ABSTRACT
This chapter relies primarily on the historical method although it has a foundation in comparative data. The comparative aspect rests on a prediction that limitation of resources is more readily perceived in unambiguously bounded societies because in these there is no space to spread out, no place to go where conditions might be better, and no place from which to expect a windfall of goods. The chapter focuses on self-contained societies and intendes that the hypothesis should extend to prediction for complex and permeable nations as well. Rome, although looking outward to empire for its raw materials, probably limited population growth through low reproduction rates as well as by the unsought mortality of war, famine, and pestilence. However, because perception of resource availability is more vulnerable to confusing and conflicting evidences in highly permeable, open social units, it may be that in these settings homeo-static adjustments are slowed.
