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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;John the Jute, post: 671255, member: 17740&quot;]<span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">That’s a good point, Mike. I was thinking of importance in a numismatic sense: a coin which significantly advances international trade and is used in many countries.</font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">So I missed the 30 pieces of silver completely. Mea culpa. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie9" alt=":eek:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">I did consider the very first coins—such as the electrum coins of Asia Minor and the early Chinese cash—but excluded them on the grounds that metallurgy was advancing everywhere in that fertile 6th century, and coins emerged independently in several places. The advent of the consistent dependable Athenian Owl, however, enabled international trade (and international counterfeiting) to take off in the Eastern Mediterranean.</font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><b><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">&lt;digression on&gt;</font></span></b></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">Sticking with a scriptural theme, I observe that the standard 1000 troy ounce bar of fine silver—available from any bullion merchant—weighs about 68 pounds avoirdupois ... and therefore about the same as a talent (or 60 minas) of silver. I have heard that some silverbugs bury such bars in their yards to keep them from thieves ... and I wonder whether they realize they are following a New Testament precedent of burying a talent in the ground. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie8" alt=":D" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><b><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">&lt;digression off&gt;</font></span></b></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">Sorry about that; I wasn’t sufficiently clear.</font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">What I was trying to get across was that the gold trade coins—such as the florin and the ducat—which worked so well for the merchants, were too valuable for everyday use. Ducats were circulating currency in some countries (eg the Netherlands) and not in others (eg Austria), but anything smaller than a single ducat was lose-ably small. The silver dollar on the other hand “could be <b>regularly</b> used as currency” by the people as a whole, much as modern people use $50 bills or £20 notes.</font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">In hindsight I can see that I was asking that poor adverb to do too much. Sorry. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie9" alt=":eek:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">Later,</font></span></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: black"><font face="Verdana">John</font></span>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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