Ancient Egypt: Domestic Trade

In a society where most of the population made a living from agriculture and surpluses were small, trade was limited. The needs of the farming population were basic: grain for baking bread and brewing beer, dried fish, vegetables, some linen for a simple loincloth and mud bricks for a hut. Food and flax they could grow themselves. Mud was found at the nearby river bank. And sometimes there was a surplus which could be exchanged for little luxuries. Trade was done by barter, a reasonably efficient method when mostly basic necessities were exchanged. Even after coined money was introduced in the second half of the first millennium BCE, barter continued to be widespread among the farming population for centuries.