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Message:: [QUOTE="kaparthy, post: 769157, member: 57463"]... condemned to repeat history. Cute, to be sure.  We know that the farthing was a quarter of a penny as the long cross silver pennies of medieval England were cut into fourths to make change.  We also have other example of cut coins as circulating media from the Carribbean and Australia.  That said, the problem in the first case was actually a rise in prosperity and an objectively increased value for silver coupled to a lack of any alternative, such as copper, for smaller values.  In the 19th century, those "plugs" were short term expediencies which gave way to regular coinage. Finally, when you look at modern Zimbabwe, where gold dust trades for bread, it is important to keep in mind that this is the end of a long slide.  In the modern world, Japan, Italy and Turkey have all lived with "lots of zeroes" and not collapsed.  Precious metals keep their value and that is their value.  They have less utility as circulating media.  (I once traded an ounce of silver for a six-pack of homebrew beer at a Libertarian Party convention.)  But it is a cute concept and these will come into the after-markets where you can buy them one-up (or four-up, as it were).[/QUOTE]