VARIATIONS IN VALUE. CHAP. xil. 



there would in the eighth century be only a 

 supply of one tenth of that amount demanded. 

 In fact, one hundred thousand pounds extracted 

 from the mines and converted into coin in the 

 eighth century would, on the supposition here 

 assumed, have been as adequate to the effect of 

 maintaining an equilibrium on the price of com- 

 modities as a million sterling would have been 

 in the first century. 



There are no means by which to mark the 

 several steps of the depression of prices which 

 accompanied the gradual consumption of the 

 precious metals between the first and the ninth 

 century ; and even in the ages that followed, 

 the facts are scattered among so vast a mass of 

 documents, and the variations in the real value 

 of the nominal money were so great, that though 

 the influence of the destruction of the precious 

 metals on the depression of price can admit of 

 no doubt, yet that influence can only be calcu- 

 lated in a way far from distinct and exact. 



If we take a view of Europe during the exist- 

 ence of the Saxon heptarchy in England, we 

 shall probably find the scarcity of money and 

 the depression of prices to have reached the 

 lowest point. The Romans in abandoning Bri- 

 tain, Gaul, and the other western portions of 

 the dominions, over which their power had once 

 extended, had carried with them all that was 

 most portable and valuable. 



