The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1881-01-08
Ancient Money.

money mas also improved elGher IN quailty
or des. .gn, or both. And we fnd that
when the emperors of Rome We're in the
zenith Of their power, the coinage was, for
those days, handsome and artistic in de-
sign many fine pieces in the British Mu
scum of the reigns of Julius Caesar, Claud
ius, and Augustus attest this. But on the
decline of the Roman power, and during
that subsequent period known as the dark
ages, when ignorance and superstition
hung as pail over the whole of Europe,
the coinage degenerated into mere shape
less Jumps of metal, with oftentimes moth
ing but rudely punched hole for de-
sign.
The earliest account of the precious
metals, either as wealth or money, is found
in Genesis xiii. 2, where it is stated that
Abraham returned from Egypt rich in
cattle, silver, and gold and the earliest
record of commercial transaction, where
the precious metals were given as a con-
sideration for commodity, is the purchase
of the field of Macpelah, when four hun
dred shekels of silver, current money with
the merchant, were weighed to Ephron
Here We see that the money was not
counted but weighed, the precious metal
being cut into a block, and stamped or
marked with the weight The shekel was
the Hebrew unit of weight, and was equal
to about half an ounce avoirdupois, which
was the weight of the earliest known coin
Of that name, the shekel of Simon Mac
cabeus. Its value was between fifty and
sixty cents. The golden shekel was but
halfthis weight, and worth about 81. In the
Bible we read of the sacred and the royal
shekel, supposed by some authorities to
have been two separate standards-as our
Troy and avoirdupois weight-the proper
ton between which was as five to three in
favor of the sacred shekel The talent, a
measure used by nearly all the nations of
antiquity, was term originally used by
the ancient Greeks to denote a balance for
weighing, and in this way came to repre-
sent certain quantity, just as the Eng
lish pound sterling formerly meant pound
of gold. But it would appear that the
talent was never coined, it being used
simply as money of account. The old
est talent was the Babylonian, and it may
be safely assumed that the Hebrew talent
was almost Identical with it, and was worth
in round numbers, about 81, 800.
The wife of Midas, the legendary king
of Phrygia, has been accredited with being
the originator of the first coins, but better
authority aseribes it to the Lydians, about
1900 B. c., and was probably of electrum,
seeing that several of the oldest specimens
extant are of that metal, And the Chi
nese claim an antiquity as great for their
small copper coin, the cash. While most
of the nations of antiquity had coins of
silver and gold, Rome, for 500 years after
its foundation, had none but copper and
brass. The Roman unit of weight, the
libra, was pound weight of either of the
two metals just mentioned, was oblong,
and was cast, not stamped, in the form of
brick. Gold and silver were not coined
in Rome till about $50 B. c., and it was
not until the time of Julius Caesar, B. c.
40, that the former came into extensive
circulation in the realm, When Caesar
invaded Britain he found currency of
brass and iron, which was measured by
weight, in use among the natives; and
during the reign of Augustus mint was
established near what is now the town of
Colchester, in Essex, and here have oc-
Cured some of the richest "fnds" of Ro-
man coins in England. Under Claudius
the Roman coinage superseded that of the
natives, but on the abandonment of the
island in the fifth century, it would appear
to have gradually fallen into disuse. pen
The Norman kings had curious prac-
tice Of coming silver pennies so deeply
marked by cross that they were readily
broken into half-pence and farthings, and,
as might have been expected, spurious
fractions of the penny soon appeared. But
all this time the circulation of the precious
metals, as money, was confined almost en-
tirely to the cities and the centers of buy
ing and selling. Elsewhere a system of
barter existed, or else the unit of value
was something peculiar to the people
among whom it originated. Thus, among
the Hebrews, cattle and grain found great
favor; in ancient Greece and Rome cattle
were also used as mCney-hence our word
pecuniary, from pecaniG, which in turn
from pecus, cattle. In Greece, before the
introduction of coined money, there was a
unit of value called drdchns, meaning a
handful, composed of six iron or copper
nails and the Jews had also 'Jewel
money" Under the Caesars, land, or the
documents representing land, were made
money the Carthagiuians had leather
money; and SO recently as the Norman
conquest there were in Britain two kinds
of money in use, known as diving" and
"dead" money; the first consisting of
slaves and cattle, and the latter of metal
or some other inanimate commodity. AT
all times and In all semi-ciyiliaed nations
iron has been highly considered as stand
ard of value, from the readiness with which
it could be converted into weapons for