An interesting find in Israel: A hoard of silver pieces used as currency before minting were discovered. “A team of Israeli archaeologists announced it has discovered the earliest evidence of silver being used as currency in the Levant, dating back more than 3,600 years, which is 500 years prior to previous estimates. “This is the earliest evidence of hoarded silver,” the University of Haifa’s Dr. Tzilla Eshel told The Times of Israel.” “People in the Levant didn’t begin using minted coins until almost 1,000 years after these pieces of broken silver were used as currency, said the researchers. For major purchases, these crudely cut pieces of silver acted as currency through the weight of the precious metal.” “Before there were coins there were a kind of proto-coins. In fact, people, before they would make coins, they first used the idea of taking silver, breaking it up into pieces and weighing them on a scale or balance.” “There were no known silver mines in the Levant, so researchers set out to determine where the pieces of silver originated. Using isotopic testing that examines the chemical composition of lead in the silver, the researchers were able to match it to silver mined from an area in Anatolia, or modern-day Turkey. In the excavated hoards, the silver was also accompanied by other objects from Anatolia, such as the head of an ax and a pendant, confirming Anatolia as the likely origin of the silver.” https://www.timesofisrael.com/study...t-silver-pieces-are-first-currency-in-levant/
