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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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'Pecunia non olet'

I recently discovered from Wikipedia that Emperor Vespasian came up with a neat form of taxation, the vectigal urinae, he taxed urine, or more precisely, he taxed the tanners and launderers who bought the urine from public bathhouses, sewers and pisspots.

On entering office Vespasian had inherited a huge national debt. It has been estimated at the beginning of his reign he would have needed 'forty thousand million sesterces' to get the empire's books balanced again, so he needed to tax.

The tax worked. Tanners require urine for curing leather, and ammonia is good for whitening togas, so urine held considerable value to the tanners and launderers, and so the wiley Vespasian raised much needed revenue.

When Titus complained to his father that this was a disgusting form of tax, Vespasian is reputed to have pulled out a coin and held it up to Titus's face. "See, my son", said Vespasian, "Money does not stink." Or to put it another way, the value of money is not tainted by its origins....

Such was the success of this tax and others that not only was Vespasian able to restore the empire's finances, he could start building the Coliseum, the monument that bears his and his sons' family name, the Flavian Amphitheater.

My first impression was what a fantastic wheeze this tax was, that is until I discovered that Vespasian's name is also associated with public urinals in France (vespasiennes), Italy (vespasiani), and Romania (vespasiene)......

The language of the everyday is remarkably permanent and unforgiving.

Vespasian's name will for ever be associated with the coliseum and.....piss.....

'Pecunia non olet' money does not stink.....but taxes do..
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Intrinsic value.

Ishmael wrote:

Anytime there is a change in "official" currency, the new currency is introduced without any inherent value. This valueless commodity is sold by force by the state. This forced sale appears to be the root of the problem.

Why is this a problem? I speculate...

The new currency has zero (or near zero) value initially. All (or most) of the value it gains is squeezed out of the economy. The new currency absorbs this value but diminishes the value of everything it is used to purchase. The effect is hidden but inexorable. The value of everything is necessarily depressed by the forced exchange..


We don't know the type of coin Vespasian flashed in the face of the young Titus, but we can hazard a guess that it would have been silver or gold, and probably on one side would have been minted the head of an emperor.

Coins issued by the emperors contained precious metals. The actual value of metal might not have equaled the value of the coin, and indeed the content dramatically declined over time.... but Roman imperial coinage like Athenian coinage (unlike most modern coinage) contained valuable precious metal giving the coins an intrinsic value.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Sparta

Not all the ancients were convinced of the value of coinage with intrinsic value, the Spartan leader Lycurgus (8BC) made it illegal to use gold or silver currency and adopted a currency based on iron bars. These bars were then heated and dipped in vinegar, to make them brittle. This destroyed the intrinsic or commodity value of the coinage, effectively making them worthless for any purpose than money. The Spartan model is some ways similar to the central issue of modern notes.

Despite the bars not having intrinsic value it seems to have been a success, unless that is you were either very wealthy, or controlled the supply of gold or silver......
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Mick Harper
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In: London
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or controlled the supply of gold or silver ......

They do say that the rise of Athens to great power status and arch-competitor of Sparta was because of the discovery of the Laurium silver mines on Athenian territory.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Moneta

When Titus saw Vespasian's coin, he would have appreciated the symbolism.

In Roman mythology, Moneta (Latin Monēta) was a title given to the goddess of memory (identified with the Greek goddess Mnemosyne).

So we could say money is linked to memory. Think of our word commemoration.

Vespasions taxes were widely resented in the ancient world, in 70 CE he had taxed the Jews two Drachma a person, to pay for the building of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus in Rome, as penance for the first Jewish revolt. When the Jews rose up against this in 90 CE, they were ruthlessly suppressed. To commemorate this victory Emperor Nerva of course...... issued a new coin......

So money is linked to memory. In one sense it is the physical representation of a previous transaction. It memorises a previous transaction, then it stores this value until it can be reclaimed.

It can also act as a reminder of who guarantees the currency.....who is boss, who you pay your taxes to..

Money in ancient Rome was coined (or minted) in the temple of Juno Moneta.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Store of value

Money functions as a store of value.

But there is a problem here.

If a currency (like say the Spartan iron bars) has no intrinsic value, how we do know the bar's worth? The answer is that it has a socially agreed or centrally imposed symbolic exchange value e.g. An iron bar stamped with a cow type symbol, or brand, can be exchanged for a cow..

If the currency has intrinsic value (the value of the precious metal within it) then in fact each coin has two values....

1) A symbolic exchange value.

2) A intrinsic commodity value.

If the commodity value, within a coin, rises above the symbolic exchange value, then there is nothing to stop your more astute very wealthy folks from melting their money down and selling it for more than the symbolic exchange value. At this point money will cease to function as a viable medium of exchange.
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Branding....

Wile E. Coyote wrote:
An iron bar stamped with a cow type symbol, or brand, can be exchanged for a cow...


The branding of cattle, to identify ownership of cattle, is an ancient process. The branding of bars would be a natural progression.Trade starts off in cattle and progresses to branded bars, which could then act as a medium of exchange or store of value.

This to my way of thinking is a much more likely route rather than sword bars........
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Coin Hoards

The Romans left in a hurry, leaving hoards of precious buried coins. Clearly they were planning to return, and dig them up again....So orthodoxy would have you believe.

To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value. They in effect did what the Spartans did.

You have a choice: your Romans acted irrationally (leaving their currency behind)

Your locals acted rationally to protect their own method of exchange.
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Chad


In: Ramsbottom
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To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value.


But the Megalithics had long valued precious metals, not least for personal adornment.

If they so despised these coins, would they not simply have re-cycled the metal content into something more in tune with their cultural preferences?
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Chad wrote:
To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value.


But the Megalithics had long valued precious metals, not least for personal adornment.

If they so despised these coins, would they not simply have re-cycled the metal content into something more in tune with their cultural preferences?


Most probably many would have been recycled, its the rest we are seeing.
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Boreades


In: finity and beyond
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Wile E. Coyote wrote:
Coin Hoards

The Romans left in a hurry, leaving hoards of precious buried coins. Clearly they were planning to return, and dig them up again....So orthodoxy would have you believe.

To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value. They in effect did what the Spartans did.

You have a choice: your Romans acted irrationally (leaving their currency behind)

Your locals acted rationally to protect their own method of exchange.


Wile E. Coyote wrote:
Coin Hoards

The Romans left in a hurry, leaving hoards of precious buried coins. Clearly they were planning to return, and dig them up again....So orthodoxy would have you believe.

To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value. They in effect did what the Spartans did.

You have a choice: your Romans acted irrationally (leaving their currency behind)

Your locals acted rationally to protect their own method of exchange.


I like this. It's a question that provokes disturbing similarities with our own "modern" trust in a banking system. Our blessed Orthodox Historians would have us believe that Romans, in some turbulent time, would bury what was most valuable. Err, right... but why? If it's close to your heart, keep it close to your heart! If the Gold Standard fails, aren't you in deep deep trouble?

Or were they all Roman grannies putting it under their mattresses? You can't trust the Bank of XXXXCester, they are all thieving bastards. Look at the bonuses they gave themselves last year!

Or, did it all go pear-shaped?
"The climate has got worse, and we are all hungry. How am I going to feed my cattle with these metal discs that nobody wants?"
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Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
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Fines

As Vespasian uttered 'Pecunia non olet' to Titus, he might have reflected that the currency had not always been based on precious metals.

Pliny states the currency used by the Romans before the reign of King Servius Tullius 578-535BC, was not silver, or gold, but ...rough pieces of bronze, which had to be weighed (think of our word pound)

In an earlier age, cattle appears to have been the principal measure of value, as various sources quote fines in terms of oxen and sheep.....

Pecunia

Online Etymology makes some intriguing linguistic links between cattle and money.

c.1500, from Latin pecuniarius "pertaining to money," from pecunia "money, property, wealth," from pecu "cattle, flock," from PIE root *peku- "wealth, movable property, livestock" (cf. Sanskrit pasu- "cattle," Gothic faihu "money, fortune," Old English feoh "cattle, money").

Livestock was the measure of wealth in the ancient world. For a possible parallel sense development in Old English, see fee, and cf., evolving in the other direction, cattle. Cf. also Welsh tlws "jewel," cognate with Irish tlus "cattle," connected via notion of "valuable thing."

So fines in the early Roman world switch from cattle to bronze.

The currency of the Republic was Bronze.

Cattle....Bronze.......

Legal tender

According to Livy, by 400 BC the only legal tender was Bronze and mining for precious metals was discouraged.

A precious metal coinage was only developed under the Emperors.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Wile E. Coyote wrote:
To my way of thinking this was just an attempt by the locals to get rid of a hated precious metal currency and revert to a megalithic currency based on symbolic exchange value. They in effect did what the Spartans did.


Total nonsense. Really. Nonsense.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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I am willing to state categorically that all roman coins are fake. They were dug up by their forgers.
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Ishmael


In: Toronto
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Wile E. Coyote wrote:
According to Livy, by 400 BC the only legal tender was Bronze and mining for precious metals was discouraged.


No!

Livy doesn't give any dates. We don't know when this character "Livy" was writing. This is important.
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