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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kevin McGonigal, post: 7311419, member: 72790&quot;]Your reply about later US citizens and large denomination notes rang a bell for me. Those who also collect US coinage and currency know that there were indeed US notes of very high denomination, from five hundred dollar notes on up. Some of these very large denomination notes were used for nothing more than transfers from one banking institution to another and never appeared in general circulation. Considering the average yearly wage of the average US worker at the start of the 20th Century his chances of having such bills in his possession were nil. But even looking at US coinage of gold coins in the early 19th century (before California gold changed this) the whole number of gold coins issued by the US mint was such that it would have been difficult for the average American to have accumulated any gold coins, considering the population of the US as compared to mint recorded issues. There really was a shortage all US coinage until the late 1830&#039;s and foreign coins were legal tender until 1857 to try to make up for the coin shortage. Larger denominations , and even small ones, were likely to have been met by privately issued notes and those of state chartered banks. Mutatis mutandis, in Rome the number of citizens who might be described as middle class and could accumulate disposable income was exceedingly small&nbsp; and such folks would have been fortunate to have a few sesterces left over after their tax payments, and in a good year, maybe a few silver denarii for the inevitable rainy day. I cannot see the average Roman (the percentage of the male population in the army was a small fraction of the whole population)or early Greeks having much likelihood of getting ahold of gold coinage through out most of ancient times. There may have been exceptions to this in unusual circumstances. Macedonian conquests in the East did bring numerous gold coins into circulation, at times so abundant that the price of gold fell in the marketplace, and maybe here the average inhabitants could pick up a few. Also extraordinary donatives or conquests (Dacia with its mines comes to mind) might have done the same thing. In America after 1849 the price of gold fell relative to silver and the quantity of gold coins n circulation increased dramatically and the US mint now issued twenty dollar gold pieces at one end and tiny gold dollars at the other. From this point to the end of the gold standard in the US workers could acquire and save gold coins. My paternal grandfather was a steel worker and he always took his pay in gold coins (at the corner tavern which acted as a bank for such workers). Bottom line? For most periods of history gold coinage was beyond the acquisition of most common laborers except for unusual circumstances.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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