Mercenaries in the Hellenistic Age: Social and Economic Aspects of Cretan Mercenaries’ Participation in the Troops of Hellenistic Rulers

Abstract

Admittedly a catalyst towards globalization, enhancing social mobility, the mercenaries who joined Hellenistic armies were most recently recognized as one for the earliest agents of international paid labour and prompted the minting of royal coinages for large-scale payments in the Hellenistic period. Cretan mercenaries were most prominent among these, as they formed part of all Hellenistic armies. The present article presents their key features and aims to explore the degree to which they contributed to the influx of foreign wealth into their homeland. Thus an outline of numismatic and other indicators of monetary imports, which may have been associated with Cretan mercenaries, is offered. In the article’s second part an attempt is made to reconcile the alleged mercenary wealth with the very poor testimonia of “imported wealth” in Crete, such as, large quantities of foreign (especially royal) silver or gold in Cretan hoards, foreign precious metal objects, and large-scale public or private investments. An attempt to explain this paradox may then elucidate further the behaviour of Cretan mercenaries as economic agents.