Greece the first society to have individual property rights?

[Eoghan]

I am currently reading VDH's book who killed Homer. His argument is that Greece was unique in having the citizens own their own land and work it not as serfs or share croppers but as individuals who owned their land "freehold". It is a recurring theme in his books but I cannot help thinking that he has a blind spot re: Israel?

Israel AND Greek city states allowed individuals to own their own land "freehold"
Israel AND Greece both relied on a militia rather than a standing army to wage wars
Greece had leadership but no king (Sparta aside)
Israel was designed to function without a king

What say ye

 

[Ben Zartman]

Long before Israel was a nation, Abraham bought land from the sons of Heth. You can't sell something that whomever is in authority doesn't recognize you as the owner of.
Cain built a city. I'd say that by right of keeping, and by God's command to replenish and subdue the earth, he owned it.

 

[Eoghan]

One of the problems for Rome was that stealing small farms deprived them of the "yeoman class" that served in the legions. In Scotland the chieftains assumed land ownership and hence used the law to enforce the clearances despite having their origins as elected clan leaders.

 

[Eoghan]

Nigel Tranter (Scots historian) explains the union of the crowns led to the scottish nobles moving to the London court where money rather than men-at-arms was important hence sheep farming and monetizing their land holdings became more important than looking after their clansmen (children in Gaelic)

 

[SeanPatrickCornell]

My hunch is that the problem is this: Secular scholars do not consider the Old Testament to be "history" and therefore everything in it is virtually disregarded unless there is corresponding archaeological / secular historical record that corroborates it.

I do not know if Victor Davis Hanson is a believer or not, so perhaps my hunch is utterly bunk.

 

[iainduguid]

This resource probably answers your questions:

https://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1409&context=fss_papers

He treats Egypt, Mesopotamia and Egypt and argues for at least some early private property rights. See p. 336 ff

 

[Eoghan]

One of the things which I find ironic is that while Israel forbad the sale of land freehold, effectively making all land sales leasehold (Jubilee year) Joseph beggars Egypt! When he stores up the grain in silos he takes the money, then the livestock, then the land and people- reducing the land owning Egyptians to serfs! He even goes further and starts to displace the population to break the tie to traditional land holdings - anticipating the Babylonian policy and that of Alexander the Great. (Genesis 47)

Ironically the money is not put back into circulation but placed in a vault. This was the model of the Great King and when Alexander liberated these strongrooms financed his building projects.