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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 1010117, member: 19463&quot;]This is exactly the case! Some cultures used owls just because everyone knows that good money has owls on it. The fact that the style, weight etc. was completely different was of no importance. There are even a few copies made for local circulation where the silver was better than the coins being copied. The intent was to provide currency, not to fool people. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>I wouldn&#039;t put too much weight on capital punishment being a sign of something being taken seriously. In much of history you could get killed for hunting without a license or something equally odd by today&#039;s standards. Counterfeiting with coins better than the official would get you into at least as much trouble since you would be treading on the royal perogative to issue coins. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Another point: In 99% of cases ancient/medieval coins were made with the proper value in metal no matter what metal was being used but there are a few examples of a ruler cheating in the process. My favorite example is when the 1662 Russian authorities decided that they did not need to waste silver by putting it in the coins and that copper would do equally well. For more information, search &quot;copper riot&quot; to see how that went over. Today we accept paper money like it was the way things ought to be but for most of history messing with the money required having a good size and well paid army ready to silence any complaints. Compare the weights of Roman denarii issued in the first year of most ruler&#039;s reigns to the ones from the year immediately preceeding that; usually they started off with a silghtly better product. This is no accident. </p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>I remain open to posting of examples of diameter being more important than weight. The more I think about it, the more trouble I&#039;m having finding examples where it made much difference. Late Sasanians did get carried away with the big thin coins but even those seemed to be equal in weight to their chunkier cousins so it is hard to accept it as an example.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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