capitalism before feudalism?

[spartan]

in my opinion capitalism is alot older then most people think. most socialists believe that we go through certain periods such as feudalism then capitalism then socialism. but look at what came before feudalism in the ancient world. the egyptians,greeks,romans,etc. these were not feudalist empires but capitalist. there whole economic system was an ancient world version of modern capitalism. they only went to war to gain control of economic intrests just like capitalist imperialists today. feudalism was only born in the crises of the third century that hit the roman empire. merchents were to scared to travel the roads because of barbarians. landowners couldnt sell there goods on foreign markets cause it cost to much to get them there and people from the cities fearing starvation flocked to the countryside and to the landowners begging to work. the landowners agreed but only on condition that these people give up some of there rights. the people agreed which arguably started feudal serfdom. eventually this became law and landowning became hereditary. thus the dividing line between the ancient world and the middle ages is actually the third century. why do socialists forget this very important era? and how does this affect are understanding of modern day socialism if at all?

[Whitten]

The classical empires are not forgotten by socialists, and Marx wrote a fair bit about them in his works on historical materialism, including how they evolved out of primitive communism (early tribal societies) and how they gave way to feudalism.

Neither the Roman Empire nor any of its cousins practiced capitalism, the class make up in Roman society was completly different than it is now. The most important difference is the role of slavery (which existed as the primary means of production in the classical empires). Key features of capitalism are missing, including the dominance of wage-labour and the capitalist class itself. Capitalism only evolved due to industrialisation, which required workers to sell their labour to a capitalist in exchange for a wage, as they were unable to afford ownership of efficient competative productive property.

Its also bad history to assign the rise of feudalism to specific political failings within the Roman Empire, as versions of feudalism grew up across North Africa and parts of Asia the Romans would never have heard of. Feudalism develops from the inherent contradictions of an economic system with mass-slavery as its foundations.

[Tower of Bebel]

not capitalist, but a slave society with feudalist characteristics at the end and the beginning.

[JazzRemington]

There were inklings of Capitalism in the ancient era. In Ancient Greece there were wandering laborers (can't recall their names) who didn't own land or any means of production, and would work at different farms for people and would be paid either in hard coin or in a share of the products they helped to harvest.

Bits and pieces of Capitalism have been going on from time to time since the dawn of civilization, it's just that with the development of Feudalism, we saw all the bits and pieces being put together to create the monolith that came to be Capitalism.