City College of New York
City College of New York
The City College of the City University of New York is a senior college of the City University of New York , in New York City. It is also the oldest of the City University's twenty-three institutions of higher learning...
, where he was influenced by members of the Frankfurt School
Frankfurt School
The Frankfurt School refers to a school of neo-Marxist interdisciplinary social theory, particularly associated with the Institute for Social Research at the University of Frankfurt am Main...
who were working in exile in America. In 1952, during the Red Scare, Finley was fired from his teaching job at Rutgers University
Rutgers University
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey , is the largest institution for higher education in New Jersey, United States. It was originally chartered as Queen's College in 1766. It is the eighth-oldest college in the United States and one of the nine Colonial colleges founded before the American...
; in 1954, he was summoned by the United States Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Internal Security Subcommittee and asked whether he had ever been a member of the Communist Party USA
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....
. He invoked the Fifth Amendment
Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which is part of the Bill of Rights, protects against abuse of government authority in a legal procedure. Its guarantees stem from English common law which traces back to the Magna Carta in 1215...
and refused to answer.
Unable subsequently to find work in the United States, Finley moved to England in 1955, where he taught classical studies for many years at Cambridge University
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
, first as a Reader
Reader (academic rank)
The title of Reader in the United Kingdom and some universities in the Commonwealth nations like Australia and New Zealand denotes an appointment for a senior academic with a distinguished international reputation in research or scholarship...
in Ancient Social and Economic History
Economic history
Economic history is the study of economies or economic phenomena in the past. Analysis in economic history is undertaken using a combination of historical methods, statistical methods and by applying economic theory to historical situations and institutions...
at Jesus College
Jesus College, Cambridge
Jesus College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England.The College was founded in 1496 on the site of a Benedictine nunnery by John Alcock, then Bishop of Ely...
(1964–1970), then as Professor of Ancient History (1970–1979) and eventually as Master of Darwin College
Darwin College, Cambridge
Darwin College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge.Founded in 1964, Darwin was Cambridge University's first graduate-only college, and also the first to admit both men and women. The college is named after the family of one of the university's most famous graduates, Charles Darwin...
(1976–1982). He broadened the scope of classical studies from philology
Philology
Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...
to culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
, economics
Economics
Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
, and society. He became a British subject in 1962 and a Fellow of the British Academy
British Academy
The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national body for the humanities and the social sciences. Its purpose is to inspire, recognise and support excellence in the humanities and social sciences, throughout the UK and internationally, and to champion their role and value.It receives an annual...
in 1971, and was knighted in 1979. He was a doctorate adviser to Paul Millett
Paul Millett
Paul Millett is a British senior lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Downing College, Cambridge. At Downing, Millett is the Director of Studies for Classics and serves as Admissions Tutor for arts subjects....
, now also a Classics professor at Cambridge.
Among his works, The World of Odysseus (1954, revised ed. with additional essays 1978) proved seminal. In it, he applied the findings of ethnologists and anthropologists like Marcel Mauss
Marcel Mauss
Marcel Mauss was a French sociologist. The nephew of Émile Durkheim, Mauss' academic work traversed the boundaries between sociology and anthropology...
to illuminate Homer
Homer
In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
, a radical approach that was thought by his publishers to require a reassuring introduction by an established classicist, Maurice Bowra
Maurice Bowra
Sir Cecil Maurice Bowra was an English classical scholar and academic, known for his wit. He was Warden of Wadham College, Oxford, from 1938 to 1970, and served as Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1951 to 1954.-Birth and boyhood:...
. Paul Cartledge
Paul Cartledge
Paul Anthony Cartledge is the first A. G. Leventis Professor of Greek Culture at Cambridge University, having previously held a personal chair in Greek History at Cambridge....
asserted in 1995, "... in retrospect Finley's little masterpiece can be seen as the seed of the present flowering of anthropologically-related studies of ancient Greek culture and society".
Following the example of Karl Polanyi
Karl Polanyi
Karl Paul Polanyi was a Hungarian philosopher, political economist and economic anthropologist known for his opposition to traditional economic thought and his book The Great Transformation...
, Finley argued that the ancient economy should not be analyzed using the concepts of modern economic science, because ancient man had no notion of the economy as a separate sphere of society, and because economic actions in antiquity were determined not primarily by economic, but by social concerns. This important text has come under scrutiny in recent years with varied criticism coming from, amongst others, Kevin Greene
who argues that Finley underplays the importance of technological innovation, and Whittaker,
who refutes the concept of a 'consumer city'.
Further reading
- Derks, Hans. "The Ancient Economy: The Problem and the Fraud," The European Legacy, Vol. 7, No. 5. (2002), pp. 597–620.
- Hornblower, Simon. "A gift from whom?: [Moses Finley's book The World of Odysseus: Critical Essay]," Times Literary Supplement, December 24, 2004, pp. 18–19.
- Morris, Ian. "Foreword [to the updated edition]," The Ancient Economy by Moses I. Finley. Berkeley; Los Angeles; London: University of California Press, 1999 (paperback, ISBN 0-520-21946-5), pp. ix–xxxvi.
- Nafissi, Mohammad. "Class, embeddedness, and the modernity of ancient Athens," Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 46, Issue 2. (2004), pp. 378–410.
- Nafissi, Mohammad. Ancient Athens and Modern Ideology: Value, Theory and Evidence in Historical Sciences. Max Weber, Karl Polanyi and Moses Finley (Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies. Supplement; 80). London: Institute of Classical Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, 2005 (paperback, ISBN 0900587911).
- Shaw, Brent D.; Saller, Richard P. Editors' introduction to Economy and society in ancient Greece (with Finley's up-to-date bibliography). London: Chatto & Windus, 1981 (hardcover, ISBN 0-7011-2549-7); N.Y.: The Viking Press, 1982 (hardcover, ISBN 0-670-28847-0); London: Penguin Books, 1983 (paperback, ISBN 0-14-022520-X).
- Silver, Morris. Review of The Ancient Economy, edited by Walter ScheidelWalter ScheidelWalter Scheidel is an Austrian historian who teaches ancient history at Stanford University, California. Scheidel's main research interests are ancient social and economic history, pre-modern historical demography, and comparative and transdisciplinary approaches to world history.- Life :From 1984...
and Sitta von Reden", Economic History Services, January 3, 2003. - Watson, George. "The man from Syracuse: Moses Finley (1912–1986)," Sewanee Review, Vol. 112, Issue 1. (2004), pp. 131–137.