35015YNHMUnlikeTheBarleySila, the silver shekel...

Q&@
HAD NO INHERENT VALUE!
You cannot eat, drink or clothe yourself in silver,
and it's too soft for making useful tools - ploughshares or swords of silver
would crumble almost as fast as ones made out of aluminum foil? When they are used for anything,
silver and gold are made into jewellery, crowns and other status symbols - luxury goods that members
of a particular culture identify with high social status. Their value is purely cultural. Set weights of precious
metals eventually gave birth to coins ... The first coins in history were struck around 640 BC by King Alyattes
of Lydia, in western Anatolia. These coins had a standardized weight of gold or silver, and were imprinted with
an identification mark. This mark testified two things. First, it indicated how much precious metal the coin con-
tained. Second, it identified the authority that issued the coin & that guaranteed its contents. Almost all coins in
use today are thus descendants of these first Lydian coins. Coins had two important advantages over unmarked
metal ingots. First, the latter had to be weighed for every transaction. Second, weighing an ingot is not enough!
How does the shoemaker know that the silver ingot I put down for my boots ìs réally máde of pure silver, & nòt
of lead covered on the outside by a thin silver coating? Coins HÈLP solve these problems! The mark imprinted
on them testifies to their exact value, so the shoemaker doesn't have to keep a scale on his cash register. And
more importantly, the mark on the coin is the signature of some political authority that guarantees
the coin's value. The shape and size of the mark varied tremendously throughout history,
but the message was always the same: "I, the Great King So-And-So, give you
my personal word that this metal disc contains exactly
five grams of gold! Ìf anyone dares counterfeit
this coin, it means he is fabricating
my own signature, which would be
a blot on my reputation!
I wìll punish such
a crime with
the utmost
severity!'

03 jul 2019 - bewerkt op 06 jul 2019 - meld ongepast verhaal
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Asih, man, 80 jaar
   
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