Economic+Byzantine


 * ====Peasants produced important goods and kept the price of food low and paid most of the taxes.====
 * ====Byzantine was able to have a secure business that enabled them to spend more time, money, and effort on expansion while commoners kept====

producing goods to trade with the eastern Mediterranean.

 * ====Trade was a large political and economic factor.====
 * ====Expansion created more trading opportunities.====
 * ====They depended on Constantinople's hold over the countryside to regulate trade and farming.====
 * ====Farmers supplied goods and made up most of the tax revenues.====
 * ====Silk was introduced from China. Silk worms were raised, and silk was produced in bulk.====
 * ====They traded with Asia, Russia, and Scandinavia, India, Arabs, and traded for some simpler goods with western Europe and Africa.====
 * ====The government controlled every aspect of life, and so the merchant class, although important, never gained much power.====
 * ====Other cities in the empire were kept to small to keep the main focus on Athens so all of the traded goods and money would go directly to the main power of the empire.====
 * ====Food prices were low so peasants wouldn't become angry, as they bore the brunt of the taxes levied on the people of Byzantine.Byzantine traded====

goods.They produced mostly sophisticated products such as silk, cloth, carpets, and spices.

 * ====Because they were one of few empires that produced more sophisticated goods, they benefited greatly from trade with other countries seeking nicer====