About the book: 2001 / A book by one of the outstanding researchers of antiquity in domestic and world science, Mikhail Ivanovich Rostovtsev (1870–1952), a major specialist in the field of Hellenistic-Roman economics period. Against the general background of the history of imperial Rome, the author provides a deep and thorough analysis of economic development trends in late antiquity. The work is based on the results of many years of comprehensive study of written and archaeological monuments, in the interpretation of which M. I. Rostovtsev is a world-class master. The book was translated from an authorized German edition, the foreword to which was written by M. I. Rostovtsev himself.