How trade led to growth during Iron Age..

Lots of econ history in this research.

Jan Bakker, Stephan Maurer, Jörn-Steffen Pischke and Ferdinand Rauch in this paper look at really old evidence of trade leading to growth:

Economists often point out the benefits of trade, yet empirical evidence for these benefits has been hard to come by and tends to be recent. This column goes back to the first millennium BC to analyse the growth effects of one of the first major trade expansions in human history: the systematic crossing of the open sea in the Mediterranean by the Phoenicians. A strong positive relationship between connectedness and archaeological sites suggests a large role for geography and trade in development even at such an early juncture in history.

Hmm…Fascinating stuff.

Full paper is here