Reply to Thread

Message:: [QUOTE="kaparthy, post: 55693, member: 57463"]In the thread "Is this 8 Reales real?" moderator GDJSMP took a shortcut.  Writing about clipping, he said:  "This was a common practice used by those trying to cheat the monetary system. Cut small pieces from the edges of the coins, save the silver or gold cut off - and spend the coin for full value." You can find out more about this from any standard book or authoritative article about the history of money or the history of coins, for instance, The International Encyclopedic Dictionary of Numismatics by R. Scott Carlton. Krause, 1996.  One problem with shortcuts is that you miss the scenic route.  Another problem is that you can get lost.  In my old neighborhood, if I took a shortcut through an alley, I could get beaten up by a bully.  So, I do not take shortcuts. I agree that coins were clipped.  I agree that milling the edges just about ended the practice.  There is much more to it than that. 1. Clipping was a serious problem with British silver pennies.  Clipping was not a problem with British gold.  The reason why is that legally, a penny was a penny was a penny, but legally, gold coins were accepted by weight.  So, the root of the problem was not that crooked dishonest cheating swindlers hoodwinked other people. The source of the problem was that the British crown passed a law that contradicted a law of economics, i.e., a law of nature.  People just adapted to an untenable situation. 2.  The "value" of silver relative to gold or wheat or apples or whatever is always in flux.  This is another natural law.  So, a pennyweight of silver might have been convenient at some time and place, but could not be expected to be equally convenient for all times and places.  People adjusted the sizes of coins to meet the realities of the markets.  This was especially necessary in markets without convenient ways to make change. 2a.  The "farthing" is a "fourthing" the cutting of a penny into quarters.  So, how do you make one-fifth? 3. Silver became increasingly valuable.  All through the Middle Ages, people in Europe exported silver to the East in exchange for silk, spices, etc. The people in the Orient had much less demand for English wools and beers.  The so-called "balance of trade" (another shortcut, really) caused an outflow of silver. Therefore, the penny had to get smaller somehow. 4.  Clipping was accepted.  If people did not want to accept a clipped coin, they could have avoided it -- even if they had to resort to some subterfuge to get around the king's laws.  (For an analogy, why do we tolerate stupid pricing like $9.95 or $19.99, when an even $10 or $20 would make everyone's life simpler?  Argue that as you will, the fact is that this is our custom.  So, too, was clipping theirs.) 5. Very few ancient Greek and Roman coins show any evidence of clipping.  Why not?  Cheats were known.  See Michael H. Crawford, Plated coins - False coins, in Numismatic chronicle ser. 7, v. 8 (1968), p. 55-59, pl. 14. See, also, my article on "Copper Owls" on Coin Newbies:<a href="http://www.coin-newbies.com/articles/msns_owls.pdf" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.coin-newbies.com/articles/msns_owls.pdf" rel="nofollow">www.coin-newbies.com/articles/msns_owls.pdf</a>Clipping was not an ancient custom.  Coins circulated by weight.  Once detected, a clipped coin would have been accepted for less than full value and then likely have been turned back into bullion. It was not the custom in ancient Greece and Rome to accept clipped coins.  It was the custom in medieval Europe. 6.  The coin in question is a "cob."  it is typical of Spain's New World mints.  Silver was rolled into a cylinder and the cylinder was sliced into a coin-sized disk.  The disk was struck by hand.  This left an irregular circular shape.  This method continued into the 18th century when milled coinage finally replaced it.  To my knowledge, clipped cobs are not common.  The reasons why are listed above for the English penny.  Most of the Spanish silver had been mortgaged before it arrived, so little of it actually passed on the streets or in the taverns -- where it would have been inconveniently large anyway. Clipping was necessary and important.  It was the mechanism by which people reacted to an irrational law.  It was the mechanism by which people adjusted their money to the realities of the marketplace. (Clipping was also done by cheats.) Suppose that for whatever reasons, clipping had remained necessary despite the milling of coin edges.  People would have only clipped the coins and then remilled the edges.  They did not.  A.  For one thing, change was possible with a wide range of circulating coins in silver and copper, all more or less interchangible. (In America, this included Spanish "fips" or "pistareens" and "bits" a system of fifths and eighths overlaid on our quarters and tenths.)  B. For another thing, while the relative values of gold and silver fluctuated in the short term -- causing some grief in the USA -- silver became less and less valuable over time.  By the late 1800s, the federal government was subsidizing silver mining and silver was an inflationary currency, dragging down the so-called "gold standard."  This happened also to the Latin Monetary Union which had to lean on Italy to stop issuing megatons of cheap silver nominally exchangible for good Swiss and French gold.  So, with money being worth "less" and with prosperity generally rising, clipping and remilling was not economically effective.[/QUOTE]

Create my FREE Account!

Log in or Sign up

Reply to Thread

Useful Searches