As time passed, they began to raise their own animals and to plant seeds for crops. Ancient Greeks learned how to irrigate crops. Even with these advances, farming was hard in Greece. The economy of ancient Greek depended heavily on its agriculture. In fact, 90 percent of the men in Greece were farmers.
Landholdings in Attica were relatively modest in size, and worked for the most part by small, independent farmers.
Some smaller farmers could not afford slaves and just managed to scrape a living for their families. If there was a crop failure, poor families could not usually survive and would have to work for their landowners on larger estates or seek work in the city.
Because there was little water barley became the main cereal of ancient Greece. Olives and grapes also grew well in the land. Some lives were eaten but most were pressed to obtain oil for cooking and lighting, or for export to sell or barter for other goods. They used grapes to make wine.
During the years of the tyrants in Greece (650-500 BC) one Athenian ruler, Pisistratus, helped smaller farmers by creating a state loan fund and injecting more money into the scheme in later years by placing a tax of about 5 percent on agricultural products, the first known direct taxation of citizens.
Ancient Greek agriculture
