Coinage Books
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Oxford University Press, USA (07 September 2006)Price: $13.59 -
Penguin (Non-Classics) (06 August 1991)Price: $18.48 -
Booksales (01 February 2004)Price: $9.99 -
University of California Press (07 November 2005)Price: $49.00 -
Osprey Publishing (22 May 1986)Price: $12.89
Definition
The first Lydian coins were made of electrum, an alloy of silver and gold. Many early Lydian coins were undoubtedly struck (manufactured) under the authority of private individuals and are thus more akin to tokens than true coins, though because of their numbers it's evident that some were official state issues, with King Alyattes of Lydia being the most frequently mentioned originator of coinage.
Most of the early Lydian coins have no writing on them, just images of symbolic animals. Therefore the dating of these coins relies primarily on archeological evidence, with the most commonly cited evidence coming from excavations at the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, also called the Ephesian Artemision (which would later evolve into one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world).
A small percentage of early Lydian coins include writing, called a "legend" or "inscription." Another famous early electrum coin with a legend is from nearby Caria, Asia Minor, with the legend reading, "I am the badge of Phanes." Nothing is known about who Phanes was, but one logical assumption is that he was a wealthy merchant.
The earliest coins made of pure gold and silver were made by King Croesus of Lydia, son of Alyattes. Shortly afterward in the same region gold "darics" and silver "sigloi" were issued by the Achaemenid Empire of the Persians.
Articles
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Originally, the Ancient Greeks employed a barter system in order to trade goods and services. This likely worked well before sea trade became prevalent in the region, and trading large goods such as sacks of wheat or large farm animals would have been quite cumbersome. Around the eighth century B.C., the Greeks began minting and using silver coins (some areas of Greece were slower to begin minting coins, and used other, more compact forms of currency, such as the Athenian obol). This streamlined business and industry, and led to a standardization of currency, weights, and measures that has continued to influence our own monies and measures today.
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Like the Ancient Greeks, the Romans employed a barter system in the early days if their history. During the Republic, around the fifth century B.C., Roman merchants and citizens exchanged goods and services with one another. The customary barter good was the pecus, or cow (the Latin word for money is pecunia). This worked well when Rome was just Rome. But as the city grew into a republic, and the Republic grew and expansion occurred, bartering became more and more inconvenient and ineffective.
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Today, traveling an hour by ferry from Piraeus, the port of Athens, the first remnant of Aegina’s great past a visitor will see is the lonely pillar of Apollo rising from the trees on the hill of Kolona. Once a splendid complex of three buildings (the Temple of Apollo itself rose on eleven large pillars and six smaller ones) and a cemetery (in which a large collection of gold and jewelry was found in the tombs, now housed in the British Museum) the pillar of Apollo is all that remains. This seems a fitting symbol for the whole of Aegina’s history: the island which once boasted the best wine, a high standard of living and a naval fleet which rivaled that of Athens is, today, known as the leading producer of pistachio nuts in Greece.
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