LaunchPad: Coin Production in the Ancient Greek World

[@SilverBearAgAu]

The real "secret" to coinage wasn't the making of the coin, but the making of the die.

[@faman92]

Exactly, how these does were made? And of which metal?

[@TheDcraft]

I don't know, all you would have to do is take a real coin and press in into the sand/clay mixture to get a mold that's an exact replica of the coin's inscription. You could then use that mold to make your die. Weight could be harder to mimic I think.

[@TheDcraft]

@@faman92 silver is a pretty soft metal so you could probably just use copper, bronze, or depending on the time period iron. Silver is melleable and a lower temp than any of those three.

[@VinceCrowe]

Same here. I had a video saved in my favorites about that but cannot find it :(

[@davidjordan8223]

This is cool stuff

[@101logickey]

I don't believe that this process is correct. It would have made much more sense to form a clay tablet with small indentations similar in appearance to the sand mould in this video, only without the running lines connecting the indentations. The precise weight in Silver or other metal would be placed in each indentation and the tablet placed in the furnace to melt the metal. Once melted you would have perfect weighted coin blanks ready for minting. I cannot believe they would have been using such an unreliable process when it was well within their capabilities and would, I think, have been an obvious method for making consistent blanks, also saving time and resources not having to shave larger blanks and re-melting under weight blanks. They were not stupid back then and I believe any person performing this task would have easily and quickly realised this as a more efficient method. Just my opinion though...!?!

[@Staroy]

wrong

[@scottadler]

The dies appear to have been made of iron, but casting iron or steel was impossible at the time. If they were made of iron, how were they cut? With steel tools?

[@se3579]

Dies were made of bronze originally

[@VinceCrowe]

Must have been deleted. A pity indeed :( I would make my own!!

[@dennismitchell1934]

How about the production of condoms back in Greek times ?

[@NumeroSystem]

Neither the weight nor the shape of the coin mattered. What mattered was the insignia stamped onto the coin. Coins were created and used by the ancient ruling classes to account for their peasants compensation to them. If the actual material was the thing of value there would no reason for the rulers to issue the coins into circulation where they might get lost, stolen or re-purposed. The single purpose of the coin was to be issued by the King to his privileged class who would then exchange them with the peasants after the peasant did work for them. Then the peasants would return the coins to the King as proof of compensation. Then the King would reissue the coins back to his privileged class to repeat the process.

[@that_sun_guy6527]

I believe you mean the "legend" of the coin, rather than "insignia." And yes, weight mattered just as much as anything else. Merchants would use scales to measure the weight of the coin. The value is in the material of the coin on which it was struck.

[@TheDcraft]

That's not true. Classical Greece used currency and the purity of the coin mattered a great deal. (Also many Greek city states didn't have tyrants and a lot of the people who used coins weren't peasants) Different city-states that manufactured coins gained a reputation for their coins purity and so coins from a city-state that was known to have a high purity became more valuable and soft after.

[@chefdenker704]

I recommend reading Carl Menger for that manner, who has convincingly shown that money was not invented by political rulers. Money was the result of the interaction between individuals. Coins as an exchange medium could only emerge and earn the trust by people because the metals to produce these coins already had a market value before they were even used as an exchange medium. In fact, this was the natural result of the early barter trade. During the era of barter trade it was quite difficult to find someone who demanded the same good and product that you could offer and at the same time provided the product or good that you demanded. As a result of this challenge, products and goods with high "liquidity" were increasingly used as a kind of currency. Since metals were rare but very useful, people started to use them as a form of currency. In other words, the emergence of money was a bottom-up process rather than a top-down invention by political leaders. Later when political entities emerged the rulers gave metal coins their faces and their official insignia. But even when rulers debased their currency, for instance, by mixing gold with copper or silver, people just started to use other gold coins from other regions or administrative entities with a higher purity and a higher value.

[@rocketlauncher81]

@@TheDcraft right the weight is important party on my friend

[@ramdas363]

Source?