ABSTRACT
What determined the shape of economic space in Greco-Roman cities? I argue that elite intervention in the civic landscape, in the form of building munificence, was one important factor. After brief discussions of the relation of economic space with economic structure and of elite views of the civic landscape as perceptible in literary sources, I turn to the evidence for building munificence in Roman imperial Asia Minor. I argue that much economic space created by elites remained ‘embedded’ within the civic structures to which they contributed as magistrates and benefactors. I close with a discussion of the changing urban landscapes of Asia Minor in the third century ce, and the link with the decline in civic munificence in the east during much of this century.
