The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1898-02-10
MONETARY HISTORY,
A GLIMPSE INTO THE PAST
TAKEN BY A WRITER
who is Able 20 Put wba He,Fiuds In
Attractive and Fore ful English
-Nnothsr Cbspter.


Corrupts and stagnates in the veins,
Unless proper circulation
Its motion and its heat maintains"
In the above poetic simile of Swift
may be found data for a diagnosis of our
nations financial paroxyisms, and in the
discovery that the patient is constit ton
ally strong, possessed of unlimited re-
sources for recuperation, and that the
conceived ailments are the reflected ills
Of sick nurses borne aloft by their ex-
halalions- of political flummery. The
| trouble is not internal but external. 1t
Is species of strangulation produced by
the grip Of avarlce on the national jugu-
lar. Paternal care, when sollcitous on
behalf Of an infant state is praiseworthy
and entitled to admir- ,tion. Had history
been silent and had money and its fu O.
tions not been reduced long since to a
science, by deduo ions and re6nements
from about forty centuries of financial
experience, the average man could look
with more complacency upon its modern
political da Sdling.
Two thousand years before the advent
Of Christ, financial transaction
involving the first recorded use
Of money Is given US in Genesis, when
Abraham in payment for burial place
for Sarah, weighed to Ephron "four
hundred shekels of silver, current m oney
with the merchants. This current
money was not coun ed but weighed, the
money Of that day being pieces Of silver
cut to certain weights, shpkel being a
half ounce Avoirdupois, Of the value of
62H cents, but not coined. The histori-
ans Herodotus and Xenophanes both tell
us that coinage was invented by the Lydi-
ans about 1900 B. G. Since the days Of
Abraham almost every known metal has
been used as and coined into money. The
Lacedamonians used iron, the Burman
empire lead. Gold, silver and copper
were coined by the Greeks and Romans.
Roman and British tin coins are known
to exist. Platinum was coined by the
Russians. The Carthgenisns hai leath-
er money. India and Africa used cowry
shells. In 1851, 1000 tons were brought
from India to Liverpool to be taken to
the coast of Africa and paid out in the
purchase of palm oil. 1t required 5000
to equal rupee, which in value was 46
cents. In 1854 pasteboard was coined in
Holland. Wampum, cylindrical pieces
of white and black or purple colored
shells, one-fourth of an inch long, drilled
lengthwise and strung on strings, was
used by the Indians as money, and about
1886 was the prevailing currency among
the colonists of Massachusetts,, each
white pisce baing Of the value of a farthing
and the dark ones double the value of
a white. The origin Of the metallic
money Of the east has been attributed to
the tendency of man, then in the primi-
tive of society, to accumulate the precious
metals at time when there was little
crops and other personal property, and as
all men came to value these metals, kings
began to collect their tribute in that
form. They coined the metal and made
it receivable as taxes. This created
a new demand for them where they had
not previously been used and from thepc4
and ever after, all men needed them
to pay the kings dues, and in this man
ner they became circulating medium.
Such being the history of coins and
coinage and the relation of man to it, its
nature and laws are too well established
and defined for honest doubts or misund-
erstandings to now exist. In this con-
nection, and by way of illustrating the
laws effect upon the material used, it
is interesting to note that in London,
during the crisis Of 1S47 it was not pos
sible to borrow guinea on go, 900 pounds
sterling.of coined silver, while on the
other hand, it is an authentic fact that
crisis of 1864 a possessor of 20, 900 pounds
sterling of old coin was compelled to de-
clare himself insolvent because 1t was
impossible to convert this gold into
rupees-all because the silver in London
was not legal tender above forty shil-
lings, and the gold in Calcutta was not
legal tender for any sum whatever. The
single gold standard in England worked
the hardship and ruin in the one cass
and the silver single standard in India
the ruin in the other. But parallel with
our ages of intimacy with coins and coin
age has run like and comprehensive ex-
perience with financial schemes and theo-
ries. Coin was the only money In use
up to the year 1894. Prior to that bank
notes were unknown. In the year 1171
the bank of Venice was founded. 1t was
the first institution of the kind in
Europe. The existence of wars and the
necessity for the government to obtain
means for coduoting them, gave rise to
its establishment. The government re-
sorted to a forced loan from it's citizens
and first organized chamber of loans
which by degrees assumed the form un-
der which as the bank of Venice it was
for many age s the admiration of Europe
and the instrument Of Venetian finance
and the mainstay Of commerce unexcell-
ed by any nation of Europe. Funds de-
posted in the bank could not be with
drawn, but were transferable at the pleas
ure Of their owners upon its books. The
bank credits became so thoroughly the
means by and through which the financial
oprations of the people were conducted,
and met with such hearty approval that
it continued In existence until the over
throw of the repu blic in 1897 by the re-