THE INTELLECTUAL OBSERVER 



JULY, 1869. 



MONEY AND MONEYERS. 



BY JOSEPH NEWTON, OF F. M. MINT. 



Theee are many conflicting accounts of the origin of money ; 

 but all agree in giving to its introduction a very ancient date. 

 It is certain, however, that at the period of the Trojan war it 

 was not known to the Greeks. Neither Homer nor Hesiod 

 speaks of gold or silver. They, on the contrary, invariably ex- 

 press the value of things by stating that they are worth so 

 many sheep, or oxen ; and they estimate a mam's wealth by the 

 extent of his flocks and herds. The wealth of a country they 

 judged of by the abundance of its pastures. Homer values, 

 for example, the golden armour of Glaucus at one hundred 

 oxen, and the brazen armour of Diomedes at nine oxen. 

 Laertes purchased the beautiful slave, Euryclea, for one hun- 

 dred oxen. In the seventh book of the Iliad we read, that — 



" Each in exchange proportioned treasures gare, 

 Some, brass or iron, some, an ox or slaye." 



It is pretty certain too that no gold coins existed in Egypt 

 till the time of the Ptolemies. Lucan attributes the invention 

 of money to Itonus, King of Thessaly, and son of Deucalion, 

 the hero of the mythological deluge, and who was said to have 

 re-peopled the earth. Several other theories, all probably as 

 baseless, have been current as to the invention of money. 

 According to Herodotus, the first people who coined gold and 

 silver were the Lydians. It is tolerably clear that so far as 

 Persia is concerned, Darius, the son of Hystapses, was the first 

 monarch who coined gold in that country. The pieces of 

 money produced by him were named after him — " Darics" — in 

 the same manner as the gold coins of Philip of Macedon, father 

 of Alexander the Great, were called " Philips." The Persian 

 coins had so little alloy in their composition, that they may 

 almost be said to be pure gold. One of them, in Lord Pem- 

 broke's collection, weighed 129 grains, which, singularly enough, 

 was the standard weight of an English guinea. While Persia 

 vol. i. — NO. VI. E E 



